Egg collection booked!

I have been full of doom and gloom the last week or two, but I'm feeling slightly more uplifted today. I had my scan this morning and my follicles have grown a little bit which I'm really happy about.

Todays scan:
Left ovary (mm) 19, 17, 16, 15, 15, 13.5, 13, 12, 10, 10, 9 < 10mm
Right ovary (mm) 19, 14, 13, 12, 11, 11, 14 < 10mm
Endo 10.6mm, Estrogen 5500

So everything seems to be headed in the right direction. My favourite nurse did my scan and I told her that I was worried about not having a decent number of mature eggs. She tried to reassure me that it was a good thing because no OHSS (how much do they go on about that!) but then she made a really good suggestion - that Steve should do IVF on the mature eggs as planned, but to also retrieve the immature eggs so that they can do IVM on those also! Now this is something that I thought about at the beginning of the cycle and was quite keen on but never really brought it up because of our failed IVM attempts previously. Janet, the nurse, went and spoke to my specialist Doreen who said that she is willing to get all mature and immature eggs furing my EPU and they will speak to Steve in the next day or so to check that he is okay with doing IVM on any immature oocytes. That makes me feel soooooooo much better.

I know that with our history with IVM, the likelihood is that none or possibly one will make it to blastocyst out of the immature eggs, but that is still better than not trying it at all. And god damn it, if I am going through all of this, I want to try every single option available to me. I may even have an embryo to freeze - woohoo! I'm trying not to get too far ahead of myself, I need to get to EPU first, and then to transfer. Then I can start to prepare myself for actually having a result, that has the slight possibility of me actually being pregnant. Wow. I said the 'p' word. I think I need to go back into my cave now!

So my egg collection is booked in for 9am on Tuesday morning. I have to continue with 225iu Gonal-F & Orgalutran injections tomorrow and Sunday morning, then I do my Ovidrel trigger at 9pm Sunday night. Monday I get to do nothing and just enjoy my wonderful Foundation Day and then I have to be at the hospital at 7.10am on Tuesday morning. I'm totally shitting myself over it all but am starting to get a little excited - we are actually going to get there!

How are you today? Understimulated thank you!

It seems to be the story of my life. Once again I am being under-stimulated by my conservative clinic and my follicles are still playing games. This week I got to the point where I took it into my own hands and decided to up my FSH dose myself. I know, a lot of people would be horrified about that, I still haven't completely wrapped my head around it either. But I have decided that this is my body, I happen to know a lot about it and how it responds to the drugs, and I will make the decision about what goes into my body.

I had clinic appointments on Monday and Wednesday which weren't particuarly exciting.
Monday's scan:
Left ovary (mm) 16, 13, 12, 10 < 10mm
Right ovary (mm) 15, 12, 8 < 10mm
Endo 9.6mm, Estrogen 1800

Wednesday's scan
Left ovary (mm) 15, 15, 14.5, 12, 12, 10, 10, 8 < 10mm
Right ovary (mm) 15, 15, 11, 15 < 10mm
Endo 10.3mm, Estrogen 3000

Some follicles have grown but the big ones haven't budged. I'm really apprehensive about my cycle. Egg collection was planned for Friday but it has been pushed back to at least Monday now - there goes my public holiday!

I don't want to be conservative with my treatment anymore. I can handle higher doses of my drugs and some more aggressive action. What I can't handle is going through another failed cycle. I am willing to take the risk of a double embryo transfer, or whatever else it takes to get there. If my clinic isn't willing to offer that then I may need to move somewhere that is going to be compatible with that.

Change up

So a change is meant to be as good as a holiday right? And I could sure do with a holiday but you know you get a little cash-strapped around IVF time... so I thought I would do a blog makeover! (Yes it is Sunday morning, and yes I am bored out of my brain!)

The gorgeous Cali has assisted me by making my awesome new blog header- how cool is it! Thanks Cali! I am very excited for Cali at the moment, she has raised enough money to pay for her FET, fingers crossed this is it!

