Three short months

I checked the date yesterday and I was shocked that it was exactly 3 months after discovering my second pregnancy had ended.  It blows me away that it has only been such a short time, I’ve changed so much, my situation has changed so much that it feels almost like years have passed.

I’ve traveled 1000s of miles in this time, and I’ve spent one month each in drastically different places, India, California and now New York.

My first month was in India. It was the happiest of these past 3 months, which is mindboggling given that it was immediately after my loss. But---being with family was going into this incredibly comfortable cocoon. It’s the same one I will return to, to fight out this battle of trying to create another human being.

The next month was spent in California, with the stress of moving cross-country while dealing with my new reality. 

The third has been spent in NYC, and here it is the stress of settling into a new place.

I’m just amazed at the speed at which my life has been moving, and the utter lack of control I have over anything.  Its also just bewildering how much I’ve learned in this short time. The most shocking revelation was that my baby had Turners syndrome. Then came the vitamin D story. Then finally came the PCOS story.

Ever so often, you learn something new, often entirely by accident. You start to tug on one chain, and it takes you someplace you had never intended to go. Sprogblogger had recommended Dr. Barad at the Center for Human Reproduction (thank you, sprogblogger!).  Absolutely by accident, I ended up looking for papers Dr. Barad had authored, and found a pretty darned interesting one.

I’ve remarked on this on ‘The science of infertility’ page : I found it very interesting that a lot of woman who had PCOS also had anti-thyroid peroxidase antibodies. I could never think of or find a link.

This paper I just found says, YES, there IS a link between the two, and it comes down to this gene on the X chromosome, called FMR1.

Women who have low copies of this gene product have both manifestations of PCOS and autoimmunity (often anti- thyroid peroxidase antibodies) and have, according to the good doctor, a much lower chance of pregnancy in IVF cycles.

Just another thing for woman having these 2 issues together to check out, if you feel up to it. However, I should add, if you do discover you have this, I think it would end up being a face-palm moment because I don’t see what you can do to fix this. But still, having this information has to give you better clarity in figuring out what your path forward is.

Despite the fact that I have both PCOS AND thyroid issues, my microarray results (gotten a while back) suggest I’m normal for this gene- still, I have to confirm that with an expert. Also, I have no issues in getting pregnant whatsoever, and this paper is all about low pregnancy rates in women mutant for this gene.

But yet, I do have a little piece of my X chromosome missing. Interestingly it is the cytoband adjoining the one that has FMR1. And I’m starting to read more and more that some of the X-linked abnormalities contributing to fertility issues- I think I’m going to have to see a top notch geneticist, just for my own peace of mind.

It never ends.

And a lot can happen in one day, let alone 3 months. I should not be so surprised  (nor unhappy) on account of  the volume of change in this short time.

Stasis sucks.  Rapid change, although disconcerting, is better.