Interested to hear about others' road to pregnancy

Pregnancy
1

Hello ladies! I am new to this board, but not new to T1. I will be ‘celebrating’ 21 years of living with T1 on November 28th this year. Hooray, my diabetes will be legal to purchase alcohol! Hahah, anywho, I’m interested to learn about others’ journey to pregnancy. I am actively trying to get pregnant (have been since last August) with no luck :frowning: there are days where I think there is something wrong with me, or that the fact when I was younger (heck, even up to about 2 years ago), I was against making my own baby due to the remote possibility that I could pass my T1 to my child. The future-guilt I felt for an unknown child was overwhelming.

Well, now I am mentally and physically ready to have a baby. My A1c has been at or around 6.8 since August (the lowest I’ve EVER been) and both my endo and my high risk ob/gyn are keeping tabs on me. I switched from the OmniPod to the Animas Vibe last spring with the intention of better control (the redesigned OP was causing me too many issues). I have also been wearing a sensor for just over 3 years (DexCom).

I know everyone has a different story and a different journey. Some people get pregnant just by looking at their significant other (what seems to happen with most of my friends… Though most of my friends at NOT T1) while others take over a year and/or fertility treatments to get pregnant.
I am doing a 24-hour urine test for Cushings Disease this weekend, so that, along with my having diabetes, is making me wonder if that’s why I haven’t been able to get pregnant. I’ve been tracking my periods, done basal body temp tests (for an entire month), I just started doing daily ovulation tests (this month), and I’ve had up to 3 apps going at once to help me pin point my peak fertility days. Sometimes I think I am just stressing myself out over it and I need to remind myself that it will happen when the time is right. Neither my husband or I have been fertility tested yet, but we may end up doing that this summer if I don’t get pregnant in the meantime.

Soooooo… Yeah. That’s me in a nutshell. Just looking to see what experiences others have dealt with so I can hopefully stop feeling so guilty for not being able to make a baby yet.

2

Hi, @elizco4! I’m Erica, and I’d love to share my story. With my first baby, it took 18 months to get pregnant. After a year of trying, we got tested. First, I was diagnosed with PCOS. I then had a HSG test done and thought I’d be starting fertility treatments, but due to the dye in the test clearing any blockages in my tubes, I got pregnant right after. It was a long and emotional road, but we were thankful for the timing when it did finally happen. I had a healthy pregnancy. My a1c was below 6 the entire time. I exercised until the third trimester. I gained about 50 pounds, but it was never a concern. I had placenta previa at one point, but it resolved before the third trimester. I ended up taking about double the insulin at the end of the pregnancy. My BG stayed steady during labor and delivery. My baby was 3 weeks early (came naturally) and was 6# 8oz. she had one low after birth, but was fine after that. I lost all of the weight by about 12 weeks. BG went back to normal right after delivery.

My advice to you is to get checked out if you feel it’s necessary. Don’t wait and see if it works. It can be a stressful process, but stay open and close to your partner and you’ll get through it and hopefully end up with a baby on the other side! Good luck!

3

Thanks for the reply Erica! It is helpful hearing others’ stories. Getting tested for fertility has been discussed lightly with my husband, but neither of us really knows where to start. We do know that due to my age, we aren’t ‘allowed’ to start looking into fertility treatments (if they’re even needed) until we’ve been trying for a full year. Maybe because I’m a T1, we would be allowed treatment or testing sooner?

I’m glad to hear you had a fairly uneventful birth and that things turned back to normal fairly quickly. Having a low during birth is also another fear I have. I have a great diabetes care team and a high risk ob/gyn that will drop everything for her patients so I have no fear that I will be well taken care of… Diabetes is just so fickle and always seems to show its face at the most in opportune times.

Thanks again for sharing :slight_smile:

4

I knew pretty young that I’d likely have trouble conceiving, due to not having regular cycles. In 2008 (25 years of being diabetic) I got clearance from my medical team to go off birth control. When I was 5 weeks late with no period in sight and negative pregnancy tests, I happened to have my annual physical with my primary doc. She referred me to an OB, who I worked with for 6 months (4 cycles of clomid) before being referred to an RE. Once with the RE, we confirmed that I don’t ovulate on my own, with clomid or with femara. So, we moved on to Follistim and a trigger shot. We have been pregnant 4 times, have 2 living children and 4 dead children (losses were not due to diabetes).

Not sure of your age, but the general rule of thumb is if you are having regular cycles and regular intercourse during your peak time, you should get checked out after 6 months without a pregnancy if age 35 or over. If under 35 then it’s 12 months with no pregnancy. While we are now done TTC any more kids, if you ever have any questions, please let me know.

