Its A Wash

As of this morning my joy and hope are gone.

Of the 9 eggs retrieved, 5 were mature, 1 fertilized.

I think its probably over.

I'd write more but I'm so angry right now.  I'm feeling hate to the universe and my spouse. 

Why the spouse?  Well he didn't do a damn thing yesterday to help me except drive and take the 3 photos.  All those casseroles I made ahead, he didn't even microwave one for me yesterday.  He made me fend for myself in all the pain I was in.  He got the day off of work and just took care of himself.  So right now I'm feeling a lot of the hate towards him.  I couldn't even get him to put out fresh pot holders after I put the others in the hamper.

Oh and I'm doing laundry today.  He had a full load of his own and I guess it was just too much for him to do his laundry yesterday so I have to do it today.  I did ask him to do his.  Heck I couldn't even get him to study yesterday. Instead he played on his computer.   I'm also doing a load of the household and a few socks of mine.  Seriously I'm supposed to be resting.  He can bite my ass!

Egg Retrieval Today

I always said I have two left feet when it comes to trying to dance and turn right.  Well this time I put it on the socks and I decided to write Left backwards on the left sock.  Dr. C. got a chuckle out of them.

J was ushered off to collection right away and I was drugged up shortly after Dr.C. showed up.  Traffic in Seattle this morning was horrendous.   Even at 0615 hrs when we were driving through Seattle it was nuts.

This is the photo of the tops of my socks.  I put our first initials into the hearts and of course I put my "R" on the left one that I wrote left backwards on because I keep telling J that I'm more screwed up than he thinks.

Okay now a bit about my crappy morning.  I get to the clinic at 0700 hrs.  They tell me I'm way early.  I said no that I'm not as my appointment is for 0730 hrs and I was told to be there at 0700 hrs.  Think used car salesman attitude from the receptionist.  She is trying to persuade me that I'm wrong.  Nope not wrong I wrote it down.  Its really that they don't want to admit that they are running behind because my doctor is caught in traffic.  I hate when they lie to me.  My doctor even told me he was stuck in traffic.  I like my doctor.  He is honest.

This is me, caught with my eyes closed trying to get J to give me a kiss for the photo he is taking.  My beautiful hair net is falling off my bundled up hair.

As you can see I am smiling and I do have dimples.  Still not the best photo of me but I'm not wearing makeup either.

J has a big smile on his face but that is because the surgery is now done and we had good news.

9 follicles, 9 eggs.  Not sure how many are mature enough to fertilize but we got 9 eggs this time.  First IVF we had only 2 eggs out of the four or five follicles that were left after the other 3 ruptured on their own.

We have real hope.  Dr. C. will call me tomorrow with the news on how many made it.  I'm excited.  I'm hoping that at least 4 make it fertilization.

Before we left I had two shots of fentanyl and a heating pad before I was released.  The pain was worse this time and I was bleeding more, a lot more.  But right now I'm okay.  The bleeding has slowed down and the vicodin and an IHOP breakfast/lunch have taken the edge off. 

16 hours without food I was starved and I needed to take a pain pill.  I had a brunch type meal of chicken, biscuits, eggs and pancakes.  I pigged out.  So much for my under 2000 calories and under 1000 mg of sodium a day.  Well one day of splurging isn't likely to kill me.  But I have to say IHOP was wonderful about accommodating me with a booth that I didn't have to share a back with another table.  I wouldn't have been able to take some adult or child bouncing in their seat and vibrating my seat because of the bouncing.  So I tipped generously the waitress for being so darn nice.

Where There Is Hope There Is Joy

I have noticed that when I have hope I'm always filled with joy.  Because of late that I have hope that I'll create a baby, and a take home one if I'm lucky, I'm filled with the joy that just spills over into other areas of my life.

I'm feeling love.  I'm giving love.  I smile more.  Now I have a chance.

