Sasha Bear

Have you ever had so much going on that you think, I can't possibly handle anything else right now?  That's where I've been for the last couple of months.  If you read my blog, you're pretty up to speed on the IF side of my life, and if you've been reading for a little while, you might also remember that I've been dealing with some family drama.  I'm not prepared to get into the details of what has transpired over the past couple of months, but it's been pretty horrible since Christmas.  The relationship between my father and me is in a pretty bad place.  I'm incredibly angry with him and hurt and it's been very difficult to deal with this, especially on top of IF - it's all just been so overwhelming.  This weekend my mom called and said I might want to drop by the house to see Sasha, our family dog.  She is a beautiful Great White Pyrenees/Husky mix and she's 14.5 now - pretty impressive for a big dog.  Her health has been slowly declining for about a year now, and drastically worsened in the last two months.  This weekend my mom was out walking her (a 5 minute walk around the complex is all she can muster anymore) and she collapsed and just lay down and wouldn't get back up.  It took both of my parents to get her up and home again.  My mom really felt like that day, Sasha was telling her that it's her time.

My heart is breaking, I love that dog so immensely, she has been part of our family for 14 amazing years, she has been such a gift to us.  We we had our lab, Bailey, who was still fairly young when my mom heard of a woman looking to find homes for her pets, they were filing for bankruptcy.  My father was adamant we would not get a second dog, we had already twisted his arm and got Bailey!  So my mom and I told him we just wanted to go see the puppies.  (If you know my mom and me, you would know what a load this was!)  When we got there, the place was filthy and disgusting.  Their 5 yrs old Great White Pyrenees got together with their 18 month Husky and had a litter of 10 puppies, 8 of whom had been placed already by the time we got there.  At this time, our pup was called Squeaky - yup, you read that right, they called this beautiful puppy Squeaky!  We realized we couldn't take the mom, she was very alpha dominant and territorial, we worried how she would deal with Bailey, so we decided to take Squeaky home, just for the weekend (no one believed this for a minute!).  Squeaky became Sasha, she met Bailey and she never left our home.  My mom also managed to find a home for the last puppy too, just around the corner from us.  It was a pretty happy ending, considering these pups were looking at the pound.

Sasha fit right into our lives, she was always so sweet and docile, so kind and gentle.  She brought so much love and happiness into our lives, she was a great companion for Bailey.  She even looked out for Bailey, who had epilepsy, by waking us up if Bailey was seizing during the night.  Those two were the best of friends.  We had to say good bye to Bailey a number of years ago and now, unfortunately, it looks as though we have to say good bye to our Sasha bear.  It is so difficult to watch our pets approach the end.  But I think we all know that it would be too selfish of us to ask more of her.  She needs us to be her family, she needs us to help her by making this incredibly difficult decision.  We owe it to her, after all she's done for us, it's really the least we can do.  I spent much of the weekend at my parents' house visiting with her, remembering the good times we've shared with her, laughing and crying, thanking her for being such an amazing part of our family.  It is with very heavy hearts that we will have to say good bye to her.

Sasha bear, I love you more than you know.  Thank you for being such an incredible addition to our family.  Thank you for blessing us with years of love and laughter, cuddles and good memories.  You will be so very missed.  But I know Bailey will be there, waiting for you, welcoming you.

The Big 2-0

Month and cycle.  Woo.Freaking.Hoo.  

After the BFN this week, I have been holding out hope that AF will not show until the weekend.  H leaves on Monday for a week and the timing is a little tight.  I started spotting yesterday and got a little panicky but was really happy to get up this morning and find AF hadn't arrived.  Whew, ok, maybe this will work out. I called the clinic to speak to a nurse about the timing - if it didn't look good, we were going to have H go in on Monday before he leaves to have a sample frozen, so we kind of needed to know today.  Fortunately when I spoke to her, she agreed the timing should be ok.  Well that's a relief!  Like I said, it's still a little closer than would be ideal, but hey, nothing in IF is ideal, right?

By afternoon....there's AF...stupid good for nothing body can't get anything right!  (using my very stern, 'I'm serious' voice, as H calls it)  I only asked for one more day, just one. But noooo, why wouldn't my period show up a day earlier, just to cause me a tiny bit more stress about it all!  The later I can start the injects, the better.  My first inject cycle I did 5 days of injects, starting CD5, then trigger, then IUI.  The second cycle, I did 6 days of injects, starting CD6, plus an additional day of Lupron, then trigger, then IUIs.  As long as my response is similar this time, we should be ok.  H might be tired and jetlagged, but he's committed!

So now I'm crampy and feeling shitty and gearing up to do it all over again.  Come on IUI#3!

And the results are in...BFN.

