My Story

My husband and I were married at the end of March of 2009, and shortly thereafter I became pregnant. I scheduled my first prenatal visit, during the appointment, after confirming I was indeed pregnant by way of a urine test, The doctor preformed an ultra-sound wherein she told my husband and I that “There is no evidence of the pregnancy” despite the fact that I should have been 6 weeks along, and there should have been a visible embryo. 

She ordered multiple blood tests, which later returned results that were both positive and normal for pregnancy. We were then asked to schedule another visit in two to three weeks. Within the first week, off and on I began to have severe cramping in my abdomen.  I had called the doctor’s office and had inquired if I should be alarmed about it; they told me it was normal.

A week later, while doing some minor chores around the house, the pain became so severe I doubled over in pain. I went to the bathroom and discovered that I was bleeding profusely. After a minute or so I became nauseated, I ended up on the bathroom floor crying in pain. I crawled to the phone and called my mother, who is a RN, to tell her what was going on. She advised me to call the doctor immediately, in which they told me come in.

When we were called in by the Doctor, she performed another ultrasound, and told us that she could not see anything wrong. She said that there was still no evidence of the pregnancy, but I was most likely having a normal miscarriage. She told us that we could go ahead and go home, it would pass, or if the pain was too great that we could go to an urgent care center, and they would help the process along.

We had decided to go home, but on the way, my abdomen erupted in such pain I was screaming, crying, and begging my husband to take me to the hospital. I have never felt such excruciating pain in my life.

When we arrived at the urgent care center, some of the pain had passed. We had to wait forty minutes or so for the ER nurse to see me. When we explained what was going on she immediately sent me for another ultrasound, during which the radiologist told me that I had had an ectopic pregnancy. Where the embryo had implanted itself in my right Fallopian tube, and had begun to mature there. 

The cause of my intense pain and cramping was the rupture of the embryo and Fallopian tube, causing severe internal bleeding. She informed me that I would have to have emergency surgery to stop the bleeding and attempt to save the Fallopian tube. Without the surgery there was a chance that the bleeding could kill me. 

She told me that the doctors should have seen the problem on both prior ultrasounds, and that preventative measures could have been taken to avoid the life threatening situation I was in.

I was shuttled to the hospital, where I underwent surgery. Afterward I was informed that they were unable to save my Fallopian tube but that they left my left ovary. I was put on birth control for 3-4 months to heal, and told after the birth control ran out we could start trying to conceive again. 

I eventually made a full recovery physically, but became very depressed due to the loss of our first child. 

We started trying again in August of 2009, with no success. It wasn't until the July 2010, we were living with my parents in Florida, that I started having severe back pain on my left side; I went to the hospital to make sure it wasn't my kidneys. When I found out I was pregnant, the ER nurse informed me that I was about 6^th weeks, and with my history of Ectopic I needed to get to my doctor as soon as possible. I went to my OBGYN the following Monday, they were unable to perform an ultra-sound at that time, but they did have blood work done and told me to come back the following morning for the ultra-sound first thing.
Monday night at approximately 7pm, I was very uncomfortable. I walked across the house to my parents’ bedroom, where I told them that I didn't feel very good at which point I blacked out momentarily. It was only just a second, but Gary and my parents rushed me to the hospital. It was confirmed that it was another ectopic and that the pain from the previous Friday was the tube beginning to rupture.
In the early hours of the morning, I had emergency surgery. My doctor was able to save my left tube and ovary, after removing ruptured embryo and repairing my Fallopian tube, she then checked my right ovary to discover that it was dead.

In my first surgery removing my right Fallopian, they had cut off the blood supply to the ovary, making it vulnerable, during the second ectopic surgery, my doctor discovered that a due to the blood supply being cut off my right ovary had been enveloped by a 5cm ovarian cyst and died.

At my two week post op, my doctor told me she did everything in her power to save the tube and wanted me to have an HSG test to check on the status of my left tube, to see if anything could get through.
At the HSG appointment it was confirmed that my Fallopian tube was 95% blocked my scar tissue and the chances of sperm or an embryo getting through were slim to none.
My doctor then told me that in order to have children I would need to go through IVF, Invitro Fertilization, and referred me to a fertility doctor. Most insurance companies do not cover fertility treatments, our insurance did not, forcing us to pay out of pocket for our treatment.
It took us 3 and half years to save enough money to pay for IVF, which unfortunately was unsuccessful. Due to only having one ovary, we were only able to retrieve a limited amount of eggs.
We have been through 1 fresh IVF cycle, and 1 frozen IVF cycle. The first I miscarried a week into our two week wait. With the second I had what is called a blighted ovum.
It has been recommended by our doctor to try one more round of IVF. 

We have not given up... we will be parents... one way or another.

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