Hormone Bloating

Every day I step on the scale.  I'm not obsessed but I do have gastric issues with many foods.  Daily my diet has to vary according to my issues. 

This morning, before my shower I got on the scale.  I thought I was going to scream.  Yesterday I ate more protein and of course some of the protein was processed so it had more sodium.  You can guess I'm sure....I gained back 1.2 pounds in bloat.

Today I'm pushing the water big time.  Yesterday's fail was due in part to my spouse.  After he came home from church, I didn't feel up to dealing with a huge amount of happy people in my mood, we had decided to go grocery shopping.  J misplaced his ID card...AGAIN!  I swear I'm going to punch a hole in it and attach a mitten string so tight around his neck he'll have to choke himself to lose the damn thing.  Depending on his uniform changes, at least two daily with PT clothes and ACUs, his ID is in various places.  The PT uniform has no room for a full sized wallet, and depending on the time of year sometimes barely enough room to put a single car key into the hidden pocket along with the ID card.

Two hours later he finds his ID card after I begged him to look in his study material.  He was adamant that it wouldn't be there.  But if he had just looked there first he would have found it.  The man is lucky I didn't try to kill him for his stubbornness and stupidity.

Sure I could have gone grocery shopping without him, but then he wouldn't have gotten food he wanted or needed since he never writes down what he is low on.  Like I said above my food problems vary daily.

Today I'm going to try to see if I can digest baby greens.  Sometimes raw veggies rip up my stomach.  I have IBS and GERD.  If I stuck with the IBS and GERD only foods I'd be living off of white starchy foods because they are soluble fibers.  That type of diet can cause other health issues I'd rather avoid.

So I'll end this writing for today and grab another glass of water on my way to transfer the laundry over to the dryer.  Hope everyone has a good day.  I know I'll be trying to have a good day and get the water weight gain back off.

All Is Well

Not much to say today.  Everything is going good.  Maybe I should have turned this into a long post about how well things are going?

I made the second payment in a week's time for the donor eggs.  Little over 6k to still pay out.
$18,799.65 for the donor eggs, physician services and embryology services.  $155 for sperm cryopreservation.   $365.00 for the office consult.    $19,319.65 before any other fees like embryo cryopreservation.  We are guaranteed two blastocysts.  We are hoping for more of course but don't know if we'll get them.  It could be a one shot deal since I'll be transferring two.

I've lost 3.6 pounds since the appointment last week.  I'm wondering if it is because I went off the prilosec.  I know that particular drug can cause weight gain.  Might be one of the reasons why I was able to gain so much weight when I went on it last year in March.  Maybe now that I'm off it the weight will come back off?  I can hope.

Yesterday I took a six hour block of time to work on the baby afghan for a friend.  M and I are more friendly since meeting her at the marriage retreat.  Her husband and mine work together.  Forty-nine blocks are basically done and just need to be trimmed in white then joined together.  The afghan will be a forty-two inch square when complete.    Yes, I'll post photos when I'm finished with it.  Not sure if I'll get it done soon or not but that is okay since her baby isn't due until June.  Bonus part, less yarn to pack up when we move.  I'm using some of the yarn I had put aside for the first IVF when I had hopes of making a genetic baby.  J was okay with me using the yarn up.  He knows I can get more.  He isn't sentimental like I am.  Good omen to me to give rather than just let it sit there and rot.

My stomach didn't hurt as bad yesterday.  Must be the pepcid and ginger pills are doing the trick.  I can only hope that today is much like yesterday and I won't be puking up.  I can deal with acid reflux but not the puking.  My throat is a bit raw still.

Sometimes You Have To Let It Out

This morning I had just had enough.  I actually screamed out loud in the house.  No one was around but I'm sure the landscapers heard me and so did my spouse as he was pulling into the driveway.

J and I share the vehicle.  He brought me to my psychologist appointment this morning.  This was a bad week.

I vented to my therapist about how my doctors and my spouse just aren't listening to me.  J just blankly stares at me and treats me like I'm glass at times, its so annoying.  My RE doctors just don't care what I think it is or that I'm in pain, or at least it feels like that most visits.  I mean why aren't they doing something about my endometriosis?

I told my therapist about how I'm upset that I'm still not pregnant.  That I'm facing a ticking time bomb in my womb and should probably just give up now.

