Our Story
Thank you so much for leaning in and listening to our story. We appreciate your time and support more than you can know!
-Trent & Jeanne
We were pregnant within one month of trying to conceive. We were excited and nervous. We could not believe how quickly that happened! After nearly 9 years of marriage, it felt like perfect timing. We were beaming. Trent talked to my belly; we saw my mom within days of taking the pregnancy test and let her know with giddy excitement. Sadly, the pregnancy took a sudden turn. I had pain on the right side and symptoms of a miscarriage. I went to urgent care, followed up by an appointment with my doctor. We were really sad. We quickly learned all the stats, like that one in four pregnancies end in miscarriage. We felt hopeful that we could try again. Several days and blood tests later, however, my doctor’s office called me in for an emergency procedure. My pregnancy hormones were not going down as they should with a miscarriage and were not going up like they should with a viable pregnancy. It was an ectopic. I needed to be treated with methotrexate, a chemotherapy drug that would save me from any chance of needing emergency surgery and would end the pregnancy. I left work and went to the doctor’s office alone. I made her promise me that there was no chance that my baby could survive. She said there was no chance, but not treating it could kill me.
If this baby had landed in the right place, she would be three years old.
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We got pregnant the next month we tried. I found out I was miscarrying the same day I learned one of my dear friends was pregnant with her miracle. That day I also presented at a seminar and celebrated my niece’s birthday. I still remember the outfit I was wearing.
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We had some testing; things seemed normal. They don’t refer you to a specialist until you’ve had more than two miscarriages. We got the marching orders to keep trying.
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We found out we were pregnant again in October 2015. We were so eager to have positive news that we told our family before anything bad could happen. That way we would sort of speak the happiness into existence. It did not work. When experiencing symptoms of another miscarriage, I insisted on getting an early appointment with my doctor’s office. The doctor I saw said, “Your symptoms could be normal. And you should know, one in four pregnancies end in miscarriage.”
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Of course I knew that.
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We were then referred to a specialist. She ran more tests. Everything seemed normal. She said to keep trying; she believed it would happen. We were tired and broken. This time it took a year to get pregnant. I was tough to be married to. I wasn’t as kind or good to Trent as I should have been. We had another miscarriage in November 2016. This is when I got my HOPE Giving Key from one of my fellow fertility friends. It’s been a signature of mine ever since. When in doubt: HOPE.
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Is this the point in Our Story that you are too sad to continue reading? Or have your eyes glazed over? I hope not. But it is just so crazy that we are only half way through telling you about our pregnancy losses. There are four more. Four more losses. Four more times our hopes went up and then were broken into little pieces.
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Next there is the pregnancy in May 2017. I was getting acupuncture and taking Chinese herbs as alternative methods to improve our chances at a successful pregnancy. This is the pregnancy that got the farthest along. This is the one that I got to see the heartbeat. (My sister did too! Trent couldn’t be at that appointment.) But the pregnancy was in the wrong spot again. This time a bit inside the uterus but too close to the fallopian tube (“cornual pregnancy”). They would watch me closely. I was assigned to a high risk pregnancy doctor. This was such a roller coaster. We had multiple ultrasounds. Multiple assurances that my symptoms could be normal. And then the next ultrasound there was nothing. Only an empty womb.
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My hope was restored, though. I had seen a heartbeat. That baby had just landed in the wrong spot. But next time it would land in the right spot. Trent was not as positive. How could the doctors expect a different outcome than the previous five losses? It just didn’t add up to him. My doctor was positive, though. She told us to keep trying. She believed it would happen.
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Then we lost another pregnancy very early (a “chemical pregnancy”) in November 2017.
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In March 2017, I found out I was pregnant. My symptoms were different this time. I was nauseous. I had no spotting. My hormone levels were really high. This was the one. My doctor’s office felt good about my numbers and didn’t need to see me until my first ultrasound, a couple of weeks out. On a Saturday I began spotting. I was nervous. This was not a good pattern for me. I laid down with my feet up and napped. My symptoms escalated all of a sudden, and I called the on-call doctor. She was concerned and wanted me to come in the next morning for an ultrasound. If my symptoms worsened over night, she wanted me to go to an emergency room. I reminded Trent of my history as we went to bed, in case he needed to call 911: “Multiple early miscarriages, with a history of ectopics. They need to know that this could be an ectopic.” The next morning we went into the doctor’s and had an ultrasound. The ultrasound tech was quiet and got the doctor (never a good sign). He walked in and said, “I’m sorry to meet you under these circumstances,” and went over our options. The pregnancy was another cornual ectopic. This one was even closer to the fallopian tube. He thought they should operate that same day. Had I eaten anything? Had I had anything to drink? Oh, I had? Then they’ll need to intibate me. They wheeled me out of the doctor’s office, tears streaming down my face. We were so terrified.
