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.

8WW?

2 weeks down and probably 6 more to go. Damn this is going to be a looooong cycle! Along with the BCP, I start sniffing the synarel this week. Fingers crossed it puts to sleep any endometrosis that's flared up again since my laparoscopy. I am feeling relatively good about this cycle so far. I've been exercising almost every day and have finally lost most of the bloat from the last cycle which I honestly thought would never go. I had another reflexology session this week and will have one more before I start stimming. But the best thing this coming week will be that I get to hand over the stressful job that I've been backfilling for the last year and return to being just a regular clinician. Whoowhoo! I am looking forward to feeling alot less stressed and alot less guilty about taking time off work for the pick up and transfer. Stress was my biggest problem last time (that was within my control) so hopefully I'll be able to manage it a bit better this time.

This week our youngest also turned 5! I can't believe she is no longer a little toddler and will be starting school next year. Life is going to be alot easier next year with both our girls on the same schedule, at least until we get pregnant and have another little one on our hands!

Gosh I hope we have better luck this time around. Even if we got another BFN I think I'd be ok if we got some frosties out of it, cause I actually like the idea of a natural thaw cycle. But somehow I think that might be a bit of a pipe dream. Anyway ... I just need to concentrate on one week at a time. Let's hope this synarel stuff doesn't give me too my nasty side effects ...

Miss Cranky Pants

Lately I feel like a cranky old lady that has nothing better to do but sit around and write letters of complaint. In the past couple of weeks I have lodged three complaints with three different organizations. I'm not normally big on making complaints but I guess I must have low tolerance for bullshit at the moment.

This week I wrote letters to my IVF clinic and another business I use at work that is not performing. The third was a dirty phone call to our realestate agent. I feel like a complaining cow and I have no doubt that that will be how others see me, but the reality is without feedback nothing changes.

This week I started on the BCP so Scout had to go into the clinic to pick up the meds. This is my third medicated cycle so you'd think by now we'd have things down to a fine art. Unfortunately when it comes to collection of meds we are still floundering around trying to figure out the rediculous system they have in place that's clearly not working. Everytime I start a cycle I call in my day 1 and I confirm with the nurse on the phone what meds to start when and where to go to pick them up. And everytime we go in to collect them, no one knows who we are or where our script is and we have to go through the same bullshit of trying to first find the script before they will give us the meds. This time, after being reassured by the nurse on the phone that the script would definately be waiting for us at reception, of course it still wasn't there and for the third time, Scout had to spend an hour dragging our 4 year old from one end of the facility to the other trying to track it down. She also had to endure the laughter of one of their reception staff who obviously found her frustration and confusion over the whole process amusing. I was working at the time so I didn't find out about this till I got home that night but needless to say I was wild when I heard Scout telling me that a member of staff had actually laughed at her. It's embarrassing enough feeling like you don't know what you're doing but then having the people who are suppose to be helping you, laugh at you instead, is just humiliating. I was pissed and spent that evening bashing out a letter of complaint which I emailed to them the very next day.

It's not like I want to get my clinic offside but I'm also not about to stand by and do nothing when my partner is treated like that. We pay big bucks for this stuff and they need to get their act together. Anyway ... enough of my bitching and moaning. If I'm like this now, god help everyone when I start on the stims!

Ding Ding - Round 2

We are finally at cd1 of our second round of IVF :) Since we are doing a down reg cycle this time around, I'm basically just waiting to start the pill in a few days time. I'm excited to be starting a new cycle as I've been feeling a little frustrated by the lack of baby making action lately since we had to skip a cycle. Of course I've still got a few weeks before anything exciting happens and we get to see whether the changes for this cycle make any difference to the egg count and quality, but I feel good about being back in the saddle again (so-to-speak!).

Since my last post I've been popping lots of different pills every day, exercising a bit more (we bought an exercise bike), trying hard to reduce the acidity in my diet (which is VERY hard to do) and generally trying to de-stress. I've also had 3 reflexology sessions and in 3 more weeks my load at work should be halfed, so I am really looking forward to having a much less stressful, guilt free cycle this time around. At least that's the plan! The cost of this cycle has gone up by about $500 with the new financial year so I have been madly sorting out my tax return to hopefully pay for the next 2 cycles. Apart from that, our girls are back and family life is well and truly in full swing again with all the usual fun and games :)

Reflexology, pill popping and a new protocol

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 :)

The aftermath

This would have to be the heaviest period I have ever had. I'm not cramping as much as I thought I would but I'm still really uncomfortable and there seems to be no end to the clots that keep coming. I was surprised that my period arrived almost immediately after stopping the progesterone. One skipped dose and the next morning it was there. I'm not complaining ... In fact I'm glad I didn't have to wait too long for it to come. But it's a little scary to know that one missed dose could have that effect. Another unexpected side effect, which I'm assuming is the result of 'hormone withdrawal', is nausea. I haven't puked but I've felt pretty damn close to it. It actually woke me up the first night it was so bad. I just feel really sick and really uncomfortable.

Despite feeling like hell, I still went to work today and was a total space cadet. My boss was really concerned because she knows I've had lots of medical appointments and she knows I'm not right but she doesn't know why or what's wrong. Anyway, long story short, she's convinced me to take a week off work. I'm just shattered and under normal circumstances if I felt like this I wouldn't be dragging myself to work. I'd take a sick day or two or organise some annual leave, but I've taken so much time off work this year I've just felt like it's not an option to take more. So I've just kept pushing myself to keep going and keep it all together ... But clearly the cracks are starting to show. Anyway I guess I just needed someone to give me "permission" to take time out and fortunately I have a very insightful and supportive manager whose done exactly that. So ... I'm taking next week off. I am tired, run down and looking forward to having a rest. The girls are away at their dad's so Scout and I will have time to ourselves. She has been so great through all this, always knowing the right thing to say and putting up with my crankiness one minute and tears the next. She's so patient and loving and I am so lucky to have her. This BFN has hit her just as hard as me, so having some time off on our own together will be good for both of us.

End Cycle

Fifty million piss sticks and one blood test all confirm that we are not pregnant. And if that wasn't enough confirmation ... AF arrived this morning.

When we started this journey, I thought all we needed was some sperm and some good timing. I had no idea I had endometriosis, scarring, a blocked tube, a dodgy cervix, a low ovarian reserve, a poor response to FSH and crappy eggs. When our doctor said we would need to do IVF, I was disappointed but I figured the up side was we'd be bypassing a whole lot of IUI attempts and disappointment. I'd read a lot of lesbian blogs where ladies who had no luck with IUIs, got pregnant first go with IVF, so I was hoping that's how it would be for us except we wouldn't have to go through all the IUIs to get there. Unfortunately things haven't turned out the way we planned. We're not the one-hit-wonders at IVF we'd hoped we would be. Producing hardly any follicles was a blow, being told I produce poor quality eggs was gutting (and probably the worst discovery to date), but following all of that up with a BFN and no frosties has left me wishing the ground would just swallow me up. Now, for the first time, I think the dx of infertility is really starting to sink in. I wasn't taking it too seriously before ... But now I am and I'm struggling with the reality of it. The reality that we might not be able to afford the number of IVF cycles we actually need to get pregnant. The reality that we might not be able to make a baby with my eggs and I may have to give up my biological role in this whole process. The reality that I may never get pregnant and we may end up in alot of debt with no baby to show for it.

It's been a shit week and while I know we've learnt a lot in terms of what to do differently next time, this whole cycle has been a painful reality check. Needless to say, we are sitting this next cycle out to let my body and our bank balance recover.