As Old as Mold

Well, you have days where you can stick your head in the sand and that's ok. I love those days! Ignorance is bliss, I tell ya! I was that girl, you know the one. The cheerleader, who was all, "Gollie gee this is gonna work, we can do it, go uterus, go!





Blechhhhhh! She was so cute and sweet and well... she annoys me now.



I don't know what I was thinking when I came up with the title for my blog. If it were changeable, it might have carried lots of different names by now... Infertility on the Brain, Failed Cycle on the Brain, Miscarriage on the Brain! Holy Crap, I'm Broke Because of IVF on the Brain, Whatever Brain...




Jaded much?





Anyway, today was not NOT one of those sticking the head in the sand kind of days. My sweet IVF nurse called to check up on me. Her words, I kid you not, "This is getting as old as mold." Direct Quote. And what could I say really, but "yep". She's really super sweet and all huggy, and I think it was meant as a warm gesture that sort of came out awkward.




She also wanted to schedule an appointment with the hematologist, Dr. Unbelieveablylongname. But then she'd talked to the RE's money-girl who had to call me back later. Another awkward, "How are ya?" But she'd made the appointment for a bad time.



So I had to call Dr. Unbelieveablylongname and set up an appointment.



Then, because I was in a face my fears and get on with it mood, I figured I'd just get all of the painful phone calls done and over with so I called the regular endocrinologist and left a message. "Please reschedule my next monitoring because I was pregnant and am no longer, THAT". Yes, now it's ME who's being awkward. The doctor herself called back and I screened (cuz I was chicken) and she left a message saying that she was so sorry and she was just checking on me and I was in their thoughts and all... SO nice. And awkward, for me at least.


Her nurse called later to reschedule. More sweetness and awkwardness.


Then I called the OB, because I had rescheduled from last week and there was where the sweetness abruptly ended. Final. Kaput. I explained why I had rescheduled, looking for a sympathy appointment - you know one that wasn't 5 years away. And so... September in the middle of the school day it is.

Other than all of that, there was the conversation with my dear friend today over lunch, who is the utmost best at just listening. Oh, and let's not forget the conversation where my mom calls me from her work to discuss it and asks me about details, like I don't even want to repeat what details she asked on my semi-anonymous blog.

Anywho, I am 'sposed to be among the topics of conversation at the RE's Thursday meeting tomorrow. I hope they can put their heads together and come up with something, but I am not holding my breath. According to Dr. Google LOTS of women just have unexplained recurrent miscarriage.

I will be ok though. I mean, I'm not the same person for having gone through this, and I do miss that innocence and positivity. It was always a strength of mine, the ability to look at the bright side. And overall, I think that will prevail as it is ingrained in my personality. I'd also like to think that going through any hardship either makes one stronger or makes them fold. And I'm not folding. Screw infertility. Screw miscarriage. There's a big world out there and I can't let this crap get the best of me.

One foot in front of the other...

Chicken Clucker

How am I? Well, it's funny that you should ask. :)

It depends on when you ask me. As in, if you ask me 10 minutes from now, or three hours ago, you might get three different answers.

Apparently the progesterone wasn't holding up on Thursday, what with the moving of furniture and all, because I started bleeding then, on my own. I did end up taking the misoprostol around 3PM just to make things move along and the worst of it was over by midnight. It was less traumatic than it was in January, I guess because I had some idea of what to expect and because it was just a lot faster and less painful. I am a lot less exhausted. Hopefully that's just a good thing and everything is ok. I'm sure they will make me get HCG tests to confirm the number gets to zero. I was a bit surprised they didn't do an ultrasound last time, so I assume they won't do one this time. I guess the HCG is enough for them.

Mentally, I go from just wanting to move on and not think about it, to being angry, to being complacent, and everywhere in between. I mean, I just can't believe this is MY story. I still hope that someday I will have a wonderful child in my arms and look back at all of this as a necessary evil, but right now it just is so not what I wanted for myself, my husband, or my marriage. It is the most inefficient, exasperating thing that I have ever been through.

I got the most wonderful package on Friday! It was PERFECT timing. It cheered me up! There really are still good people out there, because one of my bloggie friends sent me this:

I don't need the bullseye. I have launched them at the husband and the dogs, and I must say that I maybe missed my calling to be a sniper. Plus, those chickens really launch out of the chucker at a surprisingly fast speed! They are rather lethal! I think the strawberry wine I had helped me concentrate.

Thanks Rotten! You're the best!

