My husband and I got married in March 2004. We both knew we wanted kids, but I was working full time as an RN and in school to get my Master's. Besides that, we married pretty young (24) and while I couldn't wait for the day we would be ready for kids, I knew it wasn't then. I stressed for years about when we would start trying. My husband was in no hurry. The general plan was we would try after I finished school. My sister got pregnant (unplanned) my last semester in school. I was so happy and so jealous all at the same time. I didn't want to be pregnant at the same time as her (ha, ha, ha!), and we had a few trips planned for the end of the year, so it was decided we would stop birth control shortly after that.
I took my NuvaRing out for the last time late in December 2008. I had never in my life had regular periods and spent a great deal of my late teens and early twenties thinking I was pregnant because I was late (ha, ha, ha again!). But I hadn't ever gotten pregnant and I was worried that was more than just luck. Furthermore, I am a nurse practitioner and my specialty is women's health, so I knew enough to know something wasn't right. Hindsight being 20/20 and all, it's hard for me to look back now and not think there was some serious denial going on. How could I have missed all the signs? But I digress.
So after stopping the NuvaRing, I got the obligatory withdrawal bleed (aka- period), and then I waited. And waited. And waited. By this time, being the control freak, type-A that I can sometimes be, I'm already temping, watching my cervical mucous, and googling like crazy. Finally around day 35, I ovulate. 10 days later I get my period. I know enough to know this is not good, but again, fail to see the bigger picture.
Month two I'm tired of trying to read tea leaves, so I start using OPKs. Starting around day 12 a second line shows up, but it's never as dark as or darker than the control. I read the box, I google, I see what all this can mean, but still- that can't be me. This goes on for a long time, we get to day 45 and still no sign of impending ovulation. I worked at an OB/Gyn clinic at that time, complete with my own sonographer, so I decide it's time to figure out what the hell is going on. I do blood work on a Friday afternoon- the usual hormone panel, but then decide on a whim to ask the sonographer to take a quick peek "just to rule it out".
What I got instead was confirmation of what everything else had been pointing too- PCOS. My ovaries were ridiculously full of tiny follicles. Textbook. Awesome. The real kicker is, I did a huge paper on PCOS for grad school. I even taught a lecture on it. I remember thinking often "huh, that sounds familiar", but it NEVER dawned on me that I could have it. I cried off and on all weekend. But I also immediately went to work reading everything I could get my hands on about PCOS. Mind you- at this point I didn't have my hormone panels back yet. But I didn't need to. I already had two of the three criteria necessary to diagnose PCOS. My results the next week were just the nail in the coffin- textbook PCOS.
I haven't thought about all this in such detail in a long time. It brings up a lot of feelings I had mostly forgotten. One new feeling, though, is gratitude. In looking back I realize how incredibly lucky I was to have access to all the resources I needed to figure out what was wrong with me so quickly and inexpensively. Who knows how much longer (if ever) it might have taken me to get pregnant if my circumstances were different?
To be continued....
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