Author Archives: 30yr old nothing

Three Weeks Down

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We did it!! Less than 3 hours until I leave for the appointment. I can’t tell in the cramps in my tummy are nerves or poop or baby.

This week was decidedly better. Thank goodness for therapy. I think I just need a good long one hour cry.

I am still petrified but I am at least functioning better and sleeping a little better.

It’ll all be over in a little while. I’ll write again this evening with good or bad news. Thank you for again, as always, for the support and caring words.

Here goes nothing.

xx

 

 

Two Weeks Down

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8 more days. Finally into single digits.

I don’t want this to be another “woe is me” post but do rest assured the woe continues to be me.

I guess I am feeling more symptoms one could say. So I’m clinging to that with all my might. The motion sickness is more frequent and water has suddenly started to taste funny. My poor butt is screaming for sweet sweet relief. I’ve done 32 injections now. Whooo! N has hit nerves (I think) twice and that’s a whole new level of pain. But every so often he finds a new sweet spot and I feel like I could go on forever. Those are good days.

Last week someone who transferred around the same time as me had a missed miscarriage. As you can imagine this ruined me completely. I cried at the salon and blamed it on an errant hair that got in my eye. I remember when she got her positive she immediately started doing 4 week and 5 week bump pics holding her belly with signs and everything. I remembered being in awe of her bravery and how I wanted to be brave like that. I couldn’t even change my period tracker to a “P” tracker. So when her bad news came, I was absolutely crushed for her. I can’t imagine opening my heart so widely and then having it ripped out. No thank you.

But there’s no right way to navigate this part of the journey, is there? Bad things happen all the time. And you can’t live your life behind closed doors hoping that if you just sit still you’ll be okay.

I’ve had my heart broken a gazillion times and my motto has always been to “sing like no one is listening, dance like no one is watching and love like you’ll never be hurt”. All through my “heartbreak” 20’s that was always my goal. Give everything, that way you never doubt that you tried your best.

I feel now that having a boy break your heart doesn’t hurt nearly as much as a failed IVF cycle but that’s because I’m closer to the IVF stuff now. I remember spending an entire day crying in bed over one chap. I thought I would never recover.

And I remember failed IVF cycle #4 and how I thought I would never recover from that.

But now I never even think of that chap. And there’s been so much IVF happiness that the fails are distant memories.

So I’m trying to do a massive shift in my mindset here. Since I can’t seem to cling to hope and positivity for longer than a few minutes (and I really and truly appreciate that all of you are being hopeful and positive for me), I can at least cling to the fact that, in the end, everything will be okay.

As they say… This too shall pass. It may pass like a kidney stone but it’ll pass.

One Week Down

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The prenatal appointment is set for March 12th. So we have 2 more weeks to go. I forgot how torturous this wait is.

The worst part is actually the progesterone injections. I’m on day 26 of injections and I think I have 15 more to go. Hopefully they’ll let my stop but I think they make you go until 10 weeks. Which will mean another 10 on top of the 15. I don’t know if my maths is correct here but either way it’s a lot. But I’ve done it before and I will do it as long as I need to but boy does it suck. I can barely sit down. I am doing the ice before and heat after but my butt is worn out. I’m think of going into my thigh but I’m a little afraid of that.

The other thing is that I’m not feeling any notable symptoms. My nips tingle for a few minutes when I wake up and throughout the day I have about 5 waves of nausea and One or two tugs in the uterus area. I also feel like I’m bleeding every few minutes uggh. But nothing that can’t be attributed to the medication. My mind is completely fucked.

I am testing everyday like a crazy person and that’s really the only assurance I have and in all honesty, it’s not really that assuring.

I cried in therapy last week. I can’t even say the word that starts with P. Like I have a mental block when it comes to that word. I told my therapist that I had told a friend that I want to enjoy this time as much as possible, almost to the point of being obnoxious because I didn’t have that experience with Lucky, and as soon as I said it I took it back. It wasn’t the time to be excited. It’s too soon.

