Survivial Techniques; or, 2dpiui

There have been a lot of ups and downs already and I'm only 2 dpiui, which does not bode well for my sanity during this two-week wait. The HCG trigger is still working it's way out of my body, and I've got the same kind of boob pain and a slighter version of the hunger pangs of my pregnancy. Strangely, that doesn't bother me. It's like meeting an old acquaintance and realizing they haven't changed. I know it means nothing about what's going on in my body and I take it for exactly what it's worth.

But my equanimous response to the shot does not mean that I'm handling everything with aplomb. Yesterday, I decided that there's no way the IUI worked because we weren't able to follow doctors' orders and have back-up sex later that night. I spent some time hanging out with Dr. Google (stupid stupid stupid) and learned that post-wash sperm only lives 6-12 hours, so if my ovulation was even a little off, we're screwed. And then I was in quite a funk for the rest of the day.

Truthfully, though, I never really thought it would work even from the beginning. When we made the decision to rush straight into an IUI during our testing cycle, it wasn't because I thought it would actually bring us a baby. It was to get one under our belt before our necessary break in December (and at the time I thought we would also have a November break, though I've changed my thinking on that recently).

There are so many reasons I don't think this worked, aside from my fears about poor timing: the need for self-preservation; my inability to feel hope about this subject; the fact that I got pregnant this time last year; the fact that I want it so much; the fact that everyone who reads my blog wants it for me. Yes, all your encouraging posts and crossed fingers and hopeful wishes are signs to me that this won't happen. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate them-- I really do. I suppose the mind-frame I'm in is capable of turning anything and everything into evidence of its foregone conclusions.

To survive these next weeks, Lawyer Guy and I have come up with a little game. We're going to give each other some kind of nice surprise every day until I get my period or pee on a stick. Yesterday, I vacuumed the rug when he got home, which he had been asking me to do for a while (yes, I'm a terrible housekeeper). He gave me an extra-long kiss (since the bakery a few blocks down was closed). I have to figure out what today's surprise will be. I'm thinking a red velvet twinkie from that same bakery.

I wish I could give myself temporary amnesia and forgot I'm even trying to get pregnant until my period shows. But I guess this will have to do.

Please comment and let me know how you survive a 2ww after treatment or when you're anticipating betas. I'm ready for any tips you can dish out!

Ladies and Gentleman, We Have Insemination; or, Blueballs and Wee-Wee Pads

Finally, I get a chance to discuss this morning's IUI with all of you, and the first thing I have to say is: Ow!

I mean really, why did none of you tell me how much that catheter hurts going in? Lawyer Guy said he could tell how surprised I was by the pain because I was talking and laughing with him and then all of a sudden my eyes bugged out like Bella's when the vet sticks a thermometer up her butt. That was not the most fun way to spend a morning, for sure. But I'm feeling okay now even after having to stay on my feet teaching for the rest of the day, and I'm sure these last few cramps will go away by tomorrow morning.

And the important thing is, I've got spermies all up in my ute! Good ones, too, I think. DH's count was 35 million and motility was 60%. We don't know the morph numbers, unfortunately (they weren't on the sheet), but I am not going to let that keep me from thinking POSITIVELY about those results. Positive, positive, positive.

Now that the procedure is done and everything went the way it was supposed to, I can tell you about those wrenches I alluded to yesterday. I didn't want to dwell on them when I was still worried about how truly wrenchy they might become, but with the benefit of hindsight they have gained in humorousness.

So yesterday post-monitoring, as I'm sitting outside the bloodwork area waiting to get my trigger shot, LG pulls me aside and tells me that he needs to confess something. Immediately I freeze, terrified about what he's going to say. He goes on to explain that:

In an agony of anxiety about having to produce his sample for the IUI, he started "priming the pump" several days before, hoping to build things up to such a state that finishing on demand on Tuesday would be easy. But he did too good a job and had to pull back on Saturday at the very last minute, leaving him in an agony of blueballs for the next three days. He said he couldn't sit, he could barely walk around, he was so uncomfortable he wanted to cry. He also confessed that he let out a teeny bit on Sunday to try to relieve the agony, which helped for a few hours but not as long as he thought it would. He was also terrified that he had ruined the sample by that moment of release.

