It's Official - - - Retrieval is Sunday!

At 8:30am precisely...Chris won't even have to miss a bit of the football games!

I'm already pondering my post-retrieval meal. Since I've had to cut out all my enjoyable vices for this cycle, I have developed a rather odd obsession with eating. But, since I'm so bloated I can only eat a little bit. It's odd. I day dream about the food and then get a couple bites in before I can't eat any more.

This morning's appointment went well, uterine lining looks great, which is such a nice change. I'm used to the "eh.....well...." response to "how does my lining look?". In fact, Dr. R even commented that my uterus looks great. I blushed. So rare for my reproductive organs to get so many compliments! I've responded well to the meds, and she's thinking she'll get 10-12 eggs on Sunday. Now it's just step by step. Transfer will likely be Wednesday.

Tonight is the trigger at exactly 8:30pm, which will be no big deal for us since all of our other meds have been IM shots. Good news, my ass gets a break for tomorrow - no shots! It's my only day off for the whole month. I should take my ass somewhere nice to celebrate.

My new best friends:

Lidocaine Gel
and
Ice

The combination of these two have made the shots tolerable. I feel a little weenie-esq having to resort to numbing action before my shots, but dammit, my ass can only take so much. I am now very jealous of the IVF'ers that do all subcutaneous shots. They were really hurting, my poor husband was developing a complex, something had to be done. I was getting extremely bitchy right before the shot (I attribute some of this to the migraine I have had since Saturday...the feeling of a vice on your head plus shooting pain behind the eye is bound to make the sweetest person cranky, and I'm not the sweetest person to begin with), and as he started the injection, I was beginning to make a scene. A scene that started with me taking a noticeable deep breath in anticipation, then kind of yelling "Fucccckkk" as the injection started, then snapping at him that he needs to put pressure on it right after the shot. I'm laying face down when I get my shots, so I can't see his face but I'm sure it has been a combination of wincing for fear of hurting his wife, and grimacing that his wife hasn't learned to shut up and take it while he's giving a shot. Not like it's fun for him. Well, maybe if I'm uber cranky he gets a touch of satisfaction, but I doubt it.

I have to mention that our cat has now taken an interest in the shots and I personally feel he is concerned about his mom's well being as he watches dad inject a big needle into mom's ass. Chris says he's fascinated by the alcohol pad. I like my theory better.

A weekend full of needles.

How was my weekend? Pretty prickly.

Friday - morning shots, evening shots
Saturday am - morning shot
Saturday later am - acupuncture
Saturday pm - evening shots
Sunday am - morning shot
Sunday later am - blood draw at the clinic
Sunday pm - evening shots

There are people that do IVF that have a phobia of needles. A real phobia of needles. I don't have a needle phobia (although I might be developing one), but I do have a rather severe bird phobia and I'm not sure if IVF involved the use of birds in any way that I could do it. I think if someone said, "Ok, so in the morning a bird will peck you in a head a couple times, then you're going to sit in a room full of birds flying around for about an hour and a half, then in the evening we'll have the bird peck you a few more times, the following day we'll have you come to our office where we will have the bird peck at you some more, then you'll head home and set up for your evening pecks. You'll repeat this cycle daily for about a month. Sound good?" No.

On a clinical note, my E2 (estradiol) level was checked on Sunday and my level is "great, doing exactly what we want it to" (have I mentioned my clinic doesn't give specifics? Which on one hand I don't like being in the dark, but on the other hand I know this is for the best. Had they given me the actual E2 number I would have logged a few hours on google analyzing that number from every possible angle, then spent another several hours reviewing that data over and over in my head and essentially making myself a stress case over it. Even though they tell me it's good.) so all seems to be going well so far. My acupuncturist said my right ovary has a lot of activity, left ovary, eh - not so much. My left ovary I have for a long time not-so-fondly referred to it as "The Dud." I'm hoping it eventually wakes up since I really could use those follicles. Like really, really need those follicles. Righty can only do so much by herself.

He Shot Me.

Our very first stim shot was last night, and I’m happy to report, it was successful.


There is good news and bad news.