The skyline in the photo is my city - Perth! It always amazes me that there are people who read my blog from all over the world. I haven't travelled very much outside of Western Australia, I've been to Sydney, Melbourne, Cairns, and also to Fiji for a weeks holiday, but I've never travelled extensively overseas or seen many places. I have such a fascination with so many places that I would love to visit.
Like Spain & Portugal, the lifestyle there just seems perfect, beautiful weather, relaxed lifestyle. I'd love to visit the US as well, and do a huge trip to see about a billion and one different places I've seen or read about.

I think of all these awesome places and how great it would be to visit, but I always want to come home. Perth is ridiculously overpriced, has urban sprawl issues, and has been nicknamed 'dullsville' by outsiders. But it has the most amazing beaches, vineyards, restaurants, schools, low crime rates, lots of families, and the number one thing about it - it's my home.

So your task for today - leave a comment and tell me where you are from. And also tell me the best thing about where you live. Oh and if you like my new style blog or not!

Clinic visit

I don't know why people read my blog. I'm not particular inventive, or interesting, or even very funny. For crying out loud, even my post headings are getting repetitive - a little box comes up each time with all my previous headings, and I am having real issues with picking headings that I haven't already used... yes that means I am a crappy writer. Oh well. You are still reading so guess I will continue to write.

I had an appointment at the clinic this morning for my blood test and scan, and I'm actually pretty impressed with my results. Today is Day 9 and I had three 1mm follicles on my left hand side and two 1mm follicles on the right hand side. I also had all up 18 follicles smaller than 1mm. That might not sound like much to most people, but I have always responded really slowly to the drugs, and at this same point in my other cycles, the biggest follicles have been around 8mm. Am awaiting the call from the clinic on how my estrogen levels are and whether or not they want me to up my Gonal-F dose. My favourite nurse Janet did my scan today, she thinks that we will probably do the egg collection next Friday or Saturday depending on how I respond over the next couple of days.

I have a post which has been in my draft folder for a couple of days, I might eventually get around to posting it this afternoon...

The infertile conundrum

I am one of 'those' women. You know the ones I'm talking about. The ones who, the moment they give up birth control, run out and layby their whole nursery. I hate to admit it but I am one of these people.

Planning things has always been my forte. I loved planning my engagement party and wedding, I enjoy organising events for work, and my christmas shopping is usually sorted out around August, if not earlier. Hi, my name is Rebecca and I am a control freak!

So when we started trying for a baby, we naively thought that it wouldn't take us too long, so what was the matter with being prepared? My obsession started with a cute little onesie in Murray's rugby team colours. Completely harmless right? Slowly the collection grew to include bibs, sheets anda nappy bag. After about six months, for some god forsaken reason, we decided to buy a cot. It was on sale in a package with a change table, so on the spot we decided, 'the baby isn't going to be far away - let's do it!'. Uh, yep. Good thinking 99.

So ever since, we have this cot (flat-packed thank god) and change table sitting in the corner of what will one day be our childs nursery. What a slap in the face it is some days.

I also have half a cupboard of the cute baby stuff. I have handmade bibs from etsy, a fully matching manchester set that I have collected from the past two years, small toys, and lots of books. Every time I get sad, I go and sit on the floor of the nursery and take out all the things that I have collected. Sometimes it just makes me more sad, yet other days it lifts my spirits.

Because despite everything, even in the darkest days of my infertile struggle, I still believe that I will be a mother one day. I don't know if it will be from my own body, or with my own eggs, or when it will happen. But I know that it will. So some people might poke fun that I have all this baby stuff around me, or chastise me for 'jinxing' myself. Maybe I would have done things differently if I had my time again.

But then again, maybe not.

Injection Misfire

Oh I am a silly one! You think that you have it all down pat and then something happens to make you realise that you really are a dork. I got up this morning very groggily to do my Gonal-F injection, stumbled into the kitchen, forgot the alcohol swab, struggled to put the needle in the top and then injected myself without dialing in the dose! So I had to pull the needle apart again and start from the beginning! I wont be making that mistake again in a hurry!

