1st U/S - 6w1d

This is going to be a quick drive by post as I am exhausted beyond belief.  All is good!  Little Seven is doing well, measuring a little behind with a 3mm crown rump length and a gestation age of 5w6d, but has a beautiful HB of 117 bpm. 

Scanning the u/s photo wasn't working too well, so here's a picture of the picture.

I have lots of details and will post them when I'm a little more coherent.  See what happens when dog tired Jill tries to make a smoothie?

Nighty night.

6 Weeks

I went in for my standard estrogen/progesterone check today.  When I returned home, there was a voicemail from my local nurse.  I returned her call and it turns out my MTHFR results from last week had come in. I requested this test (after being told a few times in the past that it really wasn't needed) just as a precaution.

If you have the MTHFR gene mutation, it can cause pregnancy complications, birth defects and miscarriage as your body can't efficiently metabolize folic acid and it can cause blood clots in the placenta. It can be resolved by taking prescription strength folic acid and either baby aspirin or blood thinners. Unfortunately, most women don't know they have it until it's too late. In my situation of being completely out of embryos and this being my last shot, I could not afford this risk.

Well lo and behold, I tested positive for the gene mutation. I can't believe it. I have compound hetero MTHFR.  They test two genes for this.  Each gene consists of 1 copy from the dad and 1 copy from the mom.  Both of my genes have 1 good copy and 1 mutated copy.  This means that either my mom or dad also has MTHFR and needs to be tested for it.  This not only affects pg, it also increases your risk of stroke, heart attack, things like that.  Most with this mutation should really be on some type of blood thinner and prescription strength folic acid their entire life.
 
Once you test positive for this, they run a 2nd test called a fasting homocystine.  If the homocystine is high, this means that the mutation is negatively affecting you.  If it's low, you might be ok but need to keep a watch on it. My homocystine level won't be back until Fri or next week.
 
I'm a complete wreck.  I don't even know if my little miracle is ok.  My local nurse just called back and they are taking this very seriously considering all I've been through to get to this point.  She completely caught me off guard by asking me to come in for an u/s tomorrow morning.  OMG, I'm having an u/s tomorrow!!!  I'll be 6w1d.  I'm right at the point of maybe seeing a HB, maybe not.  I really didn't want an early u/s because I know it will freak me out if there's no HB, but I guess that's what I'm getting.  Oh God, please let little Seven being safe and sound!!!
 
After my u/s, assuming I'm still pg, I'll be transferred to a high risk doctor for a consultation to go over the results and decide on a plan of action.  He will decipher if I need a prescription strength folic acid (Folgard) and if baby aspirin is enough, or if I need a prescription strength blood thinner.  At least CCRM has had me on baby aspirin this entire time, I'm just worried about the folic acid. Whatever it is, I'll do it, I just can't lose this pg!
 
Today's estrogen was 798, which is a very nice level on it's own, but very concerning that it dropped from 3022.  Of course my mind jumps straight to, OMG, did my body stop producing it's own estrogen because I'm no longer pg?  My progesterone is a good 10.78.  I'm still waiting to hear back from CCRM to hear their take on all this.
 
Please say a little prayer for us, or send us positive thoughts!

Update:

CCRM called and they are having me up my folic acid to 4mg until we get my homocystine level back. They encouraged me and said they really believe all is going to be ok.  They also said my yo-yo-ing estrogen level is ok and it's going to vary.  I feel somewhat better now.

5w1d

Yesterday I had my blood drawn to check my estrogen and progesterone levels. Here's my results:

Progesterone: 9.73 (Lowest ever, but still above 6)
Estrogen: 3022 (Huge jump up from 1163, definitely above 300)

I was pretty concerned about my estrogen tripling but my nurse said all is perfect and that it shows my body is kicking out some estrogen production itself in response to being pg.  I'm to remain on all my same meds and go for another level check in a week.  She said it would not be good to drop any meds before seeing a HB.  After we see a HB, I can then either drop the patches or estrace suppositories, it's my choice. I hate it when they do that, I would rather them tell me which would be better. See, the patches are a total of 0.4mg of estrogen and the estrace is 2mg, so they're not equal.

