Friday 31 January 2014

The results will give us our answer

"The results will give us our answer".  That's what Schoolie said.

But what I got was: "he's perplexed".  I probably never ovulated.  My body needs to be "reset".  They want to put me on a mock cycle. 

The protocol:
1.  Stop the lupron. 
2.  Estrogen priming (2mg 2x day of estrace.  For 16 +10 days)
3.  Add Endometrin on day 17.  3x day for 10 days.  Continue with the estrace. 
4.  After the endometrin get a period 4-7 days later (ha! this sounds familiar). 
5.  In the next cycle they will add the estrogen patches.  I will have a lining check and they will monitor my estrogen and progesterone to make sure I don't ovulate through. 

The option she gave me: When do you want to start this new protocol? Today? Monday? 

Given the tinge of blood on the u/s wand, and these ever present cramps, I wonder if my period just may show up tomorrow? And, yes, I'm pleading with the universe- please, please just show up tomorrow! I won't be mad at you, I promise!!!

I asked, if I got my period tomorrow would they let me start?  She gave me two answer at two different times in the conversation.  A) She says none of this has been right with my body, that we need to just shed this lining and be done.  B) that yes, if I got a period tomorrow we could just start right away on the estrogen patches.   

I decided to start on Monday.  To give myself two bonus days and time to get my meds. 

There was some debate on if I should stop the lupron immediately? Or wait until I start this mock cycle on Monday?   She told me to stop it.   Even if I get my period she says it will not affect next month's outcome because they will be monitoring me (commencing 1 week after starting patches).   

Her reminder to me was, "Don't read into this".  She said this is not going to determine our chances of success.  That I can grow a nice thick lining.  She told me that I was kind, and that she never dreaded calling me after I wished her well at her new job.  I needed to hear that, the second part was a nice bonus, and the first part really helped calm me down.   

I asked her overall what the doctor thought happened this month? She said she didn't get an answer to this. 

I asked her who my new nurse was.  Was she new?  She said no, that she was her supervisor, and she had been consulting with her all along when my body wasn't cooperating. 

I asked again (first time was yesterday) if the lupron could have affected my period?  She says that depot lupron could do this.  That it's a heavy dose and it shuts down the pituitary gland completely and stops a period.   However, I was on tiny doses (10 units).  She doesn't think the tiny doses would do this to me.   D and I are both thinking differently though.  We think the lupron has over suppressed me for IVF - why couldn't it over-supress me in this way?  Maybe this makes no medical sense but it's a funny coincidence that I've never had this problem before taking the lupron. 

An hour, I got another call.  

She said that Dr. Schoolcraft wants to add Lovenox to the list (an injectable blood thinner).  40 mg every day.  Yipee.  Bring on the bruises. 

I also got a chance to ask her if it was less risk to just take the pill for the month, rather than these higher doses of estrogen and progesterone?  She said she would ask the doctor.  Later, I asked when people start the pill and she said between days 1-5 of their cycle.  I was like, "oh, so not day 52?", she said she'd check with the doctor, but she thought that he wanted more control and to "bring out the big guns" with this protocol.   Hmm. 

For the protocol after the mock cycle, they said they would monitor me closely, but there was a 10-15% chance that I would ovulate through.  I reminded her that I was usually in the small odds for weird things to happen.  

I asked her if we should regroup with Dr. Schoolcraft?  She said it wouldn't likely have anything different to say.  D says he felt like it was a waste of time the last time we did it, that he didn't learn anything.  I don't want to throw good money out the window for the consult but also don't want to be cheap while we're already spending this much money.  It's actually quite stupid that it's not just included in this.  Many of the other CCRM doctors don't charge for regroups I'm sure.  I'm going to look into that more on Monday. 




Menstrual madness and the last couple of days



So... what does cycle day 52 look like for this woman?  It's emotional. Big doses of anger, disappointment, sadness, anxiousness.  This picture above might as well be of me, because it's how I feel.  Except she should have puffy eyes and blotchy skin from crying.  I'm pretty sure if D was being honest, he'd tell you that is the woman he's been looking at the past couple of weeks too.

Yesterday I sent an email to my nurse  to check in.  It reminded them that it was cycle day 51.  That I had waited the 10 days after taking the progesterone.  That I was not seeing any other signs of my period coming despite having slight cramps every day for the past two weeks (it has actually probably been three now that I think of it).  

