At the end of my HSG, the doctor told me that one of my fallopian tubes is blocked, and I should make a follow-up appointment after a few weeks. My husband and I were hopeful that some minimal blockage may have been cleared, so now we’d just get pregnant and this would all be over. The ever-disappointing period came, and we made the follow-up appointment with the doctor. Up until now we were seeing the PA (physician’s assistant), but since we had test results we thought maybe we should see the doctor.
The follow-up appointment was pretty disappointing, to say the least. The gynecologist basically gave us a biology lesson, explaining everything we had already rediscovered on our own, with Google having filled in the blanks from those things we forgot from biology class. The whole time he was showing us pictures of tubes and ovaries and explaining how it all works, my husband and I were squeezing each others’ hand, as we realized in harmony as he spoke, that he wasn’t going to do anything more for us. I think when he reached the part in his lecture that included the words ‘God willing’ I pretty much checked out.
We left with the same feeling we had way back with the first ob/gyn – why won’t he help us? Maybe, we thought, this is just the end of the line, and trying every other month was pretty much all we could do… and that’s just what we did, for the next month.
We had a pretty torturous cycle that time around. 28 days came and went, no period. 32, 35, 40 days, nothing. We started thinking, oh, maybe the HSG did do something…maybe I am pregnant…but we couldn’t say it out loud. Not until day 45, when we decided to do a pregnancy test, which was negative…but there was a line…but faint…I tried not to get hopeful, but how could I help it at that point? It seemed like maybe, just maybe…
After scouring the internet for the reliability of home pregnancy tests, I called the doctors office to schedule a blood pregnancy test. It was Friday, and my appointment was for Monday. Naturally on Sunday, my period started. I think it was day 48. I know anyone reading this that has gone through the cycles of trying to get pregnant, and then getting her period knows what an emotional roller coaster it is. When that day 48 period came, we were crushed as hard as we tried not to get our hopes up.
After more research, I started reading about women who were struggling with infertility that felt strongly about seeing an RE (Reproductive Endocrinologist) right away rather than ‘bothering with’ the gynecologist. I read that many women were put on fertility drugs, but most of those women seemed to have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), or weren’t ovulating. I was ovulating, so again I was feeling like maybe this was ‘it’ and our only option was to ‘keep trying’.
After a bit of self-torment over what to do (if we should DO anything), we decided to call and make another follow up appointment with the PA and ask her what our options were. She was the star so far, so we hoped she could offer us something more than the advice, ‘God willing’.