The other day we were sorting through our paperwork to move it into a new filing cabinet. In amongst the bills and insurance documents we found a letter from our first ever IVF appointment. It was dated July 2021. Four years later and we finally had our first embryo implanted. It’s not a speedy process.

Embryos

After the second egg harvesting we had our usual wait to see if any had survived the various stages to be safely frozen. As before we dropped quickly from double figures to single figures, losing a few at each stage. I was less optimistic that many would be frozen, but when the phone call came we had 2, with one other embryo being left to grow another day to see if it could just make the cut. Luckily it did.

With three frozen embryos to last times one, I felt we had to have better luck this time. In theory PKD has a 50/50 chance in each embryo, so out of three we had to get at least one.

It was around a month later when we got the call; we had two PKD-free embryos. This actually meant the maths checked out. Across our two rounds we’d had 4 embryos frozen, and two had had PKD and two hadn’t. This was rather comforting, as if none of them had PKD, all this effort would had felt like a waste, but if all of them had, we’d have no embryos to move ahead with.

Having two was a relief, with the chance of the embryo reimplantation being successful being 50/50 again, we at least had some hope of success.

But it wasn’t as simple as just getting into the stirrups and asking for the turkey baster. In order to reimplant the embryo, my body needed to be at the right stage of its cycle. The science is now so precise they reimplant the 5 day old embryo (frozen after being allowed to grow for five days) into a womb that is 5 days along its pregnancy cycle.

Hormones

To do this we headed back to Sheffield to sign some more forms and for me to have an injection to stop my cycle. I then returned two weeks later for an internal scan to see if the womb was, in a sense, at ground zero.

With the womb lining nice and thin, I now had to start taking my estrogen pills. These were the pills I was warned by everyone who had been through IVF before that make you emotionally unstable.

The nice thing about them though was they didn’t come with any rules. I could take them any time, before or after a meal, as long as I took four a day. They were even small sugar-coated pills, easy to swallow. The nurse’s suggestion was to take them before going to bed, as many women experienced side effects, and by taking them at night you simply sleep through the worst of them.

Oddly, I didn’t find my emotions were particularly different. I have three theories about this; 1) People are affected differently by the pills and I simply didn’t get this side effect, 2) due to my endodemetriosis I am more accustomed to higher levels of estrogen, 3) due to the emotional disfunction that comes with autism I simply didn’t register my feelings.

Number 1 is pretty self explanatory, but I should probably go into 2 and 3. Number 2 is based on no solid science, and is simply my own musings. In a workshop on endodemetriosis it was mentioned that the endodemetriosis legions can actually produce their own estrogen. Therefore I wonder if you have extra estrogen being released into your body regularly, perhaps a few little pills doesn’t feel so different.

Number 3 is actually the one I think is the most likely. Autistic people often struggle to identify their own emotions. Usually, I can’t feel the emotions related to an event until much much later. One of the reasons I like this theory is because, although I didn’t my experience more emotional upheaval, I struggled more with touch. My dog often clambers cheerfully onto me, but for a while this felt like an attack, like being pounded by a much heavier creature, not something I’ve experienced before.

Although the emotions didn’t play ball, I did feel queasy, and at times a little fluey.

It was two weeks after starting the estrogen that I headed back for another internal scan. Once again the womb looked picture perfect and it was time to start the progesterone.

Now I was very pleased this bit of the cycle didn’t require any injections, but the progesterone is a pessary, which must be administered twice a day via the vagina or anus. For someone who moved onto tampons pretty early followed by a moon cup, this wasn’t too big an ordeal, but it’s more the general mess it made of everything I wore for the rest of the day that bothered me, with the vasaline like coating finding its way out to stain my clothes until they were washed.

Anyway, the progesterone was worst than the estrogen for side effects. For me it caused my endodemetriosis symptoms to go into overdrive for the first month. I usually get my worst pain the day before or first day of my period, in my lower back, sides or abdomen. With the progesterone this level of pain came more days than not, at its most extreme.