In other news, somehow I have managed to catch the flu. I have felt a bit yucky for a couple of days with an especially sore throat but didn't think much of it until last night. Full body aches, feeling hot and cold, an annoying headache that wont go away just add to my list of annoyances. I haven't exercised since Thursday night and I'm already feeling withdrawals. Hopefully I will start to feel better for boot camp tomorrow night.

Day 2

Had my scan and blood test this morning and everything is at normal baseline levels.
Estrogen <100, Progesterone = 4, LH = 4. I want to keep really thorough records to keep track of how my body is going. I can't believe we are really doing this again!
First injection is tomorrow morning, 150iu gonal-f, and my next nurses appointment is on Tuesday. I'm not really expecting any change at all for at least two weeks, but am hoping for the best.

Back to business

My period arrived this morning so we are ready to start AC cyle four, IVF #2. I have a nurses appointment at 7.45am and will begin my gonal-f injections on Saturday. Just need to get through these horrible cramps!

I am cautiously optimistic about this cycle - I have to put everything into it emotionally because I honestly don't know if we can afford any more cycles. We had said previously that we would keep going until the end of the year but the upfront cost is huge and we just don't have that money. We would have to borrow it or up our credit card limits which are already sky high.

Stupid Rebecca

Why do I bother even getting involved. Mitchell and Alicia are back together again. I called DCD this morning and they are trying to figure out what to do with the kids. They need to wait on the police report from Friday night to do anything else. I'm so angry, furious in fact. If I see Alicia again, I can't be held accountable for my actions.

Family drama again

Murray and I had a lovely lunch yesterday with my Mum and her partner Kevin to celebrate Mother Days early. We had a lovely time out at the Ironbark Brewery in Caversham, very relaxing, good food, good company. Everything was going great until Mum told me that Mitchell had called her this morning and that him and Alicia were in the wars again. We both expected it to happen, but it is still very upsetting everytime that they get into one of their fights.

Apparently the police were called to the house after the argument, Alicia had hit Mitchell and Mitchell had hit back, but of course only he got in trouble over it. The police made the decision that with all the history of the relationship and DCD's previous involvement, the children shouldn't be in the house with the two. Alicia was forced to get my Dad's girlfriend to come and pick the kids up, and then she was sent to a womens refuge for the night. The police threatened that if that hadn't happened, the children would be taken off of them temporarily into state care.

I rang Mitchell in the afternoon to see how he was going, and Alicia was with him, apparently they were trying to talk things out, the same as always, and I just left them to it, I didn't want to get involved.

Then I got a phone call from Mitchell at 10pm and he sounded incredibly angry and upset. They were at the house together, he'd had a couple of drinks at her urging, and then she told him that she has slept with another guy, and not just any other guy, but her step-brother! The worst thing about it all is that their little girl who is only seven weeks old, may not be his child!!!! Apparently she said the whole thing with a really smug look on her face, and taunted Mitchell by telling him that she slept with him only 15 minutes after sleeping with the other guy.

Mitchell was just devastated. The relationship has always been a bad one, he has cheated before and been honest about it and she accepted that. She also admitted to acting sexually with a number of other people but not actually sleeping with them, but that doesn't worry me because that is the relationship they chose. The thing that bothers me the most is that Mitchell really didn't want another child, and it took him so long to come around to the fact that he has a little girl now, he is finally bonding with her, and now there is a chance that this might not be his child! What the f&ck kind of mother would do that to firstly their child, but to their partner who they supposedly love!

She has been spouting off about how Mitchell can take Jordan (Mitchell's son), Lulu can go to her Dad (who has nothing to do with her) and Charlotte can be adopted out and then she will kill herself. I think she is just attention seeking, but she is seriously twisted in the head. I don't want her anywhere near those kids. She is mentally unstable. I'm going to call DCD in the morning to see what is going to happen next because it's just not right.