I asked her what the plan was going forward?  How long will they let me wait for a period?  What medicines/tests are they thinking of?  Etc. I specifically asked for her to check in with all of this with the doctor.  I feel like she doesn't ask him, that she with some help from the other nurses are making too many guesstimates. 

I didn't decide to fly across the continent for this nurse.  I did so for Dr. Schoolcraft, the superstar lab and AND his well trained team.   A package deal, but I need him to be the quarterback, not the supervisor from a distance - which is what I feel like is happening at this point in time.  I'm going to continue to request that the doctor review my file.  

At around 4pm (in my time zone) the CCRM nurse responded.  "This is not typical at all.  Can you get in to your local clinic for blood and ultrasound tomorrow?"  Then a few minutes later I got another email that said Dr. Schoolcraft thinks there will be an answer in your test results on what is going on.

They requested an ultrasound for lining thickness and pattern, hCG, LH, Progesterone, Estrogen.  

If I hadn't followed up with them, I am quite sure that I would not have heard from them to follow up with me.  They had not requested for me to call if I had not got my period.  With the weekend coming it would have likely been Monday or later that they would have possibly even thought of my case. I feel like I'm on their back burner.  This makes me so mad and disappointed.  

D says at least at our local clinic we knew that they were thinking of us every day.  

The CCRM nurse told me she was expecting my lining to be nice and thin at today's ultrasound.  

This morning, I had my ultrasound locally.  Today I had my long time IVF nurse because my new donor nurse I was recently switched to was off unexpectedly.   She asked me how things were going and I had a hard time keeping it together.  I was fighting tears and she just kept saying how she was so sorry and she knew we were going to be good parents one day.  This made me want to cry even more.   She has a kind heart and I am grateful for her. 

She checked my lining.  And it was 6 point something.   Not thin.  And it was triple striped! What the heck?!? They told me over two weeks ago that they through my lining looked luteal.  And not to mention that I've had 10 days of progesterone, and they saw what they thought was a collapsing follicle over 2 weeks ago.   When she took out the vaginal probe she drew my attention to the slight pinkish tinge on the end of the probe.  That was the first pink (etc) I'd seen in well over a month. 

She wondered if it was the lupron doing this to me? I told her the CCRM nurse said that the lupron was just to stop me from ovulating through the estrogen patches that I was supposed to start after my period came.  That the CCRM nurse said it wouldn't stop a period.    My local nurse didn't seem to think that was the case, but I trust CCRM more on this one.  (Any of you have experience with this?)

My CCRM nurse called to say that she received the ultrasound results but not the blood yet. She said it was triple lined, and thick. It was very surprising to her.  She asked if the ultrasound person could have made a mistake?  I said no, that I saw it too, that I had a copy of the ultrasound and I would scan it and send it to her (she said her copy that she received by fax wasn't that clear).  She asked me if I had a lot of discharge with the progesterone, and if they were expired?  I told her I shoved those things in as far as they would go, and yes there was some discharge.  I double checked the progesterone, and no it wasn't even close to expiring. 

Then she told me she got a new job.  And that I was going to have a new nurse as of Monday.  I'm kind of feeling neutral about this.  I think it will depend on how much I like my new nurse.   I hope I like her.  Her name starts with C and she's Schoolcraft's donor nurse.  Do any of you CCRM-ers have her? 

I ended the call by asking her if she could really get as much information as possible from Dr. Schoolcraft, to give us as much as possible to go on.  She said she would. 

......

I just made a call to my local clinic for the blood results.  I couldn't wait for CCRM to call, I wanted to be prepared with some questions for them. 

My levels were:

LH 5.8
Prog 0.6
Est 40
hCG >1

I don't know what that means.  I thought something would jump off the page for me, but it doesn't.

.................

Two other things in my online life have upset me.

Over the last couple of days, I've been following a Resolve.org post.  I don't go to this site often, but there was a time that it was my lifeline.   I stumbled upon a post of a woman who had just experienced a stillbirth after a long journey with infertility.  Reading that post and seeing such raw grief was terrifying.  It has set me back.  I cry for her and all of the other women who wrote in to support of her, sharing similar experiences.   I am so terrified that after our struggle, that this could one day be us.  I don't know that I could pick myself up after that type of loss.

Another blogger, Mara from A Blog About Love, wrote recently about how she and her hubby have decided to end their fertility journey, and that they will not be pursuing adoption because they are out of stamina.  Before infertility, and early in my journey I could never understand how people could give up on their dreams of having children.  Now, after almost 7 years of infertility, I understand.  Knowing that feeling frightens me.  