I’ve found that painkillers don’t touch this kind of pain, as many women have, but a heat pad provides some comfort. Having checked online, a heat pad is perfectly fine to use during pregnancy, so long as it doesn’t go on the abdomen, which is a relief.

So, uncomfortable, and full of pills, I waited another two weeks for my final scan. This time Chris came too, keen to hear if we were good to go. And we were.

With that a date was booked for Guys and St Thomas’ in London for the reimplantation.

Reimplantation

Now the one awkward thing for me in this stage of the IVF was that I had a new job. Whereas my old job gave IVF leave, my new job didn’t. Additionally, I didn’t feel comfortable a few months after starting to tell my boss I may be going on a long break in a year’s time. I know maternity is legally protected and people aren’t supposed to get annoyed, but they do, and I didn’t want to take the chance that this would be a unrecorded black mark against my name – not until I’d been there a little longer at least, and I could have proved my worth.

Therefore, I now had to take time off a little more cleverly than before. Luckily I had plenty of TOIL to use for most days, but it felt like I had to put a lot more effort into it than simply saying ‘I’m off for my IVF tomorrow’.

I got the time off and we headed to London. Unlike the last trip, I didn’t need to be sedated, meaning we arrived the morning of, and left straight after, with a little sightseeing in between.

The procedure was super quick, perhaps 15min once we were in the door.

As usual it was clothes off below the waist and legs in stirrups. The one thing I’d say is that the towelette they provide to protect your modesty, was about the size of a sheet of A4, and may as well not have been there, particularly when the incredibly wide stirrups were attached to a table that raised up and brought your vagina face to face with the nurse.

The only painful bit was the speculum. Having had various speculums inserted for my smear test I was used to the slight discomfort of them, but I guess this one went deeper and spread wider, as it was surprisingly painful.

With the speculum in, the nurse brought forward what looked like a syringe with a long floppy tube.

She inserted the tube, while another nurse pushed surprisingly hard on my belly, perfectly hitting my very full bladder, as previously instructed. Overall, not my favourite experience.

On the screen we could seen the grey and black monitor apparently showing the inside of my body.
‘There’s the tube,’ said the nurse, ‘and that’s the embryo fluid going in’. We saw it, a sudden speck of white, like a star suddenly appearing.

I’m not particularly emotional about the whole process but I must admit even I found that moment a little touching.

Thankfully the equipment was removed from my body, and I was allowed to go get dressed.

Blood Test

To confirm the embroy has taken I next needed to get a blood test once the embryo was 12 days old. Now luckily I was offered the opportunity to have this at my local GPs, 15min from my house, rather than the Sheffield hospital, some 2.5hrs away.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy as ringing up and booking. It turned out I needed a blood form from the hospital to book my appointment at the GPs, but it turned out Sheffield hospital no longer used blood forms. More than that their processes were different, because one was in England and one in Wales. Why, when I can easily have my breakfast in Wales, and my brunch in England, is this not something that’s been sorted out eons ago…

Luckily the nurse at Sheffield hospital did her best to get something sorted for me, and I was ready to book my blood test for the following Thursday. Except everything was booked up till mid-July. Of course. Not feeling hopeful I waited for 45min through various stages of hold music to talk to a person. I don’t know if I just sounded desperate, or if they always hold a few back for emergencies, but the very nice lady on the other end of the phone booked me in straight away. Phew!

Another blood test, and then the wait. Had it stuck? My one thought on this was that I’d been experiencing stomach pains,  twinges of different magnitudes. To me this seemed like it had to be a good sign, perhaps my internal workings rearranging themselves to make room for new growth. Who knows. Of course, even if we have success now, a pregnancy can go wrong at all kinds of stages. But always good to keep moving one more step forwards.

Finally, I was able to ring up for my results. Unfortunately, the GP receptionist said she could let me know the results but not what they meant. So I headed to Google. ‘Er I think I’m pregnant’, I said to Chris. After a quick email to the nurse at Sheffield she confirmed I was. Phew!

