Hi everyone: 

Thanks so much for all your comments.  I don’t really know what to say.  Knowing that you are out there and supporting me has been balm to my wounds.  I’ve been crying a lot for the past few days.  I didn’t cry at all on Wednesday.  I just sat and stared.  Thursday night I sat on the sofa with tears leaking out of my eyes for 3 hours.  When I finally went to bed I sobbed for 45 minutes and told SB that I just wasn’t going to make it through this.  How do we not get pregnant from 7 embryos!  How is it possible that we got a BFN!

My SB is sad but bewildered by how devastated I am.  I didn’t take the first two IVF BFNs so hard for some reason.  My SIL had her baby last night and I got drunk.  It seemed like the thing to do at the time but I have a bit of a hangover this a.m. 

I’m at a loss about what we will do next.  I told SB that if we do do IVF again he has to go with me to every monitoring appointment.  I’m no longer doing this alone.  If I’m putting my heart and soul and body into it he has to at the very least be a part of ALL the mechanics of it.  I’ve decided I’m not going to think about it for a bit — at least one cycle.  I just can’t.  My heart is broken and my SB is befuddled.  WTF?

I just don’t know what to do.  I have to see a newborn tomorrow and all I can think about is how the fuck did I end up here.  I can’t live the life I live now if I don’t have a child.  Somehow, something will have to drastically change.  My life right now is perfect for a child to come into it.  If a child doesn’t come into it my life is boring and unfulfilling and I don’t know if I can ever feel contentment and that scares the shit out of me.

So, as you can see, I’m not in a great place and don’t even know how to get to a good place.

I can’t really talk right now.  I’ll be back in a couple of days to update where we are.

Okay, NOW my boobs are little tender and my nippl.es are sore.  Also, I’m having some small cramps.  I’m thinking it is over.  This is complete crap.

I don’t get my beta until Wednesday and I feel like what a waste the next two days will be.

Crap, crap, crap.

Yes, it’s true I still got nuthin’.  No cramps, no spotting, no sore boobs, no desire to POAS (well not much of a desire to POAS).  I’m going to POAS on Tuesday night – that is the night before my beta.  Then at least I’ll have a heads up if negative.  I’m feeling like I just don’t know how it could be positive but I am trying to fight that b/c there isn’t any reason it has to be negative.  The pressure is killing me. 

I do have a back-ache every morning.  I wake up hot in the night even with the a/c going.  Then in the mornings I wake up cold.  The dreams, OMG, the dreams.  I had an O in my dream this morning and while it was lovely I was also disturbed b/c I thought if there is anything in there it just got caught in an earthquake.  Then there are all the other dreams, vivid, frightening, exhausting, depressing, WEIRD.  I hate these dreams.  I wake up so many times in the night b/c of them.  Is it just that proge.sterone changes your REM pattern?  Do we have less deep sleep and more of the lighter dream sleep?  It is just so tiring. 

I spent last evening with my BIL and his wife.  They are expecting their first baby any time.  They also struggled with IF.  It is wonderful and difficult to spend time with them.  I’m excited to see the baby, but in reality he could be here on the day I get my beta and if it is negative I just don’t know how I would be able to handle that.  Hopefully, he will come late next week after beta…please.

Physically I feel perfectly fine.  This could be any day of any cycle.  Oh, please let this be me at 3w4d pg.

Okay, I’ve got a little something, but nothing that makes me think this thing worked.  I’ve started down the nightmare road of Proges.teron dreams.  Oy.  These dreams make me crazy AND they keep me waking up all night.  Also, I’m sleepy – but that could just be because I’m waking up all night wondering what the freak is happening in my subconscious.  I’m moody as all HELL.  Today I went to get a pedicure and I was so happy.  The minute I got back in the office I just got pissed off.  EVERYONE annoyed me.  NOBODY was safe.  I’ve fired off a couple of emails that probably shouldn’t have been sent.  We’ll see if there are any repercussions from that little outlet.   I had some little bitty cramps last night, but nary a spot of blood has arrived on one of my many jaunts into the ladies room to look at the crotch of my panties.  I’m nuts.

 
What I don’t have — no sore boobs, no implantation spots, no obsessing every minute of every day.  I’ve actually had 15 or 20 minutes at a time pass by without a single thought of IVF, implantation, April 3 (EDD), etc.  Last IVF I felt sooooo fragile and like I could break my ute if I moved just so.  Yeah, I’m not even thinking about it anymore.  Last time I would go to the bathroom and try not to pee with too much force for fear of pushing the little embies out, now I just don’t worry about it.  It is possible this has something to do with the bladder.infection I had after the ER/ET.  I was in so much pain for four days I just couldn’t worry too much about what was happening.  If I did think about it it would be about the fact we put back 7 embryos and with that it can’t possibly not work.   Now – now, I just don’t know.  I haven’t a single ounce of intuition about this cycle – not that my intuition has ever been right on any cycle, but you know.  I guess I would have to say my feelings are ambiguous.  Yes, no, maybe, who knows, no one! 