It was tough. He kept berating himself, saying "This is all my fault. I fucked everything up," and I was both crying at the thought that he was going to have to relieve himself yesterday and not abstain long enough and laughing at the complete absurdity of the situation. I was glad that he told me about this (because he was acting super distant and weird for the days before and I didn't understand why), but we agreed not to talk about it too much for the rest of the night, so he could try to think about other things and I could avoid becoming insanely anxious.

Thankfully, after some hairy moments, he managed to keep it in his pants until we got to the clinic this morning, when he produced said excellent sample. Crisis averted, much laughter ensured.

In fact, I was laughing all over the place in what was probably a semi-hysterical reaction to the stress of it all. As we were waiting in the exam room for the insemination, LG reminded me that it is his brother's birthday and that I should send him an e-mail. I whipped out my blackberry to do so and just collapsed with the giggles. There is no freaking way I could e-mail my crazy brother-in-law while sitting skirt-less, tights-less, and panty-less in a hospital exam room waiting for a pair of nurses to snake a catheter through my whooha and inject me with my husband's pre-prepared, Pepto Bismal-pink sperm. No. Way.

So I laughed and laughed and kind of couldn't stop laughing and then started to cry and then started to laugh again and then the nurses came in and I held LG's hand while they did their thang.

And now comes the worst part. The waiting. It's all so strange: as much as I hope and pray that this was our lucky shot, I can't believe that it will be. Not only because we have not been first-time-lucky even once during this process (first month TTC: a bust; first pregnancy: a disaster), but also because that is not how babies are made. No one ever said making a baby would involve sitting on a Wee-Wee Pad while strange women poked sharp sticks at my cervix. It's just...it doesn't compute.

How the hell am I going to last the next two weeks?

Pull the Trigger; or, Quick Update

The follies are up to 21 mm, and this morning I got my first butt-injection (comfy!). We're all set for 8:15 tomorrow morning.

There have been some unexpected wrenches along the way which I'll cover tomorrow when we make it through the IUI and I get home from teaching (no rest for the wicked).

As much as I tell myself not to hope or expect, I can't help praying: Please, please, please God, let this be what it takes.

Not Yet; or, Monitoring Recap [UPDATED]

Time for my first morning monitoring post! I've been reading these for so long, following along with so many bloggers' growing follies and changing expectations for their cycles, that it's kind of fun to finally get to write one of my own. Much more enjoyable than another series of posts bemoaning my tortured relationship with Pissy the CBEFM and wondering if Lawyer Guy's and my genitals would rupture from overuse before I managed to ovulate.

I'll start with some good news: my lining plumped up to 9.5 over the last two days, so there's nothing to worry about on that front. Phew, what a relief! I feel a little silly for stressing so much about it on Friday, but this is all new and overwhelming, so I think I'm entitled to a few overreactions now and again.

In other reproductive news, my rightie follies are now 17 and 17.5, just under what they need to be to trigger. So close! If my bloodwork shows I'm already surging we go back in tomorrow for the IUI, but if I'm not we trigger tomorrow and do the IUI Tuesday. Either way, I should know what to expect by this afternoon.

Doing the IUI tomorrow would be better from a logistical standpoint: both Lawyer Guy and I are free all day and have plenty of time to handle the appointments. If we do it on Tuesday I'll have to figure out what to do about my 10:15 am class in Queens-- maybe push it back a half-hour or find a friend who can fill in for me. But I'm willing to do whatever's required to make this happen.

So now I just wait! I'll update later today with the doctor's instructions.

Update: No LH surge yet, so I'm going in tomorrow morning for more monitoring and most likely the trigger. IUI probably to follow on Tuesday.

