The procedure itself was painful. An inordinate amount of stretching and prodding of the cervix is never going to be comfortable, and this particular nurse was thorough in her excavations. As I lay there like a stranded frog I wondered what hope there was for conception. Feeling far from relaxed, with an increasingly stressed-out nurse, I wondered if it was all over before it had even had a chance to begin.
Ten days later I started spotting – which was unheard of for me. A few days after that I began a heavy bleed and the dream was over for that month.
I was keen to try another cycle but the clinic insisted I give my body a chance to recover. A family bereavement also meant I wasn’t ready to try again until November, this time with a stimulated cycle. I was prescribed a high dose of Clomid based on my age, but I knew it would be too much for me so I took one-third of the prescribed dose. The drug is designed to stimulate the ovaries into producing an egg but mine had never needed such support. I felt awful on it and I dread to think what might have happened if I had taken the full dose. As I suspected, when I went for a scan it showed that three eggs were about to be released. This triggered much debate at the clinic about whether the cycle could go ahead because of the risk of twins or more. I told them I’d only taken a third of the dose. Rather than comments such as ‘that’s just as well!’ I was asked why I had gone against what the doctor had prescribed.
‘If you want the cycle to go ahead you’ll have to sign to say you understand the risks of twins or triplets.’
I found it curious that I had been given a 4 per cent chance of success and yet there had been such debate about whether to go ahead with treatment when my ovaries were overstimulated.
I took the (negligible) risk and the deed was done. Ten days later, and while celebrating my mother’s birthday, I started another heavy bleed and, once again, the dream was over. Despite the low expectations, the disappointment was profound. I found it draining to go through each treatment cycle, and the rollercoaster of hope and loss of hope was exhausting against a backdrop of synthetic hormones. But increasingly I had the sense that I would, eventually, be successful, and the constant hurdles seemed like a test.
‘If you really wanted a baby you’d have IVF,’ the clinic counsellor had said. It was a provocative statement that made me suspicious, but IUI, at least as I had experienced it at this clinic, is imprecise, and I was beginning to wonder if I had wasted my money on two cycles of it.
While I didn’t have a follow-up appointment as such, it was clear that the clinic was keen to move on to a cycle of IVF, but I wanted to establish why my treatment cycles were ending in early bleeds. The clinic felt that it was not worth doing any investigations and as my chances of being a mum were remote anyway, IVF was the only way it could possibly happen.
‘Why do you think my chances are so slim?’ I asked the consultant.
‘Let’s just say that if you’d come here ten years ago you would definitely go home with a baby.’
I couldn’t help feeling that I wouldn’t be treated as anything other than an age if I stayed at that clinic.
As Christmas arrived, I knew I shouldn’t return to the clinic. Too much had troubled me there and I suspected I might have a better experience elsewhere. I let the decision sit for a while and then started doing some research.
‘And suddenly you know: It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.’
Meister Eckhart
Choosing a new clinic was a curious process. I was not so interested in overall success rates as I was in the degree to which the clinic was willing and able to take a personalised approach to its clients. Following evidence-based treatment protocols is box-tickingly easy; taking each woman as an individual case is not, and it requires time, effort and an open mind.
Harry drove me to my first appointment. It was January and it was already getting dark as we left. The clinic was over an hour’s drive away and I was grateful to be chatting freely, unconcerned about the appointment. This second clinic was also in a hospital – NHS this time. Clustered around the entrance was a group of heavily pregnant smokers, in their twenties at most, clutching dressing gowns around their bumps against the January evening air. There was a smokers’ shelter close by but it was unused, and for some inexplicable reason the hospital seemed to tolerate the entrance being crowded with pregnant smokers. It was the same entrance used by women attending for fertility treatment, for viability scans, for surgery following miscarriage and any other appointments concerned with conception and pregnancy. More than once I witnessed the distress this sight caused some women.
The clinic was markedly different from the hospital that housed it. Recently opened, it was new, clean and comparatively high-tech, and all the members of staff I encountered were friendly and welcoming. There was the usual admin to go through but they had already requested my notes from my previous clinic. When I saw the consultant he had evidently read through the notes and picked up a few omissions that would need to be corrected before I started treatment there.
I felt so relieved to be there. Attitudes were upbeat and although I did get the now-familiar ‘age speech’ it was done with a very light touch and a heavy dose of hope. Here was a clinic that looked at the whole person and kept their eyes on the prize. I couldn’t help kicking myself for not choosing this clinic in the first place.
The consultant and I devised a plan – a medicated cycle of IUI – and I had some of the blood tests that the previous clinic had neglected to do. Everything had to be paid for; making babies is big business and if you’re not fortunate to be in a group that’s funded by the NHS you will pay for every last blood test and swab. Opportunities for making money are rarely missed in this business. You have to let it go or the inequity rankles.
The medicated IUI cycle involved more drugs than I had taken so far. I was prescribed a drug to downregulate my menstrual cycle and a mild stimulant for my ovaries. Both needed to be injected. I was daunted, despite never having had a fear of needles, but I received excellent training from the staff and a few days later I had a call from the company supplying the drugs requesting payment.
When I started injecting I felt only excitement. I was so much happier about the new clinic and had a growing sense that I would have a baby; that one day it really would happen. I had no issues with the injecting at all and when the day came for insemination I was thrilled to work out that if the treatment was successful, the due date would be my birthday. It had to work. On that basis alone, it had to work.
Choosing a new donor was so much easier at this clinic. I was given a wide choice and sufficient initial information to be able to make a shortlist. I chose who I thought would be a best match based on CMV status (CMV is the Cytomegalovirus, a common virus which causes complications if contracted in pregnancy – as I had tested negative for the virus, I needed a donor who had tested negative too; a precaution that those who conceive in person don’t get to take), colouring, height and then additional information such as occupation and educational background. Clinic staff were extremely understanding of how significant this process is. It’s a decision that cannot be taken lightly.
Once I had my shortlist and had selected a favourite, I was given the donor’s pen portrait. This is a document that any children conceived in this way can read at an appropriate time to find out more about the donor. Pen portraits can vary tremendously, but I was delighted that the one my donor had written was full of detail about him, his work, hobbies, childhood, family life and reasons for being a donor. He also wrote an incredibly touching note for any child conceived as a result of his donation, complete with his advice for life. Most significantly for me, however, was his assertion that he would be delighted to meet any children that resulted from his donation if they would like to meet him when the time came. In terms of ensuring that any child I had was supported as much as possible through this less-conventional path into the world, I was convinced that this was the