The good news is the scary looking, dart-like needle that I received about a million of, is NOT used to inject the meds into me. It is a mixing needle. While the injection needle is nothing to laugh at, it’s much thinner and less dart like. This was very good news. As you can see, it’s rather intimidating. The bad news is…they hurt like hell! I have a pretty high pain tolerance (ask anyone that knows me that and they’ll say the opposite, but just because I complain a lot doesn’t mean I don’t have a tolerance. I’m just whiny, that’s all) and I winced through the whole thing. Chris did his job just fine, it’s the actual meds that hurt. Sting, to be exact. Sting like a motherfucker to be completely honest.

It appeared to be any other Thursday night. But we knew the injection was looming. You could see it in our eyes, hear it in our nervous laughter. We had a job to do. My window of injections is 6-9pm (since my morning injection window is 7:30-10:30am, I thought I’d mix it up a little. I’m wacky like that) so I decided to just get it over with. Right after Rachel Ray finished her 30 Minute Meal, I was at the kitchen table with my science experiment, the instructions from our clinic and of course, the paper work that came with all the drugs. It’s quite involved. I have felt I deserve my own white lab coat with my name monogrammed on the front for so long, and now I really, truly feel I’ve earned it. We received great instructions from our clinic and it seemed pretty easy. Well, if you consider mixing powder vials with sodium chloride and then adding the FSH medication into that vial, withdrawing all of that out into the mixing syringe (make sure you get it all! There is about $300 of meds in there, it ALL needs to get in your ass!) and changing needles easy, then it was easy. We went step by step, slowly, making sure we didn’t make any mistakes. Did I mention our clinic said, “The first 3 days of stims are the most important, so don’t mess up! No pressure!”? We read each step out loud in that slow, drawn out way you do when you’re concentrating, doing, and reading at the same time. “Noooowww, inject the soodiummmm chloride into the powder viallllll….mmmmkkkkkkkk”. Finally, it was all mixed and ready to go. Chris took the dart needle off the syringe and replaced it with the one that looks like, well, a needle. I took my position, and braced for the shot. He then walked me through each step, “OK, I’m going to start” and did a great job starting the injection, pulling it out a little to make sure there was no blood (“No blood!” “Ok, good!”) and then proceeding with injecting all the meds. Then the stinging began.

Since they are intramuscular, the injection site is sore for a couple days. I clearly remember this from all my trigger shots in the last year. It’s sore. It hurts. And I get to have these shots every day for about 10 days, THEN we move on to the even more atrocious progesterone in oil shots for another two weeks. Basically my ass is getting brutalised for a month.

While I’m open about IVF in my personal life, I’m not in my professional life with the exception of my boss. So while I limp around the office because my ass hurts, I have to lie and say it’s a pulled muscle instead of the truth. They can’t handle the truth. “Oh, it’s nothing, my husband shot nun pee into my ass last night and it’s a little sore now.”

You know, I have to giggle at the moms that only have “I was in labor for 24 hours with you!” to their children. We have so much more to make them feel guilty about. “Your father had to shoot me in the ass for weeks!” is a good start. I’m not sure how or if we’ll even approach the money aspect. Telling them we spent $12,000 (if this one works, otherwise that amount goes disgustingly higher) to even conceive him/her would probably result in some ungrateful, whiny response about that must be why they don’t have the coolest clothes or best toys.

I can’t wait.

Hit me with your best shot

(I guess I'd be talking to myself by saying "Hit me with your best shot" since I have to give myself these injections).
November 18th marked my very first shot of Lupron. Easy, easy, easy. The Lupron shots are with little insulin syringes, they're like the starter syringe for the whole process. Nothing like the what seem like hundreds of the other syringes I have for the other meds that really do resemble a dart. I shit you not, a dart. Like the ones you throw at a dart board, dart. Anyhow, these little Lupron shots are nothing. I'm quite used to them now. Although I did have a panic moment a few days after I started...things like "Why am I not getting any headaches? Why don't I feel any side effects? Oh my gawd, I'll bet I'm not even getting any liquid in the needle! I'm just injecting air! I've ruined this cycle, I've ruined our lives, I've ruined everything!" IVF can make you a little crazy. So now each time after I give myself a shot, I make sure I squeeze out the tiny little droplet that's left after the injection so that I feel better knowing there definitely was liquid in there. This prevents me from trying to get the old syringes out of my bio-hazard storage container like I did a few days ago. FYI, that top doesn't come off. Easily, anyway.