I called the clinic and postponed the u/s until Friday morning, which was when it was supposed to be anyway (I had moved it to today because of work conflicts). So, I basically decided to say “screw work” and moved it back to Friday. So the u/s will be on day 4 (well, 3.5) so hopefully it won’t be as humiliating!
Question for you — do you ladies “groom” more for appointments, or do you like to go natural?
I really don’t have that much to report. I have been doing lots of non-TTC things. I had a three day weekend and spent most of it with my dog since TW was away for five days and PT is with her mom. I went down to my friend’s farm, she boards dogs, and it was better than any dog park! Sutter got to run and play for four hours with 15 dogs. And I got to sit with my friend and enjoy the scenery, drink wine and eat chocolate…doesn’t get any better than that! I also took the dog to his agility class, and he KICKED ASS. Everyone was asking me how much I work with him between classes because he has improved SO much and he is fearless (the answer — that would be about five minutes!)
I fed lots of people. On Friday night I was talking to my friend P and she casually said, ‘What are you doing tonight’. I said, ‘Nothing’ and before I knew it I said, ‘Wanna come over, I will cook you dinner’. Then (after I hung up) I said DOH, because I had a hell of a week and I was SUPER tired. But I ended up making a pan roasted halibut with french olives, tomato, lemon, garlic, capers and olive oil; onion rice pilaf and asparagus. For dessert we had fresh strawberries with two kinds of ice cream (haagen dasz dolce de leche and macadamia nut brittle), warm chocolate sauce and whipped cream…mmmm…drooling on my keyboard. On Sunday night my friend A gave me a massage. She is in massage school and needed the hours…she didn’t have to ask me twice! I brought dinner: home made potato/leek soup with parmesan cheese and green onions; mixed baby greens with chicken, candied pecans, blue cheese and apples (home made dressing), and chocolate cake (also home made). And on Monday I went to the farm and brought my friend lunch: sesame/peanut noodles with jullienne red bell pepper and Asian slaw with chicken and peanuts. I said it before and I said it again — no wonder I need to lose 15 pounds!
All this time I have been waiting for AF to show up. I stopped the BCP on 2/14 and thought it would arrive two days later. Today I e-mailed the clinic to see if there was a problem if I don’t get my period, and they said not to worry about it. I was worried though because I have my baseline u/s tomorrow morning and didn’t want to be on day 1 for that. Well, of course AF showed up at about 3pm today, which means I will be on day 2 tomorrow. For the dildo cam. YUCK. I swear, REs should have a segment on the show “Dirty Jobs” with Mike Rowe (I love him, by the way).
That is all to report. If everything looks good tomorrow, I start stimming on Friday. FIVE shots a day! Lupron in the a.m. and p.m., Follistim in the a.m. and p.m., and Menopur in the p.m. Woo Hoo! I think I am going to need a bigger sharps container.
Yes, back to CD1.
I am going to do an IVF cycle…I am gearing up. I went to the clinic today for my blood draw…I am SO lucky that my clinic is literally 2 miles from my office. I feel ready. I AM READY. The nerves that I felt before the first cycle are not there, because the fear of the uknown is not there. The fear of failure is there though — so much so. I struggle to keep a positive outlook.
TW has an appointment to “do his thing” on Valentine’s Day, to give a sample for freezing as a back-up. Nothing like a little self-love on Valentine’s Day! I am pretty sure that as things are going, I will be doing this cycle solo. TW’s work schedule is really whacked for the next couple of months.
So, I give myself a Lupron shot on Sunday at 5pm, and go in for a 2nd blood draw on Monday at 9am. The lovely Lupron Challenge. I hope that I respond okay!
At the clinic, they installed a new HD TV in the lobby, a huge flat screen. And what were they showing? “Planet Earth”. If any of you haven’t seen the series, it is a MUST. But the ironic thing is that the episode they were playing was about a polar bear. Yes, my lovely, sad, endangered polar bear. They were showing him swim from an ariel view, going under ice flows and back up for air. I wanted to sit there all day and watch him. I was tearing up just watching, while waiting for the nurse to call me. I wanted to tell her to wait when she called my name but I dragged myself in the room. When I came out after the blood draw, it was the scene where the starving polar bear was trying to kill a walrus. He was too weak and too slow. And the walrus got away, but not before injuring the polar bear’s foot. It was not a fatal wound, but the poor bear was too weak from starvation. The last scene he lies down and shuts his eyes. And you know he wasn’t going to open them again. My poor, lovely bear. I wish I could help him.
