A Year of Change

So this post is going to talk about periods.  If you're not comfortable with that, you should probably just skip it.  Don't say I didn't warn you! ;) 

November of last year was when everything started to change (reproductively speaking).  This time last year my husband and I had pretty much lost hope that we were going to be able to get pregnant without help.  We'd been trying to conceive for long enough that if it was going to happen, it probably would have.  During that whole time I didn't even have a single late period, that is until last November.  I've always had 28 day cycles so when I hit 29 days I thought something might be up.  I told hubs.  He got excited.  I was scared and a little bit excited.  We got pregnancy tests, the good ones, and waited until the next morning to test.  Hubs got up early with me and I tested.  After the longest three minutes of my life I looked at it.  Negative.  He was still hopeful that it was just too early.  I knew that if a test wasn't positive by 16 days past ovulation that it wasn't going to turn positive or if it did it probably wasn't a viable pregnancy anyway.  The next morning there was still no period so I tested again, even though I knew what the result would be.  Negative, as expected.  I went back to bed and we laid there and cried.  I think that was the day that TTC broke us.  I had to wait two more days before my period finally arrived, and arrive it did, the day hubs and I were hosting Thanksgiving dinner for approximately 15 people.  To top it off, it was a very "memorable" period, and I'm a person who has had really bad periods for my entire life.  

So not only was I not pregnant that cycle, it soon became apparent that my textbook 28 day cycles were a thing of the past.  My periods were changing, in duration, in intensity, and in flow.  None for the better.  My regular OB/GYN wasn't the slightest bit concerned because, while abnormal for me, everything was still in the range of normal.  We were referred to the RE who was also unconcerned.  So I decided that if they weren't worried about anything I shouldn't be either.  We went through all of the testing, got shit results, and my periods continued to be inconsistent and weird.  They are still weird and heavy, and near crippling cramps a year later.  Oh, and hot flashes, can't forget those.  The solution seems to be to put me back on birth control, but that's not an option that I'm really open to exploring because I'm one of those people who didn't do well on birth control.  At this point I don't know what's up.  I know that something isn't right but I don't know what to say to make them take me seriously.  My fear is that this is the beginning of peri-menopause.  Is that illogical or are my concerns founded?  All of my female relatives had hysterectomies in their mid 30s so I don't even know what my family's average age for menopause is.  If anybody reading has gone though/is going through peri-menopause/menopause I would love to hear your two cents.  (I should mention that given my test results, early menopause is expected, I just didn't expect it this soon.)

A lot has changed since last Thanksgiving.  At this point I'm just going with the flow and taking things on as they come up.  Mercifully I will not have to deal with my period this Thanksgiving.  As an added bonus I should be in the clear for Christmas too.  There's not really a point to this post, I've just been thinking a lot about how last Thanksgiving was when it started to sink in that kids probably weren't in the cards for us, and how this Thanksgiving we're firmly there.  Thanks for sticking with me through this less than pleasant conversation about my biological functions.