I’m 28 years of age and my husband, Mark is 30. The past 2 years have been a bit of a roller coaster in terms of emotions and things happening, so please bare with me as I’m not really sure where to start with everything.
OK here we go. When I was 16 I was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovaries, at the time I had absolutely no idea what it was or what it would mean for me in later life, and to be honest I guess I didn’t really care at that point, I mean at 16 are you really thinking about starting a family and how it will work. No, you just think well when I want to have children I’ll have them right?
I met my husband Mark when I was 17 and you could say that we knew when we got together that we would get married. We got married when I was 25 (June 2007), and in the whole time we had been together had not got pregnant, but it hadn’t been a problem previously as we weren’t ready for children at that point in time.
The November of 2007 we went to see our private Doctor, Dr Peck at GP Services, Springfield Hospital, about the fact we wanted to start trying for children and then the whole history of me having Polycystic Ovaries and not having gotten pregnant in 7 years. Dr Peck started me on a low dose of clomid and contacted Mr Onwude to discuss a course of action. We tried Clomid for the next 6 months, as one month it appeared to have worked in terms of me having a monthly cycle and then other months nothing, but I wasn’t pregnant either.
In March 2008 Mr Onwude decided that it was time to see me, so we went along and met him. I have to say I have never felt so comfortable sitting and talking to a doctor or specialist as I did sitting down and talking to Joe. He was very friendly, made you feel “safe” and that everything was going to be OK, which is exactly what you need. Mr Onwude suggested that I try Ovarian drilling, which is essentially where they go in and “burst” the cysts on your ovaries to get rid of all the testosterone and hopefully kick start your ovaries again. So after the operation it was back onto Clomid, but the highest dose you can have. Unfortunately this did not seem to work either.
Joe made murmurs of IVF but did not go straight down that route, which I have to say was great, because I definitely wasn’t at the point of thinking about going for IVF, especially when you hear of some horror stories. Joe had just had a meeting with Urban from Sweden before my next appointment and they suggested trying acupuncture. So I went for a course of acupuncture for about 8 months. In that 8 months I had 1 period, so it was decided that actually it did not appear that anything was going to help, so the next route was looking at IVF.
As I’ve already mentioned you hear about all the bad stories relating to IVF and the bad experiences people have, which do happen, but I have not heard of anyone who has gone through IVF under Mr Onwude as having a bad experience. I think part of this is due to the fact that Joe understands and appreciates it is a difficult thing to go through and supports you the whole way through it, along with his nurses who are brilliant as well, I also think the other part is due to Tamsin and IVF Support Services. When we were thinking of going down the route of IVF, Joe sent me the website address for IVFSS and also introduced me to Tamsin, who was and has been absolutely amazing throughout the whole process. Tamsin made it so easy to arrange and was a fantastic support to me throughout the whole process and even afterwards. If you are going to go through IVF and thinking of going through IVFSS my advice would be to definitely do it, Tamsin’s great and you won’t feel more supported anywhere else, in my opinion J.
So after looking at the site, Mark and I sat down and decided that we would try IVF. I have to say I always thought I’d be able to have children naturally, it never really crosses your mind that may not be the case at all. I was really nervous and to be honest a little bit angry about having IVF. Our family were very supportive, although my parents did have their doubts, but you’d expect that I’m their daughter after all and they wanted me to have what I wanted and in the way I wanted it, i.e. naturally. But hey ho these things aren’t always possible and so you carry on.
The process was underway and we were planning on going for IVF over the summer 2010, but the clinic shuts down over the summer, so we thought that’s OK we’ll go when they open, no rush.
Well how wrong were we – there was no rush as such in terms of Joe, Tamsin and the clinic, it came from us. In April 2010 Mark was diagnosed with cancer the type of which is Hodgkins Lymphoma, completely out of the blue. We’d come back from holiday at New Year and Mark thought he had a cold. The cold persisted so he went to see the doctor as he’d felt a lump in his neck also. Antibiotics were prescribed for 2 weeks as it was an expected gland. After 2 weeks the lump still hadn’t gone, but as the doctor had promised to scan it if it continued, as re-assurance – he had a scan. The scan showed 10 lumps in his neck and a mass in his chest. As you can imagine this was a massive shock for both us and our doctor, as it was completely unexpected.
