Reasons

Hopelessness and helplessness. Wanting to find reason, something to blame. Self blame. Self preservation. Survival. Base living. Getting up each day. Trying to be the best I can be for my husband and for my little girl. Little more of me to give. Sense of self fragility; at the mercy of nature like a mainsail flailing in the wind.


Reading and more reading. What did we do before google!

The information I found on the side effects of Mirena, the IUD I had fitted, scared and dismayed me. When I visited the doctor she had advocated the use of the IUD. She promoted the ease and effectiveness of it as a form of contraception. She gave me a brochure which outlined the benefits. I remember reading it but not looking to carefully into it content that my doctor would not recommend anything that would disadvantage me in any way.

If I had known the possible side effects of Mirena I would never have chosen to have it inserted. This link explains in detail the ins and outs of this particular IUD http://www.fwhc.org/birth-control/iudinfo.htm
However in short - 'Mirena can cause ovarian cysts. Some women using the Mirena stop bleeding altogether. Usually their menstrual period returns when the IUD is removed. Mirena can cause weight gain, headaches, increased blood pressure, acne, depression and decrease in sex drive.'

Could this have directly contributed to my problems? Quite possibly.

After seeing my obstetrician he said that there was no clear reason as to why I may have miscarried both times. He gave us the option of running further tests to see if there may be a potential problem or if in fact we were doubly unlucky. He mentioned there were 3 levels of testing available. Blood tests for me, chromosomal test for both Mike and I and then a fertility clinic. I decided that at this point it was probably worth getting blood work done on me just to check everything was ok. The fact that we had already produced one child was encouraging but the recurrent miscarriage baffling. We decided not to progress any further with testing at this point. Part of me didn't want to make a big deal of it all and just cross fingers for third time lucky.

In the meantime I busied myself with getting as well as possible. I began regular acupuncture. I saw a natruopath. I changed my diet and began taking mineral supplements. I banished alcohol and coffee from my diet and tried to be as alkaline as possible! I drank apple juice in the morning (supposedly apples aid in the production of estrogen!) and ate grapefruit for breakfast! (aids in the production of progesterone) I ate almonds and brasil nuts and tried ever so hard to keep food combining simple but interesting. The occasional sugar treat was all I allowed and even that I felt guilty about!

The blood tests took quite some time to come back. We had decided to wait at least one cycle before trying again. Even though the obstetrician said there was no harm in trying straight away I felt that I needed to give my body a chance to recover; for the endometrial lining in the uterus to build back up.