One Small Wish

So I was watching HGTV the other night and on came a commercial for Lowe’s. Essentially there’s a woman who looks to be 6, 7 or possibly even 8 months pregnant on the phone saying “Well mom, it looks like we’re going to have to pick out couple more names…we’re having triplets!!!”

Good lord. Are you kidding me?

Does Lowe’s honestly believe that in today’s day and age people don’t find out how many babies they’re having until the woman is as big as a house? I sure hope not. I’m guessing that they’re aware of how stupid this commercial makes them appear, but they just couldn’t resist the obvious increase in store traffic that this great commercial would bring. Riiiiiiiiight…

In non-pregnancy commercial news, I am super excited for our appointment with the new clinic on Tuesday. We are so hoping that we will be accepted into the shared risk IVF program and can get started soon. Please keep us in your thoughts as we move forward with this next step.

Well, I’m exhausted since I can’t seem to get myself into bed at any sort of reasonable hour when my husband is away on business trips, so I’m going to finally go to bed.

At the dog park just about a year ago, an acquaintance told me that she just found out that she was pregnant.  She went on to say that they had been trying for 11 months before they finally got pregnant.  Without thinking about what I was doing, I blabbed that we had been trying for a while too, I guess mostly because I felt like she could relate to the difficulties we were having.  I was shocked that I just opened my mouth and told her this, especially when I hadn’t even really told any of my close friends about what was going on.  But it was too late and I couldn’t take it back, so I just kept questioning what they had been through and how they got it figured out.

When I finally got all of the details, it turned out that they were just mistiming things each month.  Her cycles were very irregular coming off of birth control and so it was hard for them to cover their bases every month.  She went to her OB/GYN and asked for help and was told to just keep trying.  A few more months went by and she went back to the OB/GYN, but happened to see a different doctor on that day.  The OB/GYN suggested that they try using OPK’s to help maximize their chances.  They did, and what do you know?  She was pregnant the next month.  No blood work was ever run, no clomid was ingested, no artificial inseminations took place, all it took was good old fashioned well timed sex.

Now I felt like even more of an idiot for opening my mouth about our difficulties.  I didn’t have any of the same issues that she did.  I had great fertility signals and knew when my most fertile time was each month which was corroborated by the charts that I kept.  Timing was certainly not an issue for us.  As far as I knew at the time, my biggest problem was chronic spotting and had actually just had my blood drawn that day for a 7DPO progesterone level.  She hadn’t even heard of having your progesterone checked and so was no help with that issue.  In fact, she seemed to know virtually nothing about infertility at all.  Up until the month prior, she didn’t even know about OPK’s.  I just couldn’t believe that in 11 months, she had never typed the words “infertility” or even just “how to increase chances of getting pregnant” into Google. 

When she had initially told me that they had been trying for a while, I felt hope because if it could work for them after so long, then there was a good chance that it would work for us as well.  My hope faded a bit when she said that their problem was just a matter of timing because we had already gone though six very well timed cycles. 

Of course I didn’t let it get me too down.  In fact, I fantasized about getting pregnant soon and being able to go through pregnancy together with her, albeit a few months behind her.  How great it would be to have someone in real life to discuss all of the weird changes that pregnancy brings?  And how wonderful for us to have kids approximately the same age? 

But as we all know now, the months slipped by as I continued to remain not pregnant and her little boy is four months old now.  So at the dog park last week, I asked her what she and her son did that day.  She told me how they went to Target to try out convertible car seats since he’s almost outgrown his infant carrying seat.  She was explaining how she was doing research and looked up reviews on different seats, but still wasn’t sure what to get.  I felt somewhat helpless to provide any advice since I know absolutely nothing about buying anything baby related, but then it crossed my mind that many, many months ago (when I naively believed I would get pregnant within a matter of months), I purchased a book called Baby Bargains.  While the title implies that the book is about thrifty tips for buying baby gear, but it’s actually more like a consumer’s guide to all things baby related.  They review nearly every model of every baby related item that you could think of and provide info on costs and manufacturer reputation.  So it’s rumored to be a fantastic resource for anyone who needs to buy baby stuff. 