I tested yesterday at 12dpo.  We had a long weekend here, yesterday was Family Day.  I debated testing, I didn't want to ruin our holiday Monday but then I decided that it might not be a bad idea to have the day, without any demands on me, to deal with whatever the test had to say.  And it's Family Day, that's a sign, right??  (20 months of signs...)  It was yet another BFN.  You'd think that 19 of them (and that's only assuming 1 per cycle!) would get easier but it's actually the opposite.  I was pretty bummed, as was H, but he tried to remain hopeful that maybe it was too early.  He has now found the HPT accuracy chart online, he knows what's up.  We had a low key day and just hung out together.  My sobfest didn't last as long as last cycle, but I did spend the afternoon baking delicious cookies - don't judge me.

It's so hard to know you've stacked the deck as best you can - we had multiple eggs and amazing post wash sperm counts BOTH days, the cycle was theoretically pretty damn near perfect and still, another failure.  As I called the clinic for the results, I was literally holding and squeezing a four leaf clover charm my good friend Chickin sent me, heart racing, palms sweaty, praying for a miracle.  I didn't get a miracle, I got the same news I always get.  I feel like I'm living Groundhog day over and over again, and I seriously hated that movie.  It is so difficult to think about doing it all over again.  I know I will, I am learning that even when part of me feels like giving up, I am stronger than I think I am.  I will pick myself up, I will do it all over again, because what choice do I have?  I'm just getting really tired of having to be so tough and strong, having to endure it all, over and over again.  I've said it before and I'll say it again, I just wish I knew where the finish line was, and what it looks like, then I know I could handle anything that is thrown my way, the not knowing is so difficult for me.

And to add to my roller coaster of emotions surrounding this BFN, I am stressing about next cycle.  H is away on business from Feb 24-Mar 3.  If AF can hold off until Sat, I think we should be ok, if not, I think H will need to go and have a sample frozen before he leaves.  I cannot stand the idea of sitting this cycle out.  I need to get back at it.  It's my last shot at getting KU before my 30th, which is quickly approaching next month, there are very few due dates in 2014 left period.  I already look around and see people on TB lapping me, my SIL is close to getting KU and giving birth, all while we're seeing an RE and trying to get pregnant.  I feel like people around me are all moving forward and I'm standing still, in the same spot I was 20 months ago - empty uterus and all.  And tomorrow officially marks 20 long fucking months.
I just want to scream FU IF!!!  

To my online friends

My good friend Cici shared this photo earlier and I absolutely love it, it is so true for me.  Love you guys!

And in cycle new, I'm 8dpIUI and getting to the point where I just want to know already!  Next week's beta seems so far away, hurry up and get here already!  (Who am I kidding, I am not waiting until beta, which is next Thurs!  I will likely cave by 12-13dpo, that's usually about as long as I can hold out!)

Sticker shock

H and I have ongoing discussions about treatment and particularly finances.  Through the province, we have coverage for b/w and u/s - we paid a one time monitoring fee when we started with this clinic but I don't pay for each test, thank goodness!  Beyond that, we are completely OOP.  These injects + IUI cycles run us around $2000 and as always, it's just a gamble.  H & I are planners, it's so hard for me to feel so far out of control, which IF does to you, that I want to assert my control over anything that I can.  H & I are also pretty frugal people, we have worked hard to save and make good decisions with our money.  We both have decided it would be a good idea to have a sit down with Dr. R.  We haven't sat down with him really since we started treatment.  Don't get me wrong, I see him during monitoring appts, and he will answer questions and stuff, but it's a busy time, it's usually more about the immediate next steps and what day I need to come back.  We want a chance to sit down and go over everything.  We were dx unexplained but it seems weak ovulation is an issue for us, and SAs are always fantastic, so I'm pretty sure the issue is not there.  But we would like to know if they've learned anything more about me/us through the last few cycles.  We're into cycle 5 with them, I'd like a chance to hear his thoughts on our case at this point.

I would really like to know if he really believes, that based on all our info, how our cycles have gone, does he really think IUI will work for us.  I am in no way ready to move on to IVF at this moment, but I am feeling the need to start doing some research and we really need to weigh the cost-benefit.  With all the info, we may still move on to IUI#3, which is standard protocol, but I really want to make sure it's worth it for us to spend the money on that rather than putting it towards IVF if that's something that will likely be in our future.  It's all so hard and confusing, there are no for sure's, no right or wrong answers per se, you just have to make a decision based on the best information you can get.  I know Dr. R won't be able to say with certainty whether or not we'll get to IVF, but I want to have an honest discussion about it.

When I called to make the appt, the nurse gave me a quick run down; all in all, IVF would cost us about $12-13K.  HOLY SHIT.  That's half my car.  That's like 5-6 vacations for us.  That's a huge chunk of our mortgage we could pay down.  That could be the price tag for a chance to have a baby.