It's clear that my body is not kicking out its own progesterone yet, hopefully soon. Now that I'm pg, my insurance is supposed to be covering my progesterone support. They have denied paying for it even after an appeal from my nurse stating that I need this in order to substain this pg. My insurance covers progesterone support, but not Endometrin specifically because it's indication states that it's for infertility treatments. I could switch to a covered progesterone, but my nurse feels that is risky.  So now I'm stuck supporting a $140/week progesterone bill. Oh fun!

I also had my blood drawn to check for MTHFR. I'll go over this more after my results are in.

I started this post yesterday and was not able to finish it.  I had stated that I still had no symtpoms.  Well scratch that, I now have 2. 

The first is exhaustion. Yesterday, as I was typing this up, I HAD to stop and go take a nap!  I think I slipped into a drooling coma and afterwards was still exhausted.  I felt like someone drugged me.  I guess that's my first obvious symptom. 

The next is pg brain.  At dinner last night, I excused myself to go to the restroom.  I walked in, headed straight to a stall and had to take a double look, why was there a man in the ladies room?  Then I wondered, why did they put a urinal in here?  A moment later, the overly crowded restaurant witnessed me running out of there while yelling Oh Crap!  So I got to the ladies room, peed, flushed and hear a loud crash.  Looked around and didn't see anything. Right as I was about to leave the stall, I noticed my cell phone sitting deep in the bottom of the toilet still fully lit up. Ugh, that was not pleasant having to stick my arm in there to retrieve it. Surprisingly after a night of drying out, it still works!

I've had a few other little minor symptoms here and there, but they have been very sporatic and so mild that if I wasn't paying attention with a magnifying glass, I really would not have noticed them. Most days though, there's been nothing. 

My adopted-step-daughter and I went baby browsing at Target. We didn't miss a single aisle. Half way through, it hit me, OMG, I'm really pg, I can actually buy something for my baby. I'm so used to that only being a dream and only being there to buy a baby shower gift. Amazingly I made it out of there without buying anything.

I'm counting down the days till our first u/s (11 days to be precise). I need to see it for my own eyes that there's really something in there.  Praying, praying, praying to see a beautiful HB.

FET#1.5 - Beta 2

2nd beta is in!

Beta 1: 193
Beta 2: 459

They want the number to double and I had an increase of 138%! According to this chart below, my levels are above high. I think I got a keeper in there!

Finally, after charting for 46 cycles, I get to see a green line!  The line turns green once you enter a positive pg test.

And finally, I get to see 2 lines on a hpt for the first time ever! The first picture contains the following all taken on 9dp5dt, beta day:

1st test:  this is an internet cheapie, the same brand that haunted me at 4 and 5dp5dt with a BFN.  The test has a sensivity of 20. It took awhile for the line to appear and while there is a definite line, I find it to be quite light considering my hcg was 193.

2nd test:  This is a conceivex test that expired in 4/2008. Pretty much the same results.

3rd test:  This is a ClearBlue Easy digital test, or what's left of it. I bought a 2-pack during my IVF#3 2ww. I peed on one the night before beta back then and it screamed "not pregnant" at me. I swore I would not pee on the 2nd test until I knew I was pregnant. So I'm all excited that I finally get to pee on it. We wait 3 mins while it's displaying an hourglass and then it goes blank. The box says that means the test is faulty and to call them. What a bummer! So we tore the dang thing apart and holy cow, it's got a circuit board inside! No wonder why it's $15 for 2 tests. Inside we found a strip with 2 blue lines.

The next photo contains 2 more internet cheapies taken at 10 and 11dp5dt. My hcg is 459 and it's still much lighter than the control. Goes to show you that a line really is a line, it doesn't matter how light or faint it is.

When I received my first beta, I didn't send it to CCRM. I instead emailed my IVF nurse and asked her to call me, said that I had a quick question. After several hours, she finally called me and said, I've been waiting all day for your beta results and haven't received them yet.  I said, well I'm turning it around on you today and I'm going to give YOU the news, I'm pregnant!!!!  She jokingly called me a brat and said no one has ever done that to her before. That was fun.