I never envisioned that this book would sit, alongside of 5 or 6 other pregnancy/birthing books, on my bookshelf for over a year.  So I offered it to her.    Much better for her to get some use out of it than for it to sit on my bookshelf unopened and unused.  While I was glad to have someone get some use out of it, it was just another reminder of what I don’t have.  At this moment, we’re not pregnant, and to admit that it may not happen for us any time soon was somewhat of a relief.  I do think that in some ways I’ve put way too much pressure on myself in regards to getting pregnant.  I always feel like “What if it doesn’t happen this month?  What will we ever do with ourselves?”  I’ve made getting pregnant into the only thing that I really strive for anymore and that’s not fair to me.  In some ways, passing that one book on has helped me to realize that I’ve been unfair to myself in creating possibly unrealistic expectations for us.  It helped me to release some of that pressure that I’ve built up for myself and allowed me to let things go just a little bit.  It was like coming to terms with where we are now and letting go of that constant fear of what might happen if it doesn’t happen.  It was an unexpected, yet very much appreciated side effect of doing nice for someone else.

Well, after I posted the below entry, I started thinking about that OPK this morning that was so obviously positive. It kind of annoys me because I’ve never had a clear cut positive on an OPK before. In fact, I was so bad at reading the darn things (it can’t be THAT hard, can it?) that I bought some very expensive digital OPK’s a few months back when we were doing IUI’s. The plan was to continue using my cheapo OPK’s until the lines got relatively dark and then use the digital ones so that there was no confusion as to whether the test was actually positive or not.Well it occurred to me just now that I sadly never even got to use the darn things. My lines the past few IUI cycles have never even been close to positive, so it seemed a waste to use a digital one. Since this will hopefully be our last cycle before IVF, those tests are going to go to waste, and gosh darn it, I want to pee on one! So I just took one of them if for nothing else than to experience the technology of it all, and what shows up?

This little guy taunting me with his smiley face, as if he’s saying “Nah-nah-nah-a-boo-boo! You’re surging and your husband isn’t even here to take advantage of it!” Bastard. Add in huge ovulation pains on my left side that make even sitting down uncomfortable and Jess is not a happy camper tonight.

A quick search of sidestep.com shows that flights to LaGuardia can be had for $302 and I briefly consider flying out there to conduct a little business with my husband, if you know what I mean, but quickly dismiss it in favor of putting that money towards our looming IVF cycle.

Here’s hoping that tomorrow is a better day.

Mark left yesterday for a business trip and will be out of town until Thursday evening.  Knowing that, it totally figures that today on cycle day 13 my OPK is 100% positive.  Only twice in my 14 cycles of charting have I ever ovulated on cycle day 14 or earlier, and one of those times was brought on by a trigger shot of HCG so it totally figures that the ONE cycle that Mark is unavailable until cycle day 15 I will ovulate early.  There goes the dream of getting a miracle natural BFP during this break cycle before we begin IVF.  Oh well.  It would have been a long shot anyway. 

It will be extremely strange to go through a two week wait with absolutely no chance of being pregnant.  I have no idea if that will make things go faster or slower, but there will definitely be less anticipation.

In more positive news, I passed my clomid challenge test!  My cycle day 10 blood work showed an FSH of 4.3, so that puts me well under the maximum combined total of 20 for the two FSH scores and means that I passed!  I e-mailed our (hopefully) new clinic and told them that we have had almost all of the required pretesting done within the last year.  I wanted to know if we would need to repeat all of those tests, or if they would just take them as is and let us into the IVF shared risk program.  She stated that if the doctor felt that “the results were within normal range then we would not need to repeat.”   This is great news for us as hopefully it means a small cost savings for us, but more importantly it means that we will hopefully be able to get going on an IVF cycle as soon as this cycle is over.  Of course I don’t want to be overly optimistic as I know that something will probably come up that will prevent us from getting going right away, but I sure hope that we can start at the end of this cycle.

There is one thing that has become increasingly clear as I’ve struggled with our fertility issues; I am spoiled.  Spoiled rotten.  I’m used to getting what I want, and usually when I want it.

Everyone says that youngest kids are spoiled and always get what they want and I guess from my experience, I can’t really disagree.  While I was most certainly not a spoiled brat demanding things from my parents, they did tend to give me most everything I wanted. 

• My parents sent me to a private driving school the summer before I turned 16 because I had just missed the cutoff to get into the class at school (though this was probably a little selfish on their behalf as well because then they wouldn’t have to drive me around anymore). 
• My parents paid for half of three week long field trip to Europe when I was a junior in high school.
• My parents paid my tuition, room and board while I was in college.  They even paid for me to spend a semester studying in France.

