Personhood Bill

As a quick FYI.  If you create a post about voting "yes" on Mississippi's personhood bill, I will promptly unfollow your blog.  You are an IFer and you should know better.

Sincerely,
Educated angry owner of frozen embryos

F*cktards

Given that this post is sensitive...I posted in Wordpress.

Leave a comment with your email addy for the password.  Enjoy this little gem and be glad you don't have to deal with this kind of crazy.


Too much crazy in my life!

Ovary egg hunt!

Just wanted to post a quick blog about my retrieval today......

34 eggs!!!!!

I'm still kind of in shock. I knew there would be a lot, but not quite that many.  Now I just have to wait for my report on fertilization tomorrow.  Hopefully most of them were mature and fertilize and yield us some beautiful blastocysts in 5 days!!!! 
I am sitting on the couch recovering.  I am in quite a bit of pain.  I am hoping this is very normal and not the start of OHSS.  DH and I went to the grocery store afterwards and loaded on up on lots of protein type foods.  Now I am crossing my fingers to not hyperstim so we can proceed with a fresh transfer.  If all goes well we are scheduled for a 9:15am transfer this coming Sunday!  

As promised, courtesy of my lovely hubby....some pics from our retrieval today...

Getting gowned up:

All ready to go!

Reading a book while waiting for the doctor

Just came out of retrieval. Not quite awake from anesthesia

 

Starting to come to....so attractive!

 

Isn't my husband wonderful for getting such a beautiful close-up of me?

 

Doing some grocery shopping after leaving the surgery center.  Can't quite walk yet.  I never want to get old!!

The results are in.....

My E2 is up to 11,305.  I cannot believe it is that high.  Fortunately, my clinic is going to let me proceed with the fresh transfer provided A) we have good embryos to transfer and B) I don't have severe OHSS symptoms between now and Sunday (which is when our transfer is scheduled).

So DH and I are off to retrieval tomorrow morning at 8:15.  I am praying that we get lots and lots of mature follicles and that OHSS doesn't follow!  I REALLY want to do a fresh transfer!

Funny pics following anesthesia to follow courtesy of my husband I am sure!

As a side note, I asked today about pelvic rest (the one thing they don't tell you about on this journey) and was informed that it begins from the transfer to the beta.  If the beta is positive it continues through the first trimester!!!!!!!  Funny how the one thing you are supposed to do to get pregnant is the one thing you are forbid to do as an IF patient.

(I swear this is what it feels like sometimes!)

Feeling less like a crazy betch...

So for a while I could not stand to see my friends pregnancy updates on Facebook and Myspace. So like a total crazy person, i went in and deleted all of these people from my friend lists. I don't know what has come over me, but lately I feel a calming feeling that has helped me to look at these things online and see these women in public. I think for the first time, I am so sure that IVF is going to bless us with a baby, that I don't feel jealousy anymore. It's an interesting feeling to come full circle, because I have been living with this jealousy since we started TTC. I'm sure I will feel differently when I am all hopped up on hormones, but for now I am enjoying this feeling!

In other news, I realized today that I CAN'T have it all. As some of you know, I have been working on my Master's degree this past year as a Nurse Practitioner in Psychiatric Medicine. Well this year, my school schedule just doesn't work with my work schedule. I was crushed over the idea of having to withdraw from school. So I decided to explore a few job opportunities that offered less money but more flexibility. I had an interview today and was just offered the position a few hours ago. One caveat: I would be taking a 25K salary cut. This was the first time that I realized that nothing was more important to me at this moment in my life than having a beautiful healthy baby with my husband. So long story short...I have made a lot of revelations today and I am feeling pretty good going into my very first IVF cycle.

Keep your eye on the prize

So DH gave me the "test" progesterone shot last Wednesday. It went surprisingly well. I will admit that I got myself completely worked up and started to cry before he did it. My wonderful husband was an absolute trooper....I know he hates needles, but he calmed me down and gave me the shot like a pro. He looked me in the eyes and told me to "keep your eyes on the prize." He said whenever I get scared or nervous to just think about why we are doing all of this. He couldn't be more right. I am so blessed to have such a level headed DH. I think the build up was WAY worse than the actual shot. I won't lie and say it didn't hurt, because it did. He did it just like a dart. Doing it quickly made the prick of the needle actually breaking the skin much more tolerable. He pushed the progesterone in oil really slow though and I think next time we will try to push it a little bit faster because it because quite uncomfortable having a needle in my butt cheek that long. The next day my bootie was tender, but nothing unmanageable.

This past weekend we went to St. Louis to see DH's sister and our nephews. We had a great time playing with them. They are absolute balls of energy. I also had the chance to talk to my sister in law about all of our infertility issues. It was quite nice because I don't think she really realized how much trouble we are having. It's easy from an outsiders perspective to say things like "How's the baby making coming" or "Are you pregnant yet" and not really realize how hurtful those phrases can be, so it was nice for her to have a glimpse into how painful this process has been for her baby brother and myself.

