Boy Do I feel like an Arse…

We had our embie transfer on the 25th May, and me in my blind optimism ordered this book for Cliff the very next day

(Cliff don’t click the link!!! I still intend on giving you this gift and don’t want you to see it before I know that I can give it to you)

and it arrived today.  Now I feel like a bit of an arse, I mean how optimistic and sure of myself was I?  BUT I guess the good thing is that I now no longer have to order my lovey a gift for the next time I am so blindingly optimistic right?

Arsie arse arse… *sigh*

Better…

Thank you so much for all the sweet words of love and comfort over the last few days.  
The Durbanville Hills and stunning flowers that Martiza dropped off were also just such a great comfort – thanks my friend!  Initially my first reaction to the BFN was to throw in the towel, I felt like I could not possibly get through another disappointment like this and I could not do this to my husband any more. (I was scared to see how deeply this BFN rocked him, I never want to be the cause of that much pain in his heart ever again).

But today I am feeling much better.  I am steadier and I feel stronger and am ready to meet with our doc to have a post mortem of the cycle so that we can analyse what we learnt about my body through the last cycle, and how we can use that information moving forward.  I am concerned that I only made it to 9DP3DT and will be discussing this with him in depth.  I really don’t want to bow out of the next race to early…  We have four on ice which is logically going to be our next step – I know that statistically FET’s are not as successful as fresh cycles but it seems like such a waste not to use them…and one never really knows does one?  Those frozen embies could very well be our children, who will drive us nuts and give us love and cuddles…

Anyway, once we have the meeting with our wonderful doc, I will update you all as to what the plan of action is, but either way we are going to take at least a month off.

It is my birthday next week Monday – the BIG 30!  I am having a dress up party so am going to throw myself into organising and sorting put all the final details this week.  I am getting myself back to gym and will be stricly following my dieticians eating plan from Monday onwards.  I figure that I should use this break to finally shake those last 3 kg’s that I have been battling to get rid of.

I must admit that I have been very angry with God the last few days.  I had hardened my heart against Him just could not wrap my mind around the fact that all went so well with our cycle and that He allowed it to end with a BFN.  But boy was I put in my place this morning at church… I know that I need to get my soul right with Him, to get over this set back. 

In my heart of hearts I know that everything happens for a reason, and the worst thing about it is that we very rarely get to know the reason until we are long past the challenge.  I need to be still in His presence and I need to keep my hope alive cos hope is the substance of our faith.  I have hope and I have faith. 

I will climb back on this horse and I will win the race.  Not this time round, but next time, maybe, just maybe it will be our turn.  And that my dear friends is what I am focusing on from now on.   That and losing those last blasted 3 kg’s…

Not a Mommy Yet

Firstly let me say thank you to everyone for your most supportive comments.  You guys are truly amazing.

I went in for the E2 and progesterone tests this morning, and I got a call from my doc to say that they had dropped drastically.  He also ran a beta just in case and it is all over – a resounding negative. 

In my heart of hearts I was expecting this, but I have taken this really hard.  I am gutted.  I am angry.  I am hurt. I feel so betrayed by my body and I feel so sad that I have yet again disappointed my husband by not being able to do this basic thing. 

I really don’t know what the next step will be but right now I am just trying to get myself through the hell of today and then we’ll take it one step at a time.  And one thing I do know is that I am going to have the biggest glass of wine tonight cos abstaining clearly did not do any good.

9DP3DT and Spotting

So it started this morning as a tiny bit of stretchy brown blood in my CM, nothing huge to panic about right?  As the day has gone on, it is getting progressively worse.  From a tiny brown streak, it changed into pinkish brownish CM, about two hours ago I had a small amount of stretchy CM with red blood in it and now I have just gone to the loo and I have quite a bit of pinkish reddish on the tissue paper. 

When I saw the initial red blood I called a friend who gave me my doctors cell number, I know they are in theatre today so I sent him a text message and he called me back.  He asked if I was cramping – slight period pain like cramps on and off – could be the uterus expanding to accommodate an early pregnancy he said.  He told me to go in tomorrow morning for an estrogen and progesterone level check but I am freaking out now that it seems to be getting worse.

Please, please someone tell me a story where this happened and it all turned out ok?  The way I feel today I really don’t know if I can fight this fight any longer.

