Day 2 Bloodwork from June 23

Here are my most recent day 2 bloodwork results:

TSH - 1.75
(normal)

LH - 2.7
(the lowest it's ever been for me)

Prolactin - 8.2
(normal)

FSH - 5.1
(Awesome! It's never been so low! Two months ago it was 8! The DHEA might be working!)

E2 - 195
(Yikes, it should be under 75. It could be falsely supressing my FSH. Or I had a cyst. Or some early follicles leftover from last cycle. My clinic says it's fine. They like anything under 250. But 195 isn't normal.)

Being Cheap Pays Off

Justin and I bought a brand new house about a year and a half ago. There are neighbours on either side of us, but behind our house is a gigantic field that makes our backyard seem much bigger. Our backyard is small, so we didn't want to fence it until there were neighbours behind us and we absolutely had to. If I'm being honest, the real reason I didn't want to fence it was because it's too expensive. We have enough expenses in our life, fencing our backyard is not a priority.

Well, being cheap paid off. Earlier this spring the neighbour on our right decided to fence his yard. So we had a nice neat fence on one side of our backyard. Instead of feeling closed in, I found that it made that part of our backyard feel much cozier. I was saying to Justin one day "If only Diane would fence her yard on the other side, and then we only need to fence the back section."

Today she started doing that. I looked out my window and saw the holes dug and the posts sitting in them. We only need to fence the back section now!

We still probably won't do that for a long time. We'll actually probably wait so long that there'll be neighbours behind us (which I'm not anticipating for like, a decade) and they'll end up fencing it. How perfect. We'll only need to put in gates. Which I'm not sure will even fit, since our houses are so close together.

Another BFN

I started spotting yesterday, right on schedule. What a wonderful Father's Day present for my husband. I kept crying during church. We should have just skipped.

Then today I got my period in full force. IUI #3 was another failure.

Another Door Closed

A couple of weeks ago Justin and I decided to pursue public adoption. I haven't been in a blogging mood, so I didn't post about it. However, we decided that even if we could get pregnant, we'd still like to adopt. Here in Canada public adoption is free, so it seemed our best option for pursuing both infertility treatments and adoption at the same time.

We've been playing phone tag with our adoption worker for the past couple of weeks. Today I actually talked to her.

Unfortunately we just missed the open house meeting that you have to go to before they start the adoption process. The next one isn't until October. And the infant list is closed - anything under 2 years old is not going to happen.

I'm so bummed. Is this God closing a door on us? Are we not supposed to pursue adoption? Does this mean he has it planned for us that we'll get pregnant soon, so he doesn't want us to waste our time doing home studies when we're just going to get pregnant? Or is it just one more slap in the face? Ha ha, something else sucks for you.

I'm sad. I didn't realize I had started counting on this so much.

IUI #3

I'm a day late in posting an update for this.

Yesterday was IUI #3. We only did a single IUI because of the timing of missing work this month. But it ended up being all we needed. We got 17.5 million motile sperm!

We were worried about the sample and only doing one IUI. So I asked the lab tech to let us know as soon as she had the SA done so that we could decide whether Justin would go in and do a second sample. That ended up being unnecessary, but I'm really glad we did it. It took away a lot of the stress in the wait before the IUI. We already knew we weren't going to get any horrible surprises.

The SA itself was 25 million/ml with 23% motility. There were about 7 ml in the sample, and 38 million motile sperm altogether in the original sample before the wash. I think that's our best sample so far.

Having an IUI with 17.5 million motile sperm is like having sex with someone who has 350 million motile sperm. You know how we love to figure those things out! ;)

I'm feeling positive right now. I hope it lasts. And I really hope I end up pregnant this cycle. It's our best cycle so far. And our 5th cycle of treatment. It's about time for this to start working.

Day 13 Ultrasound

Today was a great ultrasound. It was only 24 hours after my ultrasound yesterday, but we saw quite a bit of growth.