We also met up with some good friends that drove in to St. Louis as well. We had a great time...drank way too much (which I am taking full advantage of since I am not supposed to drink starting in a few days.

We are officially a few days away from being "in-cycle" for our IVF protocol. I take birth control through this Wednesday and then wait for AF to arrive. At that point our money in whole is due to the clinic. Then the fun begins!

First comes love, then comes marriage, then come the baby...oh wait, no...no it doesn't...

Ok, I am on my new serious kick to blog daily or close to it. I am so young, but really have experienced so much during this TTC journey. If I can touch just one person with my blog, then the plan God has for me is serving its purpose (as painful and financially draining as this “journey” is). So let’s do the catch up.

Our last IUI failed. We had SOO much hope that it had worked…but alas…it didn’t. I was rather devastated this time around because we had 3 follies and awesome counts (well awesome by male factor standards). I did have an inkling that it didn’t take though.

After this failed round, DH went in to have his counts and everything looked at. My RE called and suggested that given his counts and my PCOS, we skip the 3rd try with injects and move on to IVF. In all honesty, I don’t know why people that have multiple factors (PCOS and male factor) aren’t just encourage to save their money and start with IVF. It’s a business I guess…and they milked us for 3K each inject/IUI cycle….but I have not known one cyster with male factor to get pregnant this way.

So Randy and I went to our IVF class (that is required by our fertility center). $216 later, I am scared out of my mind. I don’t think I realized quite how many needles I’d be sticking in myself or that the progesterone in oil needle is an 22g and it goes in your butt.

Our RE has recommended doing the long IVF protocol (Lupron and the works) and ICSI. They went ahead and ordered all of our meds. We actually faired pretty well. The clinic told us to anticipate close to a $3000 medication bill. It only came out to be $1587. It arrived at my husbands’ job today. I don’t think I realized going into this quite how expensive this whole thing is. Here’s the breakdown for our IVF procedure:

• Nashville Fertility Center 3000.00
• Reproductive Specialty Lab 3500.00
• NFC Surgery Center 2300.00
• Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI) 1450.00
• Lupron 2 week kit 99.00
• Follistim 300 (7 cartridges) 1240.00
• Tetracycline 10.00
• Medrol dose pack 15.00
• Ovidrel Hcg shots (2) 179.98
• Progesterone in Olive Oil (2) 15.00
• Package of 22g needles 12.00
• Package of 18g needles 12.00
• Syringes 5.00
o GRAND TOTAL: $11,837

Damn it makes me cringe to type that out….but I guess everyone going into it needs to know. DH and I have ZERO insurance coverage for the procedure or meds. The only things that were covered were the antibiotics, steroids, and progesterone in oil.

Because I had a massive allergic reaction to progesterone suppositories (I had a Steven’s Johnsons reaction) that put me in the hospital, they want me to test taking the progesterone in oil shot one time tomorrow night to ensure that I don’t have an anaphylactic reaction to it. Since DH and I took the past two cycles off to prepare for IVF, we agreed that testing it before dumping thousands of dollars into the cycle would be a really good idea. The idea of plunging an entire 22g needle into my ass makes me cringe. The more I watch the “how to video” the more nervous I get. DH is going to give it to me just because of the location (and because I am a total chicken).

Well here’s goes nothing! I’ll keep you posted; )

Making a baby is sexy!

So if you read my previous post...you guessed right. We decided to go ahead and do the IUI despite the increased risk of multiples. I am SOOOO glad we decided to now because we found out that DH's counts are down quite a bit from the last time.

All in all, the whole processes wasn't bad at all. We arrived at the clinic at 9am. DH did his thing. They brought both of us back to an exam room just after 10:30. Two nurses were in the room with us. They went over the sperm counts. I was really down over them...in hindsight I shouldn't have shown my poor husband that I was upset...I know it was just a blow to his manhood...no pun intended. There were 0% type A and only 4.4 million total. I asked her if it was even possible to get pregnant with no type As and she said it happens all the time. It was relieving to hear that.

So I assumed the position. The nurse put the speculum in and then the catheter. It was a totally differnet experience that my first IUI...not painful at all. The cath slipped right into my cervix and she put the baby batter in there. Didn't even cause cramping. The set an alarm for 15 minutes. When the time was up, I got dressed and we were out of there.

I have realized throughout this cycle that the next time I hear someone who is pregnant complain about how much morning sickness sucks...or how swollen their feet are...i might just deck them. People have no idea how unmagical the journey to conceive a baby is when you are an infertility patient! I just don't want to hear it! I will without a doubt relish every bout of morning sickness and every kick to my bladder when I get pregnant!

First Cycle of Injectibles

Well after 3 failed rounds of Clomid, we have moved on to injectibles. I started this cycle with a hysterosalpinogram (HSG)....umm....really not fun. It was not quite as bad as I thought it would be, but it was like an extremely intense pain that lasted for maybe 2 minutes when the dye spilled into the uterus. Thank God...it's all clear!! Yay.

