This past month has been all over the place. I didn't update at all through this last IVF cycle and now that it's over and I have begun to heal, I can tell our story.
Just to recap; in our first IVF attempt our egg transfer got cancelled because of my elevated progesterone the last couple of days of stims (which messes with the uterine lining). We had our retrieval but they did not get as many eggs as they hoped and those that they got were immature. Long story short, they only made it to day 2 and died. It sucked.
This cycle started out with my progesterone being a tad bit higher than they like to see it on the day I started stims. It brought back all the feelings from our last failed cycle. The doctor wanted to continue with stims because it was still not as high as it got last cycle. Deep down I had a feeling that it would all fall apart again.
I was right. We ended up getting cancelled last Friday. My progesterone seemed to rise a little at each monitoring appt last week, so I had pretty much been grieving and coming to terms with everything by the time it was over on Friday. It still hurt A LOT, but we decided not to even try the retrieval because both of us and the doctor felt that there was a possibility that the egg quality would be similar to last time.
So much of this journey has been so unfair. Everytime we thought we had things figured out or had new hope in a procedure, we were smacked back into place. When we started IVF back in October I had no idea that we would go through 2 half cycles and get cancelled both times....not even getting a real shot at getting pregnant. Heartbreaking is the word that comes to mind.
You start to question all the decisions you've made about treatment and start panicking that you are getting closer to a truth you cannot accept. A biological child may not be within our grasp.
For now, I am working on healing myself and trying to be as relaxed as possible about our potential upcoming March IVF attempt. Our doctor will be putting me on an antagonist protocol and I will be in accupuncture throughout the cycle.
I am on a path to concentrate on my well being so that I when the time comes I can be as strong as possible to deal with whatever this journey will bring us next. Hopefully, I can get there. I'll never know unless I try and give it my all.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Thursday, January 26, 2012
A Long Time Coming
It has been almost a month since my last post (which doesn't really count since it was 3 words) and I have no explanation as to why I am not posting these days.
For a while I felt like I just was not motivated to post, didn't feel up to it, and just didn't want to talk (type) about it anymore than I had to. It seemed that my whole life was constantly consumed by infertlity and I was becoming very tired, both emotionally and physically. While I can't say that it has really changed all that much, I can say that I am becoming a stronger person and making some changes in my life.
I have new hope that I can get back to being my normal, happy self. I am in no means giving up on our journey to conceive a child, but I do need to take a gigantic step back and analyze all the pieces in my life to determine how to be "me" again. Trying to explain the way I feel is difficult, but it can be summed up in that I feel like I have lost myself with only a shell remaining. Everyday hurts more than the last. Our dreams seem to be fading quickly and the harder I work and scramble to pick up the pieces and achieve success, the further away it becomes. Quite frankly, it's one viscious circle.
Now, I was pretty sceptical about acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine to begin with and tried it because I kind of felt like I was running out of options. My IVF nurse and my doctor both recommended it, so I made an appointment.
This week, I was able to find the smallest glimmer of hope and light to help guide me into a happier existance. I started acupuncture on Tuesday evening and I already feel as if it has begun to change my life. I'm not trying to be overdramatic here, and believe me, I don't think its some magical treatment, but I do think that I finally hit a wall in where I needed to choose either to continue to be someone I was not, or to become happy again.
The entire appointment was a little over 1.5hrs with a 45 min consult to begin things. My acupuncturist is one of Chicago's best and I could tell after the first few minutes that he just "gets" it. When asking me questions he seemed to already know the answer and understand what my body is doing...or rather what I am doing to my body. He was extremely encouraging in that he has hundreds of patients that have very similar stories to mine. While there are no guaranties that I will become pregnant (which he is quite encouraging about), he is helping me to see that I can help myself to become a more healthy, balanced, and happy person.
He gave me some new and very restricting diet recommendations. I say very restricting because one of the things I have to get rid of is dairy....My favorite food is cheese. Not to mention I love milk. I have committed to myself that I will follow his guidelines since I should have been eating better than I have been to begin with. Thankfully, I can "have fun" as he puts it, 20% of the time.
In addition to my new diet, he recommended some books to read: "The Fertile Soul" and "Making Babies 2009." I started reading The Fertile Soul last night and have been so moved. I continued reading it today on my lunch because I just can't get enough. I feel like this book is hopefully going to help me figure things out and become a happier person. Of course I also hope that it brings me closer to a child, but I realize that I can't be so focused on that all the time. If I don't start making time for myself to heal, I'll never get any closer to reaching my goal.
In the coming days I do plan to post an update about all of the other things that have been going on this month, but for now I need to wrap things up.
For a while I felt like I just was not motivated to post, didn't feel up to it, and just didn't want to talk (type) about it anymore than I had to. It seemed that my whole life was constantly consumed by infertlity and I was becoming very tired, both emotionally and physically. While I can't say that it has really changed all that much, I can say that I am becoming a stronger person and making some changes in my life.
I have new hope that I can get back to being my normal, happy self. I am in no means giving up on our journey to conceive a child, but I do need to take a gigantic step back and analyze all the pieces in my life to determine how to be "me" again. Trying to explain the way I feel is difficult, but it can be summed up in that I feel like I have lost myself with only a shell remaining. Everyday hurts more than the last. Our dreams seem to be fading quickly and the harder I work and scramble to pick up the pieces and achieve success, the further away it becomes. Quite frankly, it's one viscious circle.
Now, I was pretty sceptical about acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine to begin with and tried it because I kind of felt like I was running out of options. My IVF nurse and my doctor both recommended it, so I made an appointment.
This week, I was able to find the smallest glimmer of hope and light to help guide me into a happier existance. I started acupuncture on Tuesday evening and I already feel as if it has begun to change my life. I'm not trying to be overdramatic here, and believe me, I don't think its some magical treatment, but I do think that I finally hit a wall in where I needed to choose either to continue to be someone I was not, or to become happy again.
The entire appointment was a little over 1.5hrs with a 45 min consult to begin things. My acupuncturist is one of Chicago's best and I could tell after the first few minutes that he just "gets" it. When asking me questions he seemed to already know the answer and understand what my body is doing...or rather what I am doing to my body. He was extremely encouraging in that he has hundreds of patients that have very similar stories to mine. While there are no guaranties that I will become pregnant (which he is quite encouraging about), he is helping me to see that I can help myself to become a more healthy, balanced, and happy person.
He gave me some new and very restricting diet recommendations. I say very restricting because one of the things I have to get rid of is dairy....My favorite food is cheese. Not to mention I love milk. I have committed to myself that I will follow his guidelines since I should have been eating better than I have been to begin with. Thankfully, I can "have fun" as he puts it, 20% of the time.
In addition to my new diet, he recommended some books to read: "The Fertile Soul" and "Making Babies 2009." I started reading The Fertile Soul last night and have been so moved. I continued reading it today on my lunch because I just can't get enough. I feel like this book is hopefully going to help me figure things out and become a happier person. Of course I also hope that it brings me closer to a child, but I realize that I can't be so focused on that all the time. If I don't start making time for myself to heal, I'll never get any closer to reaching my goal.
In the coming days I do plan to post an update about all of the other things that have been going on this month, but for now I need to wrap things up.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
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