...................

Oh, and to boot I am having a problem getting my money back from The Donor Source.  After two months of emailing to receive my promised refund I still don't have my money!  They've been telling me that they were "waiting for accounting to sign off" on it FOR THE LAST MONTH.  So yesterday, fed up, I told them if they didn't get back to me by today that I would be taking much more severe measures.  I hadn't totally determined what severe was going to be yet.  I imagined phone calls to senior management, trying to get the credit card payment returned as fraudulent by my credit card company, a letter from my lawyer or something of the sort. 

After getting another "I've done all I can do, it's sitting on the CFO's desk" from my contact person, I called the CFO directly.  

I'm usually very terrible at giving people negative feedback or giving them a piece of my mind.  Except for to D, poor guy.  However today fuelled by my extended PMS and other frustrations, I called the CFO.  

I told her that it was completely unprofessional to withhold a refund for TWO months.  That it affects people's lives to not have this money.  I listened to her apologize (which sounded somewhat genuine but not overly enthusiastic).  She told me the money would be put back on my card today, as she had now signed off on it.  I told her that I wasn't going to belabour the point, but I really needed her to understand just how totally unprofessional this was, and that I was disgusted.   She agreed that it was unprofessional.   I took her private phone number down just in case the money didn't show up today. 

So far, it's not here.  

....................

Ya, so um... that's my rant for the day.  Happy Friday?  Hope yours is going better than mine. 

Monday 27 January 2014

48!?!?

It's cycle day 48.  WTF?

The nurse said it can take up to 10 days to get a period after the progesterone suppositories.  I'm 7 days past them.

Every day I get some slight cramping, and think that "this must be the day".  But nothing.

This has to be some kind of personal record.

I can't help but feel like I've transitioned from perimenopause into menopause.  At age 34.  Oh man.

PS) Took another pregnancy test for D.  It was a BFN.

Thursday 23 January 2014

Nurse Reassurance



I talked to my nurse yesterday about how late my cycle is.  I was upfront with her that I was just worrying, and needed her reassurance.   She was very kind and gentle.

She told me about how my medications would be adjusted (no vivelle or change in leuprolide until a certain number of days after my period starts).

She told me it takes some women 10 days to get a period after stopping the progesterone.  That made me feel better too.

Most importantly, she told me that it wouldn't  affect my lining or next month's cycle in any way.  Deep down I think I knew this, but I needed to hear it from her.   She also told me that it's ok to call if I'm feeling worried.   I won't pester them with this.  Seriously- my anxiety is enough to drive me (and probably hubby) crazy, I don't need to drive them crazy too.  Just her saying those words was nice to hear and did the trick for me.

For the time being, D has forgotten about the pregnancy test too.  So, I guess this helped him too.

We will continue to wait.

PS)  Is anyone else in a cold climate and starting to feel a little stir crazy from all of this weather this winter?  Yesterday D and I wanted to get out for a walk but it was just too cold!   With doctor's orders to keep my heart rate below 140, I don't know what else to do for exercise when the outdoors are unfriendly.   Anyone have any suggestions?

Wednesday 22 January 2014

Cycle Day 43 and Counting

D wants me to take a pregnancy test.

I took one over a week ago just to settle my mind with the negative.  I didn't expect a positive in any way, but I just needed to get it out of my head.  I didn't mention it him.

He says if it was positive that we could be hurting the baby with the Leuprolide shots.

I'm sad that there's a little hope in him that is going to be squashed again soon.


Tuesday 21 January 2014

Still waiting

So my body has decided that it is going to take it's sweet time to have a period.  I'm on day 42(!) right now.  This has happened a few times in the past couple of years.  It never really inconvenienced me much when it happened then.

This time though, it has successfully increased my anxiety.  Because I finished my endometrin yesterday and I'm still taking the lupron.  The doctor thought I would have my period by yesterday. 

I know, it's only one day, but I can't help but worry that it's going to mess up my lining or hormone levels for next month. 

If there was any sign of it coming I might not be as worried.  I sometimes spot a bit before it shows up, but this time I haven't.  

My moods haven't been great, and have been kind of PMS-ey but that could also be the meds.  Or it could be depression related.  I dunno. 

Tomorrow I'm going to call the nurse and tell her I'm feeling anxious about this.  I'm going to ask her if it's a big deal? And how it can affect my next cycle.  