Happy Mothers Day to me.

No AF

Just spoke to the clinic, my period is around seven days away apparently, so all that pain on Friday must have been ovulation. Zero chance for us again this cycle I guess.

AWOL Period

Well my period has gone AWOL on me, I am currently on CD 34 and nothing. I had really bad cramps and PMS on Friday and Saturday, so I thought it must have been on it's way, but that has cleared up and my period is still nowhere in sight.

I rang the clinic to ask them what to do and they sent me for a blood test yesterday afternoon to see where in my cycle I am. I still track my cycles in Fertility Friend, which seems to indicate that I may have only just ovulated, if I have ovulated at all. Who knows!

I am in two minds, I want AF to come so that I can get started with the next IVF cycle, but the longer it takes to arrive, the more boot camp exercise sessions I can fit in :)

Catch up post

I've been really slack with my blogging this week, usually I try to check in every couple of days but it has been flat out at work and with starting boot camp (Check out my other blog for the story)

Last Monday I had a nurses appointment at the clinic to sign all the paperwork for our next IVF cycle. I used to love when they give you the cooler bag filled with drugs, once upon a time it would be exciting to come home and go through all the bits and pieces. Now it's just another thing that I have to do. Not so much depressing as mundane.

There was a new nurse who has only just started at the clinic and she did a really thorough runthrough of what they are going to do this cycle. I already knew all of it but it is good to have someone go through those things anyway. I also made it clear to her that I wanted to start getting additional information relayed to me after blood tests, such as my estrogen and progesterone levels. Generally they just tell me what to do next, stick with my dose or up it without explaining why. I really want to try and regain a bit of control over my body and this process, and the best thing I can do is it be informed about what is happening. The nurse said that that would be fine, and that if a nurse doesn't offer the information, to ask for it and they will give it to me. Score one for me!

I also had a counselling session with my old EAP (Employee Assistance Program) counsellor on Monday. I haven't seen her for six months, at my work you get five free counselling sessions a year and I used all of mine early last year with my initial infertility diagnosis. It was really good to see her and speak openly with someone who understands me.
I realised throgh counselling that a big part of the way I have been feeling is that in the past, I have coped with my infertility by focusing on my work. I had a job I really enjoyed that was challenging and fulfilling, but that was taken away from me because of my 'life choices', in other words because I wanted a baby and had to do IVF. I can see the logistical reasons now, and have dealt with that decision, but at the time it tore me to shreds. I was then moved to a job that was ten times as busy, but with administrative work where I felt unrewarded. I know I have done a really great job in this new position, but I just don't enjoy it. I have been doing super long hours, it's thankless and unrewarding. So now the infertility diagnosis hurts even more, because I don't have the baby, and I don't even have an enjoyable job to fall back on. My counsellor really stressed to me that while it sucks and is completely unfair, sometimes there is no perfect answer. I could stay and hate my job but it would be a better position to come back to after we have a baby, or I could change positions and have to restablish myself, possibly put the baby stuff off for a bit and be happy now, but have IVF and babies hanging over my head. She said that a lot of people think there is a third option where everything works out perfectly, but for the most part that isn't the case.

Moving along from that, on Friday my boss called me into her office for a meeting. She said that she knew I was unhappy and even though I was doing a fantastic job in the position, if I wasn't happy I shouldn't be there. Honestly, at this point I thought she was going to fire me. Instead she offered me a new position, Project Officer for a new corporate wide strategy to be rolled out over the next year. I've talked it over with Murray and I am going to take the job. It's a huge opportunity for me, while still being able to stay in the same branch with the people I have established relationships with. It's good for IVF because while the position involves organising lots of service launches, I can plan those dates and times, and will always have somebody else who can go in my place on the actual day if I'm unavailable.

So I guess I am one of the lucky ones, I do have a third option. It's taken a while for it to rear it's head but for the first time I am starting to feel really good about myself again.