I cried when I explained that I can’t utter the words and when people asked for more information (due dates and whether I wanted a boy or girl) that my guts go cold and my hands get sweaty.

The day when we found out the second beta, I was at B’s house while we were sitting outside and our sons played in the sand box. After the excitement died down she said I should tell her son. I immediately forgot how to speak English. I blustered and stuttered and eventually spat out that Hey O! Guess what, Lucky might be getting a baby sister or brother. I wanted to throw up. The news wasn’t really received well anyway. Little O wants a sibling too but his mom isn’t about that life right now. I guess I should have reworded it but I was trying not to throw up all over him and deck.

I had also started to write thank you cards to the three nurses at work who administered shots for me. I stood for 30 minutes at Target choosing the right cards and chocolates. I started writing one card and quickly tore it up because I didn’t want to jinx anything. When I told my therapist this I broke down. It’s just a card. Jinxes aren’t real.

I ended up wording the cards very carefully. Using coded language like “so far so good” and “For now, it worked”. All I really wanted was to convey my thanks and it became a whole thing. One of the cards, I wrote and re-wrote and cut up 3 times before settling on something that sounds grateful yet guarded.

This morning one of the nurses came down to my cube and whisper screamed and waved her hands in the air and danced in a circle and hugged me (shhh lady, my boss is literally 5ft away). She asked for the due dates and again my stomach clenched up and I wanted to run away. But after she left I had a massive smile on my face and for a quick second I felt I’d done the right thing. I felt excited and I guess what one would consider normal in these circumstances.

That second has passed now and I’m back to feeling dread and impending doom. It would suck to have to give her bad news after she practically lifted me out of my chair.

Sigh

I guess all I’m trying to say is that I would like to get off this part of the ride. I’d like to be on the part of the ride where it’s still scary as hell but I have a proof of life and maybe some morning sickness.

15 days to go.

 

 

 

Still Good News

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I totally forgot that the 2nd beta is the more stressful one.

After the first beta, I shared the news with everyone, blissfully ignorant. N brought me down to earth real quick with his skepticism. So much so that I barely ate anything all day because I was so stressed out.

Thankfully, the beta more than doubled and I don’t have to go back for another test which is a relief. I have to call them tomorrow  to set up an appointment for an ultrasound.

So it looks like this is really happening again. Wow. N has steadfastly said that he won’t be getting excited until he sees a heartbeat. I think we’re both a little in denial. I had hope, but I certainly didn’t expect it to work this quickly.

I’m relieved but still waiting for the other shoe to drop. You know how it goes.

Infertility will forever be the thief of joy.

IVF Round 7 Results

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It worked!!!

It worked it worked it worked!!!

I’m equal parts relieved and stressed out because the Beta is over 100 but significantly lower than with Lucky’s (341). But the nurse was very excited so that’s good then.

Once we’re over the Beta hurdles and have made it though the ultrasound (please let it get there) I’ll probably be confident enough to write the betas and talk about my TWW symptoms. I will say that I was so confident that this would work based on the symptoms but this morning, I swore I was getting my period (it was due yesterday) so I lost all hope.

The drive up to the clinic was terrible. I was near to tears, thinking over and over, I don’t want to do this again. I don’t want to do this again. I’m exhausted. Please please please.

I took the same route I take everyday. Pleading and bargaining with the universe. I came to a stop street and I looked left and right and as I moved on my eyes flitted to the second floor of a house on the corner. The window was covered by a black sheet. And written on the sheet in massive white letters, H.O.P.E. It was written backwards obviously for the room’s occupant to take heed. But I feel like the universe had given me a little wink and smile.

Usually they call at 2pm ish but the call came at 11. We had barely just finished breakfast and were settling in for a little cartoon time. I picked up this time and immediately put her on speaker. Her excited “Hi” was all I needed for my butt cheeks to finally unclench for the first time in 10 days.

So here we are. We’ve made it. I won’t count my chickens just yet. I go back on Monday, so that will be the real test but for now, for now I can go out and celebrate with a virgin daiquiri.