For those that were curious as to my E2 numbers on Friday, I found out last night for you.  I really had forgotten to ask about the E2 given the state of the follicles as they are more important when it comes down to it.  But my E2 as of Friday after 4 days of stims were 1900, we didn't check it on Saturday.

Yesterday was my last Lupron shot.  I administered it to myself.  J gave me the IM HCG last night.  Of course the required test was positive this morning.  I have hope that it won't be the only positive one before the beta.

Oh yes, I'm going to POAS before the Beta.  I want to know if I have something growing in there.

Tomorrow at 0730 hrs is the egg retrieval.  We will be doing a three day transfer due to my age.  I was hoping that maybe we'd get to 5 days but Dr. C. thinks 3 days with the assisted hatching will be fine.

So I have hope that I will have enough to get one embryo to stay put this time.

Oh and because I do have hope I bought the above bead for my bracelet today.  I have so much hope that J and I were talking about a second child using donor eggs next time.  It would still be his biologically and a half to our one we created together.  I'm fine with that.  My clock would get reset.  I wouldn't need the stim shots either which is a bonus.

This will be our last IVF with my eggs.  With my estrogen counts this high after just four days of stims I'd hate to see how bad it will be next time.

I bought some heavy weight military boot socks for the treatments.  I'm going to use a sharpie to decorate them.  Oh and if I get my husband to remember he'll take pictures tomorrow of the socks on my feet and us together with me in my gown.

Wish us luck.

Wanda's Follicle Forecast

Wanda and I are becoming great friends of late and well we should considering how intimate our relationship is with all the prodding.

Today I had my 0700 hrs appointment at REI at Madigan.  J got to play nurse to Dr. C. and take notes in my chart.  He thought that was pretty cool.  Hopefully they can decipher his handwriting as sometimes I find it difficult to see what he has written in the ledger.

After my appointment I gave myself the last of the micro dose Lupron shots for this cycle.  Tonight will be the trigger shot.  J will be home to administer the shot, Thank You!  I'd hate to try to give myself that particular shot.


Now for Wanda's Follicle Forecast:

Uterine Lining: 10

Right Ovary: 20, 20, 16.5

Left Ovary:  34, 30, 22, 15, 15, 17.5  Looks like I have two nasty cysts but they'll drain them on Monday.

Dr. C. is very happy and we are happy too.  He said he is hoping for 3-4 embryo's to transfer on day 3.  Its an age thing with me.  Younger gals usually get 1 or 2 transferred but since I'm 42 we are going for the bank load.  Most likely I'll not have a thing to freeze so here is my hope that this works and gives me a take home baby.

Keep me in your thoughts.  Looks like an early Monday morning retrieval.  I'll know more after Seattle Reproductive Medicine gives me a call later today.  Dr. C. is requesting a particular time and usually he gets his way.

I'm excited.  I'm thinking all sorts of positive thoughts.  I'm picturing me heavily pregnant and also holding our baby.   Not going to think about the negative for the next few weeks.

Latest Date With Wanda

There is no photo of today's date with Wanda.  Nope they just don't give out photos of the follicles.  But I do have some good news.

Remember me writing about the 5 antrals I had with the baseline E2 of less than 20?  Wednesday's E2 level was 1064 and I'm waiting for the blood work results on today's but I've got happiness in my veins today.

Looks like I'll be triggering this weekend.  My RE clinic is so nice to me that they are going to open up just for me tomorrow to do a special scan check.  Yup just for me.  Aren't I lucky?

But okay back to the really good news.  Including what was a cyst before of 20 mm I now have 9 follicles.  Yes, there were more hidden.

Unfortunately, as per usual with me, they are all developing at different rates.

Here are my numbers:

Uterine lining 9.1 mm

Right side: 19.5, 13, 16.5

Left side:  26, 27.5, 20,11.5, 15.5, 13.5.....we are guessing either the 27.5 or the 26 was the cyst.