Patients and Patience; or, In Which I Become Yet Another Clomid Victim

I've been riding high the past week, so I suppose some sort of crash was inevitable. This crash is small and recent and nowhere in the vicinity of the dark, sad pit I felt trapped in for much of the summer. It's more of a go-kart upset than a 747 falling from the sky. Nevertheless, my exuberant optimism and hope of the past five days has definitely dwindled to a more depressing (and probably more realistic) level.

I have two follies developing on my right ovary, both at 14mm. Dr Wonderful said I was responding "perfectly" to the Clomid and that I will probably trigger at my next monitoring appointment on Sunday morning, IUI to follow on Monday (Tuesday at the very latest). This is all marching along quite swimmingly: Lawyer Guy has off on Monday for Columbus Day, so the IUI appointment will cause no problems at all if we can manage to do it then. And my experience with Clomid has been easy and uncomplicated. No mood swings, no hot flashes, no cysts (yet). Nothing but the occasional fleeting headache and a crampy twinge or two in my ovaries.

So what's the problem? you ask. Why have I gone from blissfully imagining bringing my twins (hello, two follies! Of course I'll have twins!) to my sister's wedding next summer to sighing on the subway as I contemplate starting this whole messy process over again next cycle?

In a word, I have fallen prey to the evil Lining-Devouring Monster that is Clomid. My beautiful 12-13 mm lining is only 5-something mm. I thought I was immune, but not even my overactive uterus can overcome Clomid's death rays. Sigh. Grumble. Moan.

I must point out that Dr. Wonderful did not appear at all concerned about my lining. She didn't mention it other than in an off-hand way as she was tallying up the stats during the ultrasound. In fact, I asked her about it after she finished the u/s and she gave me her opinion that, although Clomid does lead to thinner lining, it still increases the chance of pregnancy. Plus, I suppose there's a chance my lining could improve over the weekend with more red raspberry leaf tea. And there's the salient fact that all my months of perfect, plump, enviable lining did not get me pregnant, so who's to say something a little slimmer can't get the job done.

Still, it's a bit disheartening, especially to someone who's faced a lot more downs than ups in this babychase. I've resisted the urge to google anything about thin lining and pregnancy rates because I want to relinquish control over this to my doctor--that's why we're working with her, after all. It's just that it would be so amazing to be that lucky girl who gets pregnant on her first treatment, her first month of Clomid, and now I don't think it can happen.

Dr. Wonderful said to take a pregnancy test two weeks after the insemination. That will be the first hpt I've taken since last October. And, most likely, the first negative test I'll see since the last pre-pregnant one I took in June 2009. It's probably good that my hopes are tempered and my expectations diminished, given that I will need to pick myself up after seeing that one line.

Dr Wonderful said when she walked into the exam room that I won't be a patient of hers for long. But maybe to prepare me for disappointment, she told me before she left that I need to have patience during this process, because it will work for me even if it takes a little while. I said that patience is one thing I've learned over the past year, which are fairly grand words. I hope I can live up to them.

Dr. Even-More-Wonderful; or Results and Predictions.

I got confirmation today that I am indeed a smarty-smarty, because my haphazardly chosen nickname for Dr. Wonderful is turning out to be so, so apt. She is really wonderful. I have never felt such relief and comfort after having radioactive dye injected into my nether regions.

So first of all, the results of the HSG were all clear: no obstructions in uterus, tubes flowing freely, everything where it should be and looking good. I was SUPER nervous for the procedure, but Dr. Wonderful talked me through it, making sure I knew what was going to happen at each step, making little jokes to calm me down, and even switching to a smaller catheter when I seemed to be having a lot of discomfort from the original one. She was so great.

Then Lawyer Guy and I headed back across the street to the clinic to monitor my response to the Clomid and to talk about the results of last week's SA (because Dr. W called me, LG never got a chance to speak with her about them). My follies are all still really small, so Dr. W said to come back on Friday to check them out again. We may need to bump up an additional round of Clomid at that point if they still haven't grown much, but she's hopeful she'll be able to do the trigger then and schedule the IUI for the weekend. I hope it can work out that way!

