Someone PLEASE, knock me up!

Had an insem.ination this morning.  The doctor (a new one whom I will call dr.wolf) did an u/s and the follicle that was there a few days ago was gone.  He said it looked like I must have just ovulated as the follicle sack hadn’t started to fluff (my word not his) back up.  Apparently, when we ovulate the follicle ruptures and deflates as the fluid and egg are released.  After a short time the follicle will start to retain a bit of fluid again and then slowly during the luteal phase it will completely collapse and begin producing progesterone which is what helps keep uterine lining intact during the early stages of pregnancy (if anyone else has a different understanding please chime in as it is hard to remember all they say while you are lying there with your hoohaa hanging out and a speculum squeezing your cervix).  Anyway Dr. Wolf said it looked like the collapsed follicle hadn’t yet started to retain fluid.  This tells him that we timed it just right.  Pure luck though.  I used an OPK and boy do I have trouble with those things.  Anybody else stand around looking at them and trying to determine if the test line is the same color as the compare line?  I have such a hard time determining what’s what with those things.  I hope I don’t have the same trouble if I ever get a second pink line.  Oh well, we did this IUI was because I couldn’t just let a cycle go by without at least doing something to try and get knocked up.  I know the odds are low, but my sister-in-law did get pg on an IUI so I know personally that it does happen.  There I am…ever-hopeful…again.  I know you all think I must be some kind of Pollyanna but I’m not really.  I just can’t let go of the hope…yet…and maybe if I’m lucky I won’t ever have too.  Oh, there I go again, optimism/hope hooey.

Art blog mentioned in my last post that she didn’t know what a non-medicated IUI was.  It really is just an IUI without taking the gonad.otropin injections.  Basically, you go to the dr. on CD10 and they will do an u/s to see if you have a naturally occurring follicle.  They will measure it at that point and you start using OPKs.  Once you get an indicator of your LH surge on the OPK you go in the next a.m. for an IUI.  Et viola, a non-medicated IUI.  Sometimes they are called natural IUI cycles or un-medicated IUI cycles.

On another note, and a little bit like my last post I have to talk about my SB.  Well ladies, he has finally hit TTC overload/saturation.  Up until last week he was willing to let me talk on and on about it to him (which I do ALL THE TIME).  He finally asked me in as gentle as way as I think is possible in this horrible situation if we could maybe not talk about it all the time.  As soon as I stopped laughing at him (what a crazy question afterall), I said “No, we can’t.  Sorry my love.  Now give me some hugs and kisses and oh yeah, whaddya’ think about donor eggs?”  I seriously think he thinks I’m nuts.    Poor guy : )

Nothing much else to report.  I’m now in a 2WW and I have one helluva distraction coming up…yah baby, that’s right, I’m going to St. Maarten’s a week from today for a delayed honeymoon.  Woo Hoo and happy day!  Can’t wait for this week to pass.  Have lots to do though so that helps with passing time.  If this IUI does not work we start IVF#3 as soon as we get back.  Fingers, eyes, toes, etc. crossed.

P.S.  Today is my one-year wedding anniversary.  Wouldn’t it be so nice to have gotten pg with today’s iui!  Big sigh.

Apparently, I don’t have it in me to just sit and wait out a cycle.  It seems like such a waste.  So, I decided to have yet another un-medicated IUI.  Had to go to the clinic this morning for a CD10 u/s.  I have a good lining and one big, fat, fluffy follicle on my left ovary measuring in at 18mm.  This is good.  I will begin peeing on OPKs this afternoon and wait for my surge.  Once I get a positive we will head in the next a.m. for an IUI.  Should be sometime in the next couple of days – I hope. 

I believe my SB doesn’t really think un-medicated IUIs are worth the effort.  I really have to think that everything I do is worth the effort if it has even an iota of a chance of leading to a pregnancy.  S*x at home is not enough (although we need to do that too) because every dose of spe.rm put into the correct location creates an opportunity for fertilization.  The stats tell me that four out of every five eggs I produce is probably chromosomally abnormal.  Well, isn’t it possible that this is the one month out of five that I will produce that one normal egg?  If it is, then we have to take the chance and create the opportunity.   

It really is harder on me, right?  After all, I am the one who has to wake up at the a$$ crack of dawn to go for the extra monitoring appointments.  Yes, yes, it is awfully hard on him too as he does have to wake up early one morning, go into a little room and look at terrible, awful, horribly filmed and produced p*rn and do what has come naturally to him since he was a young boy.  Poor guy—I feel so bad for him—no, no, I really really do!

It doesn’t matter really, we have to do it.  We have to take every chance we can get.  It is the price we IF peeps are required to pay, right?