Brianna

5

Thanks for sharing your story Brianna. I am 33, my husband is 32 and we have no children, so we are trying for our first. I have had mostly regular/normal cycles since I first got my period at age 12. The only time I didn’t get it was the month during and immediately following my diabetes diagnosis (age 13). The possibility that I might have issues conceiving honestly never crossed my mind because for years, I swore I would never have children. Now that we are actively TTC, it’s just really frustrating to not get pregnant. Still in the TWW right now but I don’t feel any ‘different’, although I’m not sure how one would feel any different this early into a pregnancy.

6

So glad this topic got created! Thank you, @elizco4 for your willingness to reach out on this. I’ve been reading a fair number of great pregnancy and birth stories on this forum and am very happy when I do, but the TTC part can be hard and hearing the perspectives of women going through the same would be helpful.

I have also been trying to conceive my first child with my husband and it has not yet happened. This is our ninth month, but seventh cycle (more on this below). I have had T1D for a little over eight years (diagnosed in grad school at 29) and turned 37 this year. I worry a lot about the difficulty of conceiving, but am pretty sure by now that my age is a more decisive factor than my diabetes.

My control has always been good and I have had HbA1c’s in the 5.7-5.9 range the whole time we’ve been TTC. My and my husband’s preferences are to do things as naturally as possible and “escalate” along the tech scale of reproductive assistance only slowly. So, until now I’ve been tracking my basal temps religiously and have discovered that my ovulations are pretty regular, which is helpful to optimizing our efforts. I was determined to start getting tested (hormonal blood work on CD3 and 21; sonogram; HSG as a first “package” for me + CASA for my husband) as soon as we hit the six month mark, as @powvens also discusses, and even got all the lab orders from my OB/GYN in January. However, during the time of TTC I have actually gotten an egg fertilized in me twice, both of which ended in chemical pregnancies, possibly ending before/at implantation. Each of these experiences messed up the immediate cycle afterwards (basically delaying ovulation), which is why in nine months I’ve only had seven cycles. The more recent one happened just in February, so I am now waiting to start my next cycle before I can go for the tests on their respective required days (they are all pretty precisely timed according to cycle start and ovulation). If all goes as expected now, CD3 should be next Thursday, so this will be the next action on my part.

I have learned the most about the TTC process and what steps to pursue if things aren’t happening quickly from Dr. Robert Greene’s Perfect Hormone Balance for Fertility: The Ultimate Guide to Getting Pregnant. It does not deal with diabetes specifically, but you probably already know how to do that part. It reviews the different types of impediments to conception and guides you through the various testing and treatment options without jumping to hi-tech reproductive assistance solutions immediately (though covers those as well if none of the other recommendations help). So this has been my approach.

I’ll be very happy to continue communicating here with others who are in the middle of the same process and get advice and different approaches. Anyone reading – have a good day and join the discussion if it applies to you! :slight_smile:

7

Wow, thanks for the info @dessito! I love hearing others stories of immediate pregnancy and healthy births and all, but I feel like infertility and issues getting pregnant are oven either just not talked about in general or ‘swept under the rug’ or explained away by others with things like "it’s just not your time yet’ or ’ it’ll happen when it’s supposed to’. I actually started a blog about this very topic… I think the link is in my profile, but if it isn’t, it’s Here. I’ve only just stared it so there’s only one post up so far, but I’ll be writing another probably within a week or so.

Question: can you explain what the tests are you got done?

Thanks again for sharing :slight_smile:

8

Hey, so my husband and I tried for almost 2 years before we went for testing. I thought it might have to do with me being diabetic. The blood work all came back normal, and then I did the HSG test. They discovered that my right tube is blocked and the left tube is damaged. We were told that our option was to do IVF. I honestly couldn’t do IVF so we looked into adoption. We are now just waiting to find out if we are approved. The only thing I wish I would have started the testing a lot earlier we might be further along with the adoption process.

9

@elizco4 –

Finally I can respond, after managing to schedule this first wave of evaluations!

The tests I personally am having are of two main varieties: blood work to check various hormonal levels and two imaging tests. Most of them are scheduled around specific points in a monthly cycle:

  • on day 3 after starting a period (CD3), to assess the follicular phase:
    estradiol
    LH
    prolactin
    TSH
    T4free
    FSH
    testosterone
    ferritin
    AMH
    (I had the doctor add HbA1c as well for my information though it’s not part of the OB/GYN focus, since my last one was done in early December. Also, except for estradiol and FSH, the rest could be done at any time, but I preferred to bundle them all together on CD3 so that, hopefully, I get a more comprehensive picture as soon as possible. For the same reason, my husband is also going for a semen analysis at the same time.)

