“When nothing seems to help, I go look at a stone cutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.”

-Jacob Riies

My husband is a huge NBA fan and of course we have been watching the final series of the Miami Heat verses the San Antonio Spurs. I played bball in high school myself so I usually watch the games with him.

On Thursday we were watching the game and I mentioned how strange it is that now a days they actually film/broadcast what the coaches say to the players in the huddles.

Darren said, "well, all he ever says is "keep pounding the rock."

Me: "What? Why?"

Darren: "In theory if you keep pounding a rock, it will break. The Spurs are steady and strong but older. Their motto this year has been "keep pounding the rock."

Me: (I didn't respond out loud but get major epiphany) nod my head

It all the sudden totally applied to infertility to me (surprise surprise I could connect something to infertility since I'm never, wink wink, thinking about it). Pounding (in my case punching) a rock sounds really really painful. I imagine a really sore hand. Blood. Lots of pain. Frustration. But, with the inspiration of the San Antonio Spurs, they believe if you KEEP pounding the rock it will eventually break.

In the world of IF, I have beat the living $%#^#&## out of the rock. I am tired. I am bloody. I am frustrated. But what if all I need is just a few more hits before it breaks? What if I "give up" from all the pain and lack of movement when really one more strong punch would have done the trick?

Our IVF #3 is going to happen in July. I have been pounding the rock for over two years. Little weak hits of off-timed IUIs, some bigger hits with perfectly timed IUIs or even on our own, and my hands hurt bad. IVF #3 is going to be an extra hard punch. It will hurt (literally) but I pray that this will be the last swing I have to throw for a bit.

1 comment:

AnonymousJune 21, 2013 at 5:16 AM
Great analogy. That is the perpetual problem. We can never tell if we're one, a few, or 100 more swings away from conquering our ROCK.
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Meet the Bensons

Hi! I'm Holly and Darren is my husband. We have been married 5 years; after our 11th fertility treatment in 2013 we lost triplets (2 were stillborns in the 2nd tri). It nearly destroyed us. The day I delivered my son a friend emailed us and offered to carry some of our biological remaining embryos. The transfer was a success and we had twin boys born almost exactly a year-to-the-date later than when I delivered my son. If I'm not blogging about our journey, I'm teaching high school Spanish, drinking Starbucks, hanging out with family, eating candy-and then working it off at the gym. If you ever need to contact me directly you can at hollybenson10@yahoo.com or if you want to see more into our daily lives, my instagram is hbenson10

Babies in Heaven

We have had two miscarriages and 2 stillborns (born 3 weeks apart). I'm 50/50 on naming the early miscarriages but it gives me a sense of peace and reality of their lives. In heaven, I will call for them.

Jaden lost 11/2012 blighted ovum (my sister gave me the idea for this name, it means "God has heard" and he had because it was our 1st pregnancy)

Isaac lost 8/2013 everything was perfect and then stopped at 9 weeks (my sister is law gave me this idea. Isaac means "laughter" and everyone's first reaction to us having triplets was laughter)

Infertility Treatment Journey

Me: 31 I have mild PCOS and ovulate very randomly (I respond to femera and on that have normal cycles)

Husband: 32 He has "lower" sperm count, low morphology 4% and low T

2000-Diagnosed with PCOS

3/15/2011-Got off pill

4,5,6/2011-Tried "naturally"

7/2011-Determined anovulatory (don't ovulate on my own) and low sperm count/low morphology

8/2011-50 MG Clomid, no O, BFN

9/2011-100MG Clomid, no O, BFN

11/2011-100 MG Clomid, no O, BFN

12/2011-150 MG Clomid, ovulated!!

12/2011- #1 IUI too early, IUI #2 three days later, BFN

1/2012-150 MG Clomid, false positive OPK, #3 IUI, no O, BFN

2/2012 No O

3/2012-5 MG Femera, No O, BFN

4, 5/2012-7.5 MG Femera, OVULATED!!! BFN

5-6/2012- 7.5 MG Femera, False Positive, IUI #4

6/2012, True O (4 days after fake one), IUI #5, BFN

7/2012, 7.5 MG Femera, 1st ever follicle scan (2 follies), 1st ever HGC shot, IUI #3 (but really #6) , BFN

8/2012, 7.5 MG Femera, HSG test (came back normal), IUI #7 on day of LH surge instead of day after, confirmed O (progesterone 25), BFN

9/2012, 7.5 MG Femera, Follicular scanning round 2, HCG shot, IUI #8, found out HCG shot hardly took (progesterone level on 5.5), BFN

9/26/2012 Start Birthcontrol for pending IVF cycle

9/28/2012 Trial Transfer at hospital, wait for IVF protocol

10/8/2012, Started first shots of LUPRON!!

