bump #32: relaxing didn't work

No surprise there.

Turns out infertility thrives on inaction or "relaxing" so there will be NO MORE OF THAT!

For this next cycle, it's back to medical intervention.

 IUI #2 (intrauterine insemination)

or the turkey baster method. Thanksgiving is right around the corner, so it's fitting!

The good news is that we have done this before so we know what to expect.

The bad news is that we have done this before and it didn't work.

Hopefully the hysteroscopy in July removed that obstacle.



Our doctor recommended undergoing 3 IUI's before moving on to higher level infertility treatments. There is nothing magical about the number 3, he just said that usually if nothing has happened by that point, it is in our best interest to pursue a different course of action. Which could be another surgery: laparoscopy to diagnose/remove endometriosis or another hysteroscopy if more polyps are present. The earliest he has seen polyps return after being surgically removed is 10 months. But leave it to my state of the art uterus to set a new record on that... please do not accept that as a challenge, uterus.

Here's hoping that IUI #1 was first the worst and IUI #2 will be second, the best!

bump #18: taking a break

I am not a quitter.

I am just at my breaking point.

That's great that "God never gives you more than you can handle" but no one ever said that infertility won't.

3 months ago I had the most invasive procedure of my life (or so I thought) performed to determine why I was unable to get pregnant. The results came back normal. But I knew something was wrong.  

Fast forward to 3 weeks ago when our IUI failed because of an enormous polyp. (How did they not see this during the HSG all those months ago?)

Rewind to 3 hours ago when I went in for a saline hysterogram to essentially outline the polyp with water in order to get a clearer picture of it. {One side effect they forgot to mention is that the gallon or so of water they inserted is still leaking out of me even as I write this post. What a gross souvenir!}

Yes, it's still there. Just growing and causing trouble.

That brings us to right now. The point where I want to go back in time to that place where everything didn't revolve around failing at fertility.

No hysterosalpingogram.

No hysterocscopy.

No hysterical crying.

I am taking a break.

Mostly because the next bump in the process is the hysteroscopy and the next available appointment for this surgery isn't until mid July. But I am also taking a break because even after all of these months of trying to have a baby and having medical procedures done, I don't feel any closer to the finish line. In fact, if it's even possible, I feel farther than when we started.



bump #15: BFN

The big fat negative I got on a preliminary pregnancy test wasn’t as upsetting as I expected it to be. Probably because I just got back from an awesome week in Cabo {see pictures HERE}

There’s definitely something to be said for keeping busy to take your mind off things. No time to get bummed out about baby-making May and iui #1 being a flop. Now we’re off to spend the weekend in Austin with some friends… other married couples who don’t have kids. My peeps J

bump #13: another appointment

Why?

Why are there so many appointments?

When I hesitantly made my initial consulation visit at FCSA (fertility center of san antonio) in March, I had no idea that I would be doing everything short of taking up permanent residence there.  It is becoming all too familiar and makes me think Cheers had it all wrong... Sometimes you wanna go where NOBODY knows your name.  There is simply no anonymity and these people know way more than just my name :)

I feel like I have spent more time at the doctor's office than anywhere else. Namely my job.

They must think I have something seriously wrong with me for the amount of times I have had to come in late or take random days off.  I suppose I do have something seriously wrong with me, but that is beside the point.

Last Saturday I went in for an ultrasound, Monday was the IUI, and now Friday they want me to come back for an estrogen and progesterone test to check my levels. {make sure they're increasing assuming the embryo is implanted} 3 visits in one week!

I am cancelling the appointment. 

My reasoning is 3-fold.

First, I am sick of spending every waking moment in that office. It takes a big chunk out of my day and there isn't even any good shopping or restaurants on that end of town to entice me.

Second, I take pride in my (usual) excellent attendance and do not want to miss anymore work for these annoying appointments. Let's be honest, with the large chunk of change that IF treatments cost, I really can't afford to!

Third, this IUI probably didn't take. And Friday morning is too soon to really tell either way, so best case scenario they say that the levels look great and I get my hopes up. Worst case, they say it was a collossal failure and I go into work late, sobbing the whole rest of the day.