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Following that loss I was not okay. I was broken and hopeless in a way I had not been before. I had now had more losses with this doctor than I had before I started seeing her. I wanted answers. I wanted my doctor to do her job and diagnose something. More tests. More normal results. More shoulder shrugs. Now we would monitor which side I was ovulating on. She thought something was going on with my left tube. I began seriously considering getting a second opinion.
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Trent was angry. How could our doctor just keep shrugging her shoulders, saying she didn’t know, when this was life our death. Life or death for our babies and for me. Trent still gets agitated when talking about this doctor’s approach.
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Let me tell you, advocating for yourself in this sort of situation is difficult. I was emotionally exhausted and physically spent. If I have learned something about myself over these last four years, it’s that I am resilient. In March 2018 and the months that followed, I did not feel resilient. One of my dear friends spotted my hopelessness and told me that she would hope for me when I couldn’t. My mom and my husband comforted me on Mother’s Day when I was so sad that I couldn’t function. I shared with my boss for the first time. I burst into tears in my coworker's office when she joked about being pregnant. I searched for support groups online. I texted with the friends who had been on similar journeys and ones who had not. We put the pieces back together and kept trying.
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I found out my doctor would be leaving the practice group in July 2018. We had to decide if we would go to a new practice group or switch to another doctor in the same office I had been at. In mid-July, I got a positive pregnancy test, but it was really faint. A squinter. I went in for testing. They suspected a chemical pregnancy, but they would follow my blood tests to make sure it wasn’t an ectopic. It was. I would need methotrexate again. It took two doses. I decided that I couldn’t see these doctors again. I needed a second opinion.
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During this time, we were so broken. Trent bought us a puppy. We had never been dog people, but there was a space in our heart that needed healing, and little Owen has helped so much. Trent has dealt with all of this loss much differently than me. He doesn’t cry in the shower (or in the car or in his office). Instead, he holds it in or tries to avoid thinking about it. In July 2018, he started going to counseling to deal with his grief.
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I reached out to a friend who had shared pieces of her story on Facebook and another friend whose story I knew well. I went to their practice group. The place where they felt listened to and validated and where they had been treated and received their miracles.
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During my first appointment with my new doctor, she felt that it was clear that the pregnancies were landing in the wrong spot. She said that me trying on my own was not safe for me (“Russian roulette” were her words). She recommended IVF. I cried and cried. I did not want this to be my story. I wanted the miracle of a spontaneous pregnancy. Trent, however, was relieved. Finally! A plan. A doctor who did more than shrug her shoulders.
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I immersed myself in online support groups for IVF. I started listening to podcasts about it. And I realized that I needed to share. In all of my groups, in all of my googling, and in listening to podcasts, I had never heard anyone else have a story like mine. Cornual ectopics are extremely rare. Two cornual ectopics are basically unheard of. Where I found such stories were in medical journals where the women had to have hysterectomies or removal of their tubes or part of their uterus. The cornual ectopics in conjunction with the two other likely ectopics and the four early losses? I couldn’t find anyone with a similar story.
I was alone.
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I probably wasn’t, though. There were probably other women who just hadn’t shared in a public way. Like I hadn’t shared in a public way. So in October, I shared on social media. I received tremendous support and outreach. I was invited to new online support groups. I was introduced to new people with similar stories. I was told that although our stories weren’t the same, our grief and longing were similar.
And I was not alone.
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Neither are you. In your grief. In your wanting. In your loss. Whether it is caused by desires of parenthood, like ours, or whether it is caused by some other longing or loss or desire. This is why we have decided to share.
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In January 2019, we will start our first cycle for IVF. IVF does not guarantee that we will be successful. We are nervous and excited, and we have HOPE. Please hope with us.