Laughing with Sarah

Confirmed: No pregnancy this cycle. I had a pretty good sense by Thursday evening that this round hadn't been successful, and the blood draw Friday morning confirmed it. We are sad, definitely. And frustrated. And a little part of me is feeling flashes of the despair of five cycles in a row to get Sam. But mostly? We're doing fine. I am feeling strangely at peace. As I mentioned before, my biggest fear and concern with this cycle was getting any useful number of embryos to freeze, and we have six - SIX! - frozen. So that made this cycle feel successful to me, even if not in the way that I would have most wanted. We will pursue a frozen cycle sometime after the new year (no sense in squishing one in during one of the busiest times of the year for me). Meanwhile, I am itching to get back to running, and it couldn't hurt me to fix up my sleeping and eating habits a little bit as well. So even as we head toward the holidays, I am looking forward to making a little extra...

Wednesday morning was transfer day. We left Sam with an early morning babysitter when we left the house at 5:00 a.m. to make it to Rochester for our 6:30 a.m. report time. We went up to the same floor as last Friday. The same pod of rooms. A couple of the same nurses. Our room had only chairs this time, not a bed, and the gown they gave me was easily twice the size of the one I wore on Friday. I couldn't keep the thing up over my shoulders! Thank goodness for the robe, which was more normal-sized, that I kept tied tightly around me. They took my medical history down (yet again) and gave me a small dose of Valium (which I really didn't want to do, but they assured me it was standard practice, that it would relax me, but more, that it would relax all of the lady parts that they'd be messing with, and if that would help our chances, then Valium it was). Then onto the wheely bed and down to pre-op. I was really glad when I figured out that the Valium wasn't making me a...

Here's the before and after shot from last Friday's egg retrieval. I love how the main difference in the two pictures is the presence of toast (or lack thereof). I guess this is your visual proof that my retrieval was uneventful and that I tolerated the sedation well. :) We left the house before 6:00 a.m., dropping Sam off at a friend's house (who would take him to daycare when it opened) on our way out. Our check-in time was 7:30 a.m. We got there just fine, checked in, and went up to the outpatient surgery floor, where I got all gowned up and IV-ed. We were all ready to go by about 8:20 a.m. And then we waited. And waited. And waited some more. Finally, around 9:30 a.m., they came to get me. I hopped up onto a wheely-bed, and they took me down to pre-surgery, where some nice nurses and a nice anesthesiologist all came to check in with me. And then more waiting. I was there about half an hour, during which time I did one of those "doze off and feel like I'm fal...

That's the theme of my last week. Up. Up. More up. Up to Rochester. Up for bloodwork and ultrasound on Friday. Up for bloodwork and ultrasound again today. As we get to the fine-tuning business as we near retrieval, up again, perhaps more frequently this week, to watch and micromanage meds until everything is just perfect. I'm not yet sick of the drive, which is good. But I'm also getting impatient and careless. I got pulled over this morning because I was rushing to get up for my appointment and was definitely going faster than the 55 mph speed limit. Thankfully, he was a wonderfully kind State Trooper who, upon learning that I'd never been stopped in Minnesota before, wasn't a regular commuter, and was on my way to a doctor's appointment, gave me a warning and a kindly suggestion to slow down and watch for Troopers down the road. :) Up go my numbers, slowly, finally. After last Wednesday's appointment, they bumped me up to 225 units of Gonal-F and 150 ...

Depending on how you count, we are either five or six days into our new IVF cycle. We started meds on Friday night. 150 Gonal-F and 75 Menopur for starters, and then they bumped me up to 225 Gonal-F and 75 Menopur after Monday morning's blood draw, which was itself a bit of an adventure. (They're remodeling the lab at our local hospital and can't process same-day results, which meant that I went through the bother of the blood draw only to have to drive up to Rochester - a 3 hour round trip - to re-do it that afternoon.) This morning, I rode with a friend up to Rochester for my next labwork. She had plans to be up here for the day and offered to give me a ride, which is lovely, because I'm going to be doing plenty of these round trip drives alone in the next week. Of course, her schedule vs. my schedule means that we left early - shortly after 7am - to get me here in time for my blood draw, which took about ten minutes total, from registration to getting up from the c...

I spent fifteen minutes on hold this morning with a customer service rep from one specialty pharmacy, while she waited on hold with a different specialty pharmacy so that she could track down a fax number for me. It is a weird, weird world out there, where your health insurance plan can partner with a different company to provide you a prescription plan, and said prescription company owns at least two specialty pharmacies through which they handle medications that your local pharmacy wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole, and sometimes those pharmacies get their information crossed, and sit on hold with each other to find you a stupid fax number. All this is to say that today's small (though unconfirmed) victory is that I found the right fax number for the right pharmacy so that the clinic can send in my order so that I can have meds in time to START OUR NEW ROUND OF IVF THIS FRIDAY! Yes, the time has come. I've been writing about it for a while now, because it has invo...