So yes I could have gone with the trigger shot today and retrieved on Sunday but Dr. C. thinks that those really large ones probably won't make it.  Depending on today's lab report I'll either do my trigger tonight or take my stims for another night and take the trigger shot tomorrow.  J has CQ duty today so he is going to try to get home for the early morning appointment 0645 ish hrs.  CQ is a full 24 hours I'm hoping that they'll let him home to do the injections tonight because if I have to do the trigger, intramuscular shot, its not going to be pretty.  I can do the other shots myself if I have to.

Dr. C. is very hopeful that I will have more than one embryo this time; he's thinking 3 or 4 and just as perfect as the last one. I only had 2 mature eggs last time we did the IVF and one fertilized in the perfect non fragmented 8 cell we all hope for.  I really won't mind paying the cryopreservation fee as an add on expense if I actually have something to make it to that level.  So maybe I'll have 3 or 4 follicles which will give me mature eggs come retrieval.  Come on 11.5 become an 18!

So to celebrate, after the clinic closes for the day, I'm going to dye my hair.  I don't want to look like an old grey mare for the retrieval.

I'm so hopeful.  I'm excited. 

Planning Ahead

Picture it, because I didn't take a photograph, a freezer full of casseroles and soups.

I'm cooking up a storm.  Even though I'm still sick and have several more days of antibiotics to go until this sinus infection is gone I'm cooking.  I'm planning ahead for the egg retrieval and embryo transfer.

Last IVF didn't go too well.  J was lost, confused and in general didn't know what to do to make my life easier.  When I should have been relaxing on the couch with nothing more strenuous in mind than changing a channel on the remote I was cooking for both of us.  This time will be different.

This time I preparing food for me.  Just me, not him.  J isn't on a dietary restriction.  J is a wonderful cook when he wants to be.  Last IVF, he prepared for himself from scratch Beef Wellington.  He made everything including the crust.

So I'm not exactly sure why he doesn't know one pot from a pan from a baking sheet when it comes to preparing a meal for both of us.  He took Home Ec in high school just like I did.  His mother encouraged him to learn to cook so that when he was on his own he wouldn't starve just like my mom did.

Currently I have three servings of a blue cheese casserole and one serving of a divine low sodium soup in the freezer.  Its enough for four dinners for me.  Tonight, if I feel like it, I'll cook some more and put more aside.  If I have the energy I'll be making Swedish meatballs, rice and peas.

I figure that if I make enough for 6 nightly meals I'll be set for the main parts of the egg retrieval and embryo transfer.  Just about anyone can reheat a frozen pre-cooked meal. 

I made enough of my no recipe, low sodium soup last night for both of us to enjoy and still have some for me to freeze.  Soup the night of the ER is about all I can handle too.  I don't know about you but all I wanted the first 48 hours was just enough calories in me to take my pain medicine.

The blue cheese casserole is a bit higher in sodium than I'd like but if its divided into three servings it won't be all that bad.  I was figuring the carbohydrates in it would be a nice safe bet the day after the ER or even the day of the ET.

Well this is me remaining hopeful and planning ahead.  I have to take care of me because in the end I'm the one I can most rely upon.  J being Army and all means that he might not be here as much as I'd like him to be for anything past donating his gametes to this endevour.  I'm already begging him to find out when his next CQ shift is and class dates too so that I know if I need to find a friend to take me to Seattle or not.

Well enough rambling.  Oh and to give some feedback.  I haven't been watching much SCI-FI of late.  I've never heard of Battlefield Earth to be honest, really I thought maybe it was a game or something.  I'm starting to think Sunflower has an idea with the separate bedrooms and maybe it will feel like sneaking around into each others beds if we do decide that route is best.  Kind of like when we were dating and our folks wanted us in different bedrooms.  Could be rather fun.

Checking The Costs

Just for the heck of it today I decided to start researching the cost of donor eggs.  Donor eggs would give me a bit more time to try for a child.  It wouldn't be of my genetic material but it would be still of my husband's so its not all that bad to consider.

