Chemotherapy and the Loss of Fertility

During the onset of mild psychosis Randy and I experienced while trying to uncover why Emmy’s body flailed and spasmed 24 hours a day in Boston, how could we have understood the gravity of the question or long-term consequences the doctor was asking?

“There is a possibility that the chemotherapy will harm Emmy’s ovaries and she will not be able to have children. I know she’s only eight years old and it’s hard to look that far in the future, but we need to know if you want us to harvest any eggs before we begin the transplant process”.

That question seemed ludicrous to us. Who could think about having babies when our little girl down the hallway was flailing and screaming in pain? I was barely able to sign the “Consent to Treatment” document that allowed them to fill her tiny, frail body with chemo, so how could I even consent to harvesting eggs? All I could think about day and night was, “WHY IS HER BODY SPASMING?” I didn’t think she would live through the 14 days of chemo, let alone live long enough to get married and have babies. Then came the second bone marrow transplant and the same question of harvesting eggs. But the spasms had returned from the sedation, and I already knew her eggs were probably ruined from the first round of chemo, so we declined egg harvesting. But with each questioning about babies and eggs, never once did I fully understand that the chemo not only ruined Emmy’s future chances of having babies, but also the organ that held them… the ovaries. I knew she may not have a monthly cycle, but at the time, that didn’t seem so bad. So here we are, on the other side of torment and death and dealing with the next level of the aftershock of “CNS restricted HLH”.

If you have followed Emmy’s story, you noticed Emmy is the shortest 15-year-old and hasn’t hit puberty yet. She stands at a whopping 49 ½ inches. Her awesome team at Arkansas Children’s Hospital is always on the forefront of her needs and scheduled her for a few tests. Emmy first had a bone density test done and it showed weakening in her bones, so they sent Emmy to endocrinology last week. The doctor warned me that Emmy will most likely need to be put on estrogen, since she hasn’t shown any signs of the onset of puberty. Estrogen is essential because without it, women’s bones become weak, hence hormone therapy after menopause. The doctor also said a monthly injection of some medicine will be needed to harden her bones. Three vials of blood were drawn for over 20 test and the answers are finally here.

Miraculously, Emmy’s thyroid and hormone glands in her brain are operating perfectly. The hormones released from the brain are what tells the ovaries to function and ovulate. But the test was very clear, Emmy’s ovaries are not responding to the hormones and not functioning in the least. She is void of estrogen. But I have learned a great deal about hormones, medicine and treatments from my years teaching women’s health classes on natural supplements and essential oils, and I know that synthetic hormones are detrimental to women (and men).

To back up a bit, if you read Emmy’s book Crushed but Not Broken, you will remember how during the DTSD [During-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder] (for the trauma has lessened but always present in the reminder Emmy is left with so many physical disabilities), I finally got our eldest child to a doctor. My brain was having a hard time focusing on the health of more than one child at a time. So, after years of painful and missed cycles, the doctor was able to diagnose her with PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome). She was put on synthetic hormones after months of trying to fix the problem naturally. But because of Emmy’s greater risk of cancer (from the chemo), I reached out to a functional doctor because I knew putting her on synthetic hormones would only be a last option. I knew of bio-available and bio-identical hormones after researching Young Living’s Progessence+, made from plants. Doctor Amy Beard’s office sent me the name of a few local doctors and a compounding pharmacy that mixes the bio-available hormones to meet the exact needs of the patient. Imagine, you get exactly what your body needs, no more, no less.

And just like that, God opened the pathway for not only Emmy, but our eldest daughter to get an appointment with a women’s clinic in Conway to get her off all the medicine that hasn’t worked and finally start taking bio-available hormones that will hopefully made her feel better. PCOS sucks the actual life out of you. Energy is a joke, brain-fog is constant and the evil side-effect of never being able to control your weight is ever-present.

And the compounding pharmacy the doctor recommended? My neighbors own it! I was able to ask them so many questions and find more clinics that will prescribe bio-available hormones to teens, because I can’t find anyone at AR Children’s that even knows about them. Monday, I hope to get an appointment for Emmy, as well.

After all we now know, and the talks Emmy has about having a baby one day, I would have only done a few things differently. Maybe if she would have been calm and without the spasming side-effects of sedation, we may have harvested her eggs. We just don’t know. We try not to think back and wish, “If we only knew, we would have…”, because that brings on a whole ocean of emotions and can quickly send us back into a cavern of sadness.

Emmy knows if she falls in love and wants babies, there are thousands of babies who will need parents to love and cherish them. Adoption is an option. But only God knows her future. God has worked miracle upon miracle and knows the desires of Emmy’s heart and it will all work out in due time. But until then, I am so thankful God led me down the path of homeopathic medicine, natural remedies and the ability to read and comprehend medical research. With that knowledge I can choose paths that are less likely to harm Emmy and keep her on this earth as long as God has planned for her. Because Emmy was created for a purpose and the world has yet to see all that she can accomplish.

“For I know the plans I have for you”, declares the Lord, “plans to proper you and not harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future”. Jeremiah 29:11

~ Love, Missy