JD and I talked for the hour about my issues, how I'm taking care of my needs and a possible plan to make sure that I'm getting what I need from others.  I'm not sure how I'm going to make the doctors listen to me but I am going to make sure my spouse listens.

On the way home I just cried.  I'm so tired of fighting.  Why can't any of this just be easy?  Why are my doctors ignoring me?

I sort of have the results from the stomach biopsy, my doctor called and apologized for being so behind in his paperwork of which still hasn't been mailed to me.  I have a small gastric ulcer and my GERD is bad.  Well I knew that the GERD was bad and I kind of figured I had an ulcer months ago.  He asked if I was still in pain and I said yes on the left side just under the ribs.  He ordered an ultrasound of my gallbladder.  Okay I'll get it done but the gallbladder is mid-line in the abdomen.  Unless its created a gall stone that is blocking a duct in the pancreas I doubt its the gall bladder.  The pancreas is the only other thing on the left side besides the large intestine.  I'm thinking its more likely my large intestine but I'm not a doctor.  I have IBS and the large intestine gets irritated easily.  The pain radiates around to my back on just the left side.

AH-chooooooo

They started mowing in our neighborhood today.  J heard the landscapers out there and he hates how they ruin his grass.  J is now out there mowing our grass with our old-fashioned non-motor push mower. 

I'm sneezing.  Cut grass, tree pollen, and the dandelions are making it difficult to breathe.

It might reach the high 50's here today.  Still not warm enough for me to put my seedlings outside in the garden.  The overnight low temperature last night was 32....that would freeze my plants.

On the  food front I'm starting to buy the foods that I'm allowed to eat.  I'm currently following three diets combined.  DASH diet for my hypertension, IBS diet for my IBS, and the newest one for the stomach issues which takes away even more food from what I was allowed.  Now I can't even have peppermint tea!  No chocolate or carob.  Just put me in the grave now why don't you?  No beans, lentils or nuts.  Wait I love eating my nuts.  Now its like I'm down to just chicken as a source of protein.  They took red meats, wild game, pork, eggs and dark meat away from me along with all dairy now when I used to be allowed to eat cheese.  Do you realize how quickly I can get sick of chicken and turkey?

So I'll figure out what I'm allowed to eat for soluble fiber foods and then whittle it down more from the other "you can't eat that" lists I was given.  Looks like rice cakes are going to be my main staple food.

Yes I'm complaining its my blog and I'm going to whine and sneeze today.  Since I can't have real wine, like ever again!

As for the antiphospholipid antibody test that was done on Wednesday, even though the lab tech said it would take about 8 hours to get the results, the test results won't be in until some time late next week.  Why?  Well they have to send the blood out to have the test done.  I guess my big regional medical treatment facility here called Madigan isn't so big after all that they still need to send out for tests.  So as a little preventative since I'll be ovulating this week I'm now taking one baby asprin a day...just in case.
Label me cranky today.

A New Bread Attempt

Today I'm going to attempt to make a bread I've never made before.  I will make the Jewish braid bread called Challah.  J loved the one we bought last year from our commissary and I figured while he is on CQ today I might as well put my excess free time to good use.

Who needs to do laundry?  Me, probably, but it can wait while I try to make this particular bread.

Oh I lost 0.8 lbs yesterday only to gain back 1.2 lbs overnight.  What the heck is going on with my body?  I now need to lose 5.2 pounds to get back to my pre IVF weight.

I now have an appointment to see my PCM for the very same day as my WTF appointment.  So if my RE doctor doesn't cooperate then my PCM surely will.  Well I hope he will.  Tricare, when I called them to schedule a referral appointment, had on hand the information that I was supposed to undergo a surgical procedure and they had no problem in getting me in to see my PCM for next week to get it back on its way.  Something barium endoscopy was the thing I was supposed to do according to their records.  All I know as that I will be under anesthesia of sorts and they might have to put in a balloon.  But that isn't now and I don't know when it will get done.

Our weekend plans have changed.  Good news is that its extended.  Yay!  I knew that J had a four day weekend coming up but that because he has CQ today he would be too tired to drive on Friday for the start of our vacation.  Also the place we had reservations at had only one night available and I asked to be put on the cancellation list.  So they called back and told me they now had an opening.  Now I get two nights away from this hell hole house.  I'm so thinking that beer and a hot tub are just what J needs.  He's been avoiding all alcohol and hot tubs because it can affect his swimmers.  Time to relax a bit.