I may sound like I'm getting ahead of myself, and perhaps I am a little, but this is my process, this is how I work.  I panic, gather information, feel more in control and then make decisions (with H) about how to proceed.  I think it's a good idea to go and chat with our RE to see how he's feeling about things at this point, and I wanted to do so without the pressure of another cycle starting (as in if we waited to see how this cycle turns out - by the time you get a BFN, CD3 rolls around quickly and you're already into the next one).  I know we won't have the results from this cycle back yet, we got in to see him on Thurs, but I just need to talk to him, ask him some realistic and blunt questions and start to see what the path ahead may contain. I'm still really praying that this will be our cycle and this whole train of thought/appt will be for nothing, but I need to think beyond this cycle and have some plans or ideas, or at least information, in place.

The Other Side

I was just reading a thread on TB about how sometimes people who have dealt with and experienced success after IF can seemingly "forget" what it's like to still be dealing with it and consequently, say hurtful and insensitive comments.  Someone linked a blog post that brought me to tears and I want to be able to find it again, so I'm posting it here.  I sincerely hope I can make it to the other side soon, but I know with absolute certainty that I will never forget this IF journey.  I will never forget the highs and the lows, the invasive testing and treatment, the needles and vag cams, the hopes and despair - I will never forget.  Here's the article: To My Sisters Who Wait.

Spermination: Part Two

Well, we got up nice and early to do it all over again today!  It was like groundhog day - sperm-hog day, if you will.  (Have I mentioned we're rather goofy and things like this amuse us?  No, well now you do :P)  We got to the clinic around 7:30am and it was much busier than yesterday, I'm guessing a lot of people didn't go yesterday because of the snow storm, so there were a good number of people.  Same routine - I had b/w and u/s while H made his contribution.  We headed back to Timmy's for some breakfast while we waited.  I also popped a couple tylenol, I woke up feeling really "full", like I had softballs where my ovaries are and feeling mighty crampy.  I was worried that if I was cramping, there may be some spasms and I didn't want that to affect the IUI, scaring the sperm off - cause obviously that makes sense.  It did subside a little, so I guess that's something.  Then back to the clinic we went.

They ushered us into an exam room where I got to drop my pants yet again - I think I set a record this week!  Dr. C came in to do the procedure.  The speculum part was better than yesterday, but the actual putting in of the sperm was more uncomfortable today, I could feel pressure as she did it.  If it works out the way we're hoping, I won't complain!  H's post wash numbers were awesome as always.  We hit O-2 on our own, then the IUI yesterday - I was pretty impressed his post wash today was >100 mil and >80% motility.  As the Dr. C was leaving, she jokingly says, "Have you considered being a sperm donor?"  H and I looked at each other and he just said, "I think we'll just work on her for now."  It seemed like a slightly odd comment to make.  I'd kind of like to be the first girl H gets knocked up!  So I am currently full of sperm, haha, and more than a little crampy, hoping that eases up soon.  And just when I get excited to get a break - from the clinic, from the needles, from the many things up my vag this week, I get to start progesterone tonight!  Woo hoo!  I'm just really hoping and praying that this will all be worth it this cycle.  Please let this be our cycle.  

Spermination: Part One

I love working from home, especially when there's a snow storm, the roads are a mess and it's crappy out.  Unless said snow storm arrives the night before/the morning of your 3rd of 4th RE appts this week and you have to trudge through it with everyone else.  I know, you must feel sooo bad for me ;)  

Last night H asked how I was feeling about our IUI appt this morning, and honestly, I was a little nervously excited, but it made a huge difference to know what to expect this time around.  Last cycle, the unknown got to me and I got myself all anxious and nervous, so it definitely helped to know how things would go this morning.  We left the house at 7:30am, got there and were the only people there, except one girl talking to the receptionist about a referral to an OBGYN (calm the envious screams in my head), other than that, we had the place to ourselves!  H went and made his contribution while I was doing b/w and u/s.  I had 2 - 22s, a 16 and a couple 15s.  I *think* 16+ will ovulate, but I could be wrong on that.  After that, we went to Timmy's to grab a coffee and a bite while we waited.  When we got back to the clinic, we were literally the only people there with the nurses and techs.  It was eerie.  Apparently one RE is on vacation and the other had to leave to go to an IVF related appt (plus in this weather, you need to leave yourself plenty of travel time) but I was definitely a little surprised that one of the nurses did the IUI.  It was slightly more uncomfortable than last time, but again, it really wasn't too bad.