Beyond all of the financial support they have given me throughout the years, my parents have always been there for me emotionally.  Sure, we’ve had our disagreements, but I honestly could not ask for more compassionate, kind and caring parents.  They have always been willing to stop whatever they’re doing at the drop of a hat in order to help me out with whatever was going on with me.  I can’t imagine how different my life would be without their constant support.

Even as an adult, without the assistance of my parents, I’ve been pretty spoiled.

• I got every job that I’ve ever interviewed for
• I got every house that I’ve ever wanted
• I got the man that I wanted
• We make enough money that nearly anything we want, we can just go out and buy or do

On the whole, I’ve been exceptionally fortunate.  And spoiled. 

Except for this one thing.  We can’t manage to have a baby on our own. 

The frustration of wanting something so bad, but not being able to get it is beyond anything that I’ve ever experienced before.  And it’s different from everything else that I’ve ever wanted in that there’s no guarantee that I can get it, no matter how much time, money and effort I throw at it.  This is something that I have, quite literally, no control over.  And I’m still struggling to try to figure how to handle it.

Great news! I had my blood drawn yesterday for the first of my clomid challenge test FSH levels. Last time I had my FSH measured, it was 12.9, which translates to “diminished reserve.” Of course an FSH of 12.9 will effectively eliminate me from participating in any sort of shared risk IVF program, which is what we ultimately want to do, so yesterday’s draw was really important to me. I was hoping that the months of acupuncture, reiki, meditation and various supplements that I’ve been taking would have had some effect on my FSH.

It seems that all of my hard work has paid off since my FSH was NINE this time around! And I know that FSH does have some variation between months, but holy crap! It dropped 4 points! So this bodes well for us getting into the IVF program that we are most interested in.

Since women who have elevated FSH usually fail the clomid challenge test, I’m not actually going to take Clomid. Dishonest? Yes. Will it (hopefully) help me to get what I want in the end? Yes. Do I feel bad about lying? No. Everyone says that age trumps FSH, and since I’m 29, I have to believe that we’ll still be able to conceive within a few tries at IVF. If fact, I have a feeling that the clinic will be making money off of us since I’m fairly confident that we’ll get pregnant on the first try. So I don’t feel bad about being dishonest.

So now we need to begin the process of requesting that our medical records be sent to me so that I can filter though them and keep the one test sheet that shows my 12.9 FSH to myself. We will be making a consultation appointment this week so we’ll be getting going with everything really soon, hopefully!

So that’s what’s going on! Hopes are high and we’re feeling good!

1. Since it’s a special night for your and your husband, make sure that you take a test before you go out. If it’s somehow miraculously positive, you want to be able to celebrate, right?

2. When that second pink line miraculously shows up, faint, but definitely there, prepare a special way to tell your husband that after 18 months and 5 IUI’s, you’ve finally done it!

3. When your husband comes home from work, tell him in that special way and share a brief moment of sheer happiness.

4. When your husband asks how you know, you pull that test out of your pocket to show him those two beautiful pink lines, only to realize that the 2nd pink line has faded away to nearly nothing.

5. Assure husband that you know way more about pregnancy tests than he does, and a line is a line, therefore you’re pregnant! Besides, the pee you used to test with was REALLY diluted and most women get darker lines in the morning. Tomorrow morning’s test will undoubtedly be very obviously positive.

6. Be sure to chat about how great it is that you finally got pregnant the cycle before you were going to move on to IVF and discuss all of the ways that you can spend the money you were planning to put towards IVF.

7. Continue to celebrate and discuss all of the fun things that you happily won’t get to do now that you’re pregnant, like take cruises, go to amusement parks, etc.

8. If your husband is still a bit hesitant to let himself get excited about this pregnancy because of the “barely there” second line, just remind him that no matter what happens, for this moment, you are pregnant.

9. The next morning take a test using some super concentrated pee. When the line shows up even fainter than yesterday’s (or maybe it’s not there at all, you’ve just convinced yourself that it has to be there since you ARE pregnant, after all), chalk it up to the fact that some women get better results in the afternoons instead of the mornings.

10. Run to the store at lunch to get more tests so that you can see those two beautiful lines when you test again after work.

11. When only one line shows up after work, find someway to tell your husband that you must have been wrong somehow.

12. Realize how absolutely foolish you were to jump the gun and the pain that you have caused your husband and yourself. Promise yourself that you will never, ever get so caught up in two faint lines again.

