Fumbling Towards Eggstacy

Fear

Here's Sarah McLachlan performing Fear.

I fear
I have nothing to give
I have so much to lose
I have nothing to give
We have so much to lose...

These song titles are way too easy to relate to infertility.

My IUI is scheduled for Monday morning.  Then I hop on a plane.  No bed rest, no special doctor's orders.   I've never done an IUI before, so it's a bit of a novelty to me.  I had a pre-surgery check-up with Dr. G yesterday, just in case Dr. S. recommended retrieval, and so I bombarded the poor guy with questions.  He looked tired.  I asked him if he would recommend an IUI given my circumstances (2 lead follicles).  He said, your chances are about equivalent with an IUI and an IVF.  I asked if he thought a lower number of mature eggs at trigger meant better quality.  He said no. 

My biggest fear now is that my fertility jumped off a 14'er in the last 7 months.  My last IVF wasn't too shameful.  This one, however, is not impressive, in a "you absolutely, positively need donor eggs" sort of way.  I have feelings of embarrassment as I talk to the nurse and doc now, as if I have failed them.  As if I should have known, given my age, that my body would not be super responsive indefinitely. 

I fear that the fact that some of my meds had an expiration date of June 08 means that they went bad.  And, I fear that that's not the case.

I fear that this is as good as it's gonna get with stimm drugs from now on.

I fear that God is punishing me for putting work before motherhood.

<Is this as fun for you as it is for me, dear reader?  I fear my readers are going to start charging me for reading this and providing therapy to an in-denial, over-the-hill IVF'er, LOL.>

I fear that I've made mistakes down this road.  For my first IVF, I went to an oddball, sub-par, two-man-show (OBGYN + embryologist) in FL.  The doc was super nice, but he had a policy, due to religious reasons, to only fertilize as many eggs as you want to put back.  I had 18 retrieved, so 16 were just tossed from the get-go.  I was a year younger then, so some of those may have been my lottery tickets to mom-hood.  His embryologist insisted on being paid cash and had a huge "save the squirrels" farm in Lakeland, FL.  No lies.  In my defense, I went to these guys because they had gotten a 41-yo friend of mine prego with twins with her own eggs.  At the time I didn’t realize how much luck was involved there.  But she put back 6 embies.  I didn't know to put back more than two embies.  I didn’t know that other REs fertilize the whole batch of eggs and watch them all.  I didn't know about acupuncture use for IF.  I didn't know about blogs.  There is so, so much that I didn't know about IVF.

I fear that I waited too long between IVFs 2 & 3.  A lot can happen in 7 months.  For anyone reading this who is over 35 and thinking of taking a long break, I'd urge you to not do it.  I think it was a mistake.  I know it takes some major pushing, but I urge you to push yourself.

A week from Tuesday, I have an appointment with Dr. Swanson from Conceptions.  Because I suspect the CCRM Dr. S's won't let me do IVF with my own eggs anymore.  I’ll do a follow-up consult with Dr. Su as requested but that’s what I’m expecting to hear.  Thing is, I have about $40K of IF insurance left, so I'm hoping that some doctor will let me try longer.  (I hesitate to write this because I know so many don't have insurance.  But I'd trade anyone, any day, $ for better eggs of my own!  And trust me, I am not rich.)  Even if I have to fly out to NY or Vegas or somewhere else to go to another clinic, I'd like to use every penny of it, if only to be able to say I tried every which way I could with the funds I was fortunate enough to have available to me.  Maybe I'll try the whole Chinese herb thing, get my spleen chi in balance.  I'm thinking to give treatments another year and perhaps at the same time, pursue adoption.  With adoption, GS only wants to do it if we can get a baby who otherwise wouldn’t have much of a chance, like an orphan from another country.  With donor eggs, GS isn’t on board at all.  I am, quite frankly, open to anything -- DEs, domestic, foreign, older, younger, crack baby.  Seriously.  I think.  As long as I can put a kid in daycare, since I have to earn money to feed the kid and all.

And ya, there's like a 10% chance or something the IUI will work.  So there's that.  But with those chances, I've got to be pragmatic.

I can tell you this, if I have a daughter via birth or adoption, I am going to have her freeze plenty of her eggs as soon as she's old enough.

My husband brought a CD with him to Naples with a bunch of pictures we've taken since we've moved to Denver, so he could show his family.  Mostly of beautiful places we've been, but also of our home and dogs.  When he showed them to his uncle yesterday, he told me, his uncle said if he sees one more dog picture, he's going to bark.  Looks like I'm already a weird dog lady.  I want to at least get a chance to be a weird mama.

Work Worries

This whole work reorg thing is getting in the way of my baby-making efforts.  Now I might have to go to NJ for a big regroup meeting the last week of the month, but my boss can't confirm yet.  My whole cycle is in jeopardy.  My retrieval was supposed to be Mon 5/26 and xfer, 5/29 or 31.