Six Week Scan

Next I needed a six week scan. What confused me in this was that I thought I should count my pregnancy from the age of the embryo, which we knew. However, it turned out I needed to work from my last period, so suddenly I seemed to jump ahead, and six weeks wasn’t far off.

Once again Sheffield said I could get my scan locally, but the GP told me the policy was not to offer scans before 12 weeks because of high demand. I really didn’t want to drive back to Sheffield so I managed to find a private clinic specialising in baby scans. It cost £100 but was worth it not to drive 5hours.

Due to the fact it was an early scan it needed to be internal. I was pretty disappointed as I was tired of people sticking magic wands inside me, and was looking forward to the belly scans. But despite this inconvenience it was exciting as up on the screen came a couple of blobs, and there a flickering heartbeat.

The blobs were the embryo, its egg sac, which was as big as it, and the uterus. There wasn’t any real baby form, just blobs, but the heartbeat was exciting.

The nurse informed me I had some kind of bruising, which was normal as the womb stretched, but which might cause spotting, and the fibroid I was already aware of, but that everything was healthy and looking good.

With this I could start decreasing my pills, going down from week 10 to week 12, till I was completely off them. With that our association with Sheffield abruptly ended. I’d expected some kind of handover, getting instructions of when and how to contact midwives and such, but I guess we were now just ordinary parents to be, needing to find our own way in the world.

12 Week Scan

I contacted my GPs and they put us on to the midwives. Now the normal pregnancy care began, with my first important step being the 12 week scan. This time the baby should be a little more recognisable, and a little less blobby.

While I waited for my second scan I got all the joys of the first trimester. I don’t think we really talk enough about how unpleasant the first trimester is. Yes there’s the cliché of the pregnant woman suddenly running to the toilet to be sick, but usually she spends the rest of the scene feeling a-okay.

My morning sickness started very suddenly with my head in the toilet one lunchtime. Post this episode I didn’t throw up any more, but felt constantly nauseous. Some days were a light sicky feeling, others I felt ready to throw up any moment. Nothing helped, as I worked my way through the Internet suggestions of ginger, sour foods, plain foods, biscuits. Sometimes I felt more sick if I hadn’t eaten, sometimes I started to feel worse because I had eaten. And if I wasn’t feeling sick, I had heartburn.

Alongside this was an all consuming exhaustion. Everything felt like too much effort, and I napped whenever I could. My brain also seemed to be changing. Because of my autism my thoughts often feel like a hive of bees, flying in an uncontrolled manner around the inside of my head, hard to pin down. Now my brain seems completely still, like the surface of a mill pond, and I find it hard to think about anything.

I asked around my friends to find out their experiences of the first trimester, which were very variable. It occurred to me that I hadn’t heard about them before because most people don’t share they are pregnant till after the first trimester, meaning they largely suffered in silence. I’m much more in the mood to complain.

At my first meeting with the midwife, I was surprised she didn’t ask me once how I was feeling, only checking for depression and domestic abuse. The interest was in how my health would affect the health of the baby, which makes sense, but at this point being pregnant just felt like being ill and I wanted sympathy.

Finally, the day came for our 14 week scan. This scan is held between week 10 and week 14, and is usually referred to as the 12 week scan. Our was week 14 because the unit was fully booked. Finally, it was time for a belly scan – hurray!

We headed to the local hospital and over to the X-ray unit. It took quite a while to get the measurements to confirm the babies age, as it wriggled all over the place. One minute it was facing us, then it turned its back, then upside down.

The picture was amazingly clear as we saw the baby reach it’s hands up to its face, and seem to gesticulate at the world. A proper, moving, wriggling, little baby.

And that’s it. Over four years later, many journeys to Sheffield and London, so many pills, and examinations, and now there’s a baby. So long to get to the beginning of the journey, but with PKD still causing ongoing havoc and misfortune in the family, it’s been worth it.

There’s still a journey to undertake, with two more trimester to complete, but now it’s a very ordinary journey, one many people have undertaken. We’re just two more people, heading towards parenthood.