Announcing our news to our family and friends was amazing. All of the reactions were priceless; screaming, crying and pure excitement for us. I've found that the longer the journey, the greater the reward. My reward has already been more than I could have imagined. For those still in the trenches, just know that your reward is increasing in size. My hope and prayer is that everyone of you receives your reward very soon and that it's so large you're unable to contain it.

Some of you may be wondering what Kerry's reaction was. Well he missed the awesome call from the nurse announcing the news by 2 mins. When he walked in, I handed him the fax and I think he was about to pass out. I smiled and said, I'm pregnant! He didn't believe me and wanted to see the fax. He was pretty much in shock all night. I think it finally hit him the next morning. He had tears running down his face while he told me how happy he was. Then when we went to bed, he kissed my belly good night.

Speaking of bellies, someone mentioned that belly shots are supposed to be from side view. Well, we just happen to have taken one of those too:

Hey, look, I think I've popped a little already! You'll have to pardon me, I may have an honorary degree in how to get pg, or more like how to not get pg... but I'm as dumb as a box of rocks when it comes to actually being pg. Seriously, I really have no clue what I'm doing here.

I was brave and ventured into the dark pregnancy storage area. Remember in the beginning, back when you thought sex = baby, you bought all of these cute little outfits and pregnancy items, thinking your time would be right around the corner? Then after you realized that sex does not = baby, you hid all of that stuff out of sight? Well I went there, and this is one of the items I found.

And the starting date on them, March 2004! I remember subscribing to these back when we decided we wanted a baby.  We of course couldn't start trying until Jan 2006 when Kerry had his vasectomy reversed, but wow, I didn't realize we have been wanting this baby for quite this long. I remember that I wanted to read up and be the best mom ever.

Today I started having a little bit of pink spotting. I layed down immediately and that seemed to nip it in the bud. I see it so often that I'm not going to let it stress me out. I'll just make sure I take it easy when it happens.

So what's next? Next week they will check my estrogen and progesterone levels to see if they need to tweak my meds any.  Then Nov 2 I'll have my first U/S to see if we got a heartbeat.

Speaking of the U/S, I have a funny for ya...

Kerry: So what will they look for at the U/S?

Me: They will check for a heartbeat and make sure it implanted in the correct location.

Kerry: Why would it implant in any other location than where Dr. Schoolcraft put it?

Me: Well it floats around a little and can implant in the fallopian tube causing an ectopic.

Kerry: No, Dr. Schoolcraft is the embryo whisperer, it stayed right where he put it.

Last but not least, I want to once again thank every one of you for all your support. All of the comments, emails and calls were amazing. Many of you had me in tears, happy tears.

Love,
Jill

FET#1.5 - Beta 1

The path has been chosen.

It is the path so full of joy that I'm in tears as I type.

I am in complete shock!!!!!! 

I am PREGNANT!!!!!!

Beta 193 (>50)

Progesterone 12.75 (>6)

So I was supposed to receive a fax but instead I received a call from my local nurse. This is how is played out:

Me: Hello?

Nurse: May I ask who I'm speaking to?

Me: This is Jill

Nurse: Mom?

Me: No, this is Jill

Nurse:  Who?  Mom?

Me: No, this is Jill

Nurse: Mom?

Me: OMG OMG OMG, are you serious?????

Nurse: Yes, you are pregnant!

Me: OMG OMG, how pregnant?

Nurse: 193

Me: OMG, tell me again!

Nurse: You are pregnant!

... long chit chat ...

Me: Please tell me one more time!

Nurse: You are pregnant!

Me:  OMG, I am sooooo happy!!!!!

God I've waited a long time to be able to do this! Those discolored areas on my belly are estrogen patches.

I hope this gives hope to those with failure after failure, never give up! I hope this gives hope to those with no symptoms and bleeding before beta, it does not mean you are out!

Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for all your support! This is all surreal!

Love,
Jill

FET#1.5 - 8dp5dt (Day Before Beta)

Tomorrow will be a life altering day for us. Our journey down this very long and winding road has come to a fork.

One path will be a very heart breaking one. Our life will go on without a little K&J that we have dreamt of for so long. Knowing there will be no reward for all of our blood, sweat and tears will be painful. All of our time and resources poured into this for nothing will be hard to swallow. But time will heal us and we will be ok because together, we are strong. We are so incredibly blessed with a great marriage and wonderful family and friends, that will be our focus.

