When does motherhood
begin? This is a question that has
raised much debate in law, medicine, religion, and spirituality. I don’t know
the answer to this question, but to me, motherhood might start even before one
knows she is pregnant. When I felt mentally and emotionally ready to try to get
pregnant, something inside me changed. I started to think about this potential
baby that could change everything, for better or for worse. And since that
moment, even before I was pregnant, I started to change my lifestyle, to think
ahead, to plan for this potential human being that I hadn’t even met yet. For
me, this is when motherhood began.
Most people know that I have
always wanted a baby girl. Don’t tell Landon, but when I first found out that
Landon was a boy, I cried! Of course now, I can’t imagine my life without him
and I love everything about him, but I still have this burning desire to have a
little girl. I have a deep, hidden away balloon in my head with images of me
and a little girl. I imagine dressing her up in bows and lace. I imagine baking
and decorating cookies with her and teaching her how to braid her hair. I
imagine getting my nails done with her, picking out her prom dress, her wedding
dress. When I found out I had to get chemotherapy I also found out that up to
30% of women go into permanent ovarian failure after completion of treatment.
At that moment that balloon hidden away in my mind flew away and popped. I was
devastated that I may not be able to have a baby after my treatments.
So began my whirlwind tour in
the world of reproductive endocrinology. Leaving my fertility up to chance was
not an option for me. I did a bunch of research and eventually found the USC
Fertility Clinic. I saw a wonderful female physician who specializes in
oncological cases like myself. And for two weeks my life was about preparing
for my future baby, not about cancer.
The two weeks that led up to freezing our embryos
were stressful to say the least. I only had time for one round of egg retrieval
because I couldn’t delay my chemo much longer. My future hopes for having a
baby depended on this one round of retrieval. I had to put all my eggs into
this one basket (pun intended)!
So I started with the daily
injections to stimulate my ovaries to form follicles. 2 shots everyday at the
same time. I was still working during all of this so there were times I had to
inject myself at work which was not fun. I had to go into clinic every other
day, sometimes everyday to get my blood work checked and to get transvaginal
ultrasounds to check of the progress of my follicles. By the end of all of this
my arms and belly were covered in bruises from the blood draws and injections. I
felt so bloated from my ovaries being the size of baseballs on each side. But
the good news was that I was progressing well and had many follicles.
The day of egg retrieval, I
went into the procedure center. The whole thing took only about 30 min under conscious
sedation. When I woke up I was groggy but received the great new that she was
able to retrieve 23 eggs! The rest was a waiting game but I felt good starting
with such a high number so I wasn’t too worried.
A week later I found out that
of the 23 eggs, 20 were mature enough to fertilize. 14 of the 20 actually got
fertilized and in the end, 7 of those 14 developed into the blastocyte stage.
Initially I was shocked that I started with 23 eggs and was down to only 7
embryos, but on second thought, 7 embryos seemed like a great number because I
sure don’t plan on having 7 more kids!
We decided to get
karyotypes/genetic testing on these 7 embryos. The results took about 2-3
weeks. Of the 7, 3 had chromosomal abnormalities that would have led to miscarriages
if we used them so those were discarded. We were left with 4 good quality
embryos! Thanks to the karyotype, we were able to find out the gender of the
embryos. We have 2 boys and 2 girls!! I was so excited to learn this!! And just
like that, the balloon with images of me with a daughter that I thought had
popped floated back into my mind.
I can’t believe that this
whole process is even possible. I am thankful that I live in a time where
science is so advanced that people like me can have the option to have a child
after chemo, but I can’t help but think that we are playing God a little bit
which seems amazing but dangerous at the same time.
So there you have it, after a
crazy stressful 2 weeks, somewhere in a freezer in downtown LA, I have 4 potential
kids waiting to be brought into this world. Dan and I will likely only have one
more child, and in my mind that child is going to be my daughter. And just like
that, in my heart, I have already started being a mother to her, years before
she is actually born.
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