Despite all odds....

Pain in the......

I'm going to take a moment to vent and be a whinny IVF patient.  I try so hard not to complain about this process that is giving me a chance to have a baby of my own when nature most likely wouldn't let that happen.  I feel bad complaining and being ungrateful for medicine and science that gives us a fighting chance.  And I know that FET cycles are not as intense as fresh IVF cycles.  I know all of this.  But some days you just gotta bitch.

My FET protocol was Lupron for supression with E2V (delestrogen) IM (inter muscular) injections every third day.  Now that we are getting closer to transfer I've started the dreaded PIO (progesterone in oil) shots and we've increased the E2V.  I'm doing 2cc's (100mg) of PIO every night.  This.  Is.  A.  Lot.  More than I've ever done in the past.  In addition I'm doing .4ml's of E2V every third night.  Last night was a night I had to do both IM shots.  I'm not proud to say I didn't handle this well and basically cried through the whole thing.  My bottom hurts when I walk, hurts when I sit, hurts when simply standing.  In addition I've been battling a non stop headache since this weekend.  Please, don't get me wrong.  If it meant I get a baby I would do both shots every day for the rest of my life.  But man, is it hard sometimes.

Ok so that's enough of the whining and complaining.  That being said we are one day closer to transfer.  We are getting there - making progress.  And as my best friend told me this morning every shot is one step closer to transfer and giving Frosty a home.  I pray so hard that this works.  That this will be it for us.  However the road to bringing home a healthy baby is long and full of potholes.  I will be SO SO grateful IF we get a positive beta.  But I will be plagued with worry and fear waiting to see it increase.  I know I won't be able to stop thinking about what happened last time.  I can't even picture myself going in for the first ultrasound after experiencing it last time with no heartbeat.  The fear is like a living, breathing thing inside me.  Then I begin to play out "which is worse".  Is it worse to get a negative beta from the get go?  Or to become pregnant only to miscarry.  I'm not sure there's a right answer there.  Both are terrible, horrible.  I don't want to go through either option.  I just want to get pregnant and stay pregnant and 9 months later bring home a healthy baby.  Which sometimes feels completely impossible.

But thanks to my support system I have faith.  I have people who are praying for us and helping me to be positive even when I feel hopeless.  For that I am eternally grateful.  I know it only takes one.  I have spent this week obsessing over some of your blogs where you transferred just 1 embryo and either have your sweet child home with you or are well in to your 2nd or 3rd trimester.  I envision that being us.  I hope.  I pray.  I do these stupid shots and take all of the meds and know that ultimately this is all in God's hands.  I trust in his plan for us even when I don't understand it.  I have FAITH.

Check!

Does anyone else sometimes feel like this journey is full of small boxes that you check off?  It seems that's how I picture things whenever I start a new cycle. So much has to go right before you even get to transfer.  Some of them are small steps and some larger but they all have to be completed and you have to "pass" to continue to move forward.  On Friday I had my blood work to check my hormone levels and my U/S to check my lining.  I was nervous because I've been having some strong period like cramps since the scratch and was nervous my lining wasn't going to be good.  It came in at a 10 which they said was great so that was a relief.  One more box checked.  I'm continuing with the delestrogen shots every third day and my dose has increased slightly.  In addition last night I started the PIO shots.  I really did not miss those.  Even the E2V that I've been doing that is an IM shot in the butt isn't as bad as the PIO since it's not as thick or as much.  But it's all part of the process and obviously worth it in the end.  

So as we inch closer to transfer I've been battling a lot of fears.  The biggest one is how our little "Frosty" will thaw.  This is my first FET and technically IVF try #3 for us.  We've done two fresh cycles and had poor results with both.  We only had 1 embryo to transfer the first time and I got a negative beta.  The second cycle we had 4 embryos.  1 which was pretty poor quality due to fragmentation so we transferred it along with 2 others that were fairly good quality.  I did receive positive betas that continued to climb but at the 7 week ultrasound there was no heartbeat and it showed development had stopped most likely around 6 weeks.  The 1 embryo that we froze from our 2nd fresh cycle was actually at 12 cells at day 3.  Which is further along than they are supposed to be.  Our embryologist explained that could be a good thing or a bad thing.  Sometime when embryos are ahead they just continue to divide too many times until they arrest.  This little guy held on and made to a 5 day blastocyt.  We've only transferred Day 3 embryos in the past so this is another new thing for us that does bring me some hope.  