Tonight, D and I are going out for dinner with friends that we don't see often.  It will be a nice treat to have a meal out on a weeknight.  We're having Italian too, my favourite! 


Thursday 16 January 2014

A Letter

What would I write to my friends and family about our infertility journey?  What do I really want them to know?  What have I not been able to articulate to them in person that I want to tell them in a letter?  

Maybe something like this?

******************************************************************************
Hi Friends, 

We are grateful that you continue to ask us about what has been going on with our journey through infertility.  You've asked about what we've been up to lately and how we're doing.   We are thankful to have your support and to know that you are cheering us on.  

As you know,  it's been a long road for us to try to become parents.  It's coming up on 6 years of infertility and 7 years of trying.  It's hard for us to believe that after this time we're that we're still a family of two.  

We thought a letter would be a good way for for us to share where we are at right now.  We also want to share because now, more than ever we will need your continued support.  

We are entering into our final few attempts with our fertility treatments.  We are immensely thankful for a wonderful woman who has donated her eggs to us.  After these are gone we are expecting that this will be as far as we will go.   We are deeply scared and anxious of another negative result, and/or what third pregnancy loss would do to us emotionally.   Our hope of a successful outcome is quieted by our fear of knowing that if this doesn't work, it will be the heaviest emotional burden that we have faced yet.  We are "all-in" right now.  

On the adoption front, we are also in the thick of things, having just completed our home study update requirements and signed up with an agency.   We are preparing ourselves for the chance to welcome a child into our lives, while also being very cautious.  We know from the professionals that surround us  that finding a match could be very difficult.    While we are hopeful, we aren't feeling overly optimistic about our chances, especially because of how many couples are already waiting, and the declining number of adoptions each year.   

After trying so hard for so many years, we feel flattened by all of our unsuccessful treatments.  If we were to give a score of where we are at infertility-wise, I would say we are  a 3/10 emotionally.   The positives are that we feel confident that we are under the care of one of the best clinics in the USA and we are fortunate that we still have some savings left to pursue this option.  We know many people don't have this opportunity, and so we are grateful for this.   

Something we've learned about infertility is that at its core it is really about loss and grief.  We have been grieving since we learned our diagnosis, and we continue to grieve.  Infertility is like a wound that reopens before it has a chance to heal.  A new fresh loss such as a negative pregnancy test, a miscarriage, or other fertility setbacks usually just adds to the pile.  At its worst, our grief feels cumulative.  None of the individual scars are more than we can deal with, but all together they can be a very heavy burden.

I think some of you may wonder about whether it bothers us to discuss our infertility?  For the most part, we aren't afraid to discuss it.  This is in part because we are desensitized.  Infertility has put us in a position of sharing things with people that we never imagined. We have had to, and choose to talk about it regularly.  As a couple, we talk about it almost every day.  On difficult days, we talk about it many times throughout the day.  On the days when we aren't talking about it, it's usually not far from our minds.  It's important to us and talking about it and knowing you care helps.    

What is sometimes difficult, is the social situations that we find ourselves discussing it in.  Other than the facts and dates that go along with our story, this topic is a deeply emotional one for both of us.  This is the biggest struggle of our lives, and something we are hesitant to discuss at a lighthearted gathering.  We don't want to bring down the mood by sharing our burden.  Also, we enjoy breaks from thinking about our infertility too. 

Two other difficulties with of our infertility treatment are regular hormonal manipulation, and restrictions on our lives to make our treatments a high priority.   However one of the hardest parts of infertility is that it is a socially isolating experience.   

We are truly happy for those of you with children and we want to be a part of your lives.  We want to learn from your experiences in parenting.  However, sometimes it can be difficult for us to see the joys and difficulties of your parenting because we wish that we were experiencing those too.  The times that we find this is harder for us is when we are feeling emotionally vulnerable after a new loss or setback. When this happens, we have learned it is better for us to protect ourselves from these situations.   We know that you have been considerate of us in the past, and we thank you for this. 

Thank you for continuing to lend us your support.  We are grateful for your empathetic phone calls, prayers, emails and tokens to show us that you remember our struggle and that you are still here beside us.