There are so many "mechanical" components to this whole process, it feels very contrived and science-y, way more robotic than romantic. To be honest, sometimes it feels completely unnatural. And it is.

Getting pregnant should involve romance and candles, not forceps and catheters!

All that to say I want some part of this process to be normal.

Normal people don't have to track their estrogen and progesterone every week.

I don't want to either.

No more appointments that make me feel like a science experiment!

bump #12: IUI

It shouldn't come as a shock that I have not shared many details of the last few months/years of fertility troubles with anyone in real life (blog world excluded obviously!) 

Pregnancy, particularly pre-pregnancy, is very private. It's personal and fragile and I still don't quite have a handle on it. But blogging about it, just documenting these little bumps on the way to the big bump, is really helpful and healing.

I hope that one day in the not so distant future I can scan through these posts, with the cutest little baby in my lap :) and think "yeah, that pretty much sucked, but oh it was so worth it!" 


I hope that we're not going through all of this for nothing.


Not just the money, though I complained a lot about that here.

Not just the time, man it goes by so slow.

Not just the emotions, wowza! If this is how I feel pre-hormonal flare ups, I can't even imagine what bumped-up bren is going to be like!

Not just the sacrifice. I won't get to eat sushi or drink margaritas whenever I want, and I'm still going to get super fat.

Not just the pain.  I don't even want to know!

...........................................................................................................................................................

We had our first intrauterine insemination (IUI) appointment this morning and if it is successful and brings our long-awaited baby into our lives,

it will all be worth it.

But if it doesn't work out this time, we are prepared to do it all over again...

bump # 10: good news and bad news

Bad news first:

An ultrasound this morning revealed that there is a big fat polyp making itself cozy in my uterus.

Bummer.



Read more about uterine polyps here and here and here

We have no idea where it came from, or when. I have never had any of the listed symptoms and the HSG in March and the ultrasound last week showed no polyps. How did this happen? And what the heck is a polyp anyway?  My infertility vernacular is increasing everyday...

All I know is that polyps are benign tumors that form in the endometrium and thrive on estrogen. And they act as a barrier, taking up precious space where the baby is supposed to implant, making getting pregnant even harder. Also they increase the risk of miscarriage. Fantastic. Just where exactly is this excess estrogen coming from?  I haven't even eaten soy products in months.  {Although it does explain the last hormonal flare up post.}

Sidenote: My dad, bless his heart, has had to live with 6 females (2 of them being the canine persuasion, but we all know dogs can be real b*****es too) and when my sisters and I were having particularly emotional outbursts, my dad would always chime in "oops did I step on the estrogen button?"

I can now say with certainty, that this poopy polyp has stepped all over my estrogen button!



Here is what the bad news means...

The polyp will most likely need to be surgically removed before we will be able to achieve and maintain a pregnancy. This polyp came out of nowhere and right in the middle of our first IUI cycle.  And we are too far into this to just call it off now - I have already taken the prescribed femara to boost up my follicles (see good news below), I am doing the HCG injection tonight to bring on ovulation in the next 36 hours, and we are going to continue with the IUI on Monday.  The polyp might get in the way of the embryo implanting in the endometrium, resulting in no pregnancy this month. Or, we may be able to get pregnant anyway, but miscarry later due to complications from the polyp. Thanks bing.com, you nasty nuisance with nothing but bad news that sends me straight back to the bitter bandwagon!  Of course the doctors are very reassuring and explained example after example of all the patients with successful pregnancies where polyps were present and didn't interfere at all. Hopefully we'll be one of those couples.

But realistically we are never one of those couples. You know, the ones who get pregnant on the first try. Or the second try. Or... you get the idea.

So I am already planning on this month being a wash and anticipating another exciting invasive procedure next month called hysteroscopy. (This involves getting put under while scissors are crammed up in my business to literally cut out the polyp).
Oh goody. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse!


Now for the good news:

The femara seems to have worked and picked my left ovary to be the main contributor for this month's egg competition.

This is a picture of my big beautiful follicles 

(beauty is in the eye of the beholder - I totally get that saying now!)

Those big black blotches that look sort of like a peace sign are my follicles. 

Aren't they precious?!  The biggest one is almost 23 mm.

To put it in perspective, a good sized follicle for ovulation is 18 mm.

