Trust Your Instincts
My husband and I have been working with a fertility clinic for two years now and have undergone several procedures, including IUI (artificial insemination) and IVF, sadly without success. After our last disappointment, our instincts told us two things...we had an implantation issue and we may need to find a doctor that was a better fit for us.
On the doctor front, our doctor was fine...pleasant, clearly competent, etc. My only issue was that I always felt like I was just a face in the crowd to him. I can't really explain why. I just never felt like he was focused on me as an individual with individual needs.
On the implant side, we were concerned because we met every factor for fertility. Due to all the work I've done with my diet, exercise, etc., I finally had gotten my hormones under control and normalized. Therefore, all stimulation rounds were very successful with very little medicine (thank God!). All of my husband's test also came back normal, average, and even above average (he is very proud of this!).
On the retrieval front, we've had great retrievals and fertilization success with our IVF cycles, always having enough embryos to implant as well as freeze for the future. And my uterine lining has been thick and prepared to embrace a new life. I've even undergone tests to ensure that my tubes are clear, and had an X-ray taken of my uterus to make sure there was no "weirdness" that could affect implantation.
In other words, all systems go...but still no baby.
So I asked my doctor if he could please do any test imaginable to peel back the layers on why implantation was not working. He sort of shrugged and said I could repeat the X-ray test if it made me feel better. I did, but it still showed everything to be fine.
It has been about six months since our last cycle and as we look to repeat a cycle, I made a command decision to switch doctors. Something just wasn't feeling right and I knew I had to act on it. I called two other doctors in the practice. I left 2-3 messages for one and he never called me back. I then left a message for the other, and within three hours, he not only called me back, we talked for 20+ minutes. He agreed to work with me.
My husband and I met with him and he immediately had some suggestions on things to do differently. He was also hyper-vigilant about a blood clotting issue I have and wants me to be a safe as possible.
Most interestingly, he called me recently to discuss a procedure he wanted to do (an hysteroscopy), to see if I have any adhesions, polyps, etc. in my uterus that would not show up on the X-ray, but could affect implantation. In fact, he told me that he had been thinking about my situation over the weekend and realized I reminded him of one of his patients...same exact thing. All tests normal but no baby. He did the test on her, removed some scarring/scabbing, etc. and she is now in her second trimester.
Of course I said YES!!! I had the test earlier this week, and sure enough, he removed some adhesions from the left side of my uterus, as well as polyp near my left fallopian tube. This was exactly what I had been asking my previous doctor about, and was not getting.
We are now looking to do another IVF round, and I feel so much better knowing I have a strong advocate in my corner that is looking out for me, Kimberly, as an individual with unique circumstances, and not just another face following a protocol.
It has been a HUGE lesson for me that, in all situations, follow your instincts and demand the care and attention you deserve. Not just in your fertility or even your health, but in all aspects of your life. You are so very worth it.