Watching the polar bear swim reminded me of my dream.
What is it about the polar bear? He keeps coming back to me at random moments. I hope he brings me some luck. Somehow. Please.
1. I went out to dinner with TW at an old restaurant that I hadn’t been to in ages. It started out as a nice night, we were having a nice conversation, good wine, yummy food. As always is the case, my mind wandered to the thought of babies and I said, ‘Can you see it? Can you imagine us with a little baby? Do you think it will happen?’ And to my horror TW’s response was, ‘Only God knows’. This, to me, is so similar to the “If it is meant to be” or “If it is in God’s plan” comment….the comment that makes me go into outer orbit. And it came out of my husband’s mouth. I almost completely lost it! I think my mouth dropped open and I could feel my eyes begin to tear up. And I went into my usual diatribe — about people like Britney Spears and Nicole Ritchie - THEY are meant to be mothers because God wants it so. And the guy in Alabama who dumped his 4 children ages 3, 2, 1 and 4 months over the bridge. And the woman in DC who killed all four of her children because they were possessed by the devil. THEY are the ones that God has chosen. And not me? Not me? I seriously could have stabbed him with my steak knife. I think he realized he said exactly the wrong thing but it still baffled me that the guy I am married to, the one that has been through this with me for so long, is so clueless!!! It ended up okay, believe it or not, it ended up in laughter. On the way home I yelled at him some (since I couldn’t yell at the restaurant) and then at the end of my vent, he yelled, “GOD IS GREAT” and I just busted into hysterically laughter. And then later at home we turned on the TV and watched the news. As usual the news was full of awful stories of murder and tragedy, and after each story I said, ‘That is in God’s plan” and then TW would yell “GOD IS GREAT. It was really dumb but at least we couldn’t fight anymore because we were laughing too hard.
2. At acupuncture on Saturday, K really got my hopes up. I am trying not to be mad at her because I love her so much. But at the beginning of each treatment, she takes my pulses on both wrists. Usually this is completely uneventful, I don’t even know what she is looking/listening for (she also always asks to check my tongue, I need to google that too!). In any event, after checking my pulses, K asked me if I had eaten (she always does this as well, but usually b/c my appointments are at 10am and I am not a breakfast girl — she is trying to change that). When I told her that I had lunch (a turkey sandwich and some chips), she said, “Huh. Okaaaaaaay….”. She sounded really curious so I asked her what was going on. She told me that my pulses were GREAT, REALLY GREAT, whatever that means. And then she got so bold as to say that my pulses sound like pregnant pulses! Then she immediately said she hates saying that, and that she never usually says it, but that sometimes she can tell….but that sometimes she is wrong. Then she said something feels really different. What the fuck. I asked her what about my pulses sounded “pregnant” and she said that they were just really strong. She also mentioned that my hands and feet were really hot and a little sweaty, and usually I am frozen. I actually did notice this heat myself, it is pretty cold here (45 degrees or so and mid thirties overnight) and I have felt pretty warm. The heat hasn’t been on at night, and I am taking off layers of clothing while TW is asking me to turn the heater on. So, I am not sure what is going on with me, but I really wish K hadn’t said anything about pregnancy. I have had my hopes up so high so many times! I am trying to just assume that acupuncture and herbs are doing something for me, in a good way. My body is changing for the better for the next IVF cycle. K was really apologetic for blurting it out, and kept saying she doesn’t know what is going on, I should keep an open mind, and we will just wait and see what happens. I am 8DPO (if I ovulated after her last treatment on 1/13). No other “symptoms” except for the elevated temperature (or I should say the feeling of elevated temperature since I am not doing BBT anymore). Aaaaaack!
