Trigger Happy!

Finally finished the stims :) And the sniffing! No more alarms going off morning and night thank goodness. Despite feeling pretty tired and foggy on the puregon, nothing too vague or crazy happened. I did manage to loose my keys for 24 hours but amazingly it didn't send me into a total melt down which I was half expecting. I just did my trigger and now we wait. ER is at 10.30am on Monday morning. I'm excited to finally be back at this point again and am really hoping the eggs are better this time. I've had a rediculous amount of EWCM and my ovaries are definately swollen. They actually kept me awake last night and I've felt pretty uncomfortable today. I feel like a bloated balloon down there so those follicles have gotta be doing something .... surely. I'm just praying they peak at the right time so my little eggs don't end up over cooked!

Alittle under done

So of course my follies are sloooooww growers. I was hoping to get the green light for a trigger but instead I have to stick with stimming a bit longer as they're still not big enough. I now have 6 contenders (yay!) and with another 3 days of stims hopefully a few more might join the party ;). Trigger is planned for Saturday night with pick-up on Monday morning. As much as I'm chomping at the bit to get these eggs out of there, I don't want them out if they aren't ready so I just need to be patient. I'm paranoid about spontaneously ovulating despite all the sniffing and I also feel a little uncomfortable about the pick-up being delayed past when I would normally ovulate. But I worried about this sort of thing last time and it all turned out fine so I just need to have alittle faith. Two more work days to get through ...

Quality not quantity?

So my scan today was unfortunately not as good as I'd hoped or at least my FS didn't seem to think so. I'm sitting there staring at her screen trying to figure out what's what and she's measuring away not saying anything. This is typical of my FS. I really do like having her as my specialist but sometimes I just wish she would give me a bit more information. So I ask if it's looking any better than last time and she's tells me "No, unfortunately it's not as good a response". My heart sinks and I feel totally confused because I'm sure I can see a number of follicles on the screen. Then she says, "There's only 5 follicles. 4 are a good size, and the other is alittle small. There's a few more tiny ones but at this stage they won't do anything." I'm thinking ... I'm sure 5 follicles is better than last time? She then starts talking about how we collected 7 eggs last go etc and it's unlikely we'll get more than 5 this time. Then she ends the conversation with the throw away comment "it only takes one" and leaves to let me get dressed. Ok ... So I know it only takes one, and yes I should be grateful I actually have 5 potentials at this point ... and I know this comment was meant as a comment of hope ... but it annoyed me. When I'm shelling out thousands of dollars per cycle I want more than one damn it and a comment like that makes me feel that's all she thinks I'll get again. So while I'm dressing myself I feel like challenging her about the number of follicles I had last time and how I miraculously ended up with twice as many eggs as expected, but of course I let it go. When I finally come out from behind the curtain she tells me to up the puregon to 450iu (which is the maximum dose my pen will dial) and come back for another scan on Wednesday. I drive to work feeling half ok and half upset. Part of me thinks it was a good scan and believes that it was better than last time regardless of what she said and I should feel good about that, but the other part of me is stuck on the fact that my FS (who obviously knows more than I do) said it was worse. So I don't know what to think. To be honest I'd really rather just keep my head in the sand till collection at this point given my experience of scans has been pretty negative to date. I just don't need to be stressing about numbers when the bottom lines is how many actually make it to transfer. I also hate that I have these scans right before I go to work cos it makes the whole day feel pretty crap. I had to get up at 5am to make it to the scan and the rest of the day I've had a stinker of a headache from the syneryl, so tonight I think I'll just have an early night and quit thinking about what is or isn't going on in my ovaries. I'm tired already and this week has only just begun ...

Ovaries working overtime ...

The familiar feeling of bloat and swollen ovaries has started to return. I'm not sure how much action is going on down there but it's enough to make me feel less comfortable than usual and enough to make my loosest pants feel tight. Given I didn't start feeling like this till closer to trigger last time, I'm hoping this is a good sign but who knows. I really have no confidence in knowing what my body is doing right now. I've stopped going to the gym for the time being and plan to just try and do light exercise over the next few weeks. As ridiculous as it sounds, when I'm at the gym I feel like I'm going to pop a follicle or something so I think I'll just stick to walking and the exercise bike for now.

Since we've been feeling overdue for another mini getaway we decided to visit a farmstay in Bright this weekend. It's about a 4 hour drive from where we live. The girls loved being able to play with all the animals and we did lots of walking around the acres of paddocks exploring. We tried fishing in their dam which was apparently stocked but nothing was biting. The cottage we stayed in was freezing but the bed was cozy and warm so it was nice to sleep in for a bit which we rarely get to do. We also stopped at one of our favourite fishing spots on the way back so Scout could finally catch a fish which was long overdue.

Tomorrow I head back to the IVF clinic for another scan to see if all this bloat and discomfort actually equates to more follicles this time around. It will be day 10 and my last IVF scan at day 10 only showed 2 real contenders and 4 smaller follicles so I'm hoping the results of this scan will be little better. Fingers crossed!  Anyway, here is some pics from our weekend :)

Tired, Cranky and Bound for Crazy Town

Down reg scan was all good although a little gross given I'm 3 days into my period. I'm just relieved there wasn't anything on the screen that shouldn't have been there. I was half expecting a set back but thankfully I didn't need to worry. So we're all good to go with stimming. I've started at 400iu of puregon this time. Next scan is in a week, so lets hope I'll be loaded with follies by then. I'm still sniffing which is going ok but I'm tired and feeling a little flat from the meds and how drawn out this cycle is. My alarm goes off every morning and night reminding me to take my dose which is a good thing because I would never remember otherwise. I am actually starting to get a bit sick of taking the syneryl (and preconception vitamins too for that matter!) but you gotta do what you gotta do I guess. I actually worked out the other day that I have spent nearly $500 in preconception vitamins alone since we started this whole thing in December last year. I am starting to resent buying them each month because it's a reminder that we're still not pregnant. I keep hoping each box will be the last one so I can start buying pregnancy vitamins instead! But so far that is yet to change.

Anyway ... I am preparing myself for the craziness that comes with these high doses of puregon. Hopefully I don't get caught shoplifting or anything weird this time around. I've also been quite depressed from the other meds and pretty cranky lately. I feel bad because I haven't had alot of patience with the girls and have been snappy with Scout quite often in the morning lately. I just don't seem to be sleeping very well so I'm a little worried that I'll become quite unbearable to be around over the next few weeks as the drugs build up. How people do this cycle after cycle I have no idea. All I know is I need to try and relax, distract myself, be patient with those I love, and keep my head about me as I head into the business end of this cycle.