Growing the Hill-Wood Family

Post wedding we had an amazing honeymoon in New York!

We flew with British Airways to New York for a week long adventure of big city life!

We stayed in The Crosby Street Hotel (Firmdale Group) and Ace Hotel! Both were amazing and great locations for exploring either end of Manhattan! They offered luxury and little havens of quiet after busy days walking, shopping, eating and being tourists!

Whilst on our honeymoon we discussed our family and that we might like to grow it and how we’d go about it.

At the time we only knew one same sex couple who had treatment and had their first baby - so we decided on route back to the UK we would contact them to find out what they did and how we should go about our plan to extend our family.

Due to the location the couple helping us with advice lived in - it meant they were eligible for NHS treatment and so their advice was to visit our GP. So that’s exactly what we did.

Our first appointment went appallingly - approaching them as a same sex couple we asked how we go about growing our family - to which we were hit with a wall. The GPs had no idea but said they would look into it… Two weeks later we got a call… There is no help for same sex couples.

So I contacted our local NHS trust to find out more. Again we were hit with no help. This is how the main conversation went:

The trust came back to us with “we do not help same sex couples as we do not supply donor materials”.

I responded “Ok I understand, what if we supplied the donor materials (we would buy the sperm), could we have the treatment?”

The NHS trust responded with “No, we do not supply donor materials and that would not work”.

“Ok” I said, “What about if we knew our male donor and we came in for treatment with our male donor, could you help us then?”

The NHS trust said “No. As we know you are a same sex couple and that wouldn’t work”.

Well I thought (as did my wife) - That’s just fucking great. Nothing like discrimination!

So in our local area - there is no support for same sex couples having treatment. If we wanted treatment we would have to pay for it. It’s an absolute postcode lottery!

We decided we would approach our local GP again. This time, I pretended I was “straight” and asked for fertility tests - checking our FSH (Follicle-stimulating hormone), LH (luteinizing hormone) and HIV tests. We then looked for a fertility treatment clinic to have a discussion about our possibilities as well as finding out costs.

We’d had a few “straight” friend couples that had treatment in at Care Fertility. Our friends gave glowing recommendations and so we booked in for our initial consultation.

Our consultant was wonderful and answered all our questions. We were made to feel extremely welcome and they explained the process to us both equally.

Due to our age infertility shouldn’t be an issue and we ran through the costs of IVF including treatment, scans and medication as well as Donor Sperm and any tests we may need to have.

Anyone for a brand new car or a baby?! The costs were equal to each other!

Now granted, if you’d like a baby it’s worth every single penny & your 110% committed but nothing like a kick in the goolies - especially when you know couples living in your local area (straight) are having treatment at the same clinic for not a single sausage thanks to the NHS!

Do the ’straight’ couples have any idea how much it costs? Do the clinic even let them in on the amount it costs the NHS to pay for their treatment? How much each medication costs, blood tests, through to the actual IVF and scans as well as the donor sperm (granted they don’t necessarily need this but still!).

You can’t help but begrudge those ‘straight’ couples and wish that they are feeling grateful for all the support they have received from the NHS! I mean - even if the NHS said they would cover the medication and treatment and those requiring donor material should cover that cost it makes it much fairer for all!

Anyway, rant over -we decided to have our initial blood tests done there and then at our clinic appointment because we thought why wait!

After our consultation we went home for a chat and to look at our finances and whether the timings for starting would work for us!

Egg donation was also something we had discussed and felt that it was only fair of us to look into this seeing as we were relying on the kind gesture of male donation to help us.

The clinic also gave us a list of online locations to begin the search for our sperm donor and to refine what sort of characteristics we were looking for.

My wife and I decided we would try my eggs first as My test results for my FSH came back quite low meaning I wasn’t growing many eggs. I believe it was only 12. We thought - with our age this will only get lower and so as my FSH was lower than my wife I would go first. We agreed we would have two rounds each of treatment should one go not be successful and that was our limit due to the costs. We booked back in with our clinic to begin the process, finalise the paper work, complete and further tests and scans and then choose our sperm donor.

We ended up on the Cryos sperm donation site as we wanted us much information about our donor as possible and this was perfect. We got a baby picture, his handwriting, his reason for donation via his letter and hearing his voice, a celebrity comparison from the nurses at his clinic, a comment from the nurses about the donor and background information about his family. We wanted to choose from a donation bank that would enable us to give our children as much information as we could before they would legally be able to find anything out.

As we were going to try my eggs first - we refined our donor search by looking for a donor with characteristics similar to my wife. We pretty quickly reduced the number of donors to our chosen donor and felt 100% happy we were making the right decision.

The donor sperm was sent to our clinic and I began the process of baseline scans, injections and pessaries.

We were so excited and so optimistic. Plus the clinic are always so positive you couldn’t help but get caught up in the excitement.

On egg collection day we only had just over a handful of eggs. We now had to pray for fertilisation before we would receive a call from the clinic to let us know.

They told us only a handful had fertilised and they would keep an eye on them to see if they could get to Blastocyst at 5 days or if they would need to go back into me at 3 days.

Unfortunately they didn’t make it to 5 days and so on day 3 we were back at the clinic for the eggs to be put back into me and start our TWW (Two Week Wait). None were viable for freezing for future treatment.

At the same time we were also moving house and so we were trying to distract ourselves with painting and the demolishing of walls!