3. Yesterday TW ran in a 10k race with his dad. I was going to stay home but he convinced me it was my wifely duty to go and cheer them on. So I went. I really didn’t want to go, especially after the “God is Great” conversation the night before. But I got up and bundled up like the little brother in A Christmas Story. And I was COLD, it was 33 degrees in the sun. I waited at the finish line and 1 hour after they started, here comes TW….grunting with every step and running with a really weird gait. He crossed the finish line and then it was clear that he was in severe pain…he sprained his ankle a mile before the finish line! It was a trail run through the woods, lots of obstacles and pits and rocks, etc. But this was totally his fault. He was running up a steep hill and three women passed him … he couldn’t have that! So, he decided to run as fast as he could down the steep hill on the other side. He said he was running so fast he was barely in control. And he sprained his ankle when it hit a seed pod. Serves him right! I mean, if he ran at a normal pace he would have gained at least 3 or 4 minutes on his time. But he had to run out of control and ended up injuring himself. And the three women he was trying to catch up to beat him anyway. And who is paying for his stupidity?? That would be me. He is the WORST patient!!! (But of course his sprained ankle isn’t stopping him from trying to have sex with me three times a day…I seriously wonder what has gotten into him! I wonder if his hormones have normalized in some magical way?) I will be so curious to see what his counts are when he gives a sample for our next IVF.
I was hankering for a snack today and decided a salad sounds good, and healthy too. So I got out the lettuce, spinach, cherry tomatoes and cucumber and put a bunch in a bowl. And then I decided to make home made blue cheese dressing, with mayonnaise, sour cream, blue cheese, garlic, lemon juice, pepper, green onions…I added a little non-fat yogurt for posterity but UGH, I have turned this salad into a snack worse than an ice cream sundae!
I have been corresponding with the IVF clinic about our next cycle and I will go in for CD3 blood work when AF arrives. I asked them if they still had TW’s sample from last time, he gave them a sample to freeze as a back-up. I assumed that they had it, since we used fresh sperm for the 1st IVF. The clinic informed me that per the contract, they destroy any unused sperm. ANNOYING, and I totally forgot. So TW has to go on antibiotics for 5 days again and then “do his thing”. TW’s travel schedule is going to be hectic the next two months so I am banking on going through IVF#2 by myself. But it sure would have been nice if they kept that sperm. So I asked if we could keep it next time if we don’t use it and they said we could but it would be an extra $720 dollars to store it! OMG, forget it. I swear, IVF clinics are money making machines.
Yikes - thanks for bearing with me through this monster post!
Tell me something I didn’t know.
I got my IVF report in the mail yesterday. I don’t have it in front of me right now, but here are the basic points:
**They gave me a higher dose of stims than the average patient
**Despite this, my egg retrieval only produced 7 eggs (expected 10-14)
**All 7 fertilized (expected 65-80% fertilization) - better than expected
**None of the embryos developed “normally” - they were slow to grow and fragmented
**Since none of the 3 embryos implanted, they were not viable
**Conclusion - POOR EGG QUALITY CAUSED THE FAILURE
So, TW’s sperm is probably fine, since all 7 eggs fertilized. It is so shocking to me that this whole time, it was probably MY problem, not TW’s. For the last 4 years, until we met with the IVF clinic, no one ever pointed the finger in my direction. It is my rotten, cracked, stinky, old eggs.
I feel so screwed. So totally and completely screwed. The end of the letter stated that I am still a candidate for IVF (gee, thanks!) and that I have a 20% chance of having a live birth. That seems highly optimistic to me.
The only bright side is that my acupuncture treatments (supposedly) can help with egg quality after three months of treatment. My first IVF attempt was after only 2 months of acupuncture. Maybe there is something she can do to help. Once we go for our 2nd attempt, I will have 4 months of acupuncture treatment under my belt. She has also added some herbs that she has found to be helpful for egg quality.
I am already starting to have a mind frame shift, I can feel it. I am imagining my life without any kids, prepping myself for it. Because right now, it feels like the inevitable.
11dp3dt
OMG. OMG. OMG. I am on the verge of tears. I just have NO idea what the results will be, but my heart is leaning towards a BFN. Don’t people who have successful IVF cycles KNOW IT before beta? Don’t they have some sort of feeling about it? I just feel so …. NOT pregnant. Not that I know what being pregnant feels like. I am glad I haven’t POAS. Believe it or not, I am not even tempted.
