sad, again

I spoke too soon . . .

After my last post I felt up to organizing my office. I ended up sitting on the floor and going through a box of cards and letters that range over the past ten years of my life.

I saw birth announcements.

Birthday cards.

Anniversary cards.

I re-read some of the cards. The past two years my husband and I have been telling each other. "I'm so sorry that this was such a hard year, honey. Next year will be better. I am so happy to have you in my life."

And then I realized we're due for another round of these Christmas cards showing growing families. We're due for another round of birthdays and holidays and NOTHING HAS CHANGED for us since last year.

I'm just going to be another year older.

Now, I'm sad again. We've been going through this for two hard years.

I'm hopeful . . . but I can't "make-up" holiday cards that feature our child. I can't "make-up" an anniversary card to my husband that says "all our dreams came true this year, honey. You're a wonderful mom."

Instead I realize we're due for another round of fingerprints and questions because our home study is up for renewal.

All of this evidence of the struggle of infertility is sometimes too much to take. Now I have to make something of the rest of my day. I can walk the dog and prepare the soup that I planned to make for dinner. Then there's that glass of wine I was looking forward to earlier in the day. Somehow I've got to get through this.

Monday looms . . . deep breath. . .

moving forward

It's taken a few weeks to move past our failed IVF, but I realized that I'm feeling a lot better today and that I have great hope for the future. The past few weeks have been filled with work and after work activities.

I joined a knitting group that meets at a local cafe.

Garrett and I went to a parenting class at our church - even though we don't have kids yet. Our pastor has known that we've been trying to adopt for over a year now. He said "It's good to see you're starting early . . . " when he saw us at the event. It was kinda funny to be the odd couple out amidst a throng of young parent's trying to keep their children in hand. We got some funny looks, and funny comments, but they didn't bother me. Deep in my heart I have faith that I'll need the teachings delivered at the seminar just as much as they do. Also, just knowing for myself how much I have grown as a person to get to this place makes me feel strong and at peace. Six months ago - even two months ago - I never would have been able to bring myself to that place. I know I'll have good and bad days, but this past Friday was a good day and night.

I have book club this week. We read "Wool" by Hugh Howey. This is always a fun night for me. Most of the women there are mothers with older kids, though one of our members is expecting her first child at the beginning of October. She's thirty-eight . . . from my perspective of being thirty-five, it's just nice to see that pregnancy is still possible for me. It's much harder to sit and chat with a pregnant twenty-something.

We're also thinking about signing up for Financial Peace University, which is a financial class about budgeting and getting out of debt. Infertility has really made us watch what we spend and save. It's also taught us how to be prepared financially for an emergency - infertility has been one long "out of pocket" emergency for us. We only have our mortgage and my school loans as major expenses, but now we understand how important it is to be financially responsible. I have been very grateful about the fact that we can "cash flow" our treatments and I never want to put us in a position where lack of funds prevents us from growing our family. Our goal is to be debt free - that's including our mortgage in ten years . . . . if not sooner. (Hopefully we can climb out of this hole called infertility - because that's what's holding us up.)

I've been going to church more and reading my bible. I read or heard somewhere that suffering brings a person closer to God. That's been so true for me. The only place that seems to really speak to my emotional lows is scripture and I've been very lucky to hold onto that.

I've started writing more. I have an English degree and a love of books that I've never really put to good us. Maybe this child-free time in my life and be used toward making the dream of being a published author come true? Whatever happens, it's good to have a positive goal to work toward.

All of our paper work has been turned into the National Embryo Donation Center. Now the ball is in their court. We're hoping to get in for an appointment in December. If all looks good . . . we're in line for a January or March FET. I'm hoping for January . . . It's so hard to wait.

I got my period last weekend . . . so we'll be trying naturally this month. It feels good to be off of the hormones and shots. I had some wine with dinner last night and plan to have a glass tonight . . . small pleasures that I would love to give up soon . . . 

Sending love to you all!

Jillian

back to work & an IVF refund (sorta)

 
I've been back to work this week. It keeps my mind off things, so that's good. I'm so happy for all of those girls that I was pacing my IVF with - it looks like you are all pregnant.

More joy in the world. You deserve it.

