My beautiful daughter -- my dream come true -- is now one year old and walking. She loves swimming class, strawberries, yogurt, dogs, books, peekaboo (this somehow hasn't gotten old yet), sitting on dad's shoulders, going down slides (and trying to go back up), and the Upsidedown Show (a family fave). I am truly in heaven to have such a joyous child in my life. (and my husband likes her too).
If it weren't for my struggle in having her I'm not sure I would soak up each moment with her to the same extent. I do doubt that I could ever love another child as much as I love her. But even with that doubt I am certain I could love another child and make room in my life if blessed to that extent.
So now I'm ready to give it another go. Here's a run down of my efforts:
- I verified that I have insurance money left for another IVF. I do, thank goodness.
- I met with Dr. Swanson at Conceptions two weeks ago and he ordered blood tests and an U/S.
- FSH is 9.0 which is good. Two years ago it was 10.4 (lower is better - doc wants to see <10). Although you're only as good as your highest #.
- E2 (estradiol) is 28, it just needs to be < 80.
- LH was 5, just needs to be <= FSH.
- Resting follicle count was 13 and probably even more that the tech couldn't see (the nurse said they are happy to see 10).
- I get my AMH # in another week and get my Day 10 FSH checked next week.
- I've been doing acupuncture, taking herbs, taking heavy duty liquid vitamins.
- I'm doing clomid starting today just so I don't "waste a month" of eggs while I'm still in my 30s. Dr. S gave it less than a 5% chance of working and I'm fully aware it probably won't work but hey what the heck.
- I'm considering taking bee pollen & royal jelly to improve egg quality but am scared of anaphlactic shock!! Also I haven't started taking CoQ-10 or L-Arginine or L-Carnitine but they're all sitting right here on my desk staring me in the face.
I asked about taking growth hormone with just a clomid/IUI cycle and doc says he won't prescribe because there are no studies to back it up. Because of my age myeggs may have hard shells which means they won't fertilize unless [a] growth hormone is used to make them better quality (which I think means softer shells too) or [b] ICSI is done where the embryologist actually punctures the shell of the egg and injects a single sperm. This helps because even the heartiest sperm may not be able to puncture the shell left to its own devices.
My biggest challenge is that Dr. S wants me to stop breastfeeding. I never thought I'd go this long (13 months) but here I am. DD shows no signs of wanting to stop and the more I read about BF the more I'm fine with going longer. However with IVF drugs it's not recommended, and BF may lower the chance of getting pregnant, IVF or otherwise. But DD is down to just twice a day and doc checked my Prolactin. If it is low it may not interfere too much. But he still says stop.
No idea if anyone reads this anymore but I need somewhere to capture all this data so it might as well be here!!
