Long-term prognosis

In early November 2007, we miscarried our first pregnancy after our first IVF due to a double aneuploidy. We were completely blindsided by the loss, which happened after several strong heartbeats and a graduation to the obstetrician. A few weeks later, my husband Will received an email from our reproductive endocrinologist.

It read, in part:

"See you guys soon and have a nice Tgiving. Hang in there. 

Mo's long-term prognosis here is fabulous. Remind her of this for me."

We printed the email and saved it. It ended up filed as part of my ever accumulating infertility-related medical records. Files that I am piecing through and paring down today.

I've thought of this email many times in the past five years and my reaction to it has varied.

At first, I was so moved that the RE took the time to be sympathetic and encouraging to us. I clung to his words as I grieved our loss: Our long-term prognosis is fabulous. I formed the words again and again in my mouth. Words that meant everything would be ok. We would be parents soon!

I returned to his words after our second miscarriage and took comfort in them.

And after our third miscarriage.

By the fourth, fifth, and sixth miscarriages, I had become increasingly bitter about the email. What kind of freaking fabulous prognosis was this?! Seriously? This was fabulous? Because our reality seemed dismal and our future prospects increasingly hopeless to me. It felt like false hope had been offered. The words now felt extra cruel because I had fiercely wanted to believe them for so long, although I knew the email had been written with the best of intentions.

Will and I even began wryly alluding to the email with each other in a dark-humored, angry kind of way. We needed this "fabulous prognosis" like we needed holes in our heads.

And then pregnancy number seven. Which somehow...kept...continuing. Even when we couldn't imagine that it would. All the way to a delivery. All the way to Magpie.

And now she is here.

She is sleeping in the other room. I tear up just realizing the incredibleness of it. Of her.

And so it turns out that our long-term prognosis was fabulous after all. What I had failed to appreciate was the word "long-term." I would never have imagined how long-term it would be.

But five years later here we are.

What a difficult journey it has been.

Amazing. Unexpected. She is here.

Mo


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