Right ovary - 25mm, 20mm, 18mm
Left ovary - 15mm, 13mm

I'm going to trigger tonight, and then go for my IUI at 9am Tuesday morning.

We're not doing a double IUI this month, and I have mixed feelings about that. I'm not convinced that I ovulated 36 hours later the last time I used the trigger. It actually seemed like I ovulated 72 hours later. Some websites say that washed sperm only lasts for 6-12 hours. So what if our IUI is just too early? Also, what if J's sample is awful, and we've only given ourselves one shot? Last month his samples were great (well, great for MFI), but 2 days before the IUIs we did an SA that showed only 2 million sperm! So what the heck? Anything could happen!

Part of me wonders if I'd be better off waiting for my LH surge, which probably would come in a day or two. But I also don't want to get up at 4am everyday this week. And with an LH surge you have even less idea of when you're actually going to ovulate.

This is the part that I hate. The worry about timing, whether or not I actually released the eggs, whether or not we're going to have enough sperm...

I'm thinking that after J does his first sample we should wait around for a bit to see what his count is like. If it's crappy, he can just march right back in there and do it again. Combine two samples. Do you think they'd go for that?

I know they would combine two samples if we did one at home and one at the office. But I worry about transporting the "good" sample (since its the first one) during an hour's drive to the clinic. What if we ruin it and kill all the sperm?

I'm totally stressing out about this.

5 Little Follies Jumping on the Bed

Today I went for my first ultrasound, after skipping it yesterday. I am pretty pumped. On my right ovary I have 3 follicles at 23mm, 19mm, and 14mm. On my left ovary I have 2 follicles, both at 13mm.

I have 5 follies!!!

There are two things we did different this month:
1) I added 7.5 mg of Femara on Day 3
1) I've been on DHEA for almost 4 weeks. I have already posted about all the benefits of DHEA here, but one of them is that it increases the amount of follicles you develop under stimulation.

DHEA usually takes 4 months to build up to it's full effect. Adding the Femara on Day 3 is likely the reason I have 5 follicles this month as opposed to the 3 follicles I had last month. I wish there was a way to know for sure, just to ease my curiosity.

So today I took one more injection of Bravelle. Tomorow I'm going back and I'm going to ask for another ultrasound, because I'd like to know if things are growing or shrinking. (Last month I lost a follicle). If they're shrinking, I want to trigger right away. If they've grown, but aren't quite big enough, I'll just do bloodwork on Monday and see what happens. I can do that here in town.

I also want to get an ultrasound tomorrow because on the injections I'm supposed to get one done every other day. If I don't get one done tomorrow, then I have to drive all the way there and back on Monday before work. I'd prefer not to do that.

I hope all 5 follies make it to a mature size by the time we do the IUI. I know they probably won't all get large enough. In my past experience my follicles kind of stalled at one size, and then started shrinking while one forged ahead. But this month my medications were slightly different than last month, so I'm trying to think optimistically.

I'm a Rebel

So today is Day 11. My first day of bloodwork and ultrasound for my 3rd IUI.

I skipped it.

Justin is out of town, and I didn't want to get up at 4am by myself and go through the stressful drive there and back, rushing to get to work. My follicles are never ready on Day 11, so what's the point of me going through that extra stress? There is no point.

I struggled with this decision for awhile. I like to do what I'm supposed to do. But for the past 2 cycles my follicles were nowhere near ready on Day 11. And the one cycle where I surged, I didn't surge until Day 15. So I'm not worried about surging on my own on Day 11. I took an OPK at 6:30 this morning just to make sure, though. I'm not an idiot.

The kicker is that I woke up at 4:20 am anyway. I got up to go to the bathroom, and didn't take an OPK. I should have, because I lied awake until 5:45, and then fell asleep for the last half hour. I just couldn't fall asleep! I was mad at myself for not taking an OPK, and worried that when I took one the next time I got up it would be positive and then I'd be SOL. So theoretically, I could have just gotten up and driven to London. But now I'm really glad I didn't.