We hung around for 10-15 mins afterwards, hoping and praying that this will be our cycle.  Then we headed out to the front to settle our bill - I just love this part.  Today's damage: a little over $1000, on top of the meds I've already paid for ($1155) - being OOP blows.  Then I asked about H's post wash numbers, since I had forgot before (I still managed to ask her, "You're sure it's his sample, right??"  they laughed and said he was the only man in the office at all today, even Dr. R was out!).  He had >150 mil and >80%.  I thought his >100mil last time was good, holy crap he has a lot of swimmers!  So we'll have a groundhog day tomorrow and do this all over again.  Spermination: Part Two, here we come!

Triggered up!

I had appt 2 of 4 today and everything is right on track!  They were far too efficient while I was there, I didn't even get a chance to sneak a peek at my chart!  I did ask the RE, Dr. C said there are 4 mature follies, the largest being a 21 & 20.  I guess that means those two 14s caught up a bit!  They gave me the ovidrel while I was there - last tummy shot for a couple weeks (if not longer)!  That makes me insanely happy, haha!  We are set for IUI tomorrow and Thurs morning.  Here's to hoping that IUI#2 will  be just what we need!

Coming out

Of the IF closet, that is.  Last week I was visiting my friend, she has 14 mos twin boys and I'm there almost weekly for a visit.  It was a few days after last cycle's BFFFN (I accidentally hit too many "f"s but figured it's quite appropriate, so I'm leaving it like that) so I was still bouncing back.  She had no idea we were TTC or dealing with IF.  So with very good intentions, she says, "I can't wait for you to have kids and to be a mom" and I just said, "Please don't even say that right now" as my eyes filled with tears.  I think I eluded to the fact that we'd been working on it with no luck and somehow ended the conversation promptly but was sure my secret wasn't a secret anymore.  Then I headed into the tradeshow, and my friend used to work them, so she understood the high stress week it was for me.  Being a good friend, she didn't mention another word about it all week.  So when I saw her this past weekend, after the show, I had a feeling it might come up.  After the boys were in bed and it was just us two, she said, "Ok, I didn't want to say anything with the show but I've been thinking about you since last week and I just have to ask, are you ok?"  To which I replied, "Relatively, I suppose?"  I was actually in a pretty good IF place that night and was able to tell her about things in a logical and rational manner, no tears or sobbing or anything (hey, it just depends on the day, both are foreseeable outcomes!).  I love her, she was very sweet.  She definitely said most of the things fertile people say to infertile people that they think is helpful but just hurts (pregnancy isn't all it's cracked up to be, you can borrow one of mine, etc) but I was in a good head space and I knew she meant well, so I wasn't bothered.  She sent me a very nice text after I left just saying she might not always say the right thing and she knows she can't understand this, but that they're here for me (us) and they love us and if there's anything we need - to laugh, cry, vent, distract - they're here.  It was really awesome, and it's a big step for me - my first friend IRL to know about our IF.  It feels good to have this big secret out of the way, at least with one person who I know loves me and is rooting for me.

Holding Pattern

I kept up with my injects through the weekend, 6 days, and had a follow up this morning.  I have a 19 and a 17 that are mature and a couple of 14s hanging around.  I saw the tech writing down a lot and got worried there might be too many follies, so while I waited for the RE, I ninja'd my chart!

 

I'm guessing the ones in brackets are some of my disappearing follies I always seem to have?  They didn't count those.  Dr. C told me to stop the stims but to take 10 units of Lupron today so we can ensure I don't O before the IUI.  While I was hoping to only have to do the trigger today, then be done with injections for a couple of weeks, I'm still glad I only had to do one!  I definitely had more bruising this cycle, to be expected since I did injects for a longer period of time.  But I am definitely looking forward to a break from the tummy stabbing.  This is a candid account of my IF journey, bruises and all (I'll show this to our kid one day and say, look at all I did for you!  Kidding...well...maybe).  So here it is, for the whole interwebz to see...my bruised tummy - and the pic barely does it justice, but it is a part of this journey and will so be documented.  So I go back in tomorrow to see if the 17 got bigger and if either of the 14s were able to catch up, then we'll trigger.  We are doing IUIs on Wed and Thurs - so nice to know ahead of time that we're doing two!

I'm definitely feeling much better this time around.  I had only a few bouts of nausea and some joint ache/pain but not even worth mentioning after last cycle!  I wouldn't be surprised if I exacerbated things last cycle, being anxious and nervous - I have a history of contributing to my own nausea, which happens randomly and somewhat frequently.  I am just so grateful that it wasn't nearly that bad again.  I am also much less worried about the IUIs, now that I know how easy and smooth it went last time.  Which is good, since I'm not sure H will come for both days.  It's easy enough for him to show up a little late one day, but two days in a row is tougher, and he hasn't told anyone at work about our IF.  He'll come with me on Wed and if things are smooth sailing, I think I'll be ok to go alone on Thurs.  I just never imagined getting sperminated without him even in the room!  But hey, none of this is how I envisioned it when we started out, just as long as we get our baby, it will all be worth it.