The New Reality

As a freshman in high school they teach you in health class so much about how to prevent pregnancy and get you thinking that pretty much if you look at a boy the wrong way you could get pregnant.  I am very gullible and took that as a fact.  (No wonder I waited until I was 18 to even kiss a boy!) 

Two years have officially gone by that we have been trying to start a family with no success.  I have learned so much in these past two years about how the body works and down to every detail about "where babies come from".  They never tell you in health class that sometimes it can take months or even years to have a baby once you start trying and sometimes not at all.  There are so many things that aren't talked about because the subject is kept hush hush.  Don't even get me started on insurance coverage for infertility...we can talk about that another day.

Anyways, I have been trying to take this "new reality" in stride as I go on with my life and try to remain normal while dealing with so much pain as each month brings a new disappointment.  I was reading the detailed process on a cellular level on where problems can occur during conception and you wouldn't believe everything that needs to take place for it to be just perfect. 

From http://www.advancedfertility.com/unexplai.htm

As an overly simplified example of the science involved:

• The hormones that stimulate egg development must be made in the brain and pituitary and be released properly
• The egg must be of sufficient quality and be chromosomally normal
• The egg must develop to maturity
• The brain must release a sufficient surge of the LH hormone to stimulate final maturation of the egg
• The follicle (eggs develop in structures called follicles in the ovaries) must rupture and release the follicular fluid and the egg
• The tube must "pick up" the egg
• The sperm must survive their brief visit in the vagina, enter the cervical mucous, swim to the fallopian tube and "find" the egg
• The sperm must be able to get through the cumulus cells around the egg and bind the shell (zona pellucida) of the egg
• The sperm must undergo a biochemical reaction and release their DNA package (23 chromosomes) into the egg
• The fertilized egg must be able to divide
• The early embryo must continue to divide and develop normally
• After 3 days, the tube should have transported the embryo down into the uterus
• The embryo must continue to develop and expand into a blastocyst
• The blastocyst must hatch out of its shell
• The endometrial lining of the uterus must be properly developed and receptive
• The hatched blastocyst must attach to the endometrial lining and "implant"
• Many more miracles in early embryonic and fetal development must then follow...

A weak link anywhere in this chain will cause failure to conceive

The above list is very oversimplified, but the point is made. There are literally hundreds of molecular and biochemical events that have to happen perfectly in order to have a pregnancy develop.

Tomorrow I have my next doctor's appoinment on what we are going to do next.  Thank you so much to those of you who have kept us in your prayers.  At this point that is all you can do.  I joked with my Mom that if we get enough people bugging God each day to send my husband and me a baby, maybe he will give in so we quit bugging him so much.  LOL.  I need to realize that we are at a point where there is nothing we are doing wrong and need to find peace in the fact that God is in charge and has a plan for us.

Julie

P.S.  This video gives a little insight as to what people struggling with IF go through http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiT4S8ZxeR0