Hey All,
I am the queen of starting things and never either 1)keeping up with them or 2) finishing them. So hopefully this time will be different. If you are reading this, you probably know me or want to get to know me, so a little background. My name is Christa , I'm 25 Years old, I live in Waterville, Maine with my husband, Adam and my 3 cats; Macgyver, Emma, and Gwen. We live in an apartment for the time being until the day comes we can no longer stand living in a small space and throwing our money away on rent. Oh yea, and there is that little issue of a downpayment for a house too:) I have 5 brothers and sisters, most of whom live just down the road about a 1/2 a mile. They're names are Corey, Brittany, Paige, Kylee, and Cameron. There is 14 years between Cammy and I, and, yes, we are all biologically related. In my spare time, I like to Nest at www.thenest.com, play softball, hang out with my brothers and sisters, and shop!
I am creating this blog because I feel like I need to express things that I have been feeling lately. My husband and I have a HUGE life change ahead of us and we also have some obstacles that may get in the way.
About 7 months ago, I was diagnosed with Endometriosis. For those of you who don't know what this is, textbook definition is: a condition where tissue similar to the lining of the uterus (the endometrial stroma and glands, which should only be located inside the uterus) is found elsewhere in the body. What I tell people is that I have little chocolate cysts growing everywhere in my uterus, causing scar tissue which is causing adhesions, and causing some of my organs to fuse together.
What I don't usually tell other people is that it causes horrible pelvic pain, but doesn't limit itself to the pelvis. It runs up one side of my body and down the other side sometimes. It causes attacks of my ovaries, where fluid is released from cysts and is like poisin in your body, you can breathe and the pain is something you could never know unless you experienced it yourself.
Because of it, I have what others know as a bad case of IBS. Sitting on the toilet feeling like you are going to die, a bag for vomit in one hand and a cold compress for your forehead so that you don't pass out.Endometriosis causes depression and worst of all, it causes infertility.
What I'm hoping is that someone who thinks they may have endo or wants to know more about it, will see my blog. I wasn't diagnosed until I was 24. Doctors appointments after doctors appointments, they kept telling me, "it's just a bad period", they are just bad cramps. I was put on 1000mg ibuprofen and basically told to deal with it.
When I was 17, I had to be rushed to the hospital because I had collapsed due to a cyst on my ovary. When I got to the hospital, they did an ultrasound and said that it was just a cyst and that it would go away. Little did I know, this cyst was filled with endo, something that could have been kept at bay at 17 and if I would've known, I would probably not be going to see a fertility specialist (RE) on July 12th. I've had mulitple attacks where I have had to stay home from work and school, and become more depressed because I didn't know what was going on with my body and nobody could explain it.
Since November of 2006, I've had two laproscopies. The first one was to take a 10cm tumor off from my right ovary.....it was filled with Endo. The second part of this lap was to diagnose me with stage 3 to 4 endo. The doctor said that I must've been in a lot of pain......finally!!!! Someone believed me!!! My ob/gyn put me on lupron to supress the affects of endo and also had side effects much like the ones menopause causes, not really ready schoolwise and living quarters wise to have a baby (which was one of the options the doctor gave me, Adam and I decided this would be best for me and us. 4 months later, in March, the pain was back in my right ovary, shooting pains, bad bowel movements, yada yada, not to mention the fact that the side effects of the lupron were just awful. I went in for another lap on April 9th 2007 and they found that my left fallopian tube was blocked with scar tissue and endo and they took part of my right ovary out. At this point, the gynocologist said it was about a 20% chance of me getting pregnant naturally.
Invetro Fertilization is a process where an egg and a sperm are combined out of the body and inseminated in the uterus. This is something that would work for me, but under our insurance isn't covered. So Adam and I decided with the advice of our doctor to stay on the lupron until we meet with the RE on July 12th.Two weeks ago, I found out that my work covers IVF (invetro fertilization), but for some reason, it's not considered a "life change" and I cannot switch to their insurance coverage until January of 2008.
At that point, I decided that after 7 months of being on lupron, I'm going to come off from it. I can't take the side effects anymore and I'm an emotional wreck. So, we are going to start trying naturally in about 2 weeks-6 weeks, whenever my body decides to take over and ovulate after being on the lupron which supressed my uterus for 7 months.
I'm sorry if some of this was boring, I promise to keep it more interesting than this in the future and try to update as much as I can!!:)
