a GOOD 24 hours

Ultrasound today. I guess the 125mg of follistim last night went to work. Whereas yesterday the nurse just said, some small ones on the right, today, she measured three follicles on the right and one on the left. All four are greater than 10mm - and have great potential. They did bloodwork again to test my estrogen and then they will call me today and tell me what dosage to continue the follistim at. I don't really understand how they determine the folllistim doses and actually, I don't even know when I stop doing them.

After my doctor's appointment, I went to our Junior League's Christmas Market - I LOVE those things! I happily bought two babies first Christmas gifts for two of my close friends who have had kiddos in the past year. I then splurged on a baby quilt that is themed to my husband and I's alma matter. It was SO cute - I couldn't resist, and I just have a good feeling that one of these four follicles will be the one!

Quick Update

I went in for an ultrasound yestserday (day 7). She saw a few small follicles on the right side - she didn't say anything about the left, so I am assuming not much going on. She said they wanted to run bloodwork to test my estrogen levels and then based on that, they would determine if we needed to adjust the dosage on my Follistim. They called and said that I should up the dosage to 125mg for the next two days and then come back and see them on Friday. Sounds like a good plan, EXCEPT, husband and I are going on a mini vacation, leaving tonight! I told her and she seemed a little put off - almost like I obviously don't want a baby very much if I can't even come in for my appointments. (I guess I am supposed to give up my life and just sit home and focus on having a baby!) I was waiting for her to tell me that we'd have to cancel the rest of the cycle, but instead she said, ok, well, then we will see you tomorrow. I was like, really, i was just there today and you want me to come back tomorrow. Yes. Ok. Luckily, i was already planning on taking today off to start my vacation early. Oh yeah, and I also had to order more Follistim as I am unsure how much more he is going to have me use over the weekend, and since it gets FedExed to my house, I had to get it today BEFORE we went out of town. There goes another $250! I don't know if I have talked about it yet, but this is my first "paying" cycle as all of my clomid cycles at my OB managed to fly under the radar of insurance and all of my initial stuff on the RE was for Recurring Pregnancy Loss so also covered by the insurance. Well, man oh man, hello bill. With medication and monitoring, I am looking at just over $1000 for this cycle. Sure hope I get pregnant! I can see why people resort to IVF quickly at these fertility prices. If I am going to pay over $1000 for a cycle, why not $15,000 for IVF, higher odds at success I am sure!

I did it!

Well, thanks to a CD tutorial that came with the Follistim, I was able to handle the injecting the medicine into my stomach all by myself. I have to say that all of the build up and anticipation was WAY worse than actually doing it. I kind of had a mini panic attack right before doing it, I was like, how hard to I stick it in, fast, slow, medium speed!? So finally I just did it, kind of at a medium speed and I didn't feel a thing. I was almost like, did it work, but it was clearly inserted into my stomach. So I dispersed the meds and was done! After talking to some of our friends about this, they all agreed that maybe it was better that dear husband was not at home to do the injection - recall the fertility clinic fainting. Another shot tomorrow, and two more doses of Clomid - ultrasound on Wednesday. Stay tuned!

Round Two

Trip to the doctor yesterday didn't tell me much more than I already knew, namely, that I had started my period. Dr. K said he really had no idea, sometimes in trying to get our bodies to do things, it just does things we don't understand. He said the cyst definitely could have thrown things off. Good news alert....my ovaries look "pristine" (his word, not mine). Don't even look Polycystic! Yay Metformin! So we are starting clomid again today, 100 mg day 3 through 7. And adding Follistim 50 mg, on day 5 and 6. On day 7, i will go in for an ultrasound and they will determine if i need to continue on the Follistim or if the two doses was enough. There is a part of me that thinks this is an overkill, the last cycle was a fluke and this time the clomid alone would probably be good, but then there's a bigger part of me that just wants to get pregnant and wants to throw the kitchen sink at it. I have barely googled the Follistim, but I clearly saw, chance of higher order multiples. Eeek. It's funny, before starting this whole TTC journey, I was mortified at the thought of having twins. My life would be over, I thought, I'd have to quit my job and be forced to stay at home. However, two years later, I would welcome twins. As hard as this has been for us, a two for one deal would be perfect. Who knows if we'll ever be able to make it through this again. So, if the Follistim is what Dr. K recommends, then the Follistim it is! Sure, the thought of triplets or more still scares me, but I figure with my track record, the odds for one are low, the odds for three are probably zero! Oh yeah, the Follistim is an injectible medicine and sweet husband will be out of town for the first injection. I may have to recruit a friend to come over and stick me! Stay tuned.....