Love, 

J & D 


PS) On the topic of donor egg, we ask that you keep this information to yourselves.  We are not ashamed of this.  However, if we are successful and have a child from these treatments, it will be their information to share.  We do not want the world knowing about this before our child gets to process this information, and decides to share it if they see fit.  We have trusted you and we are very serious about this.  Please do not mistake our casualness and comfort with you on the topic as permission to discuss it with other people.  Thank you for respecting our wishes. 



********************************************************************************

What do you think?

I'm on the fence if I am going to send it.  Mostly leaning towards the don't send it side.

For the send it side - I want people to know this stuff.

For the don't send it side:
1.  I don't want to make anyone feel bad, especially my more sensitive friends.
2.  If this is all over soon and I get pregnant (if I say that 1,000 times fast will it help increase my chances?),  I don't want all of the attention that this might get me at the nail biting time of the first trimester.

It did take a load off my mind for me to gather my thoughts on the topic.  I think it will help me in the even that someone does ask me how I'm doing the next time?

Wednesday 15 January 2014

Visit from my roomie



Over the weekend an out of town friend decided to see if myself and my best friend (who lives in town) would be up for a visit?  She said her kids were going to be with her mom.  We jumped on the opportunity! We all used to live together in university.  We had a great visit, and it was nice to catch up.  It was such a nice treat!

During the visit my friend told us that she had experienced a miscarriage in late November.  I really didn't expect to hear that she was trying again, but knew it wasn't something that was totally off the table for them.  They have 2 boys and mentioned in the past they may want to try for a girl.

It was interesting for me to be on the 'giving' end of an (real-life) infertility situation.  And for me to watch my best friend do so as well.   What was interesting to me was that my social worker best friend talked about it briefly, but when the first chance to change the subject came up she did. (Friend: "You guys didn't know but on our November shopping trip I was pregnant"… a couple minutes later BF: "I really got such great things shopping, I'm so glad we went…"  While this friend has done some very sweet things for me during my infertility journey it made me even more aware the shallowness of the conversations that often happen on the topic.

I brought the conversation back to the topic of miscarriage.  We talked about her husband's reaction to the news, her mother's and her friends.  We talked about hers.  She talked about how many people she know were announcing their June pregnancies.  It gave me a taste of how hard it is not to jump in with your own feelings on the topic and to know what to say.  It was humbling.

It surprised me how much I had to stifle my urge to want to dive into my own experiences.  I found myself comparing our feelings. I cringed a bit when I said "I so get how you are feeling".  Because even though I have had my own experiences, I still really didn't know what her experience was like.

My miscarriages experience couldn't have been more different than hers in many ways.  Mine were  after several years of infertility treatments, hers after two children.  Her feelings about the pregnancy were different than I expected (her doctor told her it was a grouping of "pregnancy cells" that formed similar to a growth.  She seemed comfortable with this explanation and didn't seem to view it as a loss of a baby (in a way), which was vastly different from my experience.

She talked a lot about how great her doctor was in supporting her.  She texted her to see how she was doing, and asked for updates.  She was grateful to have received such compassionate care that went above and beyond.

When the conversation turned to me, I had a hard time expressing myself.  This isn't a new reaction for me.  What is new is that lately I choke up and get teary and can't get many words out.  I hate it because I can't say what I want to say.   I would love to share just how heavy this burden has been for us.  I would love for people to have a glimpse, no actually, a good solid look into the emotional side of what our last six years have been like.

What usually ends up happening unfortunately is that I feel uncomfortable with the other person's discomfort.  Even though they have brought it up.  I'm usually able to gain my composure by talking about the timelines and more technical parts of how things are going.  After that, I try to change the subject.   I suppose it's because I don't want to add to my hurt by having them change the subject first.  I also am scared of what might happen once I open the floodgates.

I'm a big believer that if you stuff your feelings down for so long they will eventually find a way out.  That feelings don't stay hidden.  And when they do, it will probably be worse, which is where I'm at now.  Even though I know this, and I want to discuss it with my real life friends in greater detail, it never seems like the right time to break my silence.

I've often thought about writing a letter to my closest friends and family on the topic of our infertility experience.  I may do this one day, if I find the right words and the courage.

I wonder what I would write….







Tuesday 14 January 2014

Guesstimate… and we're off!



I suppose there's always a little, no wait, maybe a lot of guesstimation in treating infertility.  I should be used to it by now, but I still don't like it.

The nurses and Dr. S have estimated from the mess in the last couple of weeks that I must have ovulated a couple of weeks ago.

