31 October 2011

The end... the beginning... or just another chuffing page...

 First published in Feb 2011

"The path of my life is strewn with cowpats from the devil's own satanic herd" - Edmund Blackadder

I don't think I ask for too much in life...

I have been lucky enough to be born in a free country and have a roof over my head with food to eat.

So that's a good start, as many are not that fortunate.

I have a fantastic wife, a loving family and some great friends and work colleagues.

So that is a big thumbs up as well.

I've been able to travel a bit and have seen some of the great sights and wonders of the world.

Plus I have met some very clever and brave people along the way.

So far, so good.

In fact there is only probably one more thing i want out of life...

but it is proving to be rather elusive.

I want to be a dad.

Not too much to hope for really, especially when you see the state of some so called fathers and how they are to their children or partners. Even good ol' Rod Stewart at the age of 66 has apparently just fathered his eighth child, so i guess some guys do have all the luck :-) But that seems to be just what we are missing... luck.

We did things the right way - we got a house, we got married, we got financially stable etc.

None of this living off the state, sponging money stuff.

Yes, we had problems with illnesses and such like that meant we had to start thinking about starting our family a bit later than most do but we did it the fair way, the proper way, the right way.

So when the time was right we tried naturally...  for a few years...

When this didn't work we pestered our GP who eventually gave in and referred us to Royal Preston Hospital where we tried Chlomid medication for a few months...

When this didn't work x-rays and tests were done that showed that there was some dodgy pipe work going on inside Julie which meant there was virtually zero chance of non-assisted success.

So we were guided in the direction of Liverpool Women's hospital for potentially two NHS IVF treatments (this was not our original choice as we wanted to go to CARE in Manchester but Preston PTC doesn't deal with them... more of this later on in the saga).

So thinking our luck must change sometime we tried a run through of IVF early last year.

From memory, after Julie had endured 6 weeks of between 4 & 8 injections per day (sometimes performed in the most ridiculous of situations, such as by the light of a mobile phone sat in the car in a multi-storey car park before going in to a concert) 8 or 9 follicles produced 5 eggs, of which 3 fertilised, of which 2 grew well enough to be implanted back inside.

And our luck ran out.

Again.

The embryo's just didn't take and that was it... all over.

All we wanted was the 8 that became 5, and that then became 3, and that then became 2, to end up as one.

But it was not to be.Against our better judgement we jumped back on this roller coaster of emotions and dived straight into the second set of treatment.

But this time with increased medication... so more drugs must mean more chance of success... Right???

erm, no actually... in fact it was a big fat WRONG!

This time we didn't get to the implantation stage or to the embryo stage nor did we get to the fertilisation stage.

 We didn't even get to the egg stage.

We got nothing!

Any follicles were empty.

And again, for a second time, that was it.

 But this time it really was IT, as that was the end of our NHS funded treatment.

And we certainly aren't in the position to pay our own way without resorting to some drastic measures, such as changing finance on our house or robbing a bank.

 Before our second set of treatment we discussed between us about possible tests to increase our chances, or at least point us in the right direction.

One of these tests involved auto immunity tests which, taking Julies past medical history into account, was worth pursuing.

Or so we thought.

Liverpool Women's hospital refused point blank to listen to our requests to take the tests, because they a) don't do them (they get sent to Chicago) and b) they don't believe in them.

We reasoned with them from our medical backgrounds and even offered to pay for them (somehow)... but they still said no.

So, now we are free of the NHS rules we have finally gone to CARE, but this time privately instead.

We have done various tests which have shown a low level of fertility in general (which obviously would have been REALLY good to have known before starting the whole damn thing).

And recently we also took the auto immunity tests mentioned above.

And guess what?

24 vials of blood later they have shown a BIG problem.

We are genetically very similar.

In fact probably too similar.

If i was donating a kidney or some other organ etc then this would be fine... but for pregnancy it is the opposite way around.

We're not talking incest here, but it is that kind of idea...

Even if we went down the Donor Eggs route it would make no difference as to much similarity can cause problems with fertilisation, with carrying, with premature birth and potentially with the genetic make up of any baby that pops out.

 So, there we have it... and the question we now ask is 'What do we do now?

'Well, we don't know.

Plus, of course, in this game nothing is guaranteed to work because no amount of money will make it work.


We just need to be lucky!

And unfortunately, throughout all of this, that is just the one thing we just don't seem to have.