How many viles of blood are you taking?!?

Had our appointment with Dr. K, the RE. It was pretty uneventful. They took at least a dozen viles of blood of all different sizes and had to use BOTH of my arms (I guess I ran out of blood in one arm...does that even happen!?). They are running the following tests:

• Anticardiolipin Antibodies IgG, IgM and IgA (Clotting disorder)


• Antiphospholipid Antibodies IgG, IgM and IgA (Clotting disorder)


• Lupus Anticoagulant (Clotting disorder)


• Antithrombin III Activity (Clotting disorder)


• Protein C Activity (Clotting disorder)


• Protein S Activity (Clotting disorder)


• Factor V Leiden (Clotting disorder)


• Homocysteine Level (Clotting disorder)


• Prothrombin (Clotting disorder)


• Karyotype Male / Female (Chromosomal disorder)

Whew....that is quite a mouthful. I googled each of the above and added what is in parenthesis above. I guess i didn't realize how many potential clotting disorders were out there. The only other test Dr. K is going to do is a Hysteroscopy where they insert a thin telescope into my uterus to check it out and make sure it is shaped correctly and all that jazz. We are going to do that in a few weeks, i need to be at the beginning of a cycle. I am going to try to wait out this current "cycle" i am in to see if can get another period on my own. If it doesn't show up in two weeks, I am going to pop the Provera and roll on with the help of medication. The lab results will take about three weeks, so there's no real hurry to do the hysteroscopy.

Excitement of the appointment was dear husband passing out from giving his ONE small vile of blood. This was actually quite scary at the time - I laugh now. He was in a hurry to get back to work and of course Dr K was running about a half hour behind. So dear husband's blood pressure was likely through the roof. He went ahead of me into the lab area of the doc's office (I stayed behind and chatted with Dr K about how I've been "feeling." Dr. K is very into the emotional well being of his patients.) After we finished up, he escorted me to the lab where we found dear husband UNCONSCIOUS!! The nurse looked at me and was like, DOES THIS NORMALLY HAPPEN?!? I wanted to say, yeah, every time I take his blood at home, he does the EXACT same thing! So after a couple scary moments, he came to, doc had him lay down and be monitored for a bit, which of course only exasperated his delay in getting back to work. It was kind of a disaster. I think I'll leave him home for the next appointment. I like to be in a zen state when i visit the RE...he is messing with my zen. ;-)

Breaking News – I am NOT Pregnant!!

Yep, that's right folks, after 13 weeks and a couple days, my HCG is finally at a not pregnant level! Eh, what's a 13 week wait among the infertile!? AGONY!! That's what!

As soon as I got off the phone with my nurse this morning, I was dialing the Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE) - yep, I have him on speed dial. The nurse there was like, when would be a good day for you to come in - yesterday would have been great I wanted to say. First available appoinment - if i have a conflict at work, I'll just quit. ;-) Only kidding.....sort of. It was my lucky day, they have an opening at 12:45 tomorrow. According to the nurse, I will talk to doctor K again, then we will likely get started with whatever bloodwork they can do. I asked if i needed to bring my husband, she said, it wasn't necessary but if he was able to come they could do his required bloodwork then as well. Just as a reminder, we are doing a full work up of tests related to recurrent pregnancy loss. After my appointment tomorrow, I will provide ya'll with some more details of what tests I am doing when and for what.

Right now I am in a little bit of shock to be getting started this quickly - I was expecting the RE to tell me that I had to be at the start of a new cycle to do all of the testing because I vaguely remember him alludint to that at our initial consult. Maybe that was just for a certain test? Either way, I am ready to rock and roll - I feel like I have been stuck in neutral for the past three months and Mrs. Type A HATES neutral. It is so counterintuitive to every instinct I have. If you have a problem, you fix it, you don't sit around and think about fixing it, or talk about fixing it, or plan how you are going to fix it - you just fix it. And I am ready to BE FIXED!!

Operation "have a baby" is back on!

The calendar in my head...

Well, i got my HCG quant back yesterday, i went from 75 to 23 in 13 days. So, another two week wait for my next round of bloodwork. (Ahhh, got to love those two week waits!!) Am I being foolishly optimistic to think that on July 29th this miscarriage might finally be in the record books? Guess we'll have to wait to find out. In the mean time, i did appear to get what seems to be a period. I know my track record far too well to just assume that bleeding means a period as it would for 99% of the rest of the female population. Maybe i am still miscarrying....maybe this is just the "bottom falling out" non-ovulation bleeding...or maybe, just maybe my body is acting like a normal 29 year old woman and i am having a reproductive cycle (GASP!).

Ok, now on to the calendar in my head. I am sure alot of you have experienced this. How you have the unnatural ability to quickly add up the time until your next treatment cycle, the length of treatment and then that hopeful 9 months and quickly spit out when your miracle baby would be born. And how when your friend, holding her 4 month old in her arms says, I'm certain ya'll will be pregnant again real soon, you immediately go to the math and think:

• Still miscarrying.....at least 4 more weeks
• Have to wait for period....4 more weeks
• Miscarriage testing...4 - 8 more weeks
• Clomid cycle...4 more weeks
• Pregnancy....9 months

And then you fight back the urge to say, yeah, hoepfully a baby just in time for your little ones 2nd birthday! Instead, you just smile and nod. :-)

On this particular day, I am feeling optimistic about the future. I know we are going to have a baby - hopefully a couple. I just have to wait my turn I guess.

Going for a Guinness World Record...

Well, nurse called....HCG at 75. In two weeks, I only dropped from 175 to 75. I am on 10 weeks of knowing about the miscarriage - it actually happened a couple weeks before that. Ok, so I googled "longest miscarriage ever"....and i got back the response from google, did you mean "longest marriage ever"? NO, I didn't mean that, who would care about the longest marriage ever!! When i finally got my intended results, i found nothing....all of the sites and blogs out there talk about a couple weeks up to maybe 6 on the long end. No one mentions 3 months. And my nurse is not helpful at all, everytime she gives me my result and I groan and ask, is this normal, she gives me her party line of, "everyone is different, there really is no set time that it takes."



I saw a story on the news yesterday about a 66 year old Indian woman who gave birth to triplets through the use of IVF....that is going to be me...I will probably be 65 when my HCG returns to normal. Bhateri Devi watch out....you ain't got nothin' on me!!