However, after just checking out the cost for a donor egg set of 6 eggs, the cost is going to be way out of my budget.  $15,000 for 6 eggs.  Yes, it would give me that chance to become a mother and its still quite a bit cheaper than trying to adopt.  But I can't afford the cost right now. 

I could do a loan but really is that a smart thing to do?  In this economy taking out a loan to get pregnant?

I guess the only reason why I'm even looking into this Donor Egg route is because I've yet to ovulate on my own after testing now for three days.  I have all the pains but it could just be the endometriosis.  I'm afraid that my eggs are really failing me.

I read quite a few blogs today and on one in particular the gal mentioned a similar problem to what I had with my last IVF cycle.  Her follicles weren't waking up like they should.  Her doctor decided to tweak her meds and she ended up with plenty of good eggs.  She is just two years younger than me.  I wonder is it because the Army doctors are limited on the types of drugs they can use for our protocols that I'm to never have that baby or is it because my doctor isn't all that great as to live up to the expectations I had hoped he would or quite possibly my eggs are just expired.

My odds given the two eggs they retrieved out of 8 follicles, most not even close to being ripe mind you, were as expected.  I had a 50-50 chance of getting an embryo.  I got one.  Just one.  It temporarily implanted but then something went wrong. 

Now I wonder if its the clinic or my body.  Did the embryologist not chose the best sperm when he did the ICSI?  Or did my body just decide to reject the embryo because I had a sinus infection.

I want a do over.  I want a happy healthy pregnancy.  Maybe I'll get that chance come January.  Now I just need to get another 15 pounds off to make it to my next goal.  I could handle going into the next pregnancy with only being 20 pounds overweight since I know my blood pressure will be more under control with the more weight I get off.  But I can't prevent sinus infections, colds, and flues even if I get the flu shot next week.

Too many variables stay subjective.  I'd like to change all that and make it more of a controlled environment.  An ideal environment.  For now the thought of donor eggs will have to shelved.

Egg Retrieval Today

This morning at 0730 hrs I was in Seattle having my eggs retrieved.  I'm okay but unfortunately only 2 eggs were recovered from this cycle.

I am in pain and had to get something to eat before I could take my first vicodin.  The pain continued for over an hour before I opted to take another vicodin.  I'm allowed 2 vicodin every 4-6 hours and it looks as though I just might need them.

I'm not bleeding heavy which was a concern of my doctor's as he watched the nurse stick in the IV line and the blood run down my arm to hit the floor. Oops!  I guess she could have been a bit better huh?

My blood pressure was a concern to my doctor days before hand but today it was holding steady at 116/76.  Wish it were that good every day, then I wouldn't need my Labetalol.

J and I stopped for breakfast at IHop.  I ate half of my two pancakes, two bites of my eggs and I did finish off my 1 hash brown, I gave J my bacon, knowing that I'd need that fuel to prevent the nausea from taking the vicodin.  I'm not really hungry but I am sleepy.

I just took my doxycycline, the antibiotic they prescribed to prevent infection after the surgery.  Good thing I ate because that drug also requires me to have food in my stomach.

I must confess to having stopped at the German Bakery in Lakewood for a pretzel.  The carbs will do me some good and I'll most likely be eating only the pretzel through out the day.

So the physically painful part is almost done with now, just the intramuscular progesterone shots to go through with.   Now comes the mental pain of waiting to hear if my eggs are good enough to even fertilize.  If they make it to day 3 I'll have them transferred into me on Saturday.  I'll know more tomorrow when Dr. C. calls me with the egg results.

I really hope I get a baby out of this.  Its not so much the cost but the emotional investment that is draining.  I'm just thankful that J is by my side through this, though at times he has no clue as to what he is supposed to be doing to help out.  If anyone has any advise for him please share it here where he'll see it.

Oh, and forgive me if this post seems to be a jumbled mess...its the meds.