Yesterday J ran 2 miles in the morning for his PT and another 11.5 miles for the "Walk To Afghanistan".  They required them to run, though the family members could walk.  I didn't go as my hip yesterday, just taking the trash cans out to the road decided to slip out again.  This time it was the left one.  Back to J again.  So J has finally decided to admit he is a bit of an athlete.  Running half a marathon in one day is enough I'd say to make that observation.  Wish I could walk half of what he runs without the pain I get. 

Okay so if I want to get that bread made, remember I'm experimenting with the gluten issues though I think we all know I have some sort of sensitivity by now, I'd best end this post and get the dough rising at least.

Something Isn't Right

J gifted me this morning and I don't even have the energy to open the gifts.  Yes, I'm that tired.

I still need to go bake something that is going to make me sick.  Think today I'll make oatmeal cookies.  I never got around to making them last week.  No, I'm still gnawing on the bread from last week.  Amazingly enough it stayed fresh.

I'm sick.  My asthma is getting worse because of the GERD.  Oh and its either my GERD or I do indeed have Celiac or heaven help me my liver is getting cranky.  Why you wonder?  Well the evidence was in my toilet today.  The bile production isn't normal.  Yellow is not normal.  I shouldn't be having this much trouble with constipation either.  Its odd but bread used to have the opposite effect on me, not any more.  Oh and I gained 1.4 pounds over night.  I look huge.  I'm not kidding you when I say I went up another pant size over night with the swelling.  Everything is swollen on me, not just my face now.  Two clothing sizes since I started this experiment and only 1.4 pounds gained is just crazy.

I gave up on the peppermint tea after just two cups of it.  It was making my GERD worse.  Its been days since I had the last cup of it too.  Tums and Gas-x are still my bosom buddies.  No more than 2 Tums a day as I don't want to mess with the blood results nor give myself hypoparathyroidism from too much calcium being free in my blood stream.  I've had it before from the cortisone shots and its not fun at all.

There won't be a special dinner served at my house tonight.  Last night I had a few pieces of California roll and one egg roll.  I had some pie yesterday (it had a flour crust so oh what the heck its gluten), and some unsalted nuts.  Not sure how I could have gained 1.4 pounds from that but I did.

The 23rd can't get here quick enough.  I want to go back to my gluten free eating.  My stomach can't handle much more of this. 10 days until I beg my RE doctor to do some testing on me.  I might just make an appointment with my PCM in the meantime to get a referral to the gastroenterologist at Madigan.  Its been almost two years since I last saw one.  But I can almost bet it will take two weeks to get the PCM appointment and another 2-4 weeks to get to see the gastro doc.  I might as well wait and hope the RE doc will agree to the testing.

All I know is that something isn't right.  I'm sick and its not the flu.  Since I'm not on vitamins I think J and I have agreed to fore-go trying naturally.  I can't handle another positive hpt only to lose it a day later.  I need more time.  I need to be on folic acid for peace of mind too before we try again and right now I have to abstain from vitamins and mineral supplements to get an accurate blood count.

Blah Saturday

Yup, not much going on here today.

I got angry.

I cried.

I went grocery shopping for food that I won't eat but J will.  It was mostly his stuff he needed as well, I eat like a bird these days think bread and bread products.

Went out for lunch.  J bought me a gift for Tuesday's celebration of which he promptly wrapped when we got home.  The thing that I wanted to get for him won't be completed yet.  Its just a new stock for his granddad's shotgun.  Oh we started that project back in October but the guy who is making it is so back logged on gun projects that he probably won't get it to it until next month.  So for now J is just going to get an IOU and some candy.

Still have pelvic pain.  My GERD is hell right now.  Both kept me up last night like a newborn crying for a bottle.

Tomorrow is church.  We'll see if I feel up to going.  I hope I can go as these days its about the only thing that makes me feel a bit better about life.

If my ovaries are still possibly good and my uterus is still okay and I don't show signs for killing off any more babies we'll go with my own DNA again and give it more more try.

If my eggs are shit then we go with donor eggs.

If my endo is worse and my uterus is killing off the babies we are done.

13 more days until the WTF appointment.

Oh and excuse my cussing.  I'm just in that kind of mood.  I'll repent tomorrow and probably still swear a bit more after.  Life isn't always fair and we all know that.

Celiac note:  I'm now starting with a rash and I have a bruise on my forearm as of this morning.  No clue where the bruise came from as I don't remember hurting myself on anything.