Besides, my poor kitty is recovering from being neutered and declawed on Wednesday. He's very sore, and he spent all night cuddled up with me. I didn't want to desert the little munchkin earlier than I had to.

Sex Causes Babies

I'm in the VP office on my prep, writing out daily plans for the next week, minding my own business, and I get a knock on the door. It was a woman from the pregnancy centre coming to talk to grades 7 and 8.

She was wearing a T-shirt that said "Sex Causes Babies."

I almost told her that no, in fact, sex only causes babies if you are extremely lucky. But I didn't think it was worth it.

Back to the Old Me

I’ve started working out again. Justin is really in to fitness, and we have a gym in our garage. It’s not your typical gym with machines, because we don’t believe in machines. We believe in kettlebells, medicine balls, pull-up rings, squat racks, free weights, and plyo boxes. Our only machine is an airdyne stationary bike. An old school bike where you use your arms as well as your legs. It’s the next best thing to a rowing machine.

I was working out a lot last year, and I really liked how I felt and how I looked. But then we starting trying to get pregnant, and I stopped working out much. I was worried about being too bouncy and harming implantation. I also figured I shouldn’t work out too hard if I was pregnant (I do Crossfit, so it’s hard).

Then I was on fertility drugs, and someone told me I shouldn’t lift heavy weights or do anything bouncy, because my ovaries are enlarged and they could become twisted. This could cut off the blood supply and possibly kill them. So that was my next barrier to working out. Crossfit involves a lot of heavy weights.

I don’t care about that stuff anymore. I’m really mad that I haven’t been working out. I was looking so good last year. I was thin and strong, which meant I was nice and toned. My clothes were all too big, and I looked good in my bikinis.

Then I stopped working out. Not only do I have absolutely nothing to show for my laziness (aka: a BABY), but I’m also weaker and softer.

I quit. I quit doing the things that I’m “not supposed to do.” I’m sick of changing every aspect of my life for a pregnancy that apparently isn’t coming. I’m sick of living like this.

So I’m working out again. Last week I worked out so hard that I felt like I was going to throw up right up until I fell asleep. Since then I’ve done several decent workouts, and yesterday I matched my own PR for deadlifts. I tried to go higher, but it’s been awhile and I hit a wall. At least I didn’t regress in that area.

By the way, if you’re looking for something to do that will get you really fit really fast, check out Crossfit. I’ve been doing it since early 2007. My husband discovered it in 2005. It’s brutally hard, but it’s effective.

Life Objectives?

J and I were at a wedding on Saturday. I was standing with one of his friends watching the Arabs dance and she said "So are you and J gonna have kids?"

I said "Yes, of course."

So she went on to say "When?"

I don't hide our infertility from very many people anymore, so I told her we've been trying since we got married and we can't have kids naturally. We've been doing fertility treatments for months.

I immediately felt like she really minimized it. Right away she asked if we are considering adoption, and what my other options were. She didn't ask about the treatments we're doing or anything, she just jumped right into what else I could try. I guess I can partly understand this - infertility is something she's never gone through. Nobody knows what to say.

Then she asked me if I would ever go live in a third world world country as a sort of mission trip. WTF? I was like "Umm, we're pretty settled. We have a house and jobs, and that would really uproot our lives. We're doing fertility treatments, we can't just take off. And then we're going to have kids and I'm not going to go live in Africa with our babies."

Then she asked me what my long term goals are, besides teaching. I felt like I sounded retarded, because my long term goals at this point are to get pregnant, have kids, and keep our marriage happy.

I have already met all of the goals I had before. I have 2 university degrees and I have a full-time teaching job. I wanted to be a resource teacher, so that was a goal I had for myself, but now I've accomplished that as well. So the only thing I haven't accomplished is having kids with my husband.

I'm perfectly happy and content with where I'm at (besides the baby thing) and what my "goals" are. I feel like I've accomplished a lot for my age, and except for not being able to get pregnant, I'm right where I want to be.

But when she asked me that question, she made me feel so one-dimensional.