I’d always wanted to be a mother, and I thought that wanting something (especially something that my body was biologically designed for) would be enough to make it happen one day.
Like many people, I had spent years worrying about accidentally becoming pregnant, assuming all it would take was one slip up, and therefore I was vigilant about contraception all throughout my 20s.
After I turned 30 and was fresh from our honeymoon, the time was finally right for having a baby. Except my body hadn’t got the memo. I was genuinely disappointed when I discovered I wasn’t pregnant after the first month of trying but I told myself to be rational and that it would only be a matter of months before we were expecting our first child.
Nine months later, with no luck, we decided we’d been trying long enough to get a medical opinion (even though technically, couples aged under 35 were supposed to try for a year before seeking help).
The fertility specialist ran all the usual blood tests and when I went for the results I expected to walk in and receive a kind reassurance that we were doing all the right things, and it would only be a matter of time until we were pregnant.
Instead, I was hit with a fertility sales pitch from the specialist as well as the news that we had both an egg and a sperm factor at play and that whilst it wouldn’t be impossible to conceive, it wouldn’t be easy without help.
This was when my mental health first started to feel the impact of my infertility.
“Hope was a cruel emotion that rose and crashed in waves every month.”
A challenging IVF journey
After a few unsuccessful rounds of IUI (intrauterine insemination) and medication to help me ovulate, we were recommended to start IVF (in vitro fertilisation) as our next step.
The realisation that we needed IVF led to mixed feelings. Relief, that there was a scientific process that could help us achieve our dream of parenthood, and disappointment, because our bodies weren’t able to do what they biologically were expected to do to have a baby naturally.
The physical part of IVF including scans, injections and blood tests, was nothing in comparison to the mental anguish of waiting to find out how many follicles I had after taking all the injections, how many eggs were retrieved after surgery, how many embryos had formed, whether the embryos would survive long enough to be implanted and finally, whether an implanted embryo would actually result in a pregnancy.
Each IVF cycle involved a lot of hurdles to get through and each one lead to anxiety and potentially disappointment.
Worst of all, was the Two-Week Wait. The Two-Week Wait was the dreaded time between finally getting to the stage of having an embryo implanted back into your body and then waiting two very long weeks to see if it resulted in a pregnancy.
The constant monitoring of my body for any signs, good or bad, was all consuming. Every trip to the toilet involved an examination of my underwear for any blood which would signal that the IVF had not been successful.
Sometimes, I experienced a feeling of sad relief to see the blood and know that the anxiety of the wait was over. The torture of holding out hope for another few days felt too much to bear.
Naively I thought it would only take one round of IVF to achieve our dream of a baby, but this was not the case. The months and then eventually, years, of unsuccessful IVF attempts took their toll. I no longer wanted to socialise, especially not with anyone who was pregnant or a parent.
“Pregnancy announcements from others cut like a hot blade into my stomach and I just wanted to exist in a bubble with my husband and dog, somewhere that I didn’t need to think about any of it.”
Anxiety during pregnancy
Eventually, after four years and eight cycles of unsuccessful IVF, we finally made it through a two week wait to receive the phone call I never thought I’d get. The nurse from the IVF clinic called to tell me I was pregnant.
I hung up the phone and cried tears of joy in my husband’s arms.
Unfortunately, the feeling was short lived. After achieving my dream, it now felt so completely terrifying that I couldn’t feel any happiness.
“All I could feel was fear. Fear that in the blink of an eye my precious pregnancy was going to go wrong.”
I reached out to the psychologist at the fertility clinic who explained that mentally, I’d run a marathon and now I had nothing left in the tank. It summed up exactly how I felt.
After reaching the halfway mark in my pregnancy I finally started to relax a little but before long I was overtaken by worsening anxiety after I had some unexplained bleeding and a trip to A&E for an emergency scan.
All was fine with the baby, but I broke down crying in front of the A&E doctor, and he told me it might be a good idea to seek professional mental health support, given that my emotions were so close to the surface.
Finding the right support
I was referred to a perinatal psychiatrist who was able to work with me in the last few months before my due date. I also requested an elective C section with my obstetrician, in order to bring some control into a situation that had for so long seemed out of my control.
As it turned out, my little girl decided to come into the world 24 hours ahead of her scheduled C section date, but my medical team were able to bring forward my surgery without any issues.
The birth was straightforward, and I sobbed tears of joy and relief as my baby daughter was placed on my chest after birth.
I felt good for the first few days after giving birth until my third night in the maternity hospital when I just couldn’t sleep at all. I was wired. I got up and wondered around the hospital and a nurse asked if I wanted to visit the babies in the nursery, which was where my daughter was sleeping peacefully.
All I wanted was to enjoy my little miracle, but I was so churned up. I keep thinking, ‘What is wrong with you? You’ve got everything you wanted, and you can’t even be happy’. I didn’t sleep all night and was a mess the next morning. My perinatal psychiatrist came to see me and gave me something to sleep.
My husband looked after me so tenderly and we lay in bed watching movies on the iPad and ate chocolate while tears silently ran down my face.
“Nothing felt more fragile in that moment than being a newborn mother to a newborn baby.”
I gained some confidence over the next few days in hospital, but I really didn’t want to go home when the time came. What would I do without the amazing nurses to help me?
At home, we took things very slowly and with the help of a set nighttime routine involving my husband taking over for a period of time in the night so I could sleep, eventually I found my feet as a mother.
I did experience a few setbacks with my mental health after I stopped breastfeeding but eventually the emotional toil of my IVF experiences was able to sit further back in mind as I focused on my new life.
A couple of years later, I went through IVF again to give my daughter a sibling (this time, we were lucky after three attempts) and this time things were very different. I felt empowered as I knew I’d been able to survive and eventually thrive after going through IVF related perinatal mental health challenges.
“Being honest with yourself and your loved ones about what you are going through is the key to getting the help you need. There are no medals for putting on a brave face. Mothers need tender loving care too as we navigate our new role in the world.”
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