Moving On

Moving on forward!  C and I met with Dr. Young on the 14th to talk about moving forward.  We have 5 frozen embryos to utilize!  The doc also mentioned that we had 5 frozen eggs... which was news to me!  The 5 frozen embryos were a relief to me knowing that this second time around wouldn't involve as many shots and all of the fertility drugs to pump up my ovaries!  The 5 frozen eggs were such a bonus!  Gave me even more hope that we won't need to do the fertility drugs.... ever again? 

I knew that we'd have to take a month off from everything, so the waiting game again has tested my patience.  Hopefully, things will start up again somewhere around July 2nd.  I have to wait until my cycle starts before starting on the 2nd round of in vitro.  If my cycle doesn't start on it's own the doc gave me a prescription for progesterone to kick start 'er.  As soon a things start up, I'll start birth control pills.  After about a week and a half of that I'll start on the small subcutaneous Lupron shots in my stomach.  Again, Lupron basically puts my body in a stall position to get things just right to insert the embryos.  I'll also be starting on 2 patches of estrogen.  The first ivf cycle I only used 1 estrogen patch, but with the frozen cycles they prescribe 2 patches.  I won't have to do as many blood draws or ultrasound scans this time around, which will be a little bit easier.  

I think I've finally snapped out of my 'funk.'  I somewhat feel as though I was addicted.... if that's what addiction feels like?  The only thing that consumed my entire life for the past 3 months (well honestly longer than that... but this is the closest we've been) has been in vitro and the thought of starting a family!  Every time I turned my head I saw billboards, commercials, movies, fliers, magazines, and pregnant women... I forget what that phenomenon is... so you buy a new vehicle and all you see is the same exact model / make as your vehicle, but before you bought vehicle you never noticed that make / model on the road.  Anyways, I couldn't get the thought out of my mind - pregnant, pregnant, pregnant.  Work wasn't and hasn't been enjoyable during this entire time either, and has been somewhat of a drag.  I wanted to be anywhere but work, but all I did at home was sit around and worry about in vitro - would it be successful, and why did things not work out?

I think things are turning in a good direction.  I give thanks to all of my family and friends who have helped me through!  While Saturday, June 2nd was probably the worst day of my life, I have been reminded and I have reminded myself that I have so much to live for as well as so much to look forward to in the future!  So here's to the future...!

PS, if you haven't already marked down on your calendar... August 25th... the last Saturday in August is the Annual Jamison Fish Fry! Hope to see you all there :)

Until next time,
love,
ALJ

BFN

I've been reading a few online forums and websites and they all use acronyms for everything!  BFN also known as Big Fat Negative.  For those of you who really know me, I definitely would substitute a different word for the F, but I think just about everyone can figure that one out!  Unfortunately, on Saturday I received the call from my nurse at the clinic.  I could tell by the first words she spoke that her news wouldn't be good.  She told me that my hCG (Human Chorionic Gonadotropin) level was at a 2, which was way too low for me to be pregnant.  A hCG level of less than 5mIU/ml is considered negative for pregnancy, and anything above 25mIU/ml is considered positive for pregnancy.  My levels should have been significantly higher as I waited three weeks instead of testing at the two week point.

In other words this ivf cycle did not work.  Nicole, my nurse, said that the next step was to set up an appointment with the doc at the clinic in this next week and discuss our options for the future.  I'm not really sure what else she said during the phone call... after the words "that level is too low for a successful pregnancy," I kinda stopped listening.  I do recall her saying that the next time around would be "easier" as I won't have to have as many drugs to prepare my body, but that the prescriptions would be slightly different than this first time around. 

To say I was devastated would the biggest an understatement of the year.  I'm not sure if I am just a little naive or what...at first I always assumed that having kids would be easy, and would happen immediately... now I thought that ivf would just work, it had to right?  Everything was perfect, everything went well... but what happened?!  There are probably a million and a half scenarios that have already gone through my head as to why things went the way they did, which is probably why I have 2 cold sores on my bottom lip... a little stress maybe???? Unfortunately, I don't think I can sit around and  keep trying to figure out what happened, as I'll probably never know.  All I do know is that something must not have been right, there has to be some reason as to why this time around didn't work. 

Well we'll see what the doc has to say....!

Let the waiting game begin again! Until next time,
ALJ