So that’s my Monday evening and Tuesday in a nutshell. Why the second pink line? I have no idea. It’s definitely not an evap because the line came up within a minute or two and it’s definitely pink, just faded very much from how it originally looked. It could be a chemical, I suppose. If not a chemical, then I have no explanation.

I feel absolutely horrible for getting Mark all worked up only to have it taken away today. When I saw that second pink line come up yesterday, the feeling was unbelievable and I couldn’t believe how narrowly we’d escaped having to do IVF. But more than anything, I was looking forward to sharing my excitement with my husband. He was so excited and happy for us, despite the fact that he wasn’t completely sure if it was real or not. What hurts me the most is knowing the hurt I created for him. I cried today. Not for myself, but for the confusion, disappointment, and pain I created for him. I’ve learned my lesson and will not say anything in the future unless the test is blaringly positive or if a digital test says pregnant.

So I’m back into research mode since we will be moving on to IVF next. There are lots of small things that we need answers to in order to select where we will be doing our IVF cycles and it seems that answers are difficult to come by sometimes. But we will keep plugging away and know that someday we’ll get ours too.

The spotting started at two days past ovulation this time around and has not let up at all. I’m puzzled as to why I’m spotting because I took the HCG trigger, which in the past has kept the spotting away until much later in my cycle, and also because I’m taking progesterone. Those two things in combination have kept the spotting away for the last two cycles, so this cycle is a mystery to me. Part of me wonders if it could be due to a ruptured cyst? Either way, I’m frustrated and losing hope again.

The IUI yesterday went well. After a 35 minute delay in the waiting room, I was finally taken back. I did a much better job of staying calm this time though, trying to make my body as calm and welcoming to those little spermies as possible. The count was 89.3 million and motility was 87%, so I’m feeling good about that. For some reason the progression stat was missing from the computer and I started to get concerned about that, but then I realized that the numbers are really irrelevant. Last month we had a count of 132 million with a progression of four (which is the best) and still didn’t end up pregnant, so it seems that the numbers are not an indicator of success and therefore not worth stressing about. The nurse did mention that lab technician told her that it was a really good sample when he/she passed it off to the nurse, and that’s good enough for me.

Anyway, now that waiting game begins. I can’t tell if this two week wait will go quickly or slowly. Mark is going to be very busy with work responsibilities through Monday, so that leaves me on my own for large chunks of time. Ideally I would use this time to get things accomplished around the house, take the dogs to the park and generally keep my mind off of anything fertility related. Of course I know myself pretty well, and though I have good intentions, I can’t say that I think I’ll actually follow through with them. I guess we’ll see.

Anyway, my laptop power cord literally blew up (sparks flying and everything) last night, so I’m without power to my home computer until the replacement cord arrives. As such, updates will likely be lacking until the new cord arrives. Hopefully less computer access will make this two week wait go by even faster!

So I went in yesterday morning for my CD11 ultrasound to check and see how many follicles I was growing and how big they were. I couldn’t see the monitor too well and Dr. O wasn’t telling me the sizes, so I really had no idea how they were measuring. I could tell that they were getting pretty big, but he shocked the hell out of me when he removed the wand and said “Well, they’re ready to pop so you’ll trigger tonight and IUI Wednesday morning.” What?!? The last two cycles I’ve ovulated on CD16 (with trigger on CD14), so I was really expecting the same thing this time. In fact, I was so confident that I wouldn’t be doing the trigger until Wednesday or Thursday that I told my mail order pharmacy to deliver the trigger to me today, on Tuesday.

I should preface this with a little history on how my day started yesterday. I arrived at 7:30, right on time for my appointment and I was the first person in the waiting room for my ultrasound yesterday. Within five minutes there were a couple of other women waiting as well and one couple was taken back after about 10 minutes. At that point I started to get pissed off because I had the very first appointment on a Monday morning. Really, what could they possibly be doing that was keeping them from calling me back? At 7:50, 20 minutes after my appointment time, I was finally taken back. I quickly stripped off my pants assuming that the doctor would walk in at any second since they were so far behind. But no. There I sat, watching the minutes tick away on the clock. Every minute that passed I was getting more and more pissed off. I could hear the doctor leaving the room next to me where the couple that was taken back before me was, so I knew that someone would come for me soon. But no.