The other path will come with more joy than we could contain. All of our hard work and determination will have paid off. All of our incurred debt will no longer matter. It will be the happiest day of our lives to date. This path seems so surreal.

We have no idea which path will be chosen for us. We have done everything we could, we have left no stone unturned. It's now out of our hands and we can only pray that we will receive a miracle.

Today has not been an easy day for us. With our first 2 IVFs, AF arrived before the beta. On our third IVF we made it to beta before AF reared her ugly self, but it was a BFN regardless. So here we are, day before beta and I started spotting pink this morning. In the afternoon it turned to bright red. This does not mean we're totally out, this does happen, but it is scary for us considering our history. It's a horrible deja vu that we are really hoping to not revisit.

Kerry and I both took tomorrow off from work. As I said in my last post, we will be asking our clinic to please not call us and instead fax us the results. We will read it together. We will take the time we need to process the results. During this time, we'd like to kindly ask that all family/friends refrain from calling us. We will call each family household and share our news good or bad. Once we've called you, please remain tight-lipped until we have had a chance to share our news with all immediate family members. Once we have completed our call list, we will then post our results on this blog.

Thanks everyone for all of your support through this challenging time.

FET#1.5 - 7dp5dt

Ahhh, some relief! Let me tell you, life is so much nicer when you don't have a current evil pee stick haunting your every thought. I've regained my hope and positive outlook, it's a much nicer place to be when you're living minute by minute trying to survive the 2ww.

Still no symptoms, but I've received lots of emails/comments with reassuring stories of gals who swore they weren't successful due to no symtpoms and actually were pg. Thanks for those, I feel so much better!

I called and scheduled my beta today! At the end of the call, the lady said; ok, I got you down for beta this Wednesday. I swear my heart skipped 3 beats.

It's only 2 days away and yet it seems it will never get here.

FET#1.5 - 6dp5dt

Hi All,

Several of you commented/emailed about seeing a 2nd line on the 5dp5dt test.  I think what you are seeing is the area where the plastic part of the test meets the paper area. In real life, there is definitely no 2nd line, it's stark white. Also, thanks for letting me know that the internet cheapies are crap.

For any of you in or nearing the 2ww, please learn a painful lesson at my expense. Do NOT test early!!! You'll say to yourself you know it's early and it's ok if it's negative, but it just doesn't play out so easily.

I woke up this morning and found my temp had dropped, which usually means AF is coming. I hope my body hasn't stopped absorbing the progesterone. On top of that, the complete lack of symptoms and 2 BFNs, it was too much for me to handle. I had a mini-meltdown. Kerry asked if I was ok, I said no and then burst into tears. The fear overcame me, what if this doesn't work, this is my last embryo, my last chance.

Kerry gave me a good pep talk and I snapped out of it about 15 mins later. Then as soon as I arrived at church, I burst into uncontrollable tears. So no more testing for me!

After church, I decided to tell Kerry about the testing. We share everything with each other and it just felt wrong hiding something from him. I asked him; you know how when you proposed to me, you had all these ideas and couldn't wait to surprise me? He said yeah, then I continued with; well I've been dreaming of the day I would surprise you with a pg announcement for the last 4 years and with IVF I feel robbed of that. I literally have pages of surprise ideas I've jotted down over the years. I then told him I tested negative the last 2 days trying to fulfill that dream. All of my emotions then made sense to him.

He said it was very special what I was trying to do, but it was not worth what it was putting me through. Doubt and fear was trying to replace hope and faith, a place I had worked so hard to be at and he hated to see me have to go backwards.

We made a plan together. We will not be doing anymore testing. We're going to wait on the beta and have the results faxed to us. We'll read the fax together and either celebrate or cry together. These next 3 days are going to seem an eternity. I hope and pray that we have a happy ending to share with you all. Thanks for all your support!

FET#1.5 - 5dp5dt

I've received a few emails asking if I plan on POAS or if I'm having any symptoms yet.