 
I will tell you this though I don’t think I can do it again.  I reserve the right to change my mind but I’ve been thinking more and more of a childfree life.  I’ve been trying to imagine what life I would make for myself if we didn’t continue down this path.  There is a part of me that feels relief when I think about it but I know that is just about the procedures and the cycling and the drugs and the on-and-on, up-and-down of it all.  I don’t want to keep doing it.  I JUST want a freaking baby.  I don’t want it to be this hard.  The hard part should be for after he or she is here.  Childcare, colds, ear infections, terrible twos, rebellion, back talk, snotty attitudes, etc.  That should be the hard part.  Dammit!

 
I am filled with sadness at the idea of a childfree life.  I want to see my SB around a child.  I want to see him interact and love a child.  I want to love my own child.  I love everyone else’s and they love me and my friends are very generous with their children, but it is not the same.  I am afraid I won’t be able to make a life that, at the end of the day, I can say, I really loved it all if I don’t have a child.  I am afraid of setting a whole different set of goals for myself and failing at those too.  But, I’m so scared of continuing this ride.  The pressure, the pain, the sadness, the do this – do this – do this and still nothing, it’s too much.  I admire the strength of the women who can do IVF over and over.  I wish I were able to do the same.  I just don’t have the coping skills to recover each time when it doesn’t work. 

 
Oh well, that is just where I am today.  Maybe tomorrow things will be different. 

Manahatta is the Native American word for Manhattan.  The video you are about to see is a view of Manhattan based on the poem “Mana.hatta” written by Walt Whit.man.  My SB is does this stuff for a living and had created this short film and has agreed to put it up for the Virtual World Tour.  I hope you enjoy it.  New York is a lovely and amazing city.   Come over for a visit by clicking the link below, we’d love to see you.  P.S. it has sound, a narration of the poem and music, so be sure to turn up your volume.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwnNRqWw0zQ

I’m sorry I couldn’t get the video to embed - if anyone knows how to do that on Word.Press please let me know. 

Caveat:  this post is going to be all about my Brand Spanking Newly Diagnosed Bladder.Infection so stop reading here if you don’t want to hear ALL about me and my pee : )

 Since the ER I have had this pressure and pain from my groin up to my lower ribs.  Because it was so high up under the rib I thought it could be a slight version of OHSS.  My pain was a level 5 (which to me means it is completely present but I can bear it) with some 6’s thrown in (a six means you have to grunt or groan a bit here and there).  As an aside, how do you measure pain?  Anyway, it hasn’t gotten any better since ER on Tuesday.  When I was at the ET yesterday I should have mentioned it to the Dr.10YO but didn’t as I was so stunned and completely put off kilter by having to make a decision about the # of embryo’s to transfer.  Also, I was laying down the whole time I saw him and it feels better when I’m laying down flat.  Anyway, I didn’t mention it to him. 

This morning around 4:30 a.m. I woke up with a LOT of pain in my groin (way more than level 5 as it actually woke me out of a sound sleep.)  I thought I just needed to pee REALLY REALLY bad.  Well, to say the least peeing was a disappointment.  Dribble, dribble, dribble, wait, wait, wait, dribble, dribble, wait, wait – you get the picture.  Yuk!   It was an AHA moment for me.  Oh yes, it is a bladder.infection.  I remember the last one I had about 20 years ago – yes, they are that memorable.  I called in to my RE’s office and the saint, who is Christine the nurse, called me about 10 minutes later.  I gave her the info, she spoke to the Dr. and they have now called in a prescription that I will have in my thankful little hands within the hour.  I heart this office!

Otherwise, all is well.  Still trying to get my mind wrapped around yesterday’s ET.  But really, we are doing well. 

we arrived for the transfer we found out that we STILL HAD 8 EMBRYOS.  Zero attrition people.   HOLY CRAP.  Truly I was NOT expecting that.   In my head I had been holding on to the number 4, you know, thinking we’d have the same as last time and I would have been freaking happy with that.  But, to get there and be told we still had 8 nearly knocked me over.  It’s a good thing I was sitting down. 