Finally there was a quiet knock on the door and in walks the nurse practitioner. She said that Dr. P wanted her to come and check to see how my bladder was doing. I looked at her weird and told her that I was just there for an ultrasound, so I didn’t have a full bladder. She said that’s what she thought and that Dr. P was probably talking about someone else. She said she would send one of the doctors in to see me right away, but still the minutes ticked by. At this point I was struggling to stay calm. A good five minutes later Dr. O FINALLY shows up to do the u/s. There were no apologies or explanations for delay, which made me even more frustrated. At this point I had been waiting for 40 minutes for a 10 minute u/s. I usually try to cut doctors some slack when they are late for my appointments because I know that they have other patients who they have to see and they can’t control how long their patients want to talk, etc. But in this case I was the very first appointment of the day, which means that they were delaying my appointment strictly for themselves and not for any other reason, which really ticked me off. I was furious and fighting back tears of frustration.

So add to my very (self inflicted) fragile state the added pressure of having to trigger a full three days before I was expecting it when I didn’t even have the darn trigger in my possession yet, and I was about to lose it. I was also stressed because the follicles were so big already (21.3mm, 20.7mm and 18.8mm) that I was concerned that might be ready to come out on their own without the trigger shot, but since I hadn’t been using OPK’s yet there was a very distinct possibility that I could have missed my surge.

When I FINALLY got back to work, I peed on an OPK and it was very negative, so that alleviated my fear of having missed my surge and I called the mail order pharmacy and they were able to cancel my order so that I didn’t end up with two trigger shots. Mark was able to pick up my trigger shot at the local pharmacy for me over lunch which really helped me out. After work I had an acupuncture appointment and that always helps to relax me, so what started as a very stressful morning actually ended up being a pretty decent day in the end.

Despite the crazy day yesterday, I’m feeling good and optimistic about the IUI tomorrow. And I’ve resolved that no matter how Mark’s sample turns out, I will stay positive about this cycle.

Yesterday I fell in love. Not with another man, but with Reiki and Divine Coding. This is funny and strange to me because Reiki is not something that I really even believe in or understand. Just telling Mark about my session makes me feel embarrassed and silly because it sounds so hokey and ridiculous, but it really does work wonders for me.

While my Reiki lady Lisa is doing the Reiki, she uses her Devine Coding skills (which I’m even more skeptical about than the Reiki itself) to intuit how I’m feeling and what’s going on with me. It’s absolutely amazing what she is able to glean from placing her hands on my face for just a few moments. She uses whatever vibes she’s getting from me to guide our session and to talk through things.

This second session was very different from our first session. At our first session, after she determined that I was “all inside my head” and told me that I needed to find a creative outlet, the rest of the session was just Reiki and quiet time, no more talking.

Yesterday’s session was much more like a mini therapy session. We did so much more talking than we did last time and tried to come up with ways to cope. The first thing that we worked on was the fact that I need to not be mad or upset with my body, regardless of how betrayed or upset I am by it. She made an analogy about how if I were to go to my place of work and I knew that everyone there didn’t like me and thought I was doing a crappy job, would I want to go to work and do a good job? The answer is no, of course not. That’s how I need to view my ovaries and reproductive system. If I’m feeling negative towards my body and my ovaries, of course they won’t respond in the way I want them to. Instead of projecting animosity towards them, I need to give them love.

So she had me imagine sifts or screens beginning at my feet and sifting all the way up through my body and up to the top of my head that would filter out any negative feelings towards my body. Then she had me imagine tossing those screens full of negative gunk into a bonfire so that all of the negative energy burned up and then she had me replace the empty spaces where the negativity was with love. I felt so much lighter after the screens had sifted all of the negative energy away and then when I replaced those empty spaces with love I felt a tingling swirling sensation, which was really cool. Again, it sounds silly, I know, but it really works for me.

The second thing that we worked on is that I need to focus on the here and now. Instead of getting myself all worked up about IVF right now, I need to focus on this cycle. There is a potential that we may not even need IVF and I really need to focus my energy on this cycle right now, and send good positive thoughts towards what we’re dealing with at this moment. This struck a chord with me because I mentioned in my last post that I’m pretty much dismissing this cycle and already looking towards IVF. So I will renew my focus and try to work as hard as I can to stay positive about this cycle and where we are now and not stress about the possibilities of what might happen in the future.

Throughout all of this, I found it very interesting that while I was laying there, my mind kept wandering back to two specific trips that I taken when I was younger. One was a trip to DC in the summer after 8th grade and the second one was a three week trip to Europe in the summer after my sophomore year. While I thoroughly enjoyed both of these trips, I don’t often think about them, so I wondered if there was some significance. I mentioned these images to Lisa and she kind of helped me to discern what importance they might have for me and why I would keep conjuring them up.