Mission “Possible Symptom Obsess”

*blush* Ok, so I have been a bad, naughty girl and I need to be spanked…

I promised myself that I was not going to “possible symptom obsess” but I just cannot seem to help myself.  I don’t even know if it is physically or mentally possible to not “possible symptom obsess” during the dreaded 2ww but it seems that I sure as hell am not immune to the obsession… *sigh*

I am only 4DP3DT and I am already the super sleuth on the possible symptom watch… possible symptoms include:

• Very weird aching ovaries and uterus – this comes and goes, but when it hits I am like “ok, I have ovaries and a uterus”.  Sometimes it even feels like someone is sticking a red hot poker right in my poor vajayjay – thankfully these pains only last a few seconds…  I probably have always had these weird aching feelings but am now super aware of every twinge so am only noticing them now right?
• Boobs that have “come and go” sensitivity – when I wake up in the morning they are fine, but as the day progresses my nipples become increasingly sensitive, and my benign lump in my right breast becomes increasingly sore to the touch (and yes I know that squeezing and touching them will end up making them hurt but I.cannot.help.myself!). *hums “I touch myself”* Erm, logically I know that this symptom is a result of the progesterone but that nasty little worm in my head keeps saying “what if?”
• Bloated tummy!  Right, so I never had that whole flat iron board tummy thing going down, I have always had a little “pooch” right above my panty line (which apparently is sexy?  who knew?) but this is just too much of a “pooch” for my liking… If I don’t pull my tummy in, it is like I have an actual baby in there – really it is scary, mostly because when I see my tummy like this, I can imagine myself pregnant and until I know that I am, I cannot torment myself with those thoughts. Well maybe just a little?
• I am HOT – and I don’t mean in the gorgeous and divine way (although I am that too 😉 ) I mean in the my temperature is increased way.  Again, logically I know that this is caused by the progesterone but I think that one could probably fry and egg on my poochy bloaty tummy it is that hot…
• HUGE chorb on my jawline!!!  It appeared out of NOWHERE!  Yesterday I had perfect skin, today I have this huge chorb on my jawline… AND is it not true that chorbs on your jawline are caused by raging hormones in your body???
• What is it with the “pressure on the abdomen = really uncomfortable?” thing?  When I lie down and push on my abdomen (yes I KNOW I should not be doing this) it is really uncomfortable – like my uterus is expanding to make room for a baby or two?  Reaching?  Yes, sorry I am a pathetic fool.
• The constipation!  Ooi, not pretty, that is all I am going to say (yep, yet another thing I logically know I have progresterone to thank for)

Thank heavens we are packing up and going away to Clarens for the weekend.  I am going to keep myself SO busy with art galleries, Golden Gate, and the fireplace in our room at the guest house we are staying at, that I cannot possibly concentrate on mission “possible symptom obsess”.  Yeah right 😉 

 

Back to the Mothership

We had a 3 day transfer this morning! 

Up early to get to the clinic, it must have been the miff weather, but Cliff and I ended up having a bit of a disagreement on the way there about the speed we needed to drive to get there and be on time… He thought he needed to drive at Grandpa pace and I thought he needed to drive a bit faster than that, so we ended up having a barney.  On the day of our transfer. Nice.  We got to the clinic and talked about our fight, so that we would at least be able to pretend we loved each other in the IVF suite and kissed and made up – sjoe, crisis diverted…

We went into the doctors office to discuss our embies, and my heart was pounding, I could kind of hear a “whooshing” in my ears it was working so darn hard… As you all know out of our 12 eggs, we had 10 that had fertlised and this morning we still had all 10 growing… Embie number 1 was T.E.X.T.B.O.O.K, they had written a huge T next to it on the page.  It was a perfect 8 celled beauty and I could see straight off that it was a goodie.  The next few were not as great, some at 5 cells and some at 4 cells and degenerating etc but then we got to embie number 11 which was also  T.E.X.T.B.O.O.K… At our lab they do not freeze anything that they do not consider even remotely viable, and we were blown away to hear that they thought we had 4 embies good enough to make the freezing grade…  Naturally we elected to freeze them, just in case they are needed for future use. 

Once we had seen all our beautiful embies, we went down the the IVF suite and I got dressed in the delicious theatre gown and got myself ready for operation bladder fill.  Three glasses of water and one big mug of tea later and we were ready for action… into the theatre I walked with Cliff in his pseudo scrubs at my side, hopped onto the bed and got all jellied up – hold the boat, madam, my bladder was this measly little balloon and was not full enough to start the transfer… Ooi wei!  So we ended up chatting to the coolest IVF nurse of the lot for about 25 minutes while we waited for the liquid to fill up my bladder while listening to classical music.  Once the liquid had traveled to the correct destination, we called down the doc and my legs got all happy with the stirrups.  Poor Dr J really battled to get the cathertre through my cervix (which apparently has quite a stubborn kink in it) and ended up having to pull my uterus down with forceps to get it through – one word – OUCH.  He even told me not to worry and that he would not pull my ute out completely… Yowza!  But finally he got it to the magic place and we got to see our beautiful embies “flash” into my uterus.  I leaked a few tears and think I might have broken some bones in Cliff’s hand, but our “babies” are back in the mothership…

I am so excited and am already SO very attached to number 1 and 11.  I pray that God will continue to bless this cycle and breathe the final bit of life into my little ones, and that He will continue to let them grow and develop in my womb. 

My heart is bursting with love and I have this burning desire to see who these perfect embies will become…  The next two weeks will be tough to get through, but the plan is to keep myself as busy as I can, to try not obsess about my embies too much and just to get through each day as it comes.

Testing on 06th June 2008. 