Well, that was fast...

Well, when I returned home from the gym this morning, I noticed that I had some spotting. I was like, YES! Implantation Spotting, we did it! Well, the spotting quickly turned into a full fledge period through the morning. :-( So now I am confused, frustrated and definitely NOT pregnant. If I go back two weeks from today, that was the day after my baseline ultrasound where they saw nothing but the large cyst on my right ovary. So, unless my cyst decided to ovulated the next day, I am totally perplexed. Good news is this is now DAY 1, so i am going in for another baseline ultrasound tomorrow morning. Hopefully I can at least get a theory from my Doc on what just happened! So, I'll let you know! Never a dull moment!

Two week wait and caffiene

Today is the half way point on my two week wait for my period. If you are wondering why I am not waiting for my "positive pregnancy test result", read my last blog entry...(read, low expectations) Just the same, it's next to impossible for me to not hold out some kind of hope. I mean just the shear fact that I ovulated gets me all amped up. The last two times I have ovulated, I have gotten pregnant (seriously, how crazy is that!?) Before you hate me for it, remember, I have no babies to show for this great track record so far. To date, not really any signs or symptoms to make me think that we pulled this semi miraculous conception off.

Next topic, caffiene. After the last miscarriage, I was back on the caffiene BIG TIME. I was all about the $.49 32 oz Diet Dr Pepper from QuickTrip. Every time I felt frustrated and angry with my bad luck, I would think, well, at least I can drink this awesome, cold, refreshing soda. (yeah, pretty bad consolation prize) So since we have been cleared to start trying again, I have been weaning myself off, half-caf coffee in the morning, only cans of soda instead of buckets, you get the idea. Well, yesterday, I cut the cord completely. Definitely had a wicked headache for most of the day (I guess I hadn't weaned well enough). But luckily today, I was back in business, no headache and no caffiene. Mission accomplished. Until I get the positive pregnancy test, I will definitely still enjoy a soda on occasion, but glad that I have cut my physical dependence.

Ok, seven more days of waiting.

Is this a joke?

Well, today was cycle day 11 and the day that the nurse at my RE's office had scheduled me to come in for my first mid-cycle ultrasound. A quick recap, one week ago, i went in for my baseline ultrasound, they had found a large cyst on my right ovary, but had done bloodwork and it didn't appear to be producing any hormones, so i was cleared to start my clomid 100mg. So i took the clomid on days 4 - 8 which meant my last dose was this past Sunday. On Monday, i had some strange symptoms that i thought seemed ovulatory like, but i thought, it's only day 9, this is just a side effect of the clomid. Last night (tuesday), i was having quite a bit of pressure and discomfort in my abdomen - mostly centered near my right ovary. I even told my sister on the phone last night - "i am sure that when they do my ultrasound, they are going to find that my cyst has gotten even bigger because it is bothering me."

So i show up this morning for my 8am ultrasound and was surprised when Dr K comes in rather than the nurse who did my baseline ultrasound. I kind of think he might have walked into the wrong room (as he was a little disoriented as to what he was seeing me for), but just the same, he recovered and went with it. So he first checked out my lining, then my left side (not seeing anything there), then my right side. That's when he asks me, "now what day of your cycle are you on?" So at that point, i am like, "is my cyst still there? I was having some pains last night and was certain that it was going to have grown." Nope, cyst is gone. And there is no sign of follicles! But there is something in my right ovary that could be the remnants of a busted follicle (i.e. ONE THAT HAS ALREADY OVULATED!) So he says, well, it looks like it's possible that you have already ovulated. I just about fell out of the stirrups (is that even possible?!). Then OF COURSE he asks, have you had intercourse recently? At this point, i want to cry. No, we haven't had intercourse, we have been gearing up for the marathon trying that would typically occur days 12 through 21 of my cycle. I felt like a horrible patient at that point, here i am crying to a fertility doctor and I am not even holding up my end of the bargain - TRYING to get pregnant! So he tells me that we will do blood work to confirm that i ovulated, and that if i had pain last night, it's possible that i ovulated recently and it probably would be worth calling my husband and trying as soon as possible.