Ultimately, I think that these images were coming to me because these were journeys that I went on that I really had no part in planning. I’ve been on lots of trips since those two trips, but I’ve been the coordinator and planner extraordinaire for said trips. These two particular trips were different in that I paid my money, went on the trip and enjoyed myself. Someone else did all of the planning, research, and coordinating for me…all I had to do was show up. I’m sure that this is some way of my subconscious telling me that I need to just go with the flow a bit more and trust in my care providers so that I can enjoy my life as it is now without all of the worry of this other, very different, journey that I’m on.

Anyway, that’s the recap of my Reiki session for this month…definitely worth the money and time investment. I took my last 5 Femara pills last night, and I’m sending lots of love and appreciation to those ovaries of mine so we’ll see what it all adds up to on Monday when I go for my ultrasound.

Well, after nearly three months of a concerted effort to not consume any sugar, sugar substitutes, caffeine or alcohol, I’m off the wagon. Mark and I went to a wedding for a former co-worker yesterday and I determined that I was going to allow myself to fully enjoy the day eat and drink whatever I wanted. Since I made the decision early in the morning, I also picked up some peanut butter M&M’s and some Nestle Tollhouse cookies when we were at Target getting the card for the wedding. The M&M’s and cookies didn’t really taste as good as I thought that they should have, so I was wondering if the absence of sugar in my diet had altered my tastes, but the cupcakes that they had at the wedding were FABULOUS, so I guess my theory probably wasn’t correct. Sugar, check. Caffeine, check. Might as well throw some alcohol in there for good measure, so two glasses of white wine were consumed at the wedding as well. It was a great time and totally worth it.

And today I don’t feel the least bit guilty about it, but I am left wondering what to do about things now. I know that eliminating alcohol is something that I will continue to do because I wasn’t a big drinker in the first place so it’s not a huge sacrifice to make. And honestly, cutting the sugar out of my diet was a lot easier than I thought it would be, and even if it doesn’t even directly help me to conceive, it’s still just a healthy thing to do and helped me to lose 6 pounds without any other diet modifications. But dealing with infertility is a stressful thing and there are times that I think that sometimes a little sugar for comfort is nice. So for this moment, I’m planning on getting back on the wagon tomorrow and I guess we’ll just see where things go from there. One thing I’m sure of is that I’m not capable to having a just a little bit of sugar. I’m definitely a binger…once I get that taste in my mouth, there’s no stopping me. As a testament of that, two thirds of the bag of M&M’s is already gone. It’s shameful, I know.

In completely unrelated news, I went to Wal-Mart today to pick up my prescription for Femara. When I picked it up, I was notified that they were only able to partially fill the prescription and that the rest would be in tomorrow. So I only have enough pills to get me through tonight, and then I need to go back tomorrow to get the rest. Sigh. Why is nothing at Wal-Mart easy? Of course the easy solution would be to transfer the prescription to a different pharmacy, but the cost savings at Wal-Mart is pretty significant, and I’m a cheapo.

And as you’ve probably already figured out from the previous paragraph, we are indeed pursuing one more round of IUI with Femara. When we started seeing Dr. P and Dr O, we agreed that we would give them at least three shots at IUI before moving on, so this is it. I’m hoping that the third try is a charm, of course, but if not, then we are ready to move forward with IVF. In fact, we’re so ready to move on to IVF, than I’m pretty much writing this entire cycle off and already thinking ahead and trying to plan our IVF path.

After discussing some options with Mark, he’s ready and willing to throw $30,000 towards one of those “you’ll get a baby within three fresh cycles of IVF or you get 80% of your money back” kind of deals. Of course since I’m stingy (and also partially because I think that we would have a really good shot with IVF and might get lucky on the first try), I’m not as ready as he is to sign up for such a huge financial commitment. If we were lucky enough to succeed at our first try at IVF, then I’d forever be kicking myself for “wasting” that money. Without a doubt, it’d be so worth it to spend the money and get a baby out of it, but I’d rather just give one cycle a shot and see what happens.

