Happy Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day 2014 - I love my sweethearts more than I can say!

IVF #3 - Stimming

I've got a feeling that the stimming phase is going to go very fast and will be on the short side. I have always responded quickly to the meds, and with my doses up this high (300iu Follistim - let me tell you, that pen goes on for miles!!)... it's going to fly. I have my first monitoring appointment tomorrow, and I'm already feeling things happening in my ovaries. And on the other side of things, Dr. M said that we wants to make sure that we don't trigger too late. At the first sighting of a 17 or 18mm follie, he wants to trigger. If I go beyond seven days of stims, I will be floored.

I didn't actually get to speak to my nurse when she called on Wednesday with my instructions. I remember thinking, hmmm, she didn't say anything about when John should start his Doxycycline. And then it slipped my mind. I just called and, oops, yeah, he was supposed to start that already. ::eyes rolling so freaking hard:: The nurse told me it was ok for him to start it tonight or tomorrow and then stop it the night before my retrieval. I'm obviously annoyed by this, but trying to let it go.

I had some spotting yesterday... very unusual spotting. I'm chalking it up to the very, very weird period I had at the start of this cycle. *******WARNING: gross, TMI, skip past this if you are squeamish******* My period was dark brown almost black and thick. I mean THICK. It only lasted half a day, and seemed to come out of me in one big glob. SO GROSS. And the spotting was light brown and mixed with what looked like EWCM. Perhaps this is the Lupron messing around with my body. Yuck, yuck, yuck.

Ding-Scrape-Nail-Smash

My poor car seems to be wearing the scars of our infertility.

• Ding - someone's car door dinged the side of my car during IUI #1. I was in so much pain from ovulation, that I didn't even care when I noticed it.
• Scrape - I scraped a parked car while turning out of the parking lot at work the day before beta for IVF #1. I knew it was a BFN thanks to my testing frenzy. I couldn't hold back the tears during my meeting, and kept my head down the best I could.
• Nail - there was a nail found in my tire while I was stimming for IVF #2.
• Smash - as I was pulling out of the parking lot at my clinic this morning, I smashed my rear bumper on someone else's parked car. Thankfully, their car was just fine. My bumper, not so much. I am officially all out of tears. Instead of crying, I just feel pissed off.

John & I went in to sign some consents and do some blood work for the study. I also had my baseline. The good news is that we are all set to start stims tonight. John pissed me off while we were signing the consents. He wanted to just sign and run to work, but I wanted the lady to check and make sure we didn't miss anything. He was breathing down my neck as I was reading. ANNOYING. I told him that I was going to put my pen through his eye. LOL. Then I backed my car into a parked car. Awesome!

Quiet

I am not allowing myself to think ahead beyond our egg retrieval. It's working. Maybe a little too well, because to be honest, I'm hardly thinking ahead at all. My mind is quiet and still about what might be.

We did decide to participate in the research study. At first I was a little reluctant to relinquish control, but now I feel relieved to know that it is entirely out of our hands. We don't have to think about what to do if x, y or z. The doctors will figure it all out, if there is anything to figure.

It's getting close to baseline time. Just a few days to go.

ONE MORE BCP!!!!!! And a Research Study?

Tonight after 9:03pm, I will be all finished with BCPs :D The countdowns go as follows:

11 hours, 37 minutes until the last BCP
6 days, 20 hours, 34 minutes until baseline
7 days, 11 hours, 37 minutes until stims

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

The Lupron is still giving me joint pain, but I'm dealing with it. The heating pad is helping my back and hips. My ankles are feeling it too, but it's a very dull ache that I can distract myself from pretty easily.

My clinic contacted me about participating in a research study with our current IVF cycle. The study will compare two different culture mediums (Sequential and Monophasic). After ER, our embryos would be randomly divided. Half would be cultured in the sequential culture medium and the other half in the monophasic culture medium. The benefit to us is that we'd get CCS for free. The drawback is that they would have control over how many and which embryos to transfer (this is assuming a lot... assuming we even get a blastocyst worthy of transferring!!). If we get one of each type, then they'd transfer two embryos. If we only get one of a kind, regardless if we have more than one of that kind, then they will only transfer one. I don't know what would happen with future transfers if we were fortunate enough to have frosties.

John & I will have to discuss this possibility. I am leaning towards saying no. I don't feel that we are a good candidate for this study. Why would they want to include us even knowing our history?? While the CCS is appealing, it is something that I don't think will benefit us much. I have a feeling we will get one blastocyst... we'll know soon enough if it is chromosomally normal after transferring it (if we make it to that point).

The truth is... I haven't been thinking past ER at all, and that is my defense mechanism through all this. By considering this study, I'm being forced to think ahead... I don't wanna do that!!! So anyway, I'll discuss it with John, but think it's gonna be a short discussion.

2014 9+1

I have officially started my year long journey to qualify for guaranteed entry to the 2015 NYC Marathon. There are a few ways you can guarantee your spot for the race (YES, there are actually more people who want to run than there are spots!! So you can't just register):

• Run for charity - they expect you to raise over $2,500. If you don't raise enough, you don't get the spot
• Run another marathon really, really fast - my age group would need to run a 3:20, which is never going to happen for me
• Enter the lottery - let's face it. My luck stinks! I've applied to the lottery six times and have never gotten a spot this way!
• Do the 9+1 program -in a nutshell, run 9 marathon qualifying races and volunteer at one over the course of a year. For more details, check out the NYRR website

I have decided to do the 9+1 in 2014 to earn a spot in the 2015 race. I did the 9+1 in 2012, and it was a long and tiring road to earn my spot for the 2013 race (which in the end, I couldn't run because I chose to do IVF instead). This time around, I anticipate that it will be harder. 

Who knows what life will bring in the way of our TTC efforts. Maybe I'll be lucky enough to get pregnant soon and do the bulk of my 9+1 while pregnant. The 2015 Marathon could be my comeback race!!! (I have goosebumps at the thought!!).

Or maybe we'll crash and burn through this round of IVF and decide it's time for 'alternative' methods to build our family. As much as that would be devastating to give up on a biological child, at least I'd be able to get my body back. I would use the 9+1 as an opportunity to build my endurance base back up. The 2015 Marathon would be a tune up race for my first ultramarathon!!!

I have no idea what's going to happen in the future, but one thing is for certain: I'm gonna try. And I'm gonna wear my Team FUIF jersey every single step of the way!! 

*******************************************

Where there is desire
There is gonna be a flame
Where there is a flame
Someone's bound to get burned
But just because it burns
Doesn't mean you're gonna die
You've gotta get up and try try try
Gotta get up and try try try
You gotta get up and try try try

Lupron

Three nights of Lupron done. I feel joint pain, strangely enough only on my right side (hip, back, ankle). I am also extremely aware of my right ovary. And the little muscle in my right groin (the same one I injured in the 2010 Disney Marathon) is very tender and sore. All on the right side.

I may or may not have had a hot flash tonight. And I definitely woke up the past two mornings sweating my ass off.

Other than that, things are uneventful. Just chipping away at my countdowns. I am ready.