Mountain Mama

The doctor’s appointment yesterday went well. There was no blood-drawing drama this time. I had 18 good-sized follicles! 7 on my right and 11 on my left. The weird thing was that they couldn’t find the big follicle from the previous day. It might have been hiding or it might have been a measurement error. The smaller ones are starting to catch up. Based on my bloodwork, they decided to give them one more day to catch up. So, the retrieval is now scheduled for Monday! They assured me that it would not be pushed back any further and it WILL be Monday. I go back in for 1 more day of monitoring this morning, and then tonight I take the shot that will trigger ovulation. I am disappointed that I have to miss 2 full days of school next week (Monday for egg retrieval and Thursday for embryo transfer), but I am glad to have 2 days this weekend to work on the Field Study.

Hi! I really can’t think about anything but IVF right now. I am not exaggerating when I say that all I can think about is ovaries, procedures, fertilization, implantation, babies, etc. I never expected it to consume all my waking moments. When I try really hard and manage to think about something else for a few minutes, my ovaries start hurting and bring my thoughts back around to IVF. I was planning on working on the field study today but I don’t see how I can. I am going to try though. I think, rather than putting a lot of pressure on myself to get done a ton of work on the FS, I will park myself on the couch, turn on the TV, and work intermittently on the FS. If I plan to do that, then anything I do get done will be a bonus.

Last night Tim gave me the “trigger” shot, which triggers ovulation in 36 hours. (I go in 34 hours later for the retrieval- they catch the eggs before they get released naturally). I have to be at the clinic Monday at 8 am. Today is my first shot-free day in a while. I’m not sure when I will start taking the next round of shots. Yesterday, the doctor told me he is really glad he pushed the retrieval back another day. Now I have many more big follicles- 7 on the right and 16 on the left! Based on those numbers, he hopes to get 12 mature eggs!

My mom is going to come up Wednesday evening and take me to my Thursday appointment. That way she can be involved as well as my mother-in-law. Tim’s mom will come on Thursday night and stay through the weekend. I am really happy that Tim should be able to make it to the transfer.

I am convinced of the need to take Friday off. I don’t want to take another day off, but it is too important. Tim finally convinced me when he said that this is probably the most important thing I have ever done. Everyone will survive without me. I am sure my ST will be disappointed but she will be fine. I can come back the next week and be super-teacher again.

Time to update the blog! I’ve had some adventures lately I need to fill you in on…

It all started Sunday, in the midst of heavy snow, when I had to go to the POA meeting. I tried to get out of going, but Tim insisted I come. As I was leaving the meeting, I couldn’t see out of my rear window at all and I had to back up in an unfamiliar driveway. So I lowered the rear window (it is electronically operated). Afterwards, I couldn’t get it raised and we determined that it was off its tracks. So we taped it closed. The condensation on the window kept making the tape come off and we’ve retaped it a couple of times. I have to take it to the shop and leave it just to figure out if they can fix it or not! Last night, by the time I got home, it was 6 inches down. Tim and I went out and retaped it together.

This morning, we couldn’t find Petie, our wonderful little cat. We searched the house, and Tim went outside and looked and called, but he was nowhere to be found. Tim checked my truck and it was locked (which it never is). As it turns out, Petie was inside! He had come in when we were fixing the window and he must have stepped on the lock button as well. Anyway, that was a huge relief, because we were really worried about him.

I left early for my doctor’s appointment because of the snow. When I was almost to Bruceton Mills, I started smelling cat pee. By the time I got to Bruceton Mills, I could feel it on my seat. Petie had peed on my seat. It soaked through my pants and my underwear! I didn’t have time to go home and change, so I headed to Wal-Mart. I had never been to that Wal-Mart before so I got completely turned around in the store and panicky about being late. I bought the first pair of pants I saw that were my size and matched my sweater, a pack of new underwear, and a towel to put down on the seat.

I was a few minutes late to my appointment, but it didn’t matter because they were running behind. I changed in the bathroom at the office. When the nurse drew my blood, she didn’t hit the first vein she tried. Then, on the second try, she couldn’t unscrew the little cap at the end of the needle (that hooks into the vial). Three different people tried to unscrew it, while the needle was in my vein. Finally they gave up and tried a 3rd vein (it worked).