Is this why we can’t get pregnant?  Is there some type of divine punishment going on for some evil, horrible thing I do in my life?  Does it make sense that there would be?  Why do I feel (as many do) that we are IF because we are being paid back by god, the universe, etc. for some terrible transgression?

I think my payback is because I am judgmental and super critical about others.  The interesting thing is, I’m this way inside my head and not externally, ergo, Internal Superiority.  People who know me think I am one of the least judgmental people they’ve ever known.  Perhaps that is why I’m being punished – I’m two-faced – I don’t let people know that I am judging them.  I’m peaches and cream on the outside, easy-going and I take all weirdnesses in stride.  I nod and smile when an IRL person tells me she has to break up with her boyfriend b/c she just found out he is a Rep.ublican and now he can’t be the father of her children.   I calmly ask her questions like, does he know he was in the running for the position of baby-daddy, you know, considering you’ve only been dating 2.5 months?  The thing is, inside I’m laughing my head off in disbelief at this person and thinking, okay – here’s your idiot sign, yes that’s right just slip it over your head.  Look how pretty, it’s like a sign necklace.   That is just one example.  I’m like this about tons of stuff.  At work, on the subway, at Board meetings, watching TV. 

I know, rationally, that I am not being punished.  If I am it is because I waited to try to have a baby.  Of course, I waited because I felt it would have been irresponsible (for me) to have a baby earlier – you know, when my eggs were young and viable.  I didn’t want to have a baby alone.  I didn’t want it to be a fearful process where I was worried all the time about how I would be able to care for it by myself.  I wanted then, and want now, to have a baby that will be loved and supported emotionally, physically, and financially, not just by me but by my life partner.  I hadn’t found him 10 years ago and it isn’t fair that because I was following what I felt was the responsible path, I now can’t have what I so strongly desire. 

So, the question is, do you really believe we are IF because we are being punished?  Why do so many of us feel that is so?  Are we just trying to get an answer, any answer and have something to wrap our brains around?   I don’t know.  I do know I hate feeling like this is a punishment for something.  If this is a punishment does that mean that all fertile people are being rewarded?  That doesn’t make sense.  Rewarded for what?  Some people I know who have children should not in any way be rewarded—they should be reprimanded—on a regular basis, you know, for being terrible parents (my own mother fits into that category—she should never have been allowed to have children but that’s another story for another day).  See there’s my internal superiority again.

**This is just really a rant and you don’t have to feel obliged to answer.  I know there isn’t really an answer to any of this stuff.

Sorry I’ve gone MIA.  Had my sister and nephew in from out of town.  They came to the big city to celebrate his 10^th Birthday.  It is a tradition in my family that my sisters bring their children to NYC for each of their 10^th Birthdays.  I have three nieces and three nephews and we’ve made it through the first three, so three to go.

Haven’t been able to focus too much on the negative beta and demise of IVF #2.  We were so busy and had such a good time I really just tried to let it move as far into the recesses of my brain as I could.  I think, because we were so busy and my SB and I have a big trip to St. Maarten’s coming up in a couple of weeks, I have not really let this failed cycle slow me down at all.  I’m really okay.  I hate it that it didn’t work, I hate it that we have to try again, but I’m thankful that we can – on an emotional level and on a financial one.  We got a really big surprise and found out that from my insurance, which has a $10K lifetime ART maximum, we had only used a little over half of it towards our first IVF so the second one has mostly been covered.  We also just signed up with a secondary insurance from my SB’s job that allows us 3 IVF cycles covered at 75%.  That means we have been luckier than many who are riding this rollercoaster and I try to keep that in mind.  It is such a conflicting thing to do though.  I’m trying to be thankful for the things I can be at the same time that I’m so freaking angry about going through this struggle at all.  It is an odd feeling but I’ve just decided that this is my life for now and to let both sets of emotions live inside of me.   Unsettled neighbors, but neighbors nevertheless.

On the cycle front I’m currently on CD2 today of an off cycle.  Our clinic makes us take one cycle off between IVFs.  We will begin our third IVF starting the first weekend in May (depending upon dot start date of course).  Nothing will change protocol-wise as my response was fine.  I’ll keep taking the DHEA and hope that it helps with egg quality – no reason to think it hasn’t as I had such a better response in egg production and embryos than the first cycle.  We will do an unmedicated IUI this cycle.  Why not, it can’t hurt and it MIGHT help – one can always hope right!?

Thanks for all your kind words.  As always knowing you are all out there and feeling for us helps so very much.  

My beta was negative.

I can’t write too much right now.  I have people here from out of town.  I will write more as soon as a can.

Thanks for all your well wishes during the past two weeks.  Your support has been greatly appreciated.