Well, despite my better efforts, the evil SIL is coming here to take PT shopping today. At 3pm. She must think I am really stupid. If she truly bought a $54 jacket for PT, if she was being honest, then why the heck would she drive 3 hours down here and 3 hours back to spend another $54 dollars on a new jacket for PT. Wouldn’t she ask for the jacket back so she could try to return it herself? The truth comes out - she is a LIAR. I am so thankful I have a 8-5 job and I can just say that I have to work, sorry, cannot participate. TW can have fun with his psychotic sister. I am going to stay late at work to avoid any contact. In the mood I am in, there is no way I can slap a smile on my face and play nice with the BEE-ATCH.
My BFF J2 called me last night. She told me that I should try the Five Senses Exercise when I need to get my mind off things. To choose five things that I will get pleasure from, one for each of the five senses: touch, sound, sight, taste, smell. Sutter Puppy fulfilled four of those things easily. I always feel better when I look at him. He was asleep when I was talking to J2 and I glanced over at him and it warmed my heart. I touched his silky soft ears and listened to him “purr” when I rubbed his belly. I smelled his puppy breath (it is starting to mutate into stinky dog breath, but there is still some puppy smell there!) and buried my face in his fur. He is as close to a baby as I have right now. The only thing I couldn’t do is the taste part! Yes, last week he French kissed me by accident - GROSS - but I opted for an ice cream sundae with chocolate sauce and whipped cream. YUM. I am supposed to do the Five Senses each day. Today I will pick things that have nothing to do with my puppy or ice cream. It is a good distraction. Thank you J2!
One more day and a wake up….and I will know the answer.
At the end of 9dp3dt
Gawd. I literally am hopeful for five minutes then doubtful the next. I have visions of calling my parents with good news, which get overpowered by images of burying myself under the blankets for days on end in tears. I picture myself telling my brother the good news over Christmas, he toasting me with champagne while I sip a non-alcoholic beverage. Then I envision partying (aka drowning my sorrows) with my friend M when we go up to the mountains for a few days after Christmas. I am imagining the “congratulations” phone call from the IVF clinic. Then I picture myself trying to hold myself together on Friday afternoon when they tell me my beta was undetectable. I have plans on Friday night. I feel like I should cancel them just in case I get bad news…I won’t be any shape to see anyone. Or should I leave the plans in place in case I am over the moon with joy! I have never felt so much like a someone with multiple personality disorder. Call me Sybil.
I keep checking my bo.obs - they are sore, but they look just the same…and I know that progesterone supplements make my boo.bs sore.
I have had a headache for two days. Symptom of pregnancy? Or just symptom of stress?
Today I had this weird half nauseous/half hungry feeling for hours. Like I felt really hungry, and my tummy was growling, but my mouth was salivating too much and I felt kind of sick. And I felt starving all day.
I got up to pee twice two nights in a row. Once at around midnight, the next time at around 4am. Then I had to pee when I actually got up at 6am. I am peeing about every hour during the day, and my bladder feels like it is going to burst each time! But am I drinking more water than usual? I don’t know!
I have had a few weird crampy feelings in my stomach and some twinges in my ovaries off and on. Are these in my head?
I spotted a tiny bit yesterday, but it stopped. Is this a sign of implantation? (Could that be right? at 8dp3dt?) Or is it my yeast infection or irritation from the suppositories?
What I don’t have: sensitivity to smells, being over heated, being super tired, dark nip.ples, veins in my chest.
I know that some women don’t get symptoms until 4-6 weeks. I know that these “symptoms” I do have could just be completely in my head. It is probably too early. I am over analyzing every little thing.
One thing I do know. I am NOT going to POAS.
What a complete mind fuck. This is the most torture I have ever put myself through. Voluntarily. $26,000 worth of voluntary. Sometimes I think: WHAT WAS I THINKING.
What am I going to do if I get a negative beta?
What am I going to do if I get a positive one!
8dp3dt
My new friend “C” was really nice. Her story was pretty amazing. She married a guy 15 years her senior when she was 25. When she was about 30 they started TTC, but nothing happened. Her husband has three kids from a prior marriage (they were in grade school when they got married) so they were completely surprised when the RE told them that sperm motility was the issue. They went straight to IVF. The first cycle, they got 7 eggs (just like me) and put two in. They froze two and the other three didn’t make it. She got pregnant the first time! Surprisingly her low beta numbers turned out to be twins. She carried the twins to term, but one of them died three days after he was born. So sad. I wasn’t really sure what the complication was. She said something about the baby’s penis having retained some fluid and getting an infection, but I didn’t really understand what happened….I didn’t want to ask questions, she was getting teary talking about it. But her other baby thrived and is now in 2nd grade.