Of course, finding out this news caused SB and I, along with Dr.10YO to have to have the discussion about how many to transfer back.  SB and I never discussed it prior b/c we just didn’t think we’d ever be in a position where it wasn’t just decided for us.  You see, based on my age, the high statistical possibility of chromosomally abnormal fetus, their understanding that we would reduce high-order multiples, the fact that frozen embryos have v. low success rates for the older patient, and that it would be unlikely (though not impossible) for my embryos to make it to blast in order to be frozen, the clinic is fairly aggressive with me.  I was surprised that Dr.10YO said it was up to us.   We went back and forth and I tell you it was not an easy decision to make.  You see, I had this fantasy that IMMEDIATELY popped into my head when I was told we still had 8 embies, that is, we’ll put back 4 and freeze 4 beautiful blastocysts that would give us a sibling to the amazing baby we are going to be having from this transfer.  I kid you not, I had pictures in my head and everything.  It was almost like a dream episode one would see on a sitcom.  It took me a while and lots of questions to Dr.10YO before I realized that wasn’t the most realistic fantasy I had had. 

In the end we decided to transfer back 7 embryos.  Don’t gasp like that.  I know it is a lot but it is what we had to do.  Don’t think it was easy.  I’d really like to have A baby not a bunch of babies.  However, after discussing it A LOT this morning with the Dr10YO this is what we did.  The 8^th embryo we left to see what would happen as it was the smallest and lowest quality with some fragmentation.  We’re pretty sure it won’t make it to day 5 but you never know.  If it does, well then, maybe someday may fantasy can come true – after all it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing to happen, right?

Please join me in welcoming Sleepy, Doc, Sneezy, Dopey, Happy, Grumpy, and Bashful home.

Also, just a quick update on the pain – it is still here.  I actually had to get up out of bed at 5:30 this morning b/c of the pain.  I DON’T EVER get up that early.  This is the strangest ER I’ve ever had.  I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach over and over.  The really weird part is that when I was at the transfer I never brought it up – that should give you some indication how shocked and thrown off balance I was.

At a risk of opening up a can of worms (which I reserve the right to put the lid back on if necessary) what would you ladies have done in my situation – especially those of you over 40 like me?  How many would you transfer?  I do believe I made the right decision but I just would have loved to have my fantasy.

Happy to report that ER went very well this morning.  Of course, I’m feeling like crap and as if I’ve been bludgeoned by a blunt instrument.  I’ll get over it though.  The really good news is that we got 10 eggs.  So far my egg quality and quantity has improved dramatically since the first IVF in November 2006.  Here is the re-cap:

IVF#1 w/ICSI (November 2006):
11 follicles with only 3 eggs, 1 immature, 2 fertilized (one incorrectly)
Transferred one 4-5 cell FAIR quality embryo
BFN

December 2006 started DHE.A

IVF#2 NO ICSI (February 2007)
8 follicles, 8 eggs, 1 immature, 6 fertilized (80%)
Transferred four 7-8 cell good quality embryos on day 3
BFN

IVF#3 NO ICSI (July 2007)
10 follicles, 10 eggs
Will have the fert report tomorrow after noon or so.

I’m very excited and am so hopeful about tomorrow’s report.  Of course, I am having some amount of anxiety but an trying very hard to hold it all at bay. 

As for that taxi ride: OMG!  It was awful.  NYC taxi’s are the worst.  First of all it is really hot here today and all taxi’s are supposed to have a/c.  Well this one had it the fans just blew on low.  The worst part was that the driver smelled so bad of BO.  Normally I’m a pretty chilled out person about stuff like this but OMG I could barely stand it.  Also, he drove like a bat out of hell.  I couldn’t put the seat belt on b/c my stomach hurt so much but then I found myself sliding into the floorboard two times as he slammed on his brakes to stop a red light.  Oy!  I’m happy to report I made it and SB went to the grocery and got me all kinds of goodies as a treat for having 10 eggs.  I got ice-cream sandwiches – yum!  I know he was really happy about the 10 b/c he would never buy me ice-cream normally.  He went to work but should be home soon – I feel the need to milk this as much as I can so I have to think of more stuff he can do for me tonight, perhaps a foot rub (he hates that : ).  What else should I ask him to do for me.

Update:  I forgot to mention that my doctor this morning was Dr. CP.  Have I said how much I like the dr.s at my clinic.  Anyway, when Dr.CP came in she held my hand and chatted with me for a few minutes.  I told her how happy and relieved I was that she was doing my ER.  She asked me why and I told her it was because I needed the Cherry Picker.  She laughed and had forgotten that she told me that at my first ER.  She’s also the dr. who was so excited that I’d done tttydtgp with SB when we missed the IUI timing.  V. Cool doctors!!