I dreamt, ALL NIGHT LONG, that I had an amazing, newborn son.  He was so lovely and didn’t look anything like I expected him to look.  He was basically bald but you could tell his hair was very very light brown.  SB has nearly black hair and mine is medium brown, so I’m sure you can understand my confusion.  Something that was even more confusing, not to say horribly disturbing — I kept leaving him places.  I left him in a bouncy-seat at my Dad’s house.  Not so strange right, except no one was home.    I remember thinking that is was cool at Dad’s house and I wouldn’t have to worry about the baby being too hot.  This was a huge concern to me b/c earlier in my dream, I left him alone…in a stroller…outside…in the heat…in Arizona.  I’m a bad mother to a dream baby!   OMG.  Needless to say, I had a hard night.

Blood-draw this morning for beta.  They will call the house and leave us a message.  We will get it late tonight, but at least we will be together when we get the news, good, bad, or ugly. 

Spotting slightly since last night.  Trying to refuse to believe it means dot is on her way.  Still telling myself it could be anything.  Still trying to believe in miracles.

I am having more and more cramping AND my brea.sts have gone from an 8 on the pain scale down to a 3.  I really have to poke on them pretty hard to feel any discomfort.  I REALLY don’t want to say this, but I have been having moments (only moments) of feeling the dreaded ushy.  I really don’t want to say that.  I try to keep in mind that it might not mean anything.  My SIL was pregnant from an IUI, thought she HAD her dot and found out 15 days later that she was actually pg the whole time.  A friend who is currently pg said for the first 6 weeks she thought everyday her dot was coming b/c she felt crampy.  I know, I know, I have got to breathe deeply and just wait for beta.

Speaking of waiting for beta.  I am scheduled for Friday, April 6.  The problem is that my sister and nephew are coming into town tomorrow night (Thursday, April 5) for a long weekend.  So, I called my clinic and asked them if I could come tomorrow for beta instead of Friday.  They said sure, no problem.  WooHoo!  I just got my beta moved up 24 hours.  !Que relief!  This way, SB and I will have time to adjust to the results, whatever they may be, without an audience.  We need to know, just the two of us for just a little bit before we tell our IRL peeps who are waiting for an answer.  We only have about 5 people IRL who know what is going on.  We will not tell them I changed the beta day to Thursday.  That gives us 24 hours to settle into the news.   Don’t worry, I will update the blog as soon as I can tomorrow night as I know I can’t leave my virtual peeps and support group spinning in the wind without an answer.

Please, please, please hope, pray, cross your digits, do some voo.doo dancing, toss some salt over your shoulder, etc. whatever you can if you think it might help.  Thanks for your support.  I’m thinking of all of you and obsessively checking your blogs for updates.

Sorry I’ve been absent.  I just haven’t had anything to report AND I’ve been exceptionally busy.  I was in a wedding this weekend and OMG am I glad that is over.  It actually was fine, it is just an exhausting thing to do.  You are on, on, on, all the time and as the Maid of Honor you are the go-between with the Bride and EVERYONE else.  Tiring.  Happy it is over.  The Bride had a lovely and wonderful time and was just excited I thought she would explode.  She’ll never know how much I just wanted to sit my ass down and let the show go on without me.  Crap, does she not know I’m trying my hardest to gestate over here?!  (To give her credit, the answer is no, she doesn’t know I’m trying to gestate.)

Speaking of gestating – nothing new to report.  I have resisted the EVIL Pee Sticks (EPS) but don’t know how much longer I can hold out, I’m only 11 days total past ER, I think I need to be at least 12 days.  Tomorrow is going to be my difficult morning as it will be what I think of as the magical 12 day mark.  I will try very hard to make it till Friday, simply because I want to hold on to my hope as long as I can.  You see, I’m feeling just a little bit more crampy today than I have been.  I know, I know, it doesn’t mean anything until, well, you know it means something, but I’d really just rather not have these cramps off and on.  I am not yet feeling ushy.  Ushy is a term my IrishSista and I came up with to describe how we feel in the couple of days before Dot shows up.  I don’t know if I can explain it, but I’ll try.  Mostly I feel moist-ish in my vay jay area and just a little loose-ish down there too.  Kind of just mushy-ish, you know, if that makes sense to any of you at all.   That is what ushy feels like.  So, I don’t feel ushy, but I do feel crampy.  Oy, this is making me CRAZY!  I put the EPS on my bathroom counter.  If I were strong, I’d give them to my SB to hide.  He is totally against using them.  Of course, that is because the RE’s office said not to and he is a TOTAL Bo.y Sc.out, goody-two-shoes, do-gooder, brown-noser, etc.  I’ll try to give them to him.  I’ll try, but I’m not promising anything.

Please keep your fingers crossed for me.  I will be thinking of all of you and checking in.