As of right now, I have not had one single symptom except 1 more crying episode. Kerry and I watched the Prison Break finale last night. In the end, the main character sacrificed himself so that his pg wife could live. I had tears pouring down my face uncontrollably. Other than that, nope, nothing, nada!

I do have a confession to make.  I did POAS last night on 4dp5dt. I'm normally one that is terrified of those evil sticks and hold out until night before beta. But, I saw that a few other gals that transferred hatching blasts did get a positive on 4dp5dt. I caved in.

IVF robs you of so much, complete strangers put our egg and sperm together. What if I could find out sooner and be given the opportunity to surprise my husband like normal women do, don't I deserve to be able to tell him instead of the doctor? I prepared myself well, I knew it was very early and there was a good chance of a negative. 

Here's the test:

Do you see 2 lines???  Don't bother straining your eyes, there's only 1. I starred at that little stick for at least 30 mins willing it to have a line. I viewed it under every type of lighting. In the end, it still had 1 line.

Let me tell ya, no matter how much you prepare yourself and no matter how well you know it's probably too early, it still messes with you. Your hope goes down a little. Your doubt goes up a little. I'm sure you know what was next... I scoured the internet for others that tested negative at this time and went on to have a positive later. I found plenty of them and then I was back to being at peace.

So I've learned my lesson, or maybe not. Ponder, pee, dip and repeat.

Today's test:

See 2 lines yet?  Me either... =((((  Darn it, I just want to surprise my husband!!!!  Oh crap, here come the tears again, symptom??

Dear family, please keep this hush-hush. Kerry does not know I've tested. I'm still holding out hope that I will get the opportunity to surprise him before beta.

If anyone has an encouraging experience to share, now would be a good time.

FET#1.5 - 3dp5dt

I survived bedrest. My back was killing me and I had to deal with Kerry telling me to shut up and incubate his baby. (He was being funny of course).  I'm now back home and all's good!

I called CCRM and got my transfer day hormone levels:

Estrogen: 1163 (>300)
Progesterone: 11.5 (>6)

So far everything has been perfect and praying that it continues that way.

So any symptoms yet you may be wondering?  Not really.  Unless out of the blue boldness and crying is one.

Our neighborhood has underground utilities. It looks nice as you don't have telephone poles and lines all over the place. Unless you're the one that got stuck with all of the darn boxes in your yard! That would be me. I have 3 on one side and 2 on the other.  Not in back, not on the side, right in front. I call it our electrical graveyard. I spent the last couple of years growing bushes around them and it finally looked really nice. Until today that is.

 I looked out the window to find the electric company outside.

And this is the curb appeal they left me. 2.5 bushes gone. All for 30 seconds in the box.

I'm not a confrontational person at all, especially to 5 strange men. I marched out in my pajamas and said "I understand you need to get to the box, but do you need to be so destructive? Can you not trim them back just enough to get to the box and where they have a chance to grow back?" I then ran inside, called Kerry and burst into tears.

Can you say emotional???  Maybe it's just the hormones. I vented to my MIL about it and she said "it's okay hun, you're pg". My eyes lit up. Me, pg, could I really be???

I wanted to share a photo I rec'd from a friend that has been there for me since the beginning, almost 4 yrs ago. We've never met. She has her VR/IVF miracle. But she has never once stopped supporting me, always sending me emails with relevant photos to whatever I'm facing at the time.  She's Heidi from Vegas.

This is the photo I rec'd from her on transfer day:

Thanks Heidi! Love it!

This is one she sent me when I found out lucky embryo #7 was my only normal on 7/7.

Heidi, I made one for you, on behalf of all of us girls still fighting the fight, we'd like one of these in Vegas.

6 days to beta!!!!

FET#1.5 Transfer Day

Sorry this is so late, I've been without internet access.

Today started with a 7:48a wake-up call from Embryology verifying that they were to thaw my 1 embryo. I confirmed.

As we were leaving, Kerry got what’s hopefully the last photo of me NOT pg.

We arrived at CCRM at 10:30a. There was a huge truckload of liquid nitrogen in the parking lot. I thought this was pretty cool. This is where little Seven has been living since May.

I had my blood drawn to check my estrogen and progesterone and then headed upstairs to wait for them to call me back.