I didn't tell my boss I'm doing IVF.  I don't want to tell her.  GS thinks I should just lay it all out.  But I'm super-private at work, plus I'm in a work atmosphere where baby-making isn't highly valued.  Moms tend to be either demoted or never again promoted.  I think if they knew I was wanting to have kids, it could change the course of my career, maybe even put me in the pile of people who will be let go with the reorg.  So I'm not ready to let them in on my little secret yet.

So now I'm thinking....Maybe I could do the transfer Mon morning, fly to NJ right after, hope and pray and beg Dr. S for a 5-day transfer, but otherwise fly back Wed night for a 3-day transfer.  At least I'd be there for 2 of the 5 days, and the company could care less if I book last-minute flights.  Hoo boy.

Probably I'd be better off to just cancel the cycle.  But I wouldn't do that until getting confirmation that I truly have to go to the meeting.

My normal motto is, if I don't know what to do, then do nothing.  So, I'm holding tight.  But my mind is racing.

i.need.to.breathe.

BCP Bonehead

Yesterday was a crazy day -- I found out I'll have to move back to Tampa for my job because of a reorganization.  This caused much stress and I'm not good with surprises.  So GS and I were in discussions of priorities (city vs. job) and options.  GS is in-between jobs and we love it here in Denver, but I've had my job for 8 years and have more earning power, yada yada. 

Since I was distracted by a zillion thoughts racing through my head, I spaced out taking my BCP (I've been taking them at 6pm) and realized it at 7am today, so took it then.  Started bleeding at 10am.  Called the nurse and still waiting for a callback.

Does anyone know the repurcussions?  Now I'm worried I've screwed up the entire IVF cycle....Argh!

============================================

Update 5/8 -- Nurse Rachel called last night and said I did the right thing by doubling up the next day, and the missed pill shouldn't cause any problems.

That Sunday Night Feeling

I haven't been thinking of my current cycle very much, or the possibilities it holds, even though it's looming.  I begin stimming in two weeks.  It's a different sort of 2ww.  It feels kind of like Sunday night, when you know you have to go back to work again soon, and you know your free time is coming to a close.  It doesn’t feel quite like Saturday, or even Sunday morning, since I’m on my diet and taking BCPs and going to acupuncture visits and having a hysteroscopy tomorrow.

I’m starting to realize that after IVF Failure #2, I really did resolve myself to the fact that this may not happen. The thought really doesn’t make me as sad as I sometimes feel it should.  I’ve never been one of those women who HAS to have a child.  It’s something I want to experience in this lifetime, yes.  I know it would bring richness and dimension to my and my husband’s lives like nothing else would.  But the thought of living without a child doesn’t cause major fear or depression.  Sadness and disappointment, yes.  But I now have other plans for my life in my back pocket.

In this respect, I feel a bit alienated from the IF blogging community.  I haven’t spent most of my life yearning for a child, and I don’t feel like my life will be tortured without one.  I didn’t really even want a child THAT bad until I met my current husband and fell in love and admiration in a way that made me want to reproduce with him.  My maternal instincts come in waves – one day, I’ll see a baby and will feel lost and empty thinking I may never have one, but the next day, I’ll see one and casually think yeah, I could see having one.  Or not.  Either way's fine. 

Maybe it’s because of my life experiences.

With my first husband, I went through a major disappointment.  Not even the marriage so much as how long it took to get to the marriage.  We met when I was 17 and a freshman in college.  We dated for almost 9 years before marrying.  When my college friends were having weddings and babies, I still had my own apartment and was waiting for a ring.  That's when I first truly learned how to live with uncertainty and disappointment.  Maybe too much so.  When we first started dating, in college, I’d talk about having kids often, way far in the future, but with excitement.  But as the years passed and a proposal didn’t come as expected, I pactically stopped even thinking about kids.   

Then, divorce changed me in a lot of ways -- it made me feel strong and independent.  It made me realize I didn’t need to be married to be happy, that I could make my own way in life just fine.  I found new friends, new hobbies, a new home, all in a city that was new to me at the time.  I’m not an outgoing person, so to me this didn’t come without effort.  But I did it. 

After the divorce, I dated someone long-term, but wasn’t ready to enter into a relationship serious enough to lead to marriage for another 4 years.  My clock was not ticking very loudly.

It started ticking loud when I met my husband, though.  Regardless of my wavering maternal instincts, I am 110% confident that if this IVF works, I would be joyous and ecstatic beyond my wildest dreams.  I know we’d make great parents, and that any child we had would have enormous amounts of love poured upon it.  We would both do our parental duties without regrets.  On this point, I have no doubts or uncertainties whatsoever.  He or she would be a very lucky, very loved human being, for sure.