Doing IVF is complicated when you live in a small town far from your beloved RE (five hours away in Chicago), and far from a medical center that can handle the particular types of monitoring blood testing and ultrasounds that an IVF cycle requires (an hour and a half away in Rochester). We knew that it was complicated, which is why we talked about whether our last cycle before moving here (the one that, blessedly, resulted in sweet Sam!) would be the LAST last cycle that we ever did. Except, of course, once we had a baby in our arms, there was no question that we were going to want another one. So after our consult with Dr. Morris at the beginning of the summer, we started bracing ourselves for the logistical nightmare that would be this IVF cycle. Realizing that we'd have to be the go-between communicator, trying to get labs scheduled (both locally and up at Mayo) and then making sure the results were sent to the Chicago office in appropriately timely fashions; we had slated...

Plans are underway. Consults accomplished. Appointment and testing requests in the works. If routine tests confirm that everything looks normal with my body and my hormones (we have no reason to believe otherwise), then we are on the schedule for a two-week "vacation" to Chicago, beginning August 15, to begin a round of IVF all over again. The protocol has changed a bit since the last time we went through this - no longer do they seek to accomplish stimulation, egg retrieval, PGD, and embryo transfer all in one action-packed three week span. Instead, they take you through retrieval, and then perform PGD and freeze the embryos instead of trying to rush toward transfer. Which means a shorter on-the-ground commitment in Chicago (better for Matt's and my work/vacation schedules), with a lower-stress FET cycle to happen at a future date. One step at a time. Already, our minds and hearts have slipped back into that willfully forgetful place where we don't think at ...

I just got off the phone with my RE's office, taking care of three items of business that are all big in their own ways. I called in to get things started for another frozen transfer cycle. No sense in waiting. So just like that, we are onto another cycle of meds and blood draws and ultrasounds leading up to a fourth embryo transfer. I want to feel hopeful, but right now, I can only assume that this cycle will end up like all three of the others. I mean, a lot of me is pressing forward because hey, we have at least six good embryos frozen and it'd be a shame not to go ahead and keep trying. I know that I'll bounce back, but right now, I'll admit that I have a pretty lousy attitude going into this cycle, even if I passionately want to press ahead and do it. So related to this, I also scheduled a consult with my RE to ask the same question I asked last time, "Is there anything that we should be looking for, or anything we should do differently, or any possib...

It feels like summer today.  Not like it is October 24th. Sunny, blue skies, 77 degrees outside. Beautiful weather. Like summer the way summer should be. Perfect weather for a Summer Shandy, don't you think? Yes. The small upside in getting the "not-pregnant" phone call after today's blood draw is that at least I could drink one of those and enjoy the sun. Not sure I can articulate any other upsides, because really, it sucks that this is our third embryo transfer and it is our third failure.  And I don't quite know what to think about it all. If I think too hard, I just cry, and that gets ugly after a bit, trust me.  So for now, I'm just going to focus on the sun, and the business of these next days, and gear up for whatever it is that comes next.

It's Monday. i'm waiting waiting waiting until Wednesday's blood draw... After transfer last Wednesday, I spent the day doing nothing, and got so bored and stir crazy that I ended up being just horrible and cranky and argumentative with Matt. Yuck. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, all uneventful and still days filled with post-transfer hope and optimism. Boobs were sort of sore (though they've been sore from the progesterone supplements this whole time since retrieval, so there probably was nothing remarkable to it), and felt kind of normal, but hopeful. Yesterday was Sunday. I was brutally exhausted, and feeling like I was coming down with a head or chest cold. Exhausted, hungry, a little crampy, but no boob soreness. So I spent the entire day convinced that my body was just working itself up to start a period (like it did our first IVF cycle), but nothing came of the day. Today, I feel good. Like myself. Nothing is sore, nothing is crampy, nothing is bloate...

Ready for transfer! All smiles and gowns and jumpsuits... Post-transfer and happy, ready for 30 minutes of flat-on-back time   All set up for spending the rest of the afternoon off of my feet, just to be safe. I'm wearing my lucky socks (knit specifically for the IVF cycle)! Also notice the necessary items for a couch-bound afternoon: knitting, magazines, chocolate, and television.

I'm feeling restless and frustrated right now, in that way specific to people who are recovering from illness or injury. Because my head feels good and normal. I'm thinking like normal, most of my body feels like it should, and common sense tries to tell me that I've been sitting on my butt ALL DAY, and I really should DO SOMETHING PRODUCTIVE. Add to that the fact that since my procedure yesterday, I've been HUNGRY. I ate and ate and ate yesterday. And today, too. And the thing that stinks is that I've been working so hard to lose weight and get fit, and not only does all of the sitting around and eating make me feel gross, but the crazy bloating taking place because of the retrieval is making me feel even fatter and grosser, and the ONLY thing I want to do right now is go for a run... ...but if you were to watch me try to walk right now, you'd know that running is OUT. OF. THE. QUESTION. And so I'm a little mad that retrieval kicked my butt like...