Soon they called us back and took us to our transfer room. The nurse took my temp and blood pressure. My BP was the highest I’ve ever seen it. My normal BP is 110/60 and today is was 130/75. It must of been nerves. She asked if I was ready for my Valium and I said; Oh yeah! She then left the room so I could get my gown on.

At 11:25a the embryologist came in to give us a report on our embryo. She said something like "when embryos thaw, the cells need to survive at least 75% and the cavity needs to re-expand to be considered viable and your embryo thawed beautifully at 100% and fully re-expanded". I can not even tell you how happy I was to hear that. I asked if it had started hatching out of its shell and she said it had not.

At 11:45a Dr Schoolcraft came in, asked for my name for verification purposes and then got straight to prepping me.

Here’s how you get knocked up in my world:

The embryologist arrived with the incubator and on the monitor was my little Seven. Seven was hatching!!!!! So in 20 mins, my little overachiever had gone from not hatching to almost 50% hatched! The embryologist said this embryo was beautiful and you couldn’t even tell it had been frozen, said it looked like a fresh embryo. I so wanted to do the happy dance, but not too feasible with the speculum in place.

Schoolie did a fantastic job on the transfer. He was very fast and I literally didn’t feel a thing. We watched the embryo go in on the monitor and then it was all done. He was a bit unsocial, but incredibly skilled and that’s what counts.

Kerry asked him when we should expect implantation to happen since the embryo is already hatching. He said over the next 24 hrs. I asked if I should expect implantation cramps and he got this alarmed look and said, no, we do not want cramps, we want you to feel nothing. I then had to lay flat for an hour before being discharged.

So without further ado, I introduce you to Seven...

... and the happy, proud parents.

I'm now on for 2 days of bed rest. I plan to get caught up on all of the thoughtful emails and comments I rec'd. I appreciate every one of you!

Today's a great day as today, I am officially 2w5d PUPO!!!

FET#1.5 - Twas The Night Before

Today was another vacation day. We did the free Coors tour in Golden, CO.

We walked around Golden for a little bit but found it to be on the boring side, so we headed to downtime Denver for lunch. On the way, it was once again time for my progesterone. I'm getting pretty good at taking care of business on the fly and in the car. Now if only Kerry would give me fair warning that we were about to pass a semi driver! Ahhh!

We're now back at the hotel. CCRM called and changed my transfer time from 1:45pm to 11:30am as they want Dr. Schoolcraft to be able to do the transfer. I have to be there at 10:30am for bloodwork.

Kerry has declared it time to celebrate the end of his services. He started with a free beer at the Coors plant.

... and continued it with a relaxing time in the sperm killing hot tub after 4 years of living a sperm friendly lifestyle.

I'll start my celebration tomorrow morning when I officially become PUPO!!!

FET#1.5 - A Little Vacation Time

We came up a couple of days early to include a little vacation time prior to our transfer. Today we spent the entire day driving through the beautiful Rocky Mountains. Here's a few photos from our day.

Being stuck in the car in the mountains all day created one small issue for a gal that needs to insert vaginal progesterone 3 times a day. Yep, you guessed it, I had no choice but to do this in the car. We pulled over to the side of the mountain and I hid under my coat. Kerry had me laughing so hard. He sported a huge grin and said "oh yeahhh, IVF girl gone wild!". Hey, gotta do what you gotta do sometimes.

All day I've been calling Kerry my baby daddy and he's been calling me his baby mama. At dinner, the waitress asked us what we were in town for and Kerry told her we were here to get our embryo. Her eyes got huge, she looked at me and said "so you're a baby mama!" We both cracked up.

By the end of the day, we both looked 10 yrs older. We live at 550 ft elevation. We spent the day at 5,000 to 11,700 ft. The air is so much thinner than we're used to and it's sooooo dry. I have to put on lotion and chapstick several times a day to avoid cracking. On the way home, we stopped and bought a travel size humidifier. Hopefully we'll be able to breathe and sleep better.

Here's Kerry rehydrating.

Never a dull moment here!

CCRM left me a voicemail while I was in the mountains. My transfer is scheduled for Monday @ 1:45. TWO days to go!!!