Thank you guys so much for all your support this time around. I’m so relieved.

We did it!

xx

 

Random Distraction Post 3

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I did it… I caved…

I switched over to audio books.

It was a battle. I was the grumpy old lady on the lawn yelling at the young hip audio books to get off my lawn! But one day I allowed one of them on to my lawn. And now I’m hooked.

All thanks to the most unlikely. My husband. One who is diametrically opposed to reading of any sort. He is a gamer and one of his favourite games, the Witcher, was being made into a TV series and there is also a book series that the TV show would be based on. He, all of a sudden, wanted to read the books before the show started. It’s a 10 book series and by the time he was on book 3 he’d convinced me to try it… I’m so glad he did.

We breezed through them in about 2-3 months. All the while, my cubicle neighbour and friend from work is an avid audio book listener was also trying to get me on board. She introduced me to the app Libby to get audio and e-books from the library. She added me to her book club (I’m now in two. Hers and one at work). I was flying through book after book. Laughing and crying and gasping while I drove anywhere. The 2 hour commute to Lexington for monitoring appointments became a joy!

Then I found out that I can order audio book cd’s at our school’s library. Are you kidding me?

My list of “want to read’s” on Goodreads is starting to dwindle (still at 90 thought, yikes) and I love it. Last year my book challenge goal on Goodreads was 5. This year I’ve upped it to 12 and I’m already on the 6th book and it’s only February!

I love reading (can you tell?) but it’s been a constant battle since TV series and Twitter came into my life. Of course little Lucky bean too. A more than welcome distraction. I just can’t seem to find the time to pick up my kindle or an actual book and read. The last real book I read was Circe. It was really good but really long and I lost the will to live a few times. It took me months to read. Months! I still love the idea of books though and I still want a library in my next house. But I am an audio book convert now. Bring me all of them.

Of course it’s not always the best. I’m glad that I did the Witcher series first because the narrator was AMAZING! I was blown away. Peter Kinney is his name. He could do a conversation with 5 different characters and do 5 completely different voices and accents. Incredible. Unfortunately, now he’s set a very high bar. A bad narrator can ruin a book. The last few were autobiographies and they were narrated by the author so that’s good at least. A sufficient replacement in the absence of Mr Kinney.

So. If you listen to audio books and know all the tips and tricks I’ll note below and have a few more, please let me know! If you want to try audio books, try these tips and tricks my colleague told me about. And If you hate audio books, thanks for reading this far :).

Firstly, you don’t need Audible I don’t think. I think it’s wildly overpriced. N has audible because he couldn’t find the last Witcher book. I bought him a giftcard for Christmas too. But I don’t think it’s necessary. One thing I do like is that you can share a book with one person. We have a friend listening to the Game of Thrones books and it would be good to get them from him.

Next, open a Goodreads account if you love books.  It’s like Facebook for book nerds. You can track everything you’ve read and want to read and are currently reading. You can add other goodreads friends and see their book lists and add to your want to reads from them. You can order books (audio, E or real) from it. They have links to Amazon and Barnes and Noble. They also have links to libraries but I’m not sure how that part works yet.

Lastly get a library app. I’m currently using Libby. Another one is Overdrive (but I think it’s merging with Libby) and then SAILS has an app too. With Libby you need to attach library cards. And I believe you can get join a library online for most of them (I think). I joined Boston Public Library online. And I have a card from my local library. I just added both accounts to my Libby profile and I can find 90% of the books I’m looking for. Libby only does E-books and audio books and the only downside is that sometimes there’s a long wait but so far so good for me.

The last last thing I learned that I spoke about earlier was that I can log into my SAILS account at work and I can have audio book cd’s delivered to the library at the school. SAILS is a library network in Massachusetts with 72 libraries participating so my guess is you’ll likely find what you’re looking for at some point.