I think it's reasonable given the information from my last ultrasounds and blood work.  My LH started to go down, and the follicle started shrinking in size. My lining remained homogeneous.  However my progesterone was expected to rise and didn't (the collapsing follicle is expected to stimulate my body to produce progesterone so my period starts).

I'm on progesterone (endometrin) now 2x a day for 10 days.  I will start my luperon shots in a couple more days.

They are expecting me to get a period in a few days from the progesterone, and then I will hopefully start building a nice thick lining for my embryo transfer. Yay!

It's been too long since we've been able to embryo transfer.  The last time was August 2012.  This transfer will be number nine for us, and our first one at CCRM.

I am feeling hopeful that we will in fact make embryos with our shiny new donor eggs and D's sperm.  And gosh, in a corner of my heart I even have a glimmer of hope that it might even actually result in a real live baby…

There are lots of steps in between then and now, but I'm so glad to be moving forward.




Friday 10 January 2014

Calendar confusion



Since December 19th, I've been trying to figure out if I've ovulated, or if I'm in my luteal phase.  And yep, it's January 10th.

I know, it seems kind of basic, right?  Something that should be simple.  Something that a top notch fertility clinic could figure out?

At CCRM, a regular donor cycle would normally start out with some birth control pills and in the luteal phase, Lupron would be added to quiet my hormones to prepare for the next month's transfer.

Except, I can't use birth control pills because of my family history with stroke.

So, the nurse suggested to use ovulation predictor kits (she suggested the clear blue easy kind with the happy face).  I told her that I was worried that it wouldn't work for me.  I've never had luck with the OPKs in the past.  Not that I've used them that much anyways, because when I found out I had ovarian issues, I also learned at the same time that they were so severe that an ovulation kit was really not going to help my cause.  With D's low sperm count, trying to use those kits every month seemed futile and emotionally exhausting.  Not to mention a waste of money.  So I never used them more than a few times, back when I didn't know how messed up my body was.

I asked my nurse if it would be worth the risk to just take a low dose birth control pill for the one month instead?  After all, I was on the pill for 10 years before and didn't have any side effects.  The nurse agreed that this sounded reasonable and checked in the doctor.  He said that he didn't feel comfortable with me taking the pill.

So we trekked onwards with our OPK plan.  As a back up, the nurse said she would send be for blood work if we got past a certain part of my cycle and I had not picked up a surge yet.

I monitored all of the way through the Christmas holidays, consistently and properly, but I did not get a surge.  So, on the 30th of December, I cut my Christmas plans short and traveled back home to get my blood work done and have an ultrasound to check my lining.  My lining was homogeneous and there was a 21mm follicle.

Later that day, my nurse called to say that my local clinic didn't draw LH and they got an FSH result instead.  She said not to worry though because my other levels (estrogen and progesterone) were still low, so they didn't think anything had happened.   She told me she thought that I was about to ovulate on my own because of the 21mm follicle.   Because of the error, I had them re-run my results form the 30th for LH.  The LH came back low (in the 8's).

Due to the New Years Eve holidays at my local clinic, I went back on Monday January 2nd to repeat blood work and ultrasound.  Cue horrible snow storm.  School buses were canceled due to the snow and very low temperatures.  People weren't able to dig out their cars out to go to work.

The roads were ok for the first 30 minutes of my drive but then turned wretched.  There were so many cars in the ditch.  I battled the roads, and drove white knuckled to my clinic.  The one hour drive took me close to an hour an a half.  When I got there,  all of the lights were off because they had closed the office due to the storm!

Luckily, there was one nurse there who was able to draw my blood.  Phew!

I was concerned because my requisition was only to have LH drawn this day.  I was cycle day 27 for crying out loud.   I called the emergency line for the CCRM nurses and discussed my concerns.  Wouldn't they want estrogen and progesterone too?  Or how about an ultrasound? My CCRM nurse wasn't in, but after some debate amongst the on call nurses, they told me that the estrogen and progesterone results wouldn't  have changed that much, and I didn't need them.

I felt better hearing that.

Until the afternoon when the CCRM nurse called.  She wasn't my regular nurse, because mine was off for the holidays.  She said to me, "I don't really know how to interpret your results.  They only sent in your LH, which hasn't risen much from your last draw.  I don't know what to tell you.  I think we should wait until your nurse is back tomorrow".