Made it

All 10 embies made it through the night, and are developing as they should be.  *Huge sigh of relief* 

We need to be at the clinic tomorrow morning at 07h30 to discuss the status of our embies and to make the final decision as to whether we have a 3 day or 5 day transfer.  At this stage I am thinking we’ll transfer tomorrow, which means test date will be 06th June – a mere 10 days before my 30th birthday – what a wonderful birthday present a BFP would make.

*imagining blowing out my candles earlier than normal to wish for the BFP*

83.33%…

…of my eggs fertilised!  Yay!  I have 10 embies in the incubator 🙂 

Need to call the lab again tomorrow to check their progress… So thankful that all is going well so far!! 

Egg Retrieval

How You Get Through…

I’ve been thinking a lot about how we get through this journey we call infertility.  The tyrant we call infertility, the one we wage a personal war with on a daily basis.

For each and everyone of us running this gauntlet, we have a different approach and get through in our own unique way.  But there are a few approaches which I have noticed out there… There are those of us who use the “Denial” approach, there are those of us who use the “Einstein/Socrates” approach, there are those of us who use the “If I just stay calm I can control this” approach and there are those of us who use the “Super support” approach.

Denial approach is to me the least effective of all, while it helps keep the baying wolves of depression at bay for a short while, it really is not the approach for those of us in this journey for the long haul albeit unwillingly.  This is where you know suspect you have a problem, but you become an ostrich and pretend that all is OK.  You pretend that if you “just relax” you will fall pregnant and you will be “normal” and live the happy picket fence dream with Labradors gamboling in the garden and butterflies fluttering above your gorgeous kids heads… In my opinion, this approach is futile, the sooner you seek help to combat infertility the better.  The infertility arsenal is extremely comprehensive and if one seeks help sooner the dream of picket fence living is realised that much sooner.  I wasted a year on this approach, so take it from me, ostrich style is NOT the way to go.  But that is my humble opinion…

The “Einstein/Socrates” approach definitely has it’s merits.  This approach comes into play once you have taken the step from denial into the assisted reproduction world.  This approach has many tools which come in handy – the biggest being the Internet.  Yes, Dr Google comes highly recommended when one uses this approach, and even though his diagnosis’s (diagnoseese?) are sometimes highly contradictory, “he” continues to get many patients coming to his rooms.  Once one embarks on this approach, it is very difficult to remember that fertility specialists DID study for over 7 years to gain their knowledge and no matter how much this approach empowers the patient and makes them feel like they could be a fertility specialist in their own right, that really the only properly qualified ones are those with the appropriate diploma’s on their walls… Tough one to swallow I know, but true none the less. *shaking head, wishing I could be a FS -well not really but you know what I mean*

The “If I just stay calm I can control this” approach is also highly popular…I think it is rather strangefunny (har har) how many infertiles who are classed as time urgent perfectionists LOVE this approach. *Huge blinking sign flashes over my own head at this point of the narrative*  This approach combines a dash of the denial approach and a good measure of the scientific know it all approach.  In my experience this approach involved a lot of anal retentiveness combined with highly honed analytical and organisational skills… Infertiles who use this approach firmly believe that they have this war under control… they believe that by organising and planning and joining all the dots that they can conquer this tyrant… News flash : if there is ONE thing I have personally learnt in the last four (crikey moses it hurts to state it out loud each time) years is that NOBODY has this tyrant under control.  We learn to live with it, we learn to read it and learn to decipher it’s Morse code, but control it?  Never in a million years! 

Lastly we have the “Super Support” approach, again highly popular.  This approach is taken by those of us who need to know that we have everyone behind us every step of the way.  The infertile who takes this approach is generally very open about her infertility, and more often than not (sadly) has most likely suffered several set backs or losses during her journey.  Support is found in many areas, from family to non stupid comment making real life friends to on line friends.  This infertile shares her story in the hope that she can help someone else make the right decision sooner rather than later, and helps so many newbies on each level get through their own struggles.  They do guard their hearts though, and once they let someone past the hard outer shell, that heart consumes them with light.

Personally I have got the T-shirt (and have worn it to foam parties or burnt it) for each and every approach I have mentioned, and am now in a state of metamorphosis between the “Einstein/Socrates” and “Super Support”.  I read up, ask questions, empower myself on this journey, and I lean on people more. 

I have learnt not to try and control it all the time, I have learnt to trust others to be there for me.  I am expecting God to honor His promise to me that I will be a fruitful vine… and I have friends who are there for me in more ways than I ever expected.  From quite time with my Saviour, to early morning text messages from a real life friend (Marce this is you) cheering me on at each step of the process (even when she does not 100% understand what she is cheering for), to my online friends at Fertilicare, to my husband (who probably deserves a medal for helping me get through this war -but shhhh, don’t tell him, he’ll expect brownie points), to my Mom and sister who are the best friends I could hope for and to each and everyone of you who read my inane ramblings and comment on this blog.  I could not have got to this stage in my first (and please God last) IVF without the “Super Support” you give.

You mean more to me than you will ever know – Thank You!