Of course the caveat to the whole thing is my FSH. I’m not sure that we would even qualify for any of those “money back” programs with an FSH of 12.9. And what if we did sign up for one of those programs and then find out at the first IVF that my eggs are no good? Can we get a refund for part of that fee and opt out of the rest of the cycles? Domestic donor egg cycles are way too expensive for us, so converting the rest of the package to a DE cycle would be out of the question.

And then there’s the option of doing an IVF vacation, which I’m TOTALLY on board with. This would definitely be my first choice as to treatment options if we need to do IVF. I am most interested in the Czech Republic right now as their costs are very low and they have great success rates. Not to mention that the Czech Republic is a beautiful country to boot! I spent a few days in Prague on vacation when I was studying in France and it was gorgeous and I would absolutely love to go back. The biggest issue with doing IVF abroad would be the time commitment. If we were to do a cycle with my own eggs, we would need to take at least two weeks off of work. Donor egg is a much shorter time commitment since I wouldn’t need to be around for monitoring; we would just need to be there for egg retrieval and again for transfer, probably a week or less, but we aren’t ready to pursue egg donor yet.

Anyway, there are a lot of options out there, so there is much research left to be done. Regardless of what path we choose, I am feeling very hopeful that a baby will be a part of our near future.

Have you ever been in a difficult situation and expected a friend to be there for you? And how disappointing is it when that friend not only doesn’t step up to support you, but completely ignores you? It’s hard to deal with when you’ve been supportive to that friend through her tough times, but when the shoe is on the other foot, communication practically ceases. It’s an added stress that is definitely not appreciated when already dealing with the stress and emotions of infertility. How disappointing.

I decided to test today so that if the test was negative, I could try to get a head start on plans for next cycle before my cycle actually began. If I’m not pregnant this cycle, then I want to call both my acupuncturist and my RE and discuss what they think I should do next.

I wanted to ask the acupuncturist if she thinks that my body CAN get pregnant right now, or if we have so much work to do that I should stop the IUI’s for now until my body is ready to accept a pregnancy.

I wanted to ask my RE if it makes sense to keep doing IUI’s with Femara, or if we should move to injectibles, or if we need to consider donor egg, donor embryo or adoption.

It looks like I’ll be making those calls today. Not only was the test negative, but it appears that I’ve started to bleed a full two days early on top of it. I’m completely numb.

No, not really. Here I sit at 12DPO and I have managed to not test at all yet, not even an OPK to see what the trigger was doing…nothing. I’m pretty darn proud of myself, but honestly, I haven’t had the urge to test like I have in the past. Of course my lack of symptoms is probably a good reason for my lack of desire to pee on something. So far the only things I can report as symptoms are somewhat sore boobs (but only to the touch) and being tired lately. Of course I can chalk up the sore boobs to the progesterone suppositories and I can explain away the tiredness with an active weekend, so really I have nothing.

I think that my entire mindset regarding TTC and HPT’s is changing too though. I used to test like a mad woman, usually once a day starting at 10DPO, sometimes twice a day even. I was OK with seeing the negatives because I would tell myself that it was just too early to get a positive, so the negatives were never very difficult to take. Now I’m actually kind of scared to test. A negative at this stage in the game is so much more difficult to handle. The amount of time, energy, money and mental involvement that we devote to each cycle coupled with the sheer length of time that we’ve been trying brings such a huge sense of defeat when that second line doesn’t appear.

I can’t bear the thought of seeing only one line on another test, especially when everything went so well this cycle. Mark provided such an awesome sample, I should have had at least three follicles (maybe four), my HSG should have cleared out any debris that might have been clogging up my tubes, and the IUI was timed perfectly. If this month is a bust, it will be difficult to continue on knowing that even in the most perfect circumstances, we were unable to make a baby.

Anyway, all this is to say that I don’t know when, or if I will test.

This weekend we went up north to spend time with Mark’s family. His mom is retiring from teaching 5th grade this year, and the school district threw a party to honor all of the retirees. The drive to his parents’ house is approximately four hours long, so we had plenty of time to talk and what did we talk about? Baby names, of course.

We’ve had baby name discussions before. In fact, before we were even married, we’d already picked out our future daughter’s name, Atlanta Terra. Mark thought it would be super cool to have a daughter named Atlanta AND have her initials be ATL. Then he read Freakonomics, which said something about how people with “non-conventional” names face uphill battles in regards to getting accepted to college and in the job market (or something to that extent). I think that soured his feelings about the name, and over time, my fondness for it has diminished as well.