I'm waiting for the paper work from the National Embryo Donation Center so that we can get the ball rolling with our embryo adoption. It helps that we have a current home study. It also helps that I'm current on some of the tests that the clinic requires.

If my cards land just the right way, I could be doing my first FET in January 2015. If the timing is off and we have problems with appointment schedules and approvals that date could push back to March 2015.

More waiting. waiting. waiting.

But I have hope.

Our clinic is giving us a 25% discount for our failed IVF . . . we're getting this because of the fact that I insisted on talking to the doctor on day that I had that first bad ultrasound. The day it looked like I had only five follicles. I asked if she thought we would even get one mature egg. I'm glad I asked and voiced my concern. My husband and I will apply the refund (around $2,880.00) to our upcoming treatments.

During this hard time I've discovered a source of inner strength and hope that I didn't know that I had in me. I believe even more firmly that I will be a mom some day soon. There's a quote that goes something like: "When hope becomes too hard, it has to turn to faith." So I have faith.

Our rescue dog (Bree) has been a huge blessing during this time of sadness in our life.  She is one furry, soft, wriggling mass of pure love and adoration. She loves us!

Thinking about you all.

Jillian

a hard week - our failed IVF

This has been a very hard week for me. Since we hit the ultimate brick wall for our IVF cycle on Wednesday I've felt a major let down. All of that work, all of those hopes and then . . . . nothing.

We met with our RE on Thursday and let me just say out front that we will not be continuing treatment with our clinic. The guy couldn't even offer his condolences for our failed cycle. We had many many questions for him about why he thought our cycle went the way it did. He admitted that I had an asymmetrical response to the stimulation drugs - causing one follicle to jump out ahead of the rest, followed by four more, with five more lagging way behind that. He said that my body probably wasn't all the way shut down that the beginning of the stim drugs and that he would recommend not using Lupron for the next cycle. He also laid out a totally different drug protocol that he thought would work.

I asked if he would label me as a poor responder and he said he would not, that I just didn't respond well to this drug protocol.

The thing is: my clinic knew that I was having an asymmetrical response to the drugs and after that really bad US that I posted about (see "stim blues" below) we were wondering why our cycle was not called off. One thing I did not write about in my precious post was that I DID have a conversation with the doctor on staff that day (not our RE) about whether or not we should cancel the cycle and she was confident that we would be able to get something. She upped my doses and told me that we would probably stim for longer. Then when I went to my next appointment and looked at the ultrasound all that seemed to go out the window. The nurse counted ten follicles and she was very excited.

But that count didn't matter - not when those other five follicles would have never caught up. Never. I never even used those extra drugs we ordered because suddenly I was being ordered to do my trigger shot. What a cluster fuck.

I am angry.

I trusted them. I trusted their experience. My husband and I knew that this all could go to hell, but our doctor should not have gone forward with the egg retrieval when we had such low chances of having successful fertilization - because of our low number of what they assumed were mature follicles.

The majority of the fees for the cycle start to happen at the lab retrieval. I feel like we wasted our fertility resources. We can't get that money back.

Our Dr. said that in hindsight he should have canceled the cycle before the retrieval. That didn't make me feel better. We did go and talk to the clinic manager about recouping some of the wasted fee - somehow working it into another cycle . . . but like I said at the offset . . . we did that, but we're not going back.

I guess I just want to see what they say.

So - what a shitty, shitty experience. My dr. and clinic really did nothing to educate us about what was going on and make us aware of the risks - no one said I was having an asymmetrical response during our stim period. Tell the patient what's happening - if they weren't going to make the hard choice to stop the cycle, maybe my husband and I would have. Maybe. We were just so hopeful and desperate. We were flying forward at 60 miles per hour and then suddenly the lab called and said we had nothing.

One red flag that I should have noticed is that the nurse would always turn the ultrasound screen away from me during the procedure. She didn't want me to see the bad news? We're feeling it now. Living it.

So . . . .

One mature egg that fertilized abnormally with icsi - not that odd for a thirty-five year old woman.

and

Three immature eggs.

I do not expect our clinic to "grow our eggs" but the responsible thing would have been to call the cycle off before the couple is completely fucked.

