Jessica’s Story

I have been pregnant three times. Or actually while writing this story, I am pregnant. But I don't feel it. And as for now, it looks like I will have to hold on to that fact, and nothing more. None of my three pregnancies has ended with a child in my arms. In the fall of 2018, eager and excited me and my husband decided to start a family. It had never crossed our minds that we had such a long and bumpy journey ahead of us, with a lot of detores. That part is rarely something you hear anything about. People don’t tell you they are struggling with infertility. Our thoughts were that this will go quickly. So we prepared the best we could.

But one year went by. We were just about to start a fertility evaluation when we all of a sudden got pregnant in october 2019. I felt incredibly happy when I saw the positive test - tears, hugs and kisses! Finally! Our happiness lasted a couple of weeks. One day I felt that something wasn’t right. I didn’t feel it anymore. An ultrasound in week 12 showed that the pregnancy had ended in week 7. The sorrow washed over me. We were not prepared. We had been busy preparing for our new future, and all of a sudden it was taken from us. And there we were, not knowing what to do next.

Four months later I got pregnant again. I was scared but hopeful and as the days went by, slowly but surely we started to feel hopeful. This was our turn, right? What are the odds of having two miscarriages in a row? Week 9 came in for the second ultrasound, but unfortunately this pregnancy had also ended. One week before that we had seen a heartbeat. Once again the pregnancy had ended in week 7. The sadness knocked us off our feet. How the hell were we supposed to move on?

From there we haven’t been able to get pregnant naturally. Even though they can’t find anything wrong with either me or my husband, it just doesn’t happen. In august of 2021 we started our IVF journey. We felt a spark of hope. IVF felt like the answer we had been waiting for. Surely we might just need a little help along the way. During our first treatment I got over stimulated and therefore had to freeze all fertilized eggs. We did a frozen transfer in november, but it didn’t succeed. I was certain that it would work, since IVF was our answer. But it didn’t. My self esteem took a toll for the worse and I spent a lot of nights with tears running down my cheeks. You can’t help but feel useless when your body can’t reproduce: the most natural thing in the world.

New transfer in january. This time, it worked. The test showed on the testday that I was pregnant, for the third time. Joyfull, some might think. A positive pregnancy test when you’ve been longing for years. But the thing is that for many of us going through infertility, that’s not the case. I felt no happiness staring at the positive test. Instead came anxiety, worry, and negative thoughts. Why would it work this time?

Every time I go to the bathroom I look for blood. I check the toilet paper and in my underwear. As soon as I feel something in my uterus I wonder - am I feeling too little? Or am I feeling too much? Is it supposed to be like this? Yesterday felt different. Is this it? I want to feel nauseous! I wish that I had every horrible pregnancy symptom there is, as long as that entails a healthy pregnancy. I feel and analyze my breasts maybe 20 times a day. Are they as tender as yesterday? Or are they less tender? Because that is what happened in the last two pregnancies, the symptoms slowly went away. That’s when I knew.

So as for now, my days consist of analyzing my body. It’s not healthy, but it’s inevitable. I'm sure some might recognize themselves, but others might think I'm overreacting. But for me, being pregnant for the third time after recurrent miscarriages is a long battle, and this is my way of coping. I can’t ignore it, even though I might want to. I am terrified. Terrified of having to go through another misscarriage.

In my current pregnancy we had an ultrasound in week 8 (23 of february). The fetus they found measured 7 weeks with a heartbeat. We have another ultrasound on the 9th of march. My last pregnancy was exactly the same. At first we saw a one week too small fetus with a heartbeat that had died before the next ultrasound. And that is why, just as I mentioned in the beginning of this story, I'm saying that I have been pregnant three times. For me this pregnancy has already ended. I base it on what has happened before. This is what this journey has taught us thus far, we don't dare to hope or dream. It is very difficult when all you know is failure. By now I know that miracles do not happen to us. The road is indeed long and bumpy, with a lot of detours. And it seems like we are not there yet, and I don't know how long this journey will go on. Sometimes I would just like to take a break and feel happy and content with where we are. But they say that the last thing that leaves us is hope. And as long as there is hope, there is a way.