Positive Out Look

J and I are trying to keep a positive out look for this particular IVF cycle.  Its quite possible that when they do the egg retrieval I might get five good eggs or none at all.

This morning I had to take a pregnancy test.  Why?  Well for those of you that don't know its because of the trigger shot.

The shot I had to take at exactly 2000hrs last night was HCG (human Chorionic Gonadotropin) which is found in pregnant female mammals.  I'm not sure if its found in non-mammals or not.  Well okay in order to get the egg retrieval done tomorrow my pregnancy test has to show positive. 

And there it was this morning at 0458 hrs.  I was pregnant according to the digital test.  But I'm not actually.  Its just the shot.  Of course I called J into the bathroom to show him the test result.  I told him it might be the only time we see a positive home pregnancy test.  When I was pregnant with the twins 15 years ago my HPT never showed positive.    I've never actually had a positive home test either.  Weird but my body is like that or perhaps the tests were never that sensitive all those years ago.

See I'm not supposed to take another home pregnancy test (HPT) during this IVF cycle. No I'm supposed to just go for a blood test 14 days after the egg retrieval, not 14 days after the embryo transfer.    The 3rd of November, if all goes well I'll be getting some blood work done.

I'm nervous, I'm worried, I'm excited, hell I'm scared.  I'm trying to stay positive.  All I need is one good egg.  That super hero of all eggs that will work its seductive magic on one sperm and create us a happy, healthy embryo that is willing to attach to my uterine lining. 

I just want to get through the egg retrieval with good news.  Then of course I want to get through the embryo transfer on Saturday with good news.  I hope my body doesn't betray me now.  Seems as though I had plenty of follicles earlier but they all decided to play "you go first" and not develop together like they were afraid of the outcome.  So now my odds of a good quality egg in the bunch has diminished.  But I'm still hoping against all odds that it works for us.

Keep us in your thoughts please.  Thanks.

Trigger Shot Time

Right now I'm sitting here blogging while I'm waiting for yet another phone call.  I always seem to be waiting on phone calls from my REI of late.

In the next hour the phone call I get should be from the SRM office in Seattle.  I'll get my time for my egg retrieval and the time that I'm to take my trigger shot.

I'm ready.  I'm nervous.  I'm excited.  I'm depressed.

My ovaries are starting to fail me.  We almost cancelled this IVF today.  Yes, the count is that low.  I have only 5 follicles there and some are as small as 9 mm right now.  I doubt some will be viable.

We were counseled on how to proceed.  I was hesitating on going through with the IVF, not because of the cost, but because it might not be worth the egg retrieval.  But, if we went to an IUI I know we would be wasting our money.  Four IUI's and not one of them worked what is to say another would work.

Dr. C. gave us the choice and I swear he was leaning towards the IUI but my husband thought differently.  J thought that Dr.C. had some positive news and thought that we could achieve a pregnancy still though, the odds are lowered with less candidates.

If this IVF cycle fails, and I count a miscarriage as a fail, then we won't be able to get into another cycle until March.  Had we decided to go with the IUI they could have gotten us into the next IVF cycle which is January.

Because there is still a possibility of my husband deploying we opted to go with the IVF now.  Fingers crossed it will work.

I won't be having a day 5 transfer, I'll be having a day 3 transfer.  This means that Saturday I'll have my embryo/s put in me.  If I even have any to transfer.

I'm afraid to hope.  I'm really depressed thinking that none will make it that stage of transference.  I want a baby so bad. 

After we received the results of the ultrasound, my lining is 9.2 right now, and the number of follicles, I wanted to cry.  I really didn't think we had a snowball's chance in hell of conceiving.  I really hope that my despair is soon gone.  I'm trying to think positive but I'm actually afraid to have hope.

Oh and if I hear one more person tell me I should adopt I think I might lose my calm and do something I really shouldn't.  Seriously if you can't say something supportive and can only tell me, "its just not your time", "it wasn't meant to be", or "you should adopt", then perhaps you should hold your tongue.