Not many people know about the detail of our IVF situation, as in the issue was with me
We’d been trying for several years and it just wasn’t happening. My wife had googled things to try to improve conception and we’d tried a lot, including me having to buy loose fitting underwear (I mean WTF! – just don’t google too much). So I went for all the tests you do, including having to go to a dark room with all the out of date gentleman magazines and random videos (I didn’t even know Kylie had done a fitness video!).
Then when I found out I couldn’t have children I didn’t know where to turn. I felt empty and so many thoughts ran through my head, particularly how do I tell my wife? That day will live with me forever, I rang her and balled my eyes out through the call. I then went for further tests to be sliced and diced twice to see if that would give us something to work with, but to no avail.
After that we did a lot of soul searching, but at the end of the day I wanted to be a dad and I wanted to do everything I could in my power to make that happen.
I struggled finding an outlet to talk about how I felt as I tended to bottle it up (I can still her my wife saying typical man!). That was probably the worse thing I could have done. Honesty is the best policy. My wife and I attended some fertility support groups to learn more about the options and speak to others going through the same. We both had bad days which tended to be different days. We needed each other to pull through those days. We both say we wish we’d done more and gone out for date nights to have a break from the worry.
After the endless meetings, tests and selecting our donor (felt a bit like a Chinese menu when we said we’ll have number four) we were set. It’s finally happening.
I wanted to be fully involved and help where I could, after all my wife was going to become the human pin cushion. So my role everyday was to get all the drugs ready and recorded what we’d done on a progress sheet. We were extremely lucky and our treatment resulted in a little girl. However, during the whole process I struggled with would she look like me. After all it’s normally one of the first questions people ask. But what I learnt was that people see what they want to see and everyone says she looks like me so I didn’t need to worry. Since then I have helped a couple of other friends through it as there is only so much you can read, but having lived and breathed it, it makes it so much easier to share and help others through.
Since then we have tried for a second without success – two failed attempts and one cancelled in the space of a year, but you just keep going.
Each cycle has been different which messes with your head. Why aren’t we following the same process? Whilst its frustrating you have to trust the process.