Just Keep Swimming

Hi remember Me?  I feel like those of you who follow me will see this come up in your news feed and be like "Who's that girl?!".  And I totally wouldn't blame you.  I have unintentionally taken a hiatus from blogging.  No big reason.  Well...maybe that's not 100% true.  I guess I can admit that I've felt a little left behind lately.  That on top of the fact that there really hasn't been much to say led to the hiatus.  I mean how many times can I whine about the waiting and how bad all of this sucks.  You guys all know.  You get it.  However I finally spent some time catching up on all of your blogs and even though I am still feeling a little left behind I'm also feeling so much hope and happiness for those of you who have found success.  I mean there has been some crazy awesome stuff happening to some pretty special ladies.  Most of whom fought this battle longer than I have.  So...renewed hope combined with a little bit of progress in my world = news worthy of a blog post!

So this CCRM thing...... it's really happening.  My last cycle was ridiculous.  Something like 52 days and I only got my period because we induced it.  I have no idea what's going on with my body other than it's been on a lot of hormones for 2+ years and is basically just jacked up.  As a quick recap I had my ODWU with CCRM in April.  This appointment has be between when you stopped bleeding but before ovulation.  I proactively brought my day 3 blood work with me because the AWESOME facebook group I joined online gave me the heads up that I could save myself a month if I brought it with.  However the results were inconclusive  So after my appt. in Colorado I still needed to wait until I started my period again to have the blood work re-done before we could get our protocol.  Once again with the thought of saving time in the future I scheduled my beta 3 integrin test for the month of April (it has to be done between 9-11 days after ovulation).  Those results came back inconclusive as well.  Actually it came back "out of phase" which means even though I got a positive result on the ovulation stick my uterine tissue was saying that it wasn't the right time.  Super.  Frustrating.  Then I waited forever for my period which never came and we induced it with progesterone and I think they just felt sorry for me and finally agreed to just give me my calendar.  So we were able to schedule our regroup with Dr. Schoolcraft and he was......fine.  Honestly I know everyone says he can be kind of a jerk but my experience with him so far as been good.  He doesn't volunteer a bunch of additional information but he answers all my questions and I never feel rushed.  He basically said that there were no red flags from our ODWU.  My hysteroscopy and uterus looked "great" and the partially blocked tube isn't a issue since fluid isn't flowing back into my uterus.  He was optimistic about my AFC (16) and felt like based upon my past response he wanted to put me on protocol 3.  For you non-CCRMer's that is what they like to call their "poor responder" protocol.  It's not much different from what I did at my local clinic with the exception of there will be no BCP or Lupron for suppression.  Instead I'll be using estrogen patches to "prime" and we'll begin stims right after my period starts.  I feel like this protocol moves FAST since I'm used to the long lupron cycles.  So I'll start the patches on Wed. along with Cetrotide injections on Thurs.  I should start my period on Sunday and then have an u/s and blood work on the 1st and if every thing is good begin stim meds on the 2nd.  We'll travel to Colorado the next week and be monitored every day and then depending on how it goes we should be ready for retrieval that weekend or the beginning of the following week.

I think for us the biggest decision at CCRM is deciding if we are going to do the Family Building Program which is their embryo banking.  Dr. Schoolcraft didn't bring it up in our regroup but I asked him about it and he said based on my previous cycles he felt like that was a good idea.  How it works is it's 3 retrievals in a row (well it's about 8 weeks in between with waiting on your period and priming).  They retrieve your eggs and fertilize them and freeze them at the 2PN stage.  Then after your third retrieval they thaw everything and let them all grow to Day 5.  At that point they do the CCS genetic testing on the embryos that have made it to blast and freeze everything again.  It takes a couple weeks to get the results and then you can start prepping for a FET providing that you have "normal" embryos to transfer.  I've heard the entire process takes anywhere from 6 - 9 months.  Ouch.  So basically we are looking at not being able to transfer until 2016.  Once again....Ouch.  You guys all know how brutal the waiting is.  However based upon my research and conversations with others I was expecting this.  So while I wasn't completely devastated by the news it's still a hard pill to swallow.
As of right now I think we've decided that is our plan.  The hope being we'll suck it up and do this and this will be the last time we'll ever have to do retrievals.  We are praying that we get enough normals to at least get one take home baby....possibly even two.  And then it's all worth it right?

I'd be lying if I said I'm not secretly hoping for great numbers and the possibility that we could only have to do 2 retrievals vs. the 3.  If we could get results similar to my last cycle at my local clinic I think we'd definitely be in that boat.  But I'm also super nervous about how I"m going to respond to this new protocol, not to mention that I haven't done a retrieval in 9 months.  What if my body has forgotten how to make eggs?!  There's all sorts of fears that come along with trying something new but I just have to keep reminding myself of all the reasons we chose to come to CCRM in the first place.

One day at a time.  One foot in front of the other.  Just.  Keep.  Swimming.