Tests were ordered immediately and within 2 weeks Mark had had his biopsy, bone marrow test, blood tests and scans, and the diagnosis that it was Hodgkins Lymphoma. We were on holiday when we got the confirmation of the diagnosis, and prior to us going on holiday, Mr Onwude and Tamsin had arranged for us to go to Sweden for Mark to do a sperm bank as Chemotherapy can cause infertility. Luckily we knew he had a good sperm count from a pervious test, so this was one test we didn’t need to worry about.
The plan was to get back from our holiday on the Saturday, fly to Sweden on the Sunday, appointment on the Monday and then fly home Tuesday. Easy right? – Nope – a volcano decides to erupt whilst we’re on holiday causing an ash cloud which stops all planes flying – great – thanks for that. So we get in our hire car on the Friday (which by the way only drove on 3 wheels – dodgy) and drove to Lyon, where we changed car and then drove to Calais, where someone met us at the channel tunnel and took us from Calais back home. We arrived home at 9am on Saturday morning. 6pm that evening we get back in our car and start our drive to Sweden. My mum bless her came with us to help with the driving which was great as we did all the night driving as Mark was just too shattered. Tamsin was trying to find lots of solutions for us so that we wouldn’t have to drive all the way there but unfortunately ferries only went mid-week and the trains took just as long as driving, plus Mark had to be back in the UK for the Wednesday for more tests and his treatment started that Friday, so we couldn’t even change the date.
We arrived in Sweden 4am Monday, Mark’s appointment was at 10am, when we met Maria, who is absolutely lovely. So friendly, caring, supportive and just great. Maria explained to us what would happen next, and told us she thought we were completely barmy for driving, especially as we were heading back home straight after the appointment.
So Mark’s sperm bank was done, now the challenge started of when we could try IVF as we wanted to do it before the summer break. So we found a date in May that fitted in with Mark’s treatment. The whole process from receiving the injections to going, all seems a bit like a dream to be honest, purely because so much was going on all at once.
The process was painless, regular blood tests, scans to check the eggs were progressing nicely. I had to have a few more checks than others because polycystic ovaries produce too many follicles, but that was all fine. Joe, Tamsin and Joe’s nurses were so supportive and great, it was just easy and as long as you followed what you needed to do there was no problem at all. Tamsin helped us get our flights and accommodation booked, which was a gorgeous little log cabin on the side of the lake – absolutely stunning.
So we set off for Sweden on the Monday morning, armed with everything we needed, and met Maria at the clinic in the evening for my final injection. Once the injection was done, we waited until the Wednesday, when we went back in for the harvesting. It was on the Wednesday that we met Stefan, who was also lovely and really made you feel at home. Even this process was completely painless, I didn’t feel a thing.
They managed to get 3 good eggs, all of which I’m happy to say took, 1 had an A* mark and the other 2 were A’s (well that’s how Mark and I graded them anyway). Because I was young the clinic advised us to only put 1 egg back, and that they would freeze the other 2, which I was happy with as I was slightly worried about having twins especially with Mark being ill.
So 1 got put back and off we went. The two week wait was definitely the hardest part of the whole process, and will more than likely feel like the longest 2 weeks of your life. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so much emotion in 2 weeks, stress, sadness, happiness plus many more.
I was due to do my test on the Sunday at the end of the 2 weeks, on the Friday I had spotting, and then on Saturday my period started. I still did the test on the Sunday, but as you can guess it was unfortunately negative, great I thought more bad news. Tamsin was amazing through the whole process, she didn’t mind what time of day/night I contacted her, she was constantly there as a support for me, which really helped. My initial reaction when the test was negative was what could I have done differently to prevent it, but Tamsin was right, I didn’t do anything wrong and you can’t blame yourself (although I still do it’s only natural). I was devastated when I realised I wasn’t pregnant, firstly because how could I tell Mark that one of the positive things he could look forward to actually wasn’t going to happen and secondly I so want to be a mum, and it’s really hard to handle when everyone around you is getting pregnant, or having a child, there’s that constant reminder that your not.
He was really supportive though, even with everything he’s going through, he said it’s fine we’ll try again, don’t worry. So we will try again and we will go down the frozen embryo route, but this time we’ll have 2 eggs put back and I’ll do it at a time when Mark’s well and I can actually have 2 weeks of literally doing nothing, but laying there being pampered.
I highly recommend using IVFSS and going through the IVF process with Joe and Tamsin, they are a real rock for you and there for you when you need them. So I didn’t have a positive outcome, but that doesn’t mean to say you won’t and lets face it I didn’t exactly do it at an un-stressful time in my life J. Go for it, remain positive, and you will get the outcome you want in the end.
Gemma and Mark
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