In my head, I said every swear word I could think of.  "What do you mean?" I said. "I called for the emergency line this morning asking if I should have these exact tests!"  I was fuming mad. I drove all of that way through the ice and snow and didn't even get what I needed to have done.  I could have melted all of the ice in town with the heat steaming out of my ears.


The nurse asked me to have them re-run my results.  But I'm not able to do so because there was no one working at the clinic due to the storm.

She says, "Don't worry.  I'll have your regular nurse call you first thing in the morning".

When I don't hear from my nurse in the morning, I called her.  She phones me back at 6pm my time and says "Sorry I was waiting to get the blood results back from your local clinic, but they never showed up".

I explain to her politely what has happened.  We decide that I will call my local clinic when they reopen in the morning and have the results re-run.

I anxiously await her call on the next day with an interpretation of what is going on.

However, when she calls, she doesn't have much to tell me.  Except they aren't sure if they missed my ovulation (uummmm, ya!) and she inquires about whether I've been doing the did the OPK correctly and if I bought the brand she suggested.  I'm so infuriated! This is why I didn't want to use an OPK to begin with.  She told me she had reviewed my case with other nurses and a supervisor.  I asked "did you check with the doctor?". She said no, that he's only returning from vacation today.   I didn't bother to ask why she didn't consult another doctor there, but should have.

I asked her to please review this with the doctor and call me back.  She said she would.  I told her that we have a lot invested in this, emotionally and financially.  I wanted to know what is going on? Should we consider scrapping this cycle and opt for a different one?  I don't want to start this with huge doubts about if my medications were even started at the right times.

Late the next afternoon, I phoned the nurse in the later afternoon to see what the doctor had said.  3 hours later, I got a call back.  She said the doctor had not looked at it yet.  She told me that she once again reviewed this case with her supervisor and she said there are two likely options.

1.  We don't use Lupron this cycle.  My progesterone has been consistently low.  They will control my progesterone exposure to get me a period (I've never had a problem getting my period in the past, it's been late many times but has always shown up).

2.  They use the Lupron and coordinate it with Prometirum for 10 days.  In approximately 3-4 days after that I will get a period.  They will time the Lupron in the last 5 days of my Prometirum.

I'll admit that I don't totally understand the ramifications of these two options yet.  This is all new to me.

She wanted me to go in for more blood work and an ultrasound again today.  This will tell them what happened to my lining and that follicle.

To make things just a tad bit more annoying, CCRM didn't give me a requisition for today's blood and ultrasound, and I forgot my phone at home.  My nurse didn't want to do the ultrasound or have blood drawn without the requisitions saying it was "bad medical practice" for her to do so.  I think my sweet little local nurse had a point, but she also had a little tone in her voice letting me know that she was throwing a dig CCRM's way.  Not necessary Ms. Nurse.  Just ask me to get the freaking requisition.

By the time everything got straightened out, I'd spent an hour in the waiting room.  There were kids everywhere.  Seriously.  When I left the clinic two women walked in with FOUR children.  What the hell? There were kids at every row of seating. I chose to sit near a couple and her 3 year old son.  Both parents were barely paying attention to the kid.  I cringed inside.

I watched a nurse come out with a cute chubby cheeked baby and bring her to the receptionists to oogle over.   I was assuming she was the result of one of the clinic's treatments.  I continued to watch the 3 year old beside me try to get his parents attention.   The nurse came out to talk to the mother of the 3 year old.  She let her know that her appointment will be another 30 minutes yet.  She says "He's going to do her ultrasound today because of what's going on".  The patient says she just needs to know, "Can you do my ultrasound right now she says?"  From their muted conversations, I gather that she must be pregnant and bleeding.  I start to feel really bad for assuming things about her, and her parenting.  I realize why she and her husband aren't being responsive to their 3 year old.  It's because they are waiting to find out if she's miscarrying.

I finally got called into the ultrasound room.  I stop to talk with the nurse at the desk and I see the woman's ultrasound pictures on the desk.  They are requesting more blood work for her.  I see two small  but empty looking sacs on the pictures.   It reminds me so vividly of where we were two years ago getting that exact news.  My heart breaks for them.  And it breaks for me and D all over again.   I realize why my sweet nurse had a little bit of attitude this morning.  She's feeling emotional for them too.

My lining appears homogenius again, and that the follicle appears to have collapsed.  There are 3 smaller 3mm follicles forming.

I'm hoping this will all make more sense when my blood work comes in.  And that my nurse can give me a good explanation of everything and that I will be able to assertively ask the proper questions of her.