So dear husband and I did what we needed to do at our lunch break - so romantic! And Dr. K's office called me this afternoon and told me that my progesterone level was a 6, so i had very likely ovulated and i should just wait for my period or a positive pregnancy test.

So here i am, the evening of day 11 and my cycle is over before it even began. I didn't even have a chance to fret over it. I was pretty distraught leaving the doctor's office this morning, but as the day wore on, i realized, i am thankful that the clomid worked, and this was just yet another reminder that we are not in control. So, check back in T minus 14 days for the arrival of my period or the alternate (which i refuse to type out in that i might somehow jinx myself).

A day of ups and downs

For a day I had been looking forward to for months and months (first day of clomid!), it did not go exactly as planned. A few times I was like, is this really happening. Here's how it played out:

• Hurricane Hermine moves through our region and dumps over a foot of rain in 12 hours and I step in a 4 inch puddle getting to my car to head to the doctor at 8am - my feet were completely soaked until about 3pm
• The ultrasound tech tells me that I have a large cyst on my right ovary - she'll need to check with Dr. K. Doctor says we'll need to check hormone levels to see if the cyst is wreaking any havoc to my reproductive ability. If my hormones are out of whack, we'll have to sit this cycle out (WHAT!!!....NOOOOOOO)
• Finally get a call at 5pm (i was beginning to majorly freak out) that all is good and i can go forward with the clomid.
• See a double rainbow!!! This has to be a good sign!!
• Step on someone's gum outside of Babies R US!! This has to be a BAD sign. ;-( (Of course i was there buying ANOTHER shower gift)
• The lady in the pharmacy drive thru tells me that my insurance only covers clomid if I get advanced approval (are you kidding me? Who has time for advanced approval on this road race....i just got approval from my doc to take it hours ago and i need to get those pills into my bod TODAY! Yes, yes, yes....I will pay for the clomid out of pocket, GIVE IT TO ME BEFORE I JUMP THROUGH THIS DRIVE THRU TUBE AND RIP IT OUT OF YOUR HANDS!!

So maybe in hindsight my day wasn't that dramatic, but let me tell you, as i hobbled there in the parking lot scraping neon yellow gum off of my shoe with a grocery store reward card, i thought, can this get any better!!

Prepartion...

I started my cycle this weekend. Five days of Provera did the trick. Each time I start a round of Provera I am always secretly fearful that it won't work, that I have somehow gotten so broken that I won't be able to even drug induce my period. Thankfully so far that hasn't happened, and my body is cooperating. Of course it's a long weekend, so I have to wait until tomorrow to call my RE's office to get my prescription of clomid (100 mg) filled, this is my first time doing clomid with this doctor, so I am not sure if he's a 3 - 7 kind of guy or a 5 - 9 sort of fella. I did find out that he wants to do a baseline ultrasound this week. I never did these with my OB, just a mid-cycle ultrasound. Not exactly sure why they do the baseline ones...anyone know?

I have been taking the Folgard once a week now. I have also been seeking out anything with extra Vitamin B or Folate. I found some tasty Vitamin Water (0 Calorie) that has 100% RDA of the B vitamins. Based on all of the reading I have done on the MTHFR (on Dr Google and some of my bloggie friends sites), I began to question whether or not I should be doing more than just the Folgard for my new diagnosis - lots out there about using Lovenox, Heparin, Baby Aspirin, etc to help prevent clotting. I plan to ask my RE some additional questions about this when I see him at the ultrasound, but I believe that I will trust whatever his ultimate recommendation is. I really wish all of this were more black and white though, and that there was more conclusive information out there about the link between MTHFR and miscarriages and exactly how to treat it. Hopefully by the time my daughters (notice the positive thinking) are having babies, they will have all of this sorted out.

Oh yeah, I have also begun my caffeine cut back. :-( I already miss my HUGE fountain Diet Dr Peppers. Hard to believe it's almost time to start trying again. If we are successful this month, our due date will be within days of our first baby's due date - kind of weird.