Rebound

Well, IUI #1 was officially declared a bust on Monday (June 3rd). I woke up and just knew it wasn't good. I thought about testing one day early (12 dpIUI), but decided that I didn't want to see a BFN yet. I went to expel my FMU before I changed my mind. The cramping had intensified over night and by 10:30am, I had started spotting. I knew it was only a matter of time before AF would arrive.

I was feeling really lousy. My body was in pain from the cramping, and my mind was in total despair. I sat at my desk crying and couldn't imagine teaching children while feeling like this. I called out sick for the rest of the afternoon, went home and got directly into bed with Mocha.

When I woke up from my long nap, the cramping was getting heavier. My friend suggested that I take a HPT so I could take Advil guilt-free. Good idea! As I was cleaning up from the test and waiting for the 5 minute window to pass, I had some more spotting... except it was more significant than just spotting. It looked like the beginning of flow :-/ I got the BFN, took some Advil, and called the doctor to report that it was CD1. Of course, AF will never turn her back to an opportunity to twist the knife, so the spotting stopped as soon as I called. I waited on pins and needles for the next eight hours until the flow started in full force at 11:00pm.

I spent all of Monday feeling sad, but woke up the next day feeling a lot better. I was able to pick out the silver linings:

1. At least my cycles are short, so I don't have to wait around for a long time in between tries. This cycle ended right on my average of 25 days.
2. At least my LP isn't long. My 2WW isn't even a full two weeks, so I don't have to spend a lot of extra time anxiously wondering.
3. At least we can jump right in with the next try and don't have to wait between cycles.

All of those thoughts are comforting to me, especially the third one. I went in for my CD 3 u/s and blood work on Wednesday (June 5th). The good news is that I'm cyst-free and was instructed to take 100mg of Clomid starting that night. I will continue with the Clomid until Sunday night and return on Friday, June 14th for mid-cycle monitoring.

The side effects are already starting to get to me. I've been especially irritable and got a headache yesterday that I wasn't able to sleep off. John thought I was scapegoating at first when I told him it was because of the Clomid. He actually hung up the phone on me yesterday afternoon and told me to call him back when I wasn't such a grouch. (Thinking back on it, I can't help but to laugh! I was really out of control!) He was extra sweet to me last night and this morning when I told him about my headache. He gave me a head massage that helped me feel better. I love him.

It doesn't help matters that the Wind Symphony is in recording sessions this weekend. Everyone in the group is making huge sacrifices to work on this project. I can't wait to hear the CD and hope it'll all be worth it!! I'm playing on all sessions, so I had to be there last night from 5-9, again tonight from 5-9 and on Saturday and Sunday from 9-5. The recording process is tedious because you have to play the same sections over and over until everyone gets it perfect. And the stage is HOT. The air conditioning is too loud to run, so we're sweating it out. I hope the Clomid doesn't give me hot flashes on top of it all, because that would be cruel. It's going to be a long weekend.

So, anyway, here we go again! Here's hoping that IUI #2 is the lucky one for me! 

My chant until June 14th. I set this to my lock screen on my phone :)