Although it was her first miscarriage Chi Chi insisted on getting as much testing done as she could.
My miscarriage was automatically written off as a "bad" eggs due to Advanced Maternal Age. It never occurred to anyone, myself included, that it could be anything else but...
Meanwhile Chi Chi (who is 8 years younger than me) found out she had the MTHFR gene mutation.
MTHFR
Now I don't know what y'all (and yes I have to use a y'all here)...Now I don't know what y'all see when you look at MTHFR but I but you can guess what I see...
Mother Fucker.
And if it's a gene mutation that causes miscarriages then it really is a Mother Fucker!
So Chi Chi and I started referring to it as the Mother Fucker gene.
Chi Chi has the Mother Fucker gene.
Now I am sure that most of you will know where I am going with this but I have to give you some background first...
The clinic I went to for my last cycle is in NY about a 3 1/2 hour drive north from me. Actually a beautiful, scenic drive that I had the pleasure of seeing in all its autumn glory when I went for my ET in October.
But due to the distance of my new clinic, during this last cycle, I would go to Dr. Wow for my monitoring. And since I have such high affections for Dr. Wow, even though he did not get me pregnant (hmm does that sentence seem odd to you?), I was happy that he was doing my monitoring.
After my positive pregnancy test, I contacted Dr. Wow's office requesting a prenatal ultrasound. The office manager said that they could not perform my prenatal ultrasound because I wasn't technically their patient.
I thought it was weird and I was a little upset because I always envisioned that it would be Dr. Wow who would the doctor in my dream, the one I had right before my first miscarriage, that turned the ultrasound machine towards me so I could see my baby's heartbeat.
But alas (I've always wanted to use alas in sentence)...but alas it was not meant to be. I ended up going to my OB for that fateful ultrasound that did not yield a heartbeat and ultimately resulted in my 2nd miscarriage.
2 days later I started bleeding and they scheduled a D&C.
While my OB was wheeling me into the operating room to perform my D&C, I tearfully asked him to please run an RPL (Reoccurring Pregnancy Loss) panel on me and to test the fetal tissue. He respectfully obliged.
The results of my RPL panel....MTHFR...Mother Fucker...I have the Mother Fucker gene. Plus my Thyroid levels were high and my C-Reactive Protein levels were also high.
The meaning: clotting and immune issues which can cause repeated early pregnancy losses.
The results of the chromosome testing on the fetal tissue...a perfectly healthy baby girl...
The meaning: Mother Fucker!
Mother Fucker I agree. What does this mean for the future? Why can't they do this testing the first time if we're willing to pay for it?
ReplyDeleteYou've got to be fucking kidding me.
ReplyDeleteSeriously? And at the very least why did't they get the thyroid test done before?
As for c-reactive protein - that one's the least worrisome. Lots of things can make it high - there was a study in the New England Journal a few years ago that showed it was only a helpful test when looking at groups of patients, not individual people. Mainly because it's such a vague indicator of inflammation - you have a cold or stub your toe and your CRP goes up. Nevertheless, I hope they're going to do a few more tests on you now to be sure everything really is ok.
I always "hear" that when I read those acronyms too. Mother fucker indeed. I wish physicians would do tests earlier. I will never understand the protocol of waiting for three miscarriages before figuring out what is wrong.
ReplyDeleteMother fucker indeed. Were your homocysteine levels high? The mthfr gene testingis super confusing, a lot of people are heterozygous for the mutation and it is not too telling. A better test of this is if your homOcysteine levels are high. Taking folic acid, And maybe heparin (it's past 1 am and I'm kinda buzzed) can go toward fixing this
ReplyDeleteFor the Thyroid issue, taking thyroxine and selinium helps, according to the studies.
I highly recommend reading the book 'coming to term'. They have so many stories of women with Mthfr and all the bizarre other pregnancy related risk factors, who have had recurrent pregnancy losses, finally carry to term with all of thisstuff.
It's aptly named isn't it? Mother Fucker! I'm really sorry to hear that they didn't diagnose this sooner... and that you have had to go through the physical & emotional trauma of another m/c. I'm so frustrated just reading this!!
ReplyDeleteI don't understand either why its not something that they test after one loss. How heartbreaking to lose a normal featus -- I am so sorry.
ReplyDeleteSweetie! That is awful. It totally sucks that they did not t est earlier. I actually sort of "tricked" my RE into testing at the beginning at the advice of a coworker with this gene. She actually now has two beautiful little boys. No comfort to you now but maybe it holds some hope.
ReplyDeleteThis sucks! I can't believe it... Michaela, I am thinking about you.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry I'm so late reading this. Mother Fucker Mother Fucker!!! I'd love to just leave it at that because that's exactly how I feel however, I wanted to share that I actually had my testing done and subsequent MTHFR diagnosis after miscarriage #2 and I had to INSIST on this because my RE said "we don't typically do the recurrent miscarriage blood panel until miscarriage #3". What genius came up with that rule? ~~~ must have been someone who has never experienced miscarriage. Just a hunch. ;) lol.
ReplyDeleteLuckily, I won that battle and got the testing I desperately needed. Lot's of tears and 17 vials of blood later, MOTHER FUCKER!!!
I'm very interested to read the book that one of your followers (Jay) suggested because unfortunately, and despite following the extra folic acid, B vitamins and Lovenox, I just had MC #3. {{Thank you Jay, for the reading suggestion. I'll be checking that out for sure!}}
I'm sorry I haven't kept in closer contact with you dear friend - have had a heck of a time so far in 2012 and think, perhaps, it's time for a visit to Jersey ;)
Missing the heck out of you!
Love and baby dust,
Chi Chi <3