So we’ve brought up names randomly in the past when we heard one that sounded good, but we haven’t really had any formal discussion as of late. I think that is mostly because we are both tired of dealing with infertility and just don’t want to let ourselves get too wrapped up in the fantasy of actually getting to name a child.

Anyway, I’m not sure how the whole discussion started, but before I knew it, we were in the midst of a two hour round of the name game, suggesting names to each other back and forth. It was fun and funny and it was nice to be able to allow ourselves to think about actually having a baby again. It’s been so long since we’ve even acknowledged that we could get pregnant someday that it was kind of a relief of sorts.

And here are Mark’s definite choices if we were to end up with boy/girl twins: Emmy and Oscar, like the awards, with middle names of Pebbles and Bam Bam respectively. As you can tell, the conversation was less than serious at times. It was a nice break from the seriousness and stress and pressure of trying to conceive.

On a completely unrelated note, I caved when I was at the store the other day and bought a three pack of pregnancy tests. I was getting some contact lens solution one aisle over, and when I walked by the HPT’s, I just quickly grabbed a pack and kept on walking. I know I shouldn’t have done it…if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that if there are HPT’s in the house, I WILL pee on them. It doesn’t matter if it’s too early or if I still have the Ovidrel trigger in my system, I’ll still pee on them.

But I don’t have a plan in mind as to when I will start peeing on them this time around. Ideally it would be best to wait until the 29th which would be two weeks after ovulation, but I’m fairly certain that I won’t be able to hold out that long. Right now I’m shooting for the 27th, and it shouldn’t be too difficult since this weekend is Memorial Day weekend and we will be pretty busy and distracted most of the time. Of course a little part of me wishes that I would have peed on one a few days ago so that I could have finally seen a test with two lines, even if the two lines were due to the trigger lingering in my system still. Today is ten days past trigger, so it has probably already passed through my system and wouldn’t show up on a test.

Anyway, I’m still living life day by day. The meditation CD is working wonders for me in regards to getting a good night’s sleep, so I will definitely continue using that. I’m still trying to find a good time to try out my yoga DVD…I’m hoping I can find a block of time this weekend while Mark’s at the park with the dogs to try it out without distraction. Oh, and I’ve scheduled another Reiki appointment for June 5th, so if this cycle is a bust, at least I have that already scheduled as an additional comfort and stress reliever. So all in all, things are good right now. Let’s hope this trend continues!

My temp spike this morning indicates that I did indeed ovulate yesterday. Lesson learned…I need to trust my body and the meds a little bit more. So now comes the fun part, two weeks of waiting to see if it worked. I’m hoping that the wonderful spring weather combined with lots of activities will make it fly by!

Not much to report, other than the sample that Mark provided today was PHENOMENAL! 132 million swimmers with a progression of 4! Wow! I’m hoping that this is the last IUI report that I have to do.

Wish me luck!

So I have immensely enjoyed riding my bike to work the past few days (it’s National Bike to Work Week, for those who are unaware). All of the trees are spouting leaves and the crabapples and magnolias are in bloom. It’s gorgeous.

But even more wonderful than the physical beauty, is the smell. The smell of lilac and magnolias is just intoxicating. The smell of a freshly cut lawn… These are the smells that take me back to my childhood, a time when things were simpler and I had no cares in the world. All of the neighborhood kids would stay outside playing games until the sun went down and our parents called us in to get ready for bed. It’s a nice reprieve from the reality of being an adult and all of the responsibilities that come along with it.

As for the source of my confusion, I’m fairly certain that I’ve already ovulated. This doesn’t make any sense at all though, since I’ve been testing twice a day since Saturday and never got a surge. I took my Ovidrel trigger shot last night at 8pm, and according to Dr. O, most women ovulate right around 38 hours after taking the trigger. If that’s true, then I shouldn’t ovulate until 10 am tomorrow.

So what gives? Are my surges just so short that testing twice a day isn’t catching it? Or does my body react weirdly to the HCG shot and ovulate early? I don’t know. I will definitely be asking Dr. O tomorrow.

Other than this morning, I haven’t been temping at all this cycle so I have no idea where my coverline should be, but tomorrow’s temp should tell the tale. If it’s high, as I expect that it will be, we’re skipping the IUI. I’m definitely bummed about this, especially since we didn’t get any old fashioned baby making in lately because we were abstaining for the IUI. It basically translates into a wasted cycle, which makes me sad. I was having a really good feeling about this cycle and to have it end as a bust is disappointing.