I've been extra emotional the last week as we draw closer to transfer.  I think it's just because so much is riding on this try.  It's our very last embryo so if this cycle fails we have a lot of hard decisions ahead of us.  Not to mention more waiting and more money.  I'm just so ready for this to be over. The hardest part for me is the unknown.  If someone told me that I'd have to do X amount of IVF cycles but in 2 years we'd have a baby I could put my nose to the grindstone and pound it out.  Would the physical and emotional pain still be hard to bear?  Of course - but knowing the end result was coming would give me the strength to push through.  Obviously I don't have that luxury and it's so hard to continue to fight this battle when you have no idea if you'll ever come through the other side.  

I got hit really hard this week by a pregnancy announcement on FB.  A high school girlfriend of mine that got married in February announced she is pregnant and due in Dec.  Which basically means they tried for like one month.  The fact that we are the same age (33 very quickly approaching 34) seemed to make it extra hard for me.  Of course I'm happy for her but once again I'm sad for me.  I can't help but wonder when our time will be and if it's ever coming.  I pray that it's this cycle.  I try to focus on having positive thoughts and faith that this is it for us.  The start of our family and a healthy pregnancy that will bring us a take home baby.  But with all the odds stacked against us it's hard not to worry about if this cycle fails and where we go next. However I'm going to put all those negative thoughts aside and just work on checking off my boxes.   

Scratch

It's been a crazy week for me, as I've been traveling for work but I wanted to send out a quick update as I'm feeling pretty anxious this morning.  I had my "scratch" on Monday morning.  It was as unpleasant as it sounds.  Basically Dr. H took a catheter and shoved it up into my uterine lining and took a chunk out of a specific spot.  He then felt the need to show me the blood and tissue he removed - could have done without that!  But the point of the procedure is that when we go to transfer Frosty he'll be able to see the spot where he took the tissue and will aim to deposit him/her right into that little indentation which will hopefully help Frosty implant and burrow in  Fingers crossed.

I go in tomorrow for an U/S to check and see how my lining is looking.  The only thing I've been taking to help with it is IM injections of estrodel every three days.  It doesn't seem like much.  I thought I would be on suppositories as well but I'm not.  Hopefully my lining is looking good and we can continue moving forward.

Although my blog is anonymous there are family and friends that I've shared the URL with.  Because of that I won't be posting my exact transfer or beta dates.  When I miscarried in March everyone who knew that we were pregnant and also knows me in real life, knew the date and time of the 7 weeks ultrasound.  I feel so blessed to have so many people who love us, support us, and are cheering us on.  However when we got the bad news I was obviously hit pretty hard and all of the calls and text messages just overwhelmed me even more.  I think it would have been easier if I could have had time to process the news and then informed people when I was more settled.  So that's my game plan moving forward with this transfer.

I hope no one feels like I"m trying to shut them out or that I don't appreciate each and every one of you who follows this blogs, sends positive thoughts and prayers, or reaches out to me to tell me that they are thinking of me.  IT MEANS SO MUCH TO ME!  I'm so grateful for all of my amazing friends and family and it's what gives me the strength to keep trying.  So from the bottom of my heart thank you all so much.  As for the wonderful people that I've never met but have connected with through this amazing community your ability to understand exactly what we are going through has been a light in the darkest tunnel for me.  Feeling like we aren't alone on this journey has made it more bearable.  I appreciate all of you so much!

Frosty

It feels funny to even write about being in cycle.  I'm not really sure why but so far this FET cycle has been pretty low key.  I've been on Lupron for suppression for 2 weeks now.  The shots are annoying (the tummy bruising more so) but I don't have too many side effects from them.  I've been taking my dexamethasone and prenatal vitamins as well.  I did my first IM delestrogen shot on Tues. night.  We are progressing slowly but surely.  

