Dreams and False Alarms

Not getting on the train to crazy-ville

Well, we are on the ramp up to the next ovulation, and I had an attack of fiscal freak-out, and thought that maybe doing an IUI would be a good use of these rest cycles and a cheaper way to leverage our odds.  My acupuncturist thought it was an ok idea, and my husband, smart man, is more on the 'nah' side then the 'no' side. But after talking for a while, I realize I am feeling better now than I have in the last 4 years (yeesh, maybe 7), and I don't really want to get on the train to crazyville this month.

So I'm going to keep popping the DHEA, doing my Pilates (which is so lovely, I wished I'd started years and years ago), going to my acupuncturist, writing and enjoying my sex life without having it completely tangled up in TTC. That isn't to say I'm not going to follow the LH surge, and get busy at the right time, but it will be with my feet on the ground, and my eyes on my own future, not just whether or not sperm will meet egg and do the right thing.

For now, I'm booking a weekend away from me and my man--no I won't be ovulating, just because we need to get out of dodge, and this is another way of enjoying our life together. 

Have no fear, the train station is still open, and I have my ticket, but I'm not waiting for the boarding call right now.

OH! And I strapped on a major pair of ovaries and contacted a famous journalist about the octuplet mom fiasco and the effect on the perception of IVF and infertility stuff, and if anything comes of it, I'll crow about it in detail.

Take care my dears!

No time for a real update...

However there is some more good news!

FSH is 7.18, down .82 from last months 8.0.  Here's hoping that is a meaningful shift!

We are going to wait to do the IVF until April. We'll give it the full four months of DHEA, and another month of no-IVF-sanity.

My husband and I will be celebrating our 10 years as a couple anniversary next month--and we are going to go away for the weekend! No cat pillling for 36 whole hours.

And in other news, please go give some love to BeeCee; she just had her beta for her very last with her eggs IVF, and it was negative.

See you on the flip!

Dang! But in a good way for once!

Yesterday morning, after the I, Veruca post husband and I went to the clinic to meet with the new doctor. She's a little on the hyper side, but I'd say more perky than hyper. So perhaps Dr Perky? Not sure yet.

Anhoodle, I was wearing my stirrup socks, made by the lovely Eva (a picture of the socks, someday), and I was just about on the edge of being an asshole to my husband. I'm usually pretty nice, but I was S-T-R-E-S-S-E-D!  So I pulled off my knickers (getting all British on you now), and hopped on the table. 

We looked at Righty first: 8 antral follicles! That is a increase from 4 last month to 8. Would you math whizzes out there call that a 100% increase?

Drum roll Please: INTRODUCING LEFTY, THE MAGICAL TRANSFORMING OVARY!!!!!!!!!!!!

15 antral follicles on lefty! That is up from 6 one month ago.  A bit more than a 100% increase!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And I quote "These are donor egg quality numbers"

Now we all know I'm not gonna make 30 eggs with a bunch of frosties, but it was sure nice to hear some positive feedback on the girls. Poor things have been through the ringer this year!

Overall, I have 23 antral follicles. If I get pregnant with my next IVF Dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) will be in the running for a girl or boys name.  I think we can come up with adequate nickname, but the first day of school is gonna be a killer.

Now the big question is what to do. Dr Perky suggested that we go ahead with an IVF in March. That would mean estrogen priming starting about March 6th, and stims starting around March 14th, with retrieval and transfer around the 4th week of march, or early April.  Or we could do an IUI in March with progesterone supplementation, and if it doesn't work, do an IVF in April/early May. Starting estrogen priming April was our plan walking in, but when we saw the great numbers during the ultrasound, we started thinking about moving it up.  If we do go with moving it up, the plan is that we'd go in for an ultrasound in 4 weeks, see if the antral count is still as high, and then start stims with my period. It seems Dr Calm is shying away from any pre grondapins suppression, but we won't know for sure until we talk to her.

Dr Calm is on vacation (maybe for another week?) and we want to talk to her about whether or not postponing make sense. Essentially, Mr. Science (also known as Husband) wants to make sure that the same processes that make the antrals activate are those that are involved with them responding well. So basically, is it possible to know whether seeing this many antrals means that we've gotten the full effect of the DHEA, or is it possible that these antrals would benefit from having more time to get more receptors activated, or can that even happen.  I, Veruca, want to plunge ahead. Luckily, I have him to restrain me.

So I'm heading off into the weekend lightened and refreshed, not contemplating anti-depressants, and pleased that doing something (DHEA) didn't turn out to be yet another pointless futile step along this journey. Of course I want it to result in a real live human baby, but for the moment, I'll be really pleased with just more antrals.

I, Veruca

Its been a while since my last post. At this point, I think I can manage a post a week.  Gone are the heady days when I had something that needed to be said daily--gone are the days when I could bare to think about infertility daily.

Monday would have been Sparky's due date.  As is my style, the two days leading up to it were awful (cranky on Sat, and a weepy mess on Sunday), but Monday, was ok. My husband had a business trip from Sunday through Wednesday, and strangly enough, it couldn't have come at a better time.  One of my friends reflected to me that sometimes it is better to go through these things alone, but it is so hard to know the right time to do it.  The stars aligned, and it was the right time.  I just simply did whatever I needed to do, and I didn't take a moment to think about anyone else. My husband is a wonderful compantion, and wouldn't have made any sort of demands on me, but for some reason, after the crying stopped, I was able to be focused, and it was very restful.  He's back now, and I'm ready for some company, but we could sure use a vacation.

