Lion Fox & Co would like to welcome with open arms Instagrammer Lanni Cordwell, otherwise known as @mumandmila. She is 38 years old and has been married to her husband John for 6 wonderful years. Her beautiful Mila was born 6 months ago, which required plenty of anticipation and planning. Lanni explains in her blog that love, marriage and children is generally the sequence of a relationship however falling pregnant was not an easy task for Lanni and her husband John. This is her story..
Making a Baby
I have always dreamt of having children, even from a very young age. I was an au pair then a nanny abroad for 10 years in the USA since I was 18 years old. Being around children was always a part of my life. 2 years into my marriage we decided it was time to start a family. I was going to be 33 years of age and I was ready. I was very excited and scared especially when I was very close to the 35 years old older woman bracket. I knew it would be harder but boy was it a lot harder. It was not easy but I was determined and I wanted to be prepared. I read up on when was the best time of the month, what positions, even down to the time of day. I went on Elevit, took multivitamins. I brought boxes after boxes of ovulation tracking kits. I downloaded and purchased tracking apps. It was months and months of using the kits and apps, tracking my cycle and a whole lot of sex. We even had morning sex for a whole week because I read somewhere it was peak timing for sperm. I also laid in bed afterwards for 30 minutes with my legs up in the air making sure no sperm would escape. But nothing. Pregnancy test, after pregnancy test it all read negative, all just with one line present. I felt defeated. John was tired but I could see the look on his face. He felt bad. He knew I was hurting, even though I told him I was fine. It will happen I said to reassure him, but I was saying it to reassure myself. I had faith. But he knew, he knew I was tearing up inside.
After years of trying (2 years have passed now) and constant questioning from family, friends and strangers we went to our doctors to discuss what we could do. He referred us to a fertility clinic called Fertility North and told us to book an appointment. We went to our first appointment and both of us were nervous to meet our doctor, Dr Vince. Lovely man Dr Vince Chapple was very nice and very straight forward which we loved, putting us at ease. After Running through our history and telling him that we haven’t used birth control since we got married, Dr Vince said that getting pregnant was easy, but the fact was we had been trying for the last 4 years and had been unsuccessful. It was the most heart wrenching thing to hear. I had so many thoughts going through my head, how could this happen? But I was meant to have kids, was it because I waited too long to have kids? What was wrong with me? My head was racing. I had so many questions. I always had that perception that having babies was such an easy thing. I mean 18 year olds were having them, my mother had 4 kids. Both my sisters had 2 kids. How hard could it be? The question of what was wrong with me kept creeping back. John and I both blamed ourselves and we both were feeling down.
As we sat there, both of us fighting back tears Dr Vince explained the process of what’s next? He said there were to be tests, lots of tests that we had to go through. He explained that it was a very expensive process, not just the IVF process itself but all the testing as well if we decided to go ahead with everything. There was no question, we wanted to have kids so we agreed and we got started. There were consent forms to fill out, finance appointment, a counselling session and numerous nursing appointments. Then the testing started for both John and I. Lots of test, blood tests for both of us, lots of blood, urine tests, semen testing. John had to do his business in a cup. It seemed endless but finally the results came in. There was bad news and good news. First the bad news. John had a very low sperm count and that the percentage of uncorrupted sperm (basically good swimmers) was very low. I had endometriosis. Endometriosis is a disease in which tissue that normally grows inside the uterus grows outside of it. The main symptoms are pelvic pain and infertility. That explains the very painful period pains I have always experienced. Good news was that endometriosis can be removed through surgery and we could work with a low sperm count.
First step I had to have surgery and get my endometriosis removed. Done. Next John was told to go on Melevit (male elevit). He had weekly test to check on his swimmers. He said it was very awkward, knowing what he had to do and that people knew what he was doing. Months of being on Eelevit worked. His count had increased by 300%. Great we were on our way! Nope, more tests. I had blood tests every other day to check my estrogen levels. They had to be high enough to get my body right for the harvesting of my eggs. This took a few months because my levels just didn’t seem to get high enough. I had to go back on the pill to increase my levels. How weird to be going back on the pill when we were trying to have a baby! So more waiting, more extra stress. We got through it though. We had to stay positive, we had our eyes on the end game. Finally the pills took affect and my body was ready after being on it for a month.
Next step, egg cultivation. This was one of the hardest parts of the whole process. I had to do daily injections to grow my eggs. This was a no go zone for John. He hated needles. Luckily I was ok with them. I had to inject myself at exactly the same time every day for 12 days. Then came the ultrasound to check on the growth of the eggs (follicle tracking). They had grown to a good size and I had 10 eggs in each ovary. The eggs were at final maturation and needed a trigger (final injection) to get them ready for collection. I was booked in for my egg extraction surgery. It was a day surgery, under general anaesthetic. Every follicle is drained and flushed. No stone left unturned. While my eggs were getting extracted, John needed to give his sperm so the process of fertilising the eggs could commence. They told us fertilisation was complex and dynamic. In simple terms, there was no guarantees. They were to call us on our results. More waiting, more worrying.
We received the phone call the next day, we had 6 embryos that were successful, and one was of an A+ status that was ready to go. Pure joy, tears of happiness, looks of love. We were so close. The day was finally here. We made the appointment for the insemination. All the hard work, all the doctor appointments, all the tests, all the needles, all the tears, all the heart break, all the road blocks and all the fees, oh my gosh the fees! it had finally led us to this moment. The day that would change our lives forever.