On Monday I go in for an endometrial scratch?  Has anyone had this done before?  It's supposed to help with implantation so I'm all for it if it works but it sounds painful.  But at this point really I'll do anything.  While I'm definitely hopeful that this cycle works I'm also trying to stay very level headed about it.  Our 1 little embryo, "Frosty", is all we have left for this try.  Honestly I don't even know any details about his grade or rating.  I know he made it to blast on day 5 and was frozen.  I am hoping and praying that he survives the thaw so we actually have something to transfer.  There's a part of me that thinks that he's made it this far maybe he really is the one.  We've never transferred a five day blast, only day 3 embryos.  But another part of me knows we transferred three last time and still have no baby, so it's hard to feel super hopeful for one. 

I'm not sure if my low key attitude is a good thing or no.  But I'm sure it's a good thing that I'm not super stressed and over-thinking everything.  So I'm going to try and remain positive and put my faith and trust in God and his plan for us.  I pray that his plan is for Frosty to be our take home baby. 

In other news we are enjoying summer and our time on our boat on the lake.  The three day weekend was great, with the exception of getting caught in some rain storms on Monday afternoon.  It's felt wonderful to get outside and run again and I'm finally back to my "normal" mile times.  I feel like my body is in a healthy place as I've finally lost the weight I put on with my first 2 IVF cycles.  So overall I'm feeling pretty good!  Now if I can just get pregnant and STAY pregnant life would be pretty perfect (don't we all feel that!).

Here's some pictures of our weekend on the lake!  Our dog Chloe thinks she's the captain of the boat :) 

One of those days....

It's not often I go a full day without thinking of our infertility struggle. However the last week of work has been so busy and stressful it hasn't been on the top of my mind. However today was one of those days that there was no avoiding it. This morning a colleague came over and was asking my cubemate about her little boy. He then turned towards me and asked her when she was going to talk me into "giving kids a try". After a fake laugh and a "We'll see!" from me he continued to ask me (jokingly) if I was scared. Sigh. 

Two hours later in the bathroom a girl that works with me and goes to my gym asked if I'd been to the gym lately. I told her yes I had been going a lot. She then started complaining about how she can't make it because of her son's schedule and how I'm so lucky I don't have kids to mess up my gym time. Oh yes. So lucky. 

Finally tonight when picking our dog up from daycare (cuz she goes to daycare twice a week :) the owner commented on how she seemed kind of pouty today. I laughed and said she's got an attitude and the owner replied "That's what you can look forward to when you two finally have kids". 

As I'm sure a lot of you know easy, passing comments like this are something to endure everyday.  Today was just one of those days where I felt like every place I turned someone was reminding me of our struggle. Of course these people have no idea the pain associated with these comments which are meant to be funny. I'm not angry at them as obviously they know nothing about our situation.  But I feel like I've built a wall around my heart to protect myself and every innocent comment breaks it down a little more  

So, I'll spend tonight taking care of myself. I'll go for a long run, cook a healthy dinner, snuggle on the couch to relax with D and rebuild my wall to face what tomorrow brings. One day at a time. 

Endurance

The crooked path that infertility leads us down is filled of highs and lows. Today is a low one for me. I knew Mothers Day wouldn't be easy. I did what I could to prepare myself and protect my fragile heart. But here I sit drowning in a pool of endless tears I don't know how to turn off. I wanted to be strong today, to be selfless. To focus on my amazing mother who is always there for me. To shower my dear friends and family who are mothers with love to make them feel special. But when it comes down to it I'm just not strong enough today. I know that infertility is a marathon. And I feel like I've currently hit the wall. And today is just one of those days where I can't find my hope, my faith, or my positivity. I should be 15 weeks pregnant today but instead I'm mourning the loss of our precious little one who didn't make it. I can't stop myself from wondering how I would be feeling today if he or she had made it and the wonder of motherhood was a real possibility ahead of me. Instead I can't help but sit here and wonder if it will ever happen for us. 

Overall I do feel like this struggle has made me stronger but today my endurance is fading. I do find comfort knowing I'm not alone. That there's others who have walked in my shoes, many that still are. We are not alone. I hope that brings comfort to others as well. Tomorrow is a new day.