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Halfway through my week off work and I'm slowly starting to feel a little less stressed. Scout and I are missing the girls but we're enjoying having some much needed quality time together. Last weekend we went to Echuca and stayed in a cabin on the Murray River for two nights. It was great. We took the boat with us and went fishing. Still didn't catch anything (much to Scouts frustration), but we did enjoy exploring the river. I almost fell in the water once trying to brake off a snag and we ran out of petrol coming back, about 100m from the boat ramp! The engine just cut out and the current started taking us backwards. We had to break out the oars and row against the current to the nearest shore LOL. Alittle embarrassing and Scout was petrified we were going to get bitten by a snake climbing up the embankment. Fortunately it wasn't much of a walk to find the car and go get more petrol, but we've decided to invest in a reserve tank now as that could have been a nightmare if we'd been further away or worse if we had the girls with us! Anyway, we can laugh about it now :).
Monday I spent the whole day in the garden which I haven't done in ages, cleaning up the vegie patch, rotating our compost bins, chopping back tress and racking up leaves. I could barely walk by the end of the day but I enjoyed it. And yesterday we had a big day on the TTC front with two appointments planning our next round of IVF.
By a random coincidence it turns out Scout's sister has an ex whose mother does Reflexology with a special interest in fertility so we've decided to give her a go as she has a very good success rates with her clients. Scout contacted her last week and yesterday we had our first appointment with her. She seems very nice, understands alot about the IVF process and has worked with IVF clinics before so I feel pretty confident that she will be able to help us - even if all she does is help me cope with stress a bit better. She explained how her therapy compliments an IVF cycle and at what stages of the cycle we need to see her. She gave me a relaxation cd, recommended an alkaline diet and while she couldn't "prescribe" she has suggested we consider taking Vitex to help with egg quality and baby aspirin every second day to address any possible implantation or clotting issues. The Vitex sounded like a good idea but I was alittle worried about the baby aspirin. She said because I have an A blood group and an english background, I'd be more prone to having "sticky" blood which can sometimes effect implantation. She said that clotting issues are expensive to test for so IVF clinics often wait till you've had 3 or more miscarriages or failed cycles before they consider testing for it and then prescribing the baby aspirin. I guess I don't really want to take something unless I know I need it and a doctor prescribes it ... But I also don't want to go through 3 failed cycles or miscarriages if all I needed to do was take a little baby aspirin every other day. Anyway, I'm in two minds about this. I also asked her about Royal Jelly and Baca which I've been reading a bit about lately but she seemed to think these things might not be the best idea to take due to their potency and side effects. I'm not sure if any of you have ever tried this stuff or the Vitex or baby aspirin but I'd like to hear your thoughts on them if you have any.
We also had an appointment in the afternoon with our FS, so I asked her about the baby aspirin and she said she didn't feel it was indicated at present and left it at that. Scout also asked her about HDEA and she said she didn't think I needed that either and that it would just make me hairy LOL. Instead she has recommended a down regulation cycle to put to sleep any endometrosis that might still be active at the moment and then start stimming at 400iu Puregon with the hope that we'll get better numbers. I was a little surprised as I've heard some low responders say that their ovaries have had trouble waking back up on this protocol, but my FS didn't think it would be an issue. So it looks like we are headed for the long cycle of bcp followed by stimming and sniffing syneryl before we get to collection. I'm actually ok with this as it gives us more time to save and work of egg quality. AF is due at the end of the month but I have plenty to work on in the meantime ... Primarily getting my stress under control, figuring out how to make this alkaline diet work for me, getting rid of the belly bloat I've got going on and getting a few reflexology sessions under my belt.
5 more days till I have to go back to work, so today I think I'll make some "alkaline" soup of some description and give this relaxation cd a crack :)
Glad everything is looking well in the TTC front! I have heard about the alkaline diet. Do you mind me asknig what it entails? I take baby aspirin for the implantation issue as well. The old and current facility I have been at both recommend that. I have not really researched much into it.
ReplyDeleteI think a huge thing for me on this cycle was stress. Its so hard to not stress because all you are thinking about is IVF and what is happening next. I really, really want to try and get my stress levels under control. In fact I need to! I have tried the meditation CD and they work but you just have to make sure you have zero distraction. I have a hard time shutting my brain off.
Im so excited this is starting for all of you! Im in search of learning of better ways to build better eggs!
Good luck!
My understanding of the diet is you need to aim for a 70-75% alkaline and 25-30% acid diet. From what I've read, most fruit and vege are alkaline and meat, dairy, carbs, sugars, processed foods etc are acid. I think the increased alkalinilty is suppose to have a positive effect on the uterine environment which is probably more relevant for IUIs but I think there is suppose to be an implantation benefit as well as a general health/destressing effect for those doing IVF. At least that's the impression I got from what she said, so I figure it's worth a go. I have to say I'm finding it hard to put into practice but like you, I just keep reminding myself that it's all part of achieving my baby making goal :)
ReplyDeleteI was and still taking baby aspirin, even though they don't know if I have any particular issue, they give it to all IVF/FET patients at my clinic for precaution, you might want to insist on that one next time...
ReplyDeleteI have to say this time I wasn't too stressed about the whole thing, frozen embryo transfer FET is less invasive, I flew to Italy for a wedding 2 days after transfer (that's where my baby /babies implanted1) and took it easy for 3 days.
I really hope next time is your time! I think it's nice to try to improve our lifestyle and eating habit before pregnancy. Best of luck!