  • on CD7 (really could be any time after end of period and before ovulation):
    HSG (hysterosalpingography, which is an imaging procedure to evaluate the uterus and fallopian tubes with a dye-based x-ray)

  • right before ovulation (for the mythical “textbook” cycle, that would be CD12, for me, more like CD17):
    sonogram (an ultrasound to see the development of follicles, how many, their size and thickness of the endometrium)

  • a week after ovulation (for “textbook” cycles, on CD21), another blood draw to to confirm that ovulation happened and assess the luteal phase:
    progesterone

So this is it – fingers crossed for some answers and possible solutions… I would be curious to see what other things people have done, as well as what the second stage might be after this evaluation phase.

10

@dessito wow, that’s a LOT of tests… Although I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Thanks for sharing them. If we get to the point of needing me to be fertility tested, I’ll just bring this hahah.

Hopefully you’ll get some good news after all those tests. Keep us updated :slight_smile:

11

Hi Elizco4-
Here’s my story: I am currently 33, husband is 39. I’ve had diabetes for 18 years. We are now 20 weeks pregnant, with a girl, and everything is going really well! But it took us 2 years and some help to get pregnant, so I wanted to share my story as well for you and others. Knowing and hearing about others was really helpful me as we went through this process.

We started TTC in September 2013 - tracking cycles, using ovulation predictor kits, cycle tracking app, etc. My cycle is incredibly regular, but we did not get pregnant, and it was a little stressful on both of us to be on a “schedule”. After about a year, my OB/GYN offered to try Clomid, and refer us to a fertility clinic if we wanted it. Didn’t seem like Clomid gave that much of a bump on its own and I was nervous about adding more drugs without more info/guidance. Spring 2015, hubby had his testosterone checked and a semen analysis (both normal) and I had an HSG (Also normal - it’s a little painful but doesn’t last long).

Finally made an appointment with a local reproductive endocrinologist (RE) in October 2015. Did the AMH, estradiol, FSH tests which check various hormones - as Dessito said the estradiol and FSH they test on Day 3 of your cycle as the levels fluctuate over the month. For me the results were pretty much all normal. My regular endo already does the thyroid TSH/T3/T4 checks - definitely get those ASAP if you haven’t had it checked lately, don’t need official infertility diagnosis for that, diabetes is enough. The RE more or less said there wasn’t any real good reason why we hadn’t gotten pregnant yet, and so suggested trying Clomid with insemination (IUI), using a shot to trigger ovulation and help the eggs grow bigger before being released. We were successful on the second round using Letrozole instead of clomid and waiting an extra day to do the trigger/IUI - about Day 16/17.

As I said - we’re now about halfway through, and everything looks great, both me and baby. My A1c is low, and has been low for the past few years as we’ve been trying, and so far no complications or issues. I am being seen by the maternal fetal medicine high risk OB since they have a pregnancy & diabetes clinic, but no concerns really at this point that I will have any diabetes-related problems.

I’d say the only regret we have is waiting almost 2 years to go to the RE- should’ve made an appointment as soon as we hit the 1 year mark, but obviously in hindsight that is easier- we didn’t know at the time that next month wouldn’t be the month everything worked out.

Good luck to you, and definitely ask questions if you more, I’m happy to share more details about anything we’ve gone through. Hang in there, and make sure to take some time off or just work on having fun with your hubby without worrying about it for a month or two. Admittedly, it’s hard to not be letdown once you’ve decided you’re ready and your body isn’t cooperating!

-Beth

12

Hi Beth,
Thanks for sharing your story. My husband and I are still TTC (8-9 months in). He has made an appointment to get his sperm checked in June (I think), but I don’t think I can start to get tested for anything until August, when it will have been 1 year if TTC for us. If it gets to be August and I’m not pregnant, I do plan to call both my PCP and my Maternal Fetal Medicine/High Risk OB (who I saw a few times last year before TTC). I think I also need to chat with my mom about any fertility issues she may have had… she’s never been one to “share” stuff like that, but it would be good to know if she had issues. Thanks for sharing about the tests you had and meds you tried.

Glad to hear you’re halfway through with no problems. Hope the rest of your pregnancy is uneventful and you can meet your little girl in a few months!