This chart above shows the sizes of the follicles... the next biggest one is 15 mm and could possibly ovulate as well.
Usually only one follicle releases an egg per month though. We'll take what we can get.

So here we are.

Taking the good with the bad and hoping for the best.

bump #8: femara

I think we can all agree there are many better ways to start your weekend than an early morning ultrasound surveying a super empty uterus. *sarcasm*

But whatever.  It is what it is.

This sonogram was the same exam we had back in March at our consultation visit. And no, it was not any more comfortable or less awkward than last time.

I pretty much dread going to FCSA. It is all the way across town, through 3 major freeways of traffic.  I always make Andrew drive because I refuse to learn still don't know my way around this crazy city. The stress of the 40 minute car ride there is enough to make me want to quit this whole inconvenient infertility journey. {Not really, but it sure makes me cranky.}  Somehow sitting in traffic all morning is not conducive to happy thoughts. Who knew?!


Eventually we made it to the doctor's office where I took a proverbial chill pill and we established a course of action for the month, which we will heretofore refer to as baby-making may. But before that,

There were a couple things I had to come to terms with today.

1) My body is not going to naturally get pregnant on its own. For whatever reason, that hasn't happened in the last 2 years that we've been trying and it probably won't happen without some form of medical assistance.

2)  When it becomes apparent that your only option for pregnancy is going to be medically induced, you can greatly increase your chances of success with ovulation inducing hormones.

Ok. 


That brings us to the purpose of today's visit:  to see how many follicles my body is producing on its own to determine if the medication they prescribed me will increase that number, thus increasing our chance of pregnancy.

I am not a fan of medication and that is putting it lightly. I can count on one hand the number of times I have taken antibiotics or other types of prescribed medicine (including last month's valium and doxycyclene).  I know it has it's purpose, but when it comes down to it, I am quite skeptical of the pharmaceutical industry in general and distrusting of most doctors. (Call it a Kohler gene.)

So when the fertility specialist told me that I would need to take femara, I immediately researched the heck out of it. 

I was not pleased with the results of my inquiry.

Let's just say it is NOT FDA approved for infertility treatment and has been associated with miscarriage and birth defects if taken during pregnancy. (It is actually prescribed for people with early stages of breast cancer, but has some benefits when used as an ovulation inducing hormone.)  It should come as no surprise that I freaked out a little bit a lot and am still unsettled about taking it. Why would I put any more risk on my poor reproductive system? Isn't there a better option than this?

Eventually I was talked down from the ledge, so to speak, and led to believe that the chances of miscarriage or birth defects are the same for everyone regardless of their use of femara or clomid or any other drug.  "Right, whatever!" I'm thinking to myself. There is no way that I would ever opt to take pills that could potentially harm my unborn baby or myself. Who does that?

People who want what they can't have do that.
I might have to do that.
Bear with me...

We are in a "unique" situation. And by unique, I mean sucky.
I mean we don't have a lot of options here.

I never imagined in a million years that I would have to

take hormone pills and injections to produce eggs 

 track my temperature three times a day

 pee on litmus strips to see if I'm ovulating

 get ultrasounds to see if I even have follicles

so I can take medicine that has detrimental risks

all the while paying thousands of dollars 

to become a mother.

That it wouldn't just happen at the right time all on its own is heart breaking.  

This is something I am going to have to come to terms with each and everyday.   

I don't have the privilege of just getting knocked up the old fashioned way.
So yes, I am going to take the medicine. And I am going to pray about it. I am going to pray that it does exactly what it is supposed to and nothing more. I am going to continue to pray for a miracle natural pregnancy, but remain cautiously optimistic as we continue on with our plan of IUI.



Today my doctor gave me a super low dose prescription of femara.  2.5 mg to be exact. 
{This is important because the lower the dose, the lower the likelihood of yours truly becoming the next octo-mom.} That is to say, compared with other fertility drugs, femara has a much lower chance of resulting in multiple births. Both the doctors, hubbs, and my uterus agreed that one baby at a time is preferable.

Although now that I think about it, twins wouldn't be that bad. Especially if we got a boy and girl. Then I could be all done in 1 shot!

Somehow I don't think it is that easy.