Still Nothing

OK, so I had my final ultrasound. It looked about the same as the one on Friday, big black blobby thing with a ring (yolk sac) in it. No fetal pole. I got the other doctor who took lots of measurements. None of that 10 second wanding thing the other doctor does, but I guess if you've been doing ultrasound for probably 30 or 40 years, you know an empty sac when you see one.

We sat in the office and talked for a while afterwards. This was more of the instructions for miscarriage meeting, but I got some WTF meeting-type info too.

I'm gonna go ahead and do the misoprostol on Friday, because I have a thing on Thursday that I can't miss (dammit, I hoped to never touch that shit again). Until then he gave me some prometrium. I have wine chilling in the fridge, and junk food, and a somewhat trashy novel to console me this weekend.


The RE said that most likely this was genetic, even though we'd done the karyotyping. He said that (and I chuckled a bit inside), that women around 36 usually miscarry 15 percent of the time and that I just happened to be in the 15 percent THREE times in a row now, as they consider the chemical I had in October to count as a miscarriage.


I asked about PGD and got a huge explanation about why it wasn't good for recurrent miscarriage. He said that there are places in the US that claim that it works well, but that the SIRM has made a statement saying that it doesn't work that way. He said that just because they biopsy one of the cells and that cell is normal, that doesn't mean that the other cells aren't abnormal. Apparently it is better if they are looking for some known genetic issue. I'm kind of glad that we don't have to pay that, as I imagine it is not cheap.

He also said that probably the next step for us would be Levonex which is a blood thinner. He said even though I didn't test positive for blood clotting disorders they know that in some 20 percent it is still a problem - and then admitted this was a sort of grasping at straws thing to do. So I may get to add Hematologist to my list of specialists. I know my insurance loves me, as much as I love them.

I'm surprisingly ok. I mean, it does weigh heavily on my mind, but I've sort of succumbed to the fact that this didn't work. I'm still dumbfounded that our luck has been so hideous. My husband and I went back to the sheet that details the guidelines for our multi-IVF package. If we quit now, we'd get the same refund as if we do another round. Technically, we still have two IVF's left - which amazes me. If they drop us, we get 100% refund. If we stop we still get about 75% of it back. We mulled it over. Mr. PJ was thinking that would be a good downpayment on a new car, and I said I'd rather have a baby. And then a few days later, he said he's rather have a baby too or know that he'd done all he could do to get there. I still don't think either of us want to adopt all that much. We are stubburn, I guess. Even masochistic, maybe? So it'll be late September/early October at least until my schedule is good for another round.

Deja Vu

No fetal pole.

R.E. is 95% sure the pregnancy will fail.

Repeat ultrasound on Tuesday.

Stop reading now if you don't want to hear me feel sorry for myself and vent and complain and cuss and moan.

What is there to say, really? CLEARLY something is wrong with me, and I want answers. It's so fucked up that I can get this far and then EXACTLY like the last time in January, be let down. What an emotional and physical and financial toll this has been, and for FUCKING NOTHING but heartache and despair!!!

I must have been some horrible, awful person in a past life to deserve this. I know that's irrational, but still. This is unbelievably bad luck.

I'm angry this is happening to me yet again. To us. My husband was pretty upset. I'll have to go through the whole stupid misoprostol again probably, which is that pill that induces miscarriage. I hated that in January, I hated the feeling of doing it to myself even though I knew the pregnancy was doomed, and even though I wanted to be done with it so that I could heal. And the whole miscarrying itself, wondering if things are tissue or not... is a horrible feeling. I wish I could skip that. He said a D&C wouldn't be necessary, and I agree. I don't want to go under. But I simply don't want to miscarry at all.

The RE hadn't read over our file recently. He threw out that blah blah blah, chromosomal abnormalities, 50% or all pregnancies, yada yada. And that the science behind diagnosing miscarriages wasn't great, in other words we may never know why you're so fucked up. I asked about trying again, and he said he'd have to look at my file again. We're on that pay a certain amount, get 4 IVF's deal but I wouldn't blame them if they totally dumped us since we are single handedly screwing up their success rates.

And I don't know if I want to do this to myself again. I know it would all be worth it if we had one baby out of all of this, but we have really, really been through a lot of shit by now. I've been taking injections now since April 17th. I have two very full sharps containers and a really sore ass. I've gotten up at 7AM every morning this summer (on my VACATION) to get a damn shot before my husband has to leave for work. No caffeine, no alcohol, no painting the house for fear of the fumes, no lifting stuff... and I know those are all little petty things and would mean nothing if a baby resulted in this, but it makes me mad that I've sacrificed and have gotten nothing in return. All of the fucking days off of work over the past year, well really two years for nothing.