After the trauma of losing a baby, her husband was completely against embryo transfers of more than one embryo. He was just too scared of having multiples. So they did FIVE more IVFs, transferring one embryo only. None of them stuck. For the last attempt, they put two embryos in, and she has her 4 year old son.
When we were having coffee at the Starbucks, this other woman walked in that I recognized, but didn’t know. She was also a mom at PT’s school. C knows her and after the other woman left, C told me that the woman also did IVF! She had triplets and one of them was lost as well, but she has her twins in 2nd grade. It made me wonder…how many other kids at PT’s school came from IF treatments? For the last 5+ years, every time I went to PTs school for whatever reason, I always looked around feeling sorry myself, looking at all the moms and thinking they all had it so easy. But obviously that was not the right attitude. The stat is something like 20% of couples have trouble conceiving. So, out of the 500 or so families at PT’s school, maybe 50-75 dealt with IF? (I dropped it from 20% to 10-15% because I guess some couples who go through IF never end up having kids…so obviously they wouldn’t be at PT’s school). But this was really eye opening. Sometimes I am so self absorbed. Even though I realize that IF hits so many people, it is hard not to just focus on ME, ME, ME.
C was really sweet, but kind of dingy. I told her that I had questionable egg quality based upon my fertilization report. She said, “What is a fertilization report?” And she asked a bunch of questions about IVF that I thought someone who had been through it seven times would already know…I realize she did it starting 7 years back and maybe things have changed somewhat, but still. I thought SHE would be more of expert, but she seemed to just look at the whole process as some sort of miracle. It seems like she went through the motions for IVF, but didn’t do any reading about it and never tried to UNDERSTAND what was going on in her body. I guess everyone is different. I couldn’t go through this process without trying to understand everything.
She also kept repeating herself that she KNOWS I am pregnant, she just knows it. I like positive attitudes, and I certainly need them, but sometimes it is annoying. She kept saying, “You have good egg quality!” but I had just told her that we weren’t sure about that. She wants me to call her on Friday so we can meet that night (the night of my beta). I am so nervous. I guess I will see how I feel. If I have a negative beta, I think I will be crawling under a rock for a while.
One thing I have been thinking about that really threw me at acupuncture on Saturday. Of all people, K has always been SUPER positive during this process. She has always said I don’t need any luck, that IVF was going to work for me, blah, blah. For some reason when K does this it isn’t annoying…maybe because I feel like she has experience dealing with IF people in her practice and she has seen the success stories with her own two eyes. But this last session, when she asked me how I felt and I told her that I didn’t think it worked, she didn’t try to talk me out of that feeling. She just said, ‘Oh, okay’ and became quiet. Then I was the one that tried to explain that maybe it did work, I don’t have symptoms but it may not mean anything, some people don’t have any symptoms this early….and K agreed with me, but she was kind of quiet about it. Then later she even slipped and said, “So next time you try IVF…” So, I have a feeling K doesn’t think it worked either.
Trying to just hold out until Friday, but having another BFN after all this is going to be really hard to bear.
7dp3dt
I am wasting posts with my annoying drivel. I should probably wait a few days so that I have something interesting to say! But I am bored and distracted. So I am going to use this blog to waste a few minutes.
I had acupuncture yesterday and she told me to buy some acidophilis for my yeast infection. I ran out and bought some and started taking it, but it hasn’t helped yet. It is weird to think I am ingesting billions of bacteria on purpose! But it is supposed to replace the bacteria that the doxycycline killed last week. I hope it gets the yeast problem under control. Believe me, progesterone suppositories + yeast infection = wanting to jump out the window.