FET#1.5 – We’re Here!

It’s been a long day! Our day started around 4am and as you can see, Kerry was out before our flight even took off. Shhhh, he doesn't know I took this photo, hee hee.

We had a great flight into Denver. I arrived to 32 degrees in flip-flops, brrrr! We headed to CCRM. As the building came in sight, we were in awe with thoughts of our baby; this is where our baby resides, we're finally bringing little Seven home. We both just smiled.

We walked up to the front desk and the lady asked if she could help us. Out of the blue, Kerry says in a country hick voice “I’m here to pick up my baby… I’m the baby daddy… Where's the freezer?”. Everyone is listening distance was cracking up. The lady asked for my name and I literally couldn’t tell her as I was laughing too hard.

While waiting in the lobby, a guy sitting near us was called back “Peter, hi, please follow me”. All of us IVF patients know what that means, it’s time to provide a sample. Kerry says to him as he walked by “Go Pete!” and then Kerry turned to me “Pete’s gonna whack it”. By this time I’m belly laughing.

Our nurse came and got us. I had blood drawn to check my progesterone and we signed all the consent forms. Afterwards we got groceries and then headed to my electro-acup appt. Trying to keep up with all my meds while running all over the country has proven to be challenging.

I just got the call from my nurse. She said my progesterone level is perfect at 9.84 (>6). Yippee, all of your prayers and vibes are working!!!

To all my fellow bloggers, I’m intentionally letting myself get behind on all of your blogs so that I’ll have lots of good stuff to read while on bed rest. So I’ll be back to commenting then. Love all of you!

THREE days to transfer!!! Alrighty, I’m beat, nighty night!

FET#1.5 - Meds Meds Meds

2 days ago Kerry and I celebrated my last injection. After 240 self-injections over 4 IVFs and 2 FET preps in just over a year, this was something that felt so incredibly good to be done with. Good bye Lupron, I hope the next time I experience menopause, it's from age. Good bye Bravelle, Menopur, Gonal-F, Ovidrel and Novarel, may I never need to farm my eggs again!

I now look forward to celebrating the day when I'm done with non-injectable meds as well! I assumed FETs would be so easy... not for me. Maybe it's because I've had to do 2 of them to get to 1 transfer.

Now that we're done building my lining, we're now prepping it for the embryo. I continue with 4 estrogen patches every other day and 1 Estrace vaginally every evening. I'll also continue baby aspirin 1x/day and all my supplements 2x/day. I added in Endometrin vaginal progesterone suppositories 3x/day.

For the next 4 days, I'll also be on a round of Tetracycline (4x/day) and Medrol (1x/night). The Tetra will help prevent infection. The Medrol is a low dose steroid that will suppress the immune system from interfering with embyro implantation.

So yeah, have to insert 4 pills up my hoo-ha every day and be covered in patches until several weeks into pg when they start weening me off the hormones and let the placenta take over. My cervix is already irritated and I have red welts from the patches.

I'm just so tired of all these meds/procedures. Keeping up with doses, dates and times for everything has become a part-time job. I've done more procedures than a cancer patient and have taken more meds than a drug addict. I know so many of you can relate. If this all works out, it will be worth it, sooooo worth it. If it doesn't, well I can't even go there.

In other news, a couple of funnies...

I had another dancing butt cheeks electro-acup appt. Afterwards, I found she had left the lights on with the window blinds all the way up. The parking lot has a full view into this window. I'm sure I gave quite a few laughs. Thank God my face was hidden.

This may be TMI, but it gave me a great laugh. Kerry walked by the bathroom and saw some blue streaks in my undies (from the blue Estrace pills). He pointed to it and said "hey, smurf skids!". Probably not as funny as it was to me, but oh well. =)

FOUR days to transfer!!!  It doesn't even seem real. I've been in process since May to get to this transfer. Maybe it will seem more real when I arrive in Denver TOMORROW and have my blood draw and fill out my consents at CCRM!

To those that have left comments or sent emails, thank you so much for your support!  You all have some powerful vibes/prayers. I don't want to hog all the vibes, but if you can spare some, please send me some perfect thaw, transfer and implantation ones. Thanks!