I had my progesterone checked on day 21, and it was 8. Enough to signal that I'd ovulated, but not a high number. The last time I'd had it checked (2007), it was 13 without clomid and 21 with clomid, so hmmm. We're going to see the newest doctor in the practice today; Dr Calm is on vacation.  Psudonym to follow.  We're doing an antral follicle count, and I'm going to ask her about my lining, but this close to the end of my cycle, I'm not sure what that would tell us.  I think I'm suffering from data withdrawl.

Here is my (not so) secret wish: I'd like to do a monitored IUI with a trigger shot. Or timed intercourse with a trigger shot.  I guess I must secretly want the mindfuck of the trigger shot. Here is why I want this: I want to know if the DHEA is affecting my response in any measurable way.  Are my eggs getting large enough? Is my lining growing appropriately? Could I get pregnant with an IUI? I think I must also be suffering from Drama Withdrawl.  I'm also going to ask her about the drinking a quart of milk thing that BeeCee is doing. 

As I alluded to in my last post, my husband suggested that we may want to wait an extra month, just to give the DHEA more time to work. It seems that the internet agrees that 4 months is the minimum amount of time you need to take it to get the best results. And I do want the best results, but I also want something now. Feeling a bit like Veruca Salt.

I am not actully crazy at the moment, but sometimes I think the effort to keep the crazy under control is very hard. Like Veruca, "I want it now!", and in the craziest part of myself, I would steal a squirrel (novel), or a goose laying the golden eggs (movie).  But alas, my inner Veruca is chained up, only to come out at therapy, where I let the nice lady help me with all these bad scary feelings. 

It is not easy to be grumpy and cranky. I am not usually a grumpy, cranky person. It feels very disorienting to feel greedy, petty, angry and irritable. 

And yet, a small aprt of me would like unleaseh my inner Veruca:

Just substitute baby, and I think you get the picture:

Veruca:

I want the world
I want the whole world
I want to lock it all up in my pocket
It's my bar of chocolate
Give it to me
Now!

I want today
I want tomorrow
I want to wear 'em like braids in my hair
And I don't want to share 'em

I want a party with room fulls of laughter
Ten thousand tons of ice cream
And if I don't get the things I am after
I'm going to scream!

I want the works
I want the whole works
Presents and prizes and sweets and surprises
Of all shapes and sizes
And now
Don't care how
I want it now
Don't care how
I want it now

Now if that isn't a prayer for the deep down crazy in me, I don't know what is.

More Poetry for the Journey

Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Happy Fricken Blogoversary to me--in which I express some irrational rage at logic and science.

Woo, fucking hoo.

Actually, it's belated, because I actually started this blog on January 25th 2008.  That was the year I was supposed to have a baby. That was the year I paid those nice people all that money to monkey around in my lady business and get me knocked up.  That was the year I had one little glimmer of life on the other side--my Sparky.  And now it is all fucking gone.

Last night my husband and I had a productive but painful conversation about expending the DHEA experiment for one more month--that would make it 4 months total, which seems to be the amount of time that the internets think you need to do this for to have the best result.  The doctors don't know because they just started doing experiments with it in 2007, and the results aren't published yet. Argh.  We do know that a study that only had people taking it for 2 months showed no significant results, so if we were to go ahead and do the cycle in March, I'd be 1.5 months ahead of that.  However, it makes me want to rip off all my skin and go into a coma to think about waiting one more fucking month. And yet, if I don't, and the result isn't good, I'll always wonder if I had waited that extra 4 weeks, would it have helped?  Is impatience, distress and a wish to just do it already a stupid reason to not give myself the chance?  Ugh. Logic tells me to delay one more month. I want to rip off logics head and s#*t down it's neck. Classy ain't I?

I woke up this morning all discombobulated. My combobulation has been such a nice break from the upset of the last few months.  My first thought when I woke up was "This could have been the day my Sparky was born."  I composed this whole letter to him in my head, and then had a bit of a cry.

Here's what the letter said:
"Little Sparky, this could have been your birthday.  You could have been born, all red and slick, crying and wondering what you'd just gotten yourself into in this cold, bright new world. Your father and I would have looked at every inch of you, marveling at your 10 tiny toes and fingers, your squishy little face, and your beautiful little mouth. We would have looked at each other in awe, at what we had created, and the fierce conviction to give you something better than either of us ever had, would have been on lips, in our hands, on our minds.  I would have put you to my breast, and maybe even cried out at the shock of the pull of your tiny mouth. I would have cried at the thought that after all these years, you were finally mine, and you weren't a dream."

But instead, it is an ordinary Wednesday. No bells, no whistles, just this aching heart and empty arms.

I came across this poem by Charlie O'Hay's on his blog. He Cecily's husband's, and a very talented poet. I think you'll agree that is both beautiful and fitting.

Day 28: untitled poem

Charlie O'Hay

Strange that the arrival
of tragic news
leaves so many things
   untouched:

The houseplants do not wilt
the salt shakers do not collapse in grief
the book, left splayed on the chair,
   does not burn.

The unpaid bills
do not fling themselves from their perch
nor the phone hang itself
   in sympathy.

That list of errands,
once so urgent, continues
to shout from its magnet
   upon the fridge.

But all you can hear
is the disbelieving thrum
of blood
   in your ears.

I would give anything to have him in my arms today.

Maybe one more month isn't as long as I think.

Rest in Peace my dear baby.

Strange that the arrival
of tragic news
leaves so many things
   untouched:

The houseplants do not wilt
the salt shakers do not collapse in grief
the book, left splayed on the chair,
   does not burn.

The unpaid bills
do not fling themselves from their perch
nor the phone hang itself
   in sympathy.

That list of errands,
once so urgent, continues
to shout from its magnet
   upon the fridge.

But all you can hear
is the disbelieving thrum
of blood
   in your ears.