My acupuncturist always takes my pulses and yesterday she said that my pulses were “hungry” and asked if I had eaten anything yet. I hadn’t. I always wonder when she takes my pulses — do pregnant women have pregnant pulses? Would she be able to tell if I am pregnant before I get my beta? I guess it is moot b/c my next appointment is on Saturday morning and my beta is on Friday. GAWD. The 2WW is so slow. I am only half way there. It seems that my ET was SO long ago but it was at 11:30am last Sunday!
So far symptoms can be completely attributed to progesterone supplements: really sore boobs, bloated, gassy, cranky, hungry all the time, constipated, peeing every three seconds. WOW. I am such a joy to live with right now!
My plan to ask for the receipt from my SIL for PT’s jacket backfired on me. She went into this huge tale (LIE) about how she bought it at this one department store, and that she even thought that the sleeves looked a little short, but that the sales girl said the kids are wearing thermal shirts underneath jackets with short sleeves now, it is all the rage. This department store she mentioned always puts a sticker on the tag so that if the receipt is lost, you can still return it. This jacket had NO TAGS anywhere. Don’t you leave tags on gifts when you give them? I just cut the small part with the price off. My SIL lies so much, she begins to believe her own lies. It is quite amazing. Anyway, the next thing she said was that PT would be getting a gift certificate for that store in the mail. Which was fine! I thought “I WON!”. Then the next message was that my SIL wanted to drive down here today and take PT shopping. OMG. Seeing SIL twice in one weekend is enough to make me gag and I don’t even have morning sickness (yet). I think she is feeling tres guilty that we called her on her bullshit finally. Anyway, I e-mailed her back that the Sunday after Thanksgiving is the WORST day to drive during the whole year, and that we had plans anyway (LIE). She was mad, but I don’t care. She thinks the world revolves around her and no one ever has plans to do anything, we just wait around for her to announce that she is coming and expects everyone to bow.
Today I am meeting a girl for the first time. A mutual friend met her in Hawaii last year when their families were in adjacent townhouses for 10 days. This new friend lives only 2 blocks from me, and her kids go to PT’s school! I am sure I am going to recognize her when I see her…this should be interesting. And the topper: She was IF for years and both her kids are from IVF! I can’t wait to meet her. She sounds super sweet. She promised to keep my IF/IVF a secret b/c the last thing TW wants is for the news to spread through the school gossip mill. She actually promised over her kids’ dead bodies, which I think I can completely trust. 
She left me a long message on my cell phone when we were trying to coordinate a meeting, and mentioned that her oldest son was a fighter…her first beta was so low (13) that everyone at the IVF clinic was already giving her condolences and telling her that it was not a viable pregnancy. But they kept doing betas and the the number got bigger and bigger…and she had a perfectly healthy baby. Miracles happen every day.
I hope one can happen for me too.
6dp3dt
The 2WW has slowed to a halt. I called the clinic yesterday because I got a STACK of what looked like bills for ICSI, assisted hatching, anesthesia…when the guy answered I thought it was the answering service because usually a woman answers. I asked whom I was speaking with, and it was Dr. S! He was very sweet and told me that the “bills” were just FYI. Then he made a little small talk with me. I told him that the 2WW was kicking my but. I can’t believe that my transfer was less than one week ago, it feels like a million years ago.
I think I have a horrible yeast infection. This makes sense because I usually get one after antibiotics, but I haven’t taken any in so long it slipped my mind. I am so bummed I didn’t ask Dr. S about it when I had him on the phone. But yesterday morning when I called I just thought I had some irritation from the bajingo bullets (progesterone suppositories) so I didn’t mention it. But by last night I was in pure agony. And this morning too. We are supposed to go to the local college football game today, and TW wants to ride bikes. I don’t think I can handle 8 miles of bike riding (each way) the way my coochie feels right now. Plus, putting more bullets up there during my infection SUCKS. But I don’t know what to do. Obviously I don’t want to stop the progesterone, but this is just hell. I have acupuncture today, maybe she can help?? (Don’t ask me how).
In addition, my progesterone is giving me all these phantom preggo symptoms…really sore boobs, bloaty, gassy, tired, cranky. What a mind fuck.
And to make things even more fun, I did a walk-through at the construction site, and they have framed a wall in the middle of my “open kitchen” that is going to mess everything up! They better not tell me it is “structural” or I am going to have a heart attack!
Highlights from Thanksgiving:
Ugh. When will 11/30 get here!!!