Now to use the injectible meds, they made me take an FSH class at our fertility clinic to learn all about the different types of drugs and how to stick myself with a needle. Not terribly enlightening for $100.

I decided, naturally, to go with the most expensive option-the Follistim pen. It seemed only logical since this was the only option that did not require mixing of drugs and had a safety mechanism built in which would prevent me from dumping $1000 of medication on to the floor.

I ordered my first pen through Metro drugs. It came out to be the cheapest-$900 for the 900IU pen and a shot of Ovidrel.

I started the shots on CD3at 75IU. Given that I have PCOS, they didn't want to hyperstim me...which give how much OHSS sounds like it sucks, I was ok with that. Here are the results of the subsequent E2's and Ultrasounds:

CD3 [baseline]- E2=39
Follicles=none
Dosage=75IU

CD8- E2=165
Follicles=nothing over 10mm on either side
Dosage=100IU

CD11-E2 187
Follicles=7mm on left
Dosage=150IU

CD14-E2=1314
Follicles= Right-10mm, 10mm, 12mm
Left-14mm
Dosage=112.5IU

CD15-E2=2788
Follicles=Right-17mm, 14mm, 10mm, 10mm
Left-14mm, 10mm

On CD 15 the clinic called with news from my doctor. She said she is very concerend that we may conceive multiples with this cycle. They gave us the option of cancelling the cycle or triggereing that night and proceeding with the IUI tomorrow (Thrusday). You'll never guess what we decided............

How the hell did I get here?

Hey everyone. I've never blogged before...but given how much the journey into fertility has sucked...I thought it might be a nice outlet!

Let's see...I am 24 years old (that's right...24....and infertile). I never imagined in a million years (ok...well 24 years) that I would be one of those women that so desperately wants a baby that I would do anything to my body or spend vast amounts of money to get it. But alas…here I am. My hubby is 30 years old. We are your typical working stiffs. Get up, go to work, go the gym, eat dinner, pass out 30 minutes later, wash, rinse, repeat. I work at a major university in Nashville in research ethics. It’s pretty much a fancy title for getting to tell MDs and PhDs that they did something wrong. I kind of like it. I also go to school part time…working on my Masters degree as a Nurse practitioner in psychiatric medicine. Ironic given how crazy this fertility stuff has made me. The hubby works for a record label…putting music in movies and commercials, etc. Lots of extra hours at the office and more travel than I’d like…. But he’s the sugar daddy…so I won’t complain.

We’ve been married for 2 years (this May). Time sure flies. We have been trying to get pregnant for about a year now. It’s funny to think about how many years we dated and focused on not getting pregnant. Seems a little silly to have spent all of that money on contraception! Hindsight is 20/20 I guess. Last year I was diagnosed with PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome). To sum it up PCOS is an endocrine disorder that affects approximately 5% of all women and is the most common hormonal disorder among women of reproductive age, and is a leading cause of infertility. The principal features are weight problems, lack of regular ovulation and/or menstruation, and excessive amounts or effects of androgenic (masculinizing) hormones. The symptoms and severity of the syndrome vary greatly among women. While the causes are unknown, insulin resistance, diabetes, and obesity are all strongly correlated with PCOS.
Yay…so not only am I infertile…but I will also have the joy of battling my weight and hormones all my life and likely die of some type of cardiac problem. Can’t lie….finding out I had PCOS was a little bit of a relief. I always wondered why all of the dieting in the world wouldn’t make me thin. Now I know.
On top of the PCOS, we found out DH has some motility problems. He sucked it up and went to a urologist (after many months of TTC) and found out he had prostatitis. Doc sent him home with some antibiotics….hopefully that’ll do the tricks.
Ok….so to date…..we’ve been seeing a fertility specialist for about 6 months. 3 failed rounds of Clomid, 3 large cysts after each and every Clomid cycle, one trip to the emergency room for a severe allergic reaction to progesterone, and about $4,000 later we are now moving on to the big league drugs.
I am starting my first round of injectible drugs as soon as AF shows up. My doc prescribed Follistim 900IU pen. The thought of actually sinking that needle into my stomach every night makes me a little queasy….or maybe it’s the price tag of this cycle (~$2300 to $3000). Getting knocked up is not for the poor!
Thus far insurance hasn’t covered shit. So nice to know that I pay into it every month and get squat out of it.
So now I am just sitting and waiting for AF to arrive so I can get this show on the road. I just finished up a 10 prescription of Prometrium to induce AF. So far nothing. As soon as I start I have to go in for a baseline U/S and hormone level check. The doc also wants me to have an HSG done…..not looking forward to that at all.
So that’s my shitty journey thus far! I am really looking forward to meeting others who have shared this experience….and hate it as much as I do!