Then before we all left, Lawyer Guy and I had a chance to ask her a bunch of questions. She said she's not terribly worried about his morphology results-- she thinks it's the least important factor in the SA and that while it could be contributing to the delay in our conceiving, finding it wasn't an "a-ha" moment. Then she actually said that she doesn't think we're technically infertile! She thinks the timing maybe hasn't been quite right yet, maybe there was a little mucus in the tubes that has now been washed out, maybe some little thing here or little thing there hasn't been matching up and that's why we've been having such trouble. She also speculated-- while cautioning us that less invasive methods will probably work but require a certain amount of patience-- that she thinks she will be able to help us get pregnant within the next six months!

As much as I am super wary of letting myself think that optimistically, it was such a relief to hear her speak with confidence. After spinning these doomsday scenarios in my mind of IVF with ICSI and months and months of saving and draining our accounts and spending years on this, six months sounds like a weekend! I have to laugh a little at how dire I once thought waiting six months to get pregnant would be, while now it sounds like no time at all.

I feel much better today than I have in months. I could be doing an IUI very soon. And while this cycle might not pan out, that's okay. We've survived worse and we can survive that. One of these days something is going to go right for us, and for the first time in forever I don't feel like I'm the one who has to make it happen.

Pins and Needles; or, Action and Stasis

These have been two of the busiest two days of my life, filled with frantic cross-town subway journeys on the trail of Clomid, down-to-the-wire pill-popping (I took my first dose yesterday at 11:57 am; Dr. Wonderful said to get it in by noon), confused phone calls, new appointments, extensive amazon orders, and way, way, way too much Googling for anyone's comfort. And crying.

The good news, I suppose, is that I took my Clomid on time and we're still on track for IUI #1. The good news is that I went to my very first acupuncture appointment this morning and didn't pass out when the acupuncturist put the needles in (though I did shake pretty uncontrollably for a few minutes.) The good news is that IF treatments appear to be the most effective cure for extreme needle phobia available: alert the psychological community! Desire for a baby outweighs run-of-the-mill neurosis! The good news is that several books on IF are arriving at my house in the coming days.

The bad news is that I am really, really scared. I am scared that my husband's sperm is crap. I am scared that we will never have a baby together. I am scared that my dream of a little boy or girl with his height and my hair (or vice versa, I truly don't care) will never come true.

Last night we were lying in bed together both reading. I looked over at Lawyer Guy and took in his big brown eyes and it hit me that I might never have a baby with those eyes and it was all I could do not to sob right in front of him. This coming from a blue-eyed girl who used to worry that the odds of a a blue-eyed baby were too low with only one of LG's grandparents' passing on those genes. How did I ever think that was important? How could I ever actually think that I would rather have a baby with lighter hair and bluer eyes than one who looked exactly like him? I hate myself for ever thinking that way, because I know now that looking into my child's face and seeing Lawyer Guy reflected there will be the fulfillment of every dream.

We're doing this IUI and I'm totally committed to it. And yet I don't have a prayer of it actually working. Maybe it's self-protection, but when I hear good luck wishes they sound so pointless. Of course the first treatment we try--with those morphology numbers--isn't going to work. Of course not. But we need to get some info on how I respond to treatment and we need to start working with Dr. Wonderful and a Clomid+IUI doesn't cost us anything (thank God) so why not give it a shot?

As LG keeps pointing out, I'm operating on a mix of panic, hearsay, and half-gleaned info from Dr. Google. He's refusing to feel anxious or secure until we speak with Dr. W and hear her evaluation of our situation. I wish I could be as detached as him (he actually said this morning, "We don't know anything that will happen to us in life, so there's no point in worrying over it all. We just have to take it one step at a time.") and as able to put my emotions aside when my rationality requires it. That's a pretty tall order, though, and right now I would be content to just not burst out of my skin with fear and terror while waiting for the next steps.