Complete loss of trust. I feel no qualms about stating that our clinic was the University of Minnesota Reproductive Medicine Center, if you want more info about them, email me and I can tell you more about my experience. I feel it's my responsibility to share this - maybe it can save someone else the heartbreak that we've been through this past week.

If you read about someone who is experiencing this same thing . . . please try to warn them. At least they can quiz their drs about it at their next appointment.

So, what's next: Embryo Adoption. We're already signed up and we feel great about it. More to come as soon as I can start lining things up.

I wish this hadn't happened. I wish I was on the two week wait. I am miserable and sad, but I still have hope. I thought IVF was the bottom of the barrel, but God has shown us another way. We hope he as much faith in us as we have in Him.

Thank you all for lifting me up. Praying for you all.

Jillian

canceled

Out of the 10 follicles that were developing, we got 4 eggs.
Three of them were immature.
They tried to fertilize 2 with ivf and the best 2 with icsi.
Three of them didn't fertilize. One fertilized abnormally.

devastated. just devastated.

trigger day

After my ultrasound and blood work yesterday, my doctor told me to give myself my trigger shot last night. One of my follicles was pushing over 20 mm, so we don't want to lose that one.

Retrieval is tomorrow morning at 8 AM. I'm scared and excited. Scared that I'm excited. I hope we get something that we can work with. I hope I can feel some hope and excitement tomorrow when we hear back from the lab about how many of our eggs were fertilized.

I don't know what to expect. This journey has already been full of so many ups and downs. I know that hardest part of the IVF journey is still to come - THE TWO WEEK WAIT.

We still have some major hurdles to get over before we can go there.

I realized as I was driving home from work that this will be our seventh treatment cycle. We have had 4 failed all natural IUI cycles and 2 medicated IUI cycles with donor sperm - also failed. This one is number seven. 

Lucky number seven?

I hope so.

Jillian

grow follicles! grow!

So, this morning's appointment was much, much better. The other follicles are catching up! The nurse who was doing my ultrasound said that they would definitely want to try to capture every singe follicle that they can, so that means we are going to have to manage my stims very wisely these next few days.

I didn't write down my stats, but I do have one follicle at 18 mm today with the smallest of the 10 coming in at 9 mm. The median range seemed to be 13-10 mm. I have heard that things develop quickly toward the end of the stimulation phase so I'm just praying and letting God have the wheel on this.

I'm going to let the numbers surprise me. One of these eggs will help form our child.

I'm taking it easy today. Preparing some food that will get us through next week. It sounds like we will be triggering on Monday or Tuesday with the retrieval 36 hours after that and the transfer 3 days after that - depending on how the embryologist feels about everything.

Thank you God for the improvement and THANK YOU ALL for your kinds words of encouragement and support. I can't tell you how grateful I am. Truly grateful. I would be going crazy with anxiety without all of your support.

Sending love:

Jillian

stim blues

Well, I had a very disappointing day today. My body is not responding very well to the stimulation medication that they have me on.

Out of the 10 follicles that I have developing 5 are solid 11 - 13 mm range but the other five are lagging behind at the 6 - 8 mm range. I was hoping for a better showing.

The nurse was so fast about doing the ultrasound, I was trying to count the follicles, that my ultrasound session seemed very short and abrupt today. She told me to get dressed and then came back in to talk about the results and then I started crying.

She asked if I wanted to talk to a doctor and I said yes. At that point I was thinking we should just turn this cycle into an IUI because of my poor response. Then the doctor came in and said that while my response was a little below average, she wouldn't consider canceling this cycle. The other five could still catch up - some of them.

My estrodiol level is at 784.

So now I'm on 275 IU dose of Follistim for tonight only and they they have doubled my Meopur dose in the mornings. It was at 75 IU, but now it's up to 150 IU. Will this help? Will this hurt? I'm trying to keep a positive attitude. I made it through work today and then came home and bawled on my husband's shoulder.

I just want this awful time in our life to be over and in my mind in order for that to happen we need more eggs. Then a baby.

Please help me out here, ladies. Any kind words of encouragement, tales of success and prayers would be greatly appreciated.

I'm making a pot of homemade chicken noodle soup - it's the only thing I can think to do.

Sending love and hope:

Jillian