Ready to go! (IV in right hand...sad band-aid on left hand...) Nope. Didn't keep up tracking my meds here this time. It was a quick cycle and I was busy. Having upped my dosages to speed things up, my estrogen level was up to 4000 by this past Tuesday morning, which (according to Dr. Google) is on the high side of normal. So this probably why my doctor had me trigger Tuesday night for a Thursday morning retrieval. Yesterday's retrieval went well. Well, mostly.  They had trouble getting my IV in, so yeah, that wasn't great. A nurse was digging around in my left hand and I am so surprised that I didn't faint. Yuck. But try two on my other hand went quickly and easily. I wore my lucky socks yesterday - socks that I had started knitting during our first IVF cycle but didn't finish - and the last thing I remember as I drifted off in the procedure room was explaining the socks after being complimented on them. I woke up easily and felt good but sore. ...

And so, without much fanfare, we have started this next round of IVF. At our consult last month, my doctor had no real reason to believe that there was anything except for bad luck to blame for our first IVF and FET failures. The only thing he could think of to do was try to shorten the time between start of cycle and retrieval, so he upped my starting dosage of the Follistim. Last IVF cycle, we started at 300 IU Follistim. This cycle, we begin with 450 IU. So Saturday night we started injections. We attended a friend-of-my sister's wedding (because I officiated!), and it was beautiful. And it was really fun to hang out with my sister and her boyfriend at the reception. Except that near the end of dinner, I came down with crazy migraine, which made all of me feel just terrible. So we ducked out of the festivities early, got home, and I settled on the couch with a pillow and blanket, trying to feel better. And so I was not so pleased to have to do our first injection. ...

So it would appear that we are all in for another go at IVF. This afternoon, we went in for our re-consult with my RE. My hopes for the conversation were that we would 1) talk a little bit about how things had gone for both our fresh IVF cycle and our frozen cycle from the first half of the year, to see whether there were reasons to be concerned or reasons for failure other than bad luck, and 2) talk about where to go from here, whether there were any tests or repeat tests he would recommend, and a potential gameplan and timeline for a new round of IVF. Our conversation covered both topics - past and future. Looking back, he said that everything about our first cycles was good, and that the only things he could "pick on" were the length of time between starting injections and egg retrieval (which can be shortened by upping the dosages on my meds this time), and the percentage of eggs that fertilized/expanded (which is partially related to the length of cycle issue). I ...

So here we are.  It is August.  It is absolutely crazy to me to think that almost exactly a year ago, I was starting Clomid and getting squeamish about the eventual "trigger shot" that they would have to give me and the handful of monitoring ultrasounds they'd have to do to pinpoint a date for that shot.  Little did I know just how many shots, blood tests, and ultrasounds were ahead of me. It's August, and now nearly three months since our failed FET cycle, and no, I still haven't called my RE to schedule a consult.  To be fair, we did decide to take the summer off, at least until after all of our summer travels. The logical parts of me feel certain that we will do another round of IVF (and, if we have enough embryos, another FET cycle), because...well...wouldn't it be silly not to?  I mean, two rounds of "failure" this spring does not constitute Failure.  Two rounds can yet be easily explained away in terms of bad luck.  It hasn't worked yet...

My RE has two offices. One here in town, which is tiny office, equipped only to do things like consults, regular office visits, blood draws, ultrasounds, and things like that. He has a second office, downtown Chicago, where he does all of his surgeries and advanced procedures. Every woman going through IVF needs to go to that Chicago office twice: once for egg retrieval, once for embryo transfer. There is an empty plot of land in town, near his existing office, and he is building a new office, complete with surgical suites, so that his patients can do all of their fertility-related treatments in one place. Last month, the city council was scheduled to vote on the project, merely to approve the land use, on unanimous recommendation by the Planning and Zoning Commission. A small group of conservative Catholics in town showed up at that meeting, opposed to the fertility center on moral grounds, and because of their arguments, the city council postponed the vote until their next mee...

Forty-six percent. That was the possibility that we would get pregnant transferring two embryos (blastocysts, if you want to be accurate). In those first few days after our transfer, with those two little dudes trying to figure out how and whether to stick around, I thought about how good a near-fifty percent chance was. My glass was definitely half-full . In those first 24 hours, I felt sure and terrified that we'd end up with twins, because if they put two of them in there, of course two of them would stick around, right? As the week went on, I felt the shift in my soul, from the glass being half-full to the glass just being, well, half-something. Not half-full. Not half-empty. Just half. I realized that there was just as big of a chance of us not getting pregnant as there was of us getting pregnant. But I yet continued to remind myself that in nature, if you're doing this whole "let's get pregnant" thing the old-fashioned way, you have around a th...

This is me, standing in the fog and drizzle on the patio outside the Shedd Aquarium, texting family and friends that our first IVF cycle ended up negative. In so many ways, this picture sums up the mood. --- Thanks to Matt for planning a Chicago getaway today, where we could celebrate if there was something to celebrate, and enjoy ourselves (and distract ourselves) if the news came back negative. We got the phone message about the bad news while we were on our way to see the penguins. We took a quick break to text close friends and family who had been praying for us and to call the doctor's office to schedule a follow-up consultation. But then, we went right back to enjoying all the fishies. We saw sharks and sting-rays and turtles and all sorts of crazy and colorful fish, and there were eels and frogs and manatees and starfish and seahorses and penguins and otters. Oh my. Otters are cute. By the time we left the aquarium, this is how I was feeling. Much better, do...