Tim has seen several signs this week that the IVF will be successful… I few mornings ago he spilled coffee on the counter and said it looked like a woman. Then he spilled more coffee and it turned into a pregnant woman. He also saw a nursing mother in the shadows on the ceiling the other morning.

Yesterday Melinda emailed me to say she had had a dream that I came to school to tell her I was pregnant with a baby girl.

Tim just told me he saw a big set of breasts in the shadows on the ceiling this morning. I’m not sure what that’s a sign of…

Tim couldn’t make it to this morning’s checkup, which was fine, because there was a lot of waiting around. I had 2 big follicles and 5 smaller follicles on my right side, and 5 big ones (about 11 mm) and 11 smaller ones on my left side. The doctor told me that I’m “not responding like a 29 year old,” which was really disappointing. He said I’m doing OK, but not what they would like to see for someone my age. They hope to get 20-30 eggs, and there are only about 7 that are looking like they will mature. He said there might be 7 perfect eggs in there though. I go back for more monitoring on Thursday morning. They are guessing that the retrieval will be Saturday and the transfer next Tuesday (but that’s just a guess). Later today I will get my blood test results and find out if they want to change my dosage. I’m trying hard not to cry.

The IVF nurse just called my cell phone. I am “not having an exhuberant response” to the meds, so they are doubling my dose. Good thing I practiced last night because she told me to give myself another injection now. It didn’t go as smoothly. There was a lot of blood involved. Anyway, now they want me to come back Tuesday instead of Monday, which works out better for me.

The appointment went well this morning. I am still waiting to hear from the nurse on my blood test results. They measure my estradiol level and depending on how high or low it is, they might make a medication dosage change today. I have 1 decent sized follicle on my right and 5 other smaller ones, and 1 9mm follicle on my left and 11 smaller ones. It is kind of cool how I have felt more pain on my left and I have more eggs there. I have to go back Monday morning for more monitoring. It stinks that I have to miss my student teacher’s first morning but it can’t be helped.

Retrieval is a much more invasive procedure than transfer. They put me under “concious sedation” (they say most women don’t remember anything) and use a catheter to retrieve as many eggs as possible. They hope to get 20-30. That’s why I’m on this medicine now- to stimulate a bunch of eggs to mature as opposed to the usual 1. Then, that day, they fertilize the eggs using a microscopic needle to actually inject 1 sperm into each egg. Over the next 2 days, we will get a report on how many fertilized successfully, how they are growing and dividing, what quality they are, etc. Then, they will pick the best 2 to transfer (if, for some reason, they are *all* low quality, we would transfer 3, but that is the only scenario in which we would transfer more than 2). That procedure is a piece of cake but I will have to lay around for a couple of hours before I go home- to give the embryos time to get settled. I won’t actually be pregnant until one or both implant, which could take a couple of days. I won’t know if they have implanted until about 10 days after the transfer, when I go for a blood test.

Yesterday I fretted a lot about Tim being away for the big needle bum shots. Melinda offered to do it but she lives 20 minutes away, and I don’t really feel that comfortable bearing my arse for the neighbors. So Tim suggested I see if I could inject myself. Granted, this is a tiny needle in the belly and easy compared to the later shots, but I gave it a try. It was actually really easy and it didn’t hurt at all! Then he suggested I stick it in my rump to see if I could do that and that was easy too! So my plan will be to give myself the shots, and if it doesn’t work, I will call Melinda.

The IVF retrieval procedure will most likely be 1 week from today! The embryo transfer will be 3 days later (Monday 1/29 if the retrieval is Friday). They won’t really know for sure until it gets closer to that time, but the goal is for it to be Friday. It stinks because I can’t line up a sub- I don’t want to have to cancel on them at the last minute.

Tim got to stab me last night for the first time. The needle was 5/8″ long. He said it really seemed official now that he was giving me a shot. It hurt a lot more than the one the nurse gave me! I could “feel” the medicine going in. I couldn’t watch. I think I felt a couple more twinges where I think my ovaries are.

I think Tim is getting excited about the whole process. He is talking about it and bringing it up a lot, which is nice. Having him excited makes it seem more real to me. With this field study “cloud” hanging over my head, I can’t focus on the IVF as much as I would like to. I also can’t focus on the FS as much as I would like to! I hope I get it done but it is starting to seem less important already. Maybe that’s a good thing.