10/20/2012, Started "stimulation" injections 125 ius of follistem in morning and 100ml menopur at night, lupron reduced to 10 ml at night.

10/30/2012, egg retrieval surgery day, 24 eggs retrieved!

10/31/2012, embryoligst called, 20 fertilized!

11/2/2012, pushing day 3 transfer to day 5 or 6, all 20 are still in the running!

11/4/2012, transfered 2 perfect scored embryos, only 4 extras made it to the "ice age" zone...10 day wait.

11/13 2012, #1 IVF took hpt BFP first one EVER
confirmed 11/14 bloodwork BETA 100

11/16 2012, last BETA check to make sure embryo is growing. Bad News, BETA #2 only 104

11/19 2012, BETA #3 only 134. Praying for a miracle but heartbreakingly dim hope

11/26 2012, BETA #4 881

11/28 2012, BETA #5 2021 FINALLY DOUBLED!!

12/4, 2012, ultrasound confirmed miscarriage, BFN

12/10 2012, D&C

1/08, 2013, started provera to induce period to start the LONG 7 week protocol for FET (projected date March)

1/16/2013, Cycle day 1 from provera

2/1/2013, Start 20ml Lupron injections to put everything to sleep

2/16/2013, Supressed. Reduced lupron to 10ml and taking estradial pills

3/1/2013, Lining check ultrasound was told lining looks "perfect" stop Lupron injections/start PIO

3/8/2013, Transfered two frozen embryos 1 4AA 1 4AB. 2 week wait begins

3/17/2013, #2 IVF (FET) BFN, hcg beta 1

4/10/2013, trying on our own! 7.5mg femera, O on CD #20, BFN

5/1/2013, 1 more month of "solo" 7.5 mg femera, O on CD #17, BFN

6/2013-Started Lupron till the 17th and then stimmed from June 29 to July 6-1 menopur vile nightly, started me on 100 iuis of follistem but quickly dialed me down to 50

7/2013, 17 eggs retrieved, 11 mature, 11 fertilized, 9 made it to blast-transferred 3: 2-4AA, 1-4AB, froze 6 to join our other 2 frosties (8 frosties total from the 2 IVFs)-BFP!!!

7/22 Beta #1 440 (9dp5dt)

7/24 Beta #2 939 (11dp5dt)

7/31 Beta #3 15,431 (18dpt5dt)

8/09/2013: TRIPLETS! 3 perfect heartbeats
8/16/2013 (7.5 weeks) 3 heartbeats on track

8/25 light spotting
8/26 Miscarriage of 1 triplet (fetal pole had completely stopped) :(

10/9/2013: It's a boy and a GIRL!!

10/22/2013:PPROM-water sac broke at 17 weeks :(

10/30-delivered my stillborn daughter at 18 weeks, 1 day

11/17-due to infection, I was forced to deliver Jude, our son at 21 weeks, also a stillborn

2/12/14-caught a random ovulation on CD 27. We will move towards medicated cycles as a next step...

3 and 4/14 strong ovulation with femera and Darren on clomid and back to back IUIs-BFN

5/18/2014-ovulated on own-BFN

6/2014 Trying to not "try" but I'm still looking for signs of O

7/2014 I ovulated around day 25, BFN

8/2014, ovulated around day 30, BFN

9/2014-gestational carrier is 24 weeks pregnant with our genetic twin boys so I start birth control to induce lactation

Infertility is...

Watching your husband playing with your friend's baby and
wishing you could give him one of his own.

Telling nurses to please take blood from your right arm because the veins in your left arm are all gone because of all the IVs you've had.

Avoiding people you haven't seen for a long time because you
don't want to hear the question, "Do you have any kids yet?".

Feeling very left out when your friends start comparing their
pregnancy or childbirth experiences.

Feeling like the whole town is pregnant except for you.

Getting tired of people always expecting you to do things
because "you don't have any kids to worry about".

Waking up in the middle of the night and wishing you could hear your baby crying.

Wishing you could give your parents grandchildren.

Wanting to fall apart if one other person says, "Why don't
you adopt?" Easy, right?

Sometimes avoiding friends who are pregnant or with newborns because you just can't handle the situation at that moment.

Every single time you babysit someone else's kid they go off about how you are getting "practice." I want my own child, I know how to change a diaper. Thanks.

Credits: How to Have a Baby: Overcoming Infertility

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Keep Pounding the Rock

“When nothing seems to help, I go look at a stone cutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.”

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