A couple of days before we were meant to test I started to bleed. We were not feeling positive and so decided to test. It was negative. We were gutted. We’d got swept away with the excitement. We knew it was a possibility it wouldn’t work and so we both said we would try again knowing how the process works and that it wasn’t always 100% guaranteed as hopeful as you are!

Second time round - the clinic tried to adjust my medication for more eggs and better quality. We went through the usual scans and medication (and another round of expenses!). During the scans we were told it wasn’t looking great for collection and we could cancel this round of treatment because they were not sure the egg collection would be that fruitful. We decided to go with our gut and continue. We’d got this far and already spent the money so why not. This time they also tried ‘Embryo Glue’ in the hope this would make a difference.

On egg collection day we had even less eggs than the first time. We then found ourselves in the same situation of only a couple of eggs making it through to day 3 and starting the TWW again.

We were unsure what was going to happen and tried our hardest to not be thinking about babies and the things we would like to do as a family.

Unfortunately the same happened again and I was bleeding before my period was due to start and before we reached the end of the TWW. Again we tested and it was negative.

I thought I was ok and dealing with it (a few tears in the morning) but went to work.

I realised once I got to work how upset I was. A colleague said to me “It’s not the end of the world”.

They just had no idea. This broke me. I knew with the low level of eggs and quality and the agreement with my wife - our chances of having a baby with my eggs was over.

As much as the potential of having babies with my wife’s eggs was amazing, it was still a little heartbreaking to know my eggs were no good and no babies with my genes would be born.

I went home from work and cried. My wife came home and we cuddled. It was hard. Tough going. We’d spent so much money and you can’t help but think what if’s.

It took us a couple of months to recover before we decided to try again with treatment but this time with my wifes eggs.

My wife has polycystic ovaries and so this time they were concerned she could over stimulate and produce a lot of eggs. As much as this was a worry, it was also wonderful to hear potentially how many eggs we would have.

After my wife doing her time under the control of injections, hormones and scans it was egg collection day! We had so many eggs we were over the moon! Even more amazing was that nearly all of them made it to blastocysts and day 5!! With eggs to freeze! We felt so positive and excited it was just wonderful.

My wife also egg shared. This meant half of her egg collection was given to another lady trying to conceive. We both felt like this was something we should do (I would have if my eggs were better quality) as without our sperm donor we would not have had the chance to try for our family and so there are women out there and families that also need eggs. Unfortunately the lady was not successful with any of Lydia’s eggs. A really sad feeling because you are so hopefully for them and excited for them too.

On day 5 - our embryo was transferred into my baby incubator. We just felt so different and positive.

On day 3 of the TWW (3dp5dt - that’s three days post 5 day transfer - lingo for anyone googling - see the list below) I just had a funny feeling. I just knew I was pregnant. I can’t describe it but I knew. So I tested! It was positive!!!! We were over the moon but decided to test again with the clinic test when we were meant to! That of course meant I would test every day until the clinic test just to make sure! It stayed positive for every test and for our clinic test. We were so excited to tell them it had finally worked!

Once we had spoken to them we booked in our 7 week scan to check for our heartbeat and placement of the baby to ensure it was a good start to our pregnancy.

By the time we go to 7 weeks nausea had kicked in. It was constant but I hadn’t yet been sick - we were so hopefully this was a good sign.

Our 7 week scan was another internal scan. Whilst the nurse turned the screen to check herself before showing us, I think my eyes were shut with such nerves of what she was going to say. Then all of a sudden you heard “There they are, all looks great” before hearing a very fast heart rate and seeing a tiny blob on the screen!

I burst into tears and so did my wife. We were over the moon. It was just so unreal! We couldn’t wait to tell our closest family our news.

Our pregnancy went well and our surprise was a little girl born in December 2016. She was 2 weeks and 2 days overdue! But hey we had waited this long! She was a dream baby and we settled so quickly into family life. I’m sure a pregnancy/labor blog will come soon!

In 2017 we decided to try again with our frozen embryos!

Thankfully this time there were no injections or lots of medication but simply controlling our cycle and ensuring my lining was ready.

Our first embryo didn’t thaw as the embryology team would have liked, we thought ok we will try with another embryo…. second embryo - same again. We were assured how unusual this was but we could proceed with our last embryo to try again. Thankfully third time lucky, our little embryo thawed and was transferred and for the 4th time - we began our two week wait!

Unlike my previous pregnancy I wasn’t feeling as hopeful and definitely didn’t have the feeling of being pregnant. So we tested on the same day as we did in our last pregnancy (albeit earlier than advised!). It was negative. My wife reassured me I was just testing too early and to be patient! So we waited another couple of days. Then there was our pink line we had been waiting for! We were thrilled (and relieved) to let the clinic know and book us in for our 7 week scan!

We decided we’d find out what we were having this time at a private scan - another girl! We were so happy. The sickness then swiftly returned!

Our pregnancy went well up until the final couple of weeks where the baby decided to lay transverse and I had a lot of fluid! So after a two week hospital stay - our second daughter was born via C section in June 2018!

Our second born is a beautiful little scary mary! Definitely has no fear! Thankfully both girls are now playing together nicely…for all of 5 minutes!

But what next?! Well who knows! No more babies or more babies? Never say Never!

But having our family is definitely the best thing we’ve ever done, no matter how much of a rollercoaster journey!

It was all worth it in the end!