When you work hard and make tons of sacrifices and want something badly, you usually get rewarded. This is NOT how it's supposed to work.

I think on Tuesday I will want the RE to lay out some plans. In fact, I think I'm going to call and ask for just that, some consult time attached to the ultrasound if they can manage that. Luckily it's with the other RE who is more forthcoming. I want to go over my history, get some insight, and discuss our options. I'm so over it that I told my husband not to bother coming because he had to miss work to do so and his work is so damned pissy about him leaving for appointments.

I'm angry.

Oh, and then there is the fun part of untelling people. I hate that part. I hate for people to feel sorry for me. I think I can feel sorry enough for myself without that. Oh, and I purposely did NOT tell many people so that I wouldn't have to untell them. My husband wants to tell his father/mother in law that we are miscarrying again when we didn't tell them we were pregnant in the first place. Same with his sister. He says they will feel bad if they find out and we didn't tell them? Huh? Wouldn't they be stupid if they couldn't put two and two together and figure that we just didn't want to share that with them for self preservation's sake? I hate IVF. I'm tired of people knowing about my reproductive life - the massive failure that it is.

So angry. Will update on Tuesday.

Too Soon?

I have to go back on Friday for another ultrasound.

The RE says it's too soon to tell. He saw, I guess, a gestational sac and a yolk sac. I think that's what it was, the big dark blob with the white ring inside of it. But there was no definite baby or heartbeat. I asked him isn't there usually a heartbeat by now, 6w3days and he said, "more often than not, but sometimes it takes longer to show up."

Seems like a repeat of January at this point, except in January he was talking misoprostol already and this time he seemed a tad more optimistic. Perhaps because he knows I've been through this before.

The nurse said that sometimes the embryo kind of hides between the yolk sac and the edge of the blob.

So, it could work out.

Or, it could NOT work out.

I am so disappointed and I detest being in limbo like this.

Thanks for your continued thoughts and prayers.

Dear Internets

I'm totally freaking out now! Ultrasound is on Monday. Right now, not feeling optimistic. After all of the crap I've been though, can you blame me for not believing that something good could happen from all of this?

Please keep us in your prayers, thoughts, or whatever type of well wishes, good vibes, and positive thoughts you have--that there's a healthy baby in there, developing on time with a heartbeat.

I think that day in January when we went in all blazin for the ultrasound and there was no heartbeat will haunt me forever. Please God, let me not have to relive that!!!

Five More Sleeps

I. hate. waiting!!! So I will entertain myself by blogging some randomness... Now that makes you want to dive in and read, right? Sounds all juicy! (detect sarcasm)



I went to get my blood drawn to check my thyroid on Monday. I got down on my hands and knees and begged for an HCG, but the nurses smacked me and said heck no! I had to go to the stupid slumfest (outsourced?) lab where I got all of my recurrent pregnancy testing done. Because, Anthem Healthkeepers insurance is cheap and evil! Not a good memory.



I have my monitoring appointment with my regular endocrinologist tomorrow. I'm interested to see if my thyroid numbers have gone up already, or not. Supposedly it does that when you get pregnant and they have to monitor you carefully.

I saw said endocrinologist whilst getting gourmet pizza on Monday. It's kind of like when my students see me in public, it's weird for them, it's weird for me. It's just weird. Although, I think they think I actually physically live at the school so it's probably weirder for them!


I have my regular GYN appointment a week from Friday. I almost don't want to go, as in I don't want to be prodded and violated until I'm WAY into this pregnancy (I know, haha!). I have this irrational fear of knocking something loose, or jinxing it in some way. I have a LOT of irrational fears, come to think of it. But my IVF nurse said it was ok to go.



One of my irrational fears was to park in the same area where I got sick in October, the day I found out that I had a chemical. I'd been avoiding it. I parked there for my last HCG on the 8th. Take that, fear!



Am such a dork!


When I go the regular Endocrinologist and the GYN, I will need to tell them when my last period was. This is one reason my blog is so helpful, because otherwise I'd still be scratching my head! What with all of the Lupron suppression and whatnot, I think it was April 2nd! Uh, that was a while ago!


I am still so nervous that this won't work out. And while statistics are mostly on my side with this one, I'm still freakin' scared. I have some mild nausea/low blood sugar in the mornings and before bed. I guess, basically if my stomach is not full. The girls are not sore at all, and they were last time. My back hurts sometimes. I'd try not to read too much into symptoms, but hey, it's all I've got right now!

BTW, I've been playing phone tag with the home insurance agency. Still no answers there.

Five more sleeps!!!