And that’s my favourite thing to do right now. I’m so happy that reading is back in my life. I’m even happier that N is into books now too. Last night he said he needs a new book asap and hopped onto Goodreads to search for something. If you have any fantasy or sci-fi recommendations for him please let me know. In fact if you’ve read anything awesome lately, please let me know too :).

 

 

Random Distraction Post 2

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We’re a media family. We watch a lot of TV. We’re always on our phones. Lucky has a tablet (for shame). N has a giant gaming computer and I have my rinky-dink laptop. Something, if not everything, is always on.

Yes, we eat dinner in front of the TV as well and depending on who you speak to this either means Lucky’s intellectual growth will be stunted and our marriage will end orrr it’s just another way to live and all will be well in the end.

While I try to not let the guilt get to me and I do try to limit Lucky’s day time TV on weekends, one thing both N and I struggle with is the damn phone.

I know there are apps to help curb your use but I don’t have enough self control for that. I could also impose rules on myself, but again, self control. Thankfully, I have something better. A chatty demanding 2 year old.

When Lucky and I get home from work or when he wakes up he asks to put the tv on and I always tell him no he has to play a bit first. After a bit of whining he’ll move on to one of his toys and I’ll have a bit of time to get my phone fix on before I have to mom it up. But as soon as he sees I have it in my hand he yells “Put the phone down!!!”

It’s usually while I’m in the middle of a text or searching for something so he keeps yelling it and getting frustrated with me until I drop it and pay attention to him. His jam now is play fighting with his dolls and sometimes it’s more fun to have someone else play the bad guy.

I won’t lie. It’s annoying at first. The pitch of the scream and the whine while I’m trying to concentrate on whatever mundane crap I just have to do at that moment is a lot to take. But as soon as my attention is on protecting Iron Man from the repeated smashing from… another Iron Man it’s easier to forget about my phone. And let’s face it. It’s way more fun watching him enjoy beating me up or pretending to get hurt.

Sometimes I’ll get a text and quickly grab my phone and he’ll shout “Put the phone down!!”. Sometimes he’ll wrap my knuckles with a hard plastic ninja. It’s not the reminder I want, but I guess it’s the reminder I need.

All this being said, being bullied by a toddler really helps our weekend daytime usage. I don’t feel as addicted to it as I used to. But sometimes I have to physically leave my phone upstairs. And other times I just give in to the scrolling, all the while aware that I’m losing brain cells by the second while I hide from Lucky.

But as soon as night time and especially night time weekends roll around, all bets are off. Right now we’re trying a new show on Netflix. At the same time N playing a game on his phone and I’m typing on my laptop and Lucky is dozing off in front of his iPad. We’re a child development scientist’s nightmare right now.

But it’s all about balance right?

Random Distraction Post 1

Posted in Random Tales, Uncategorized by

Something terrible happened.

Someone I know has been arrest for sexual assault. Someone who treated me as a patient for some time.

I saw him regularly in 2014 and 2015 and then a sporadically as time continued on. But I had just been back to him 2 weeks ago for something. My friend told me about the news because his name popped up on an FB group with police asking for more victims to come forward. The story also came on the news. He is currently being held without bail until his trial.

I am firmly in the “believe women” camp. As someone who has ample experience with abusive men, I know why women stay quiet and I furiously applaud the strength it takes to come forward.

But this shook me. This man is the complete opposite of what mainstream media will have us believe is a rapist. He’s an old man (a bit younger than my father). A soft spoken, kind man. He’s English isn’t good. He remembers my entire family and asks after them every time I’m there. He’s a good doctor.

Apparently the assault took place at his practice. I thought of the building. His tiny little practice where his mild mannered wife worked the front desk. I thought of how friendly and inviting they were and how safe I always felt.

But I thought of how closed off it is. A basement office with no windows. Only one way to escape. I thought that he may be old but he’s quite tall and steady. While he’s always gentle I’m sure he could overpower me if he wanted to. I was often the only patient there. I never feared for my safety but I wonder if that is naive.

I’m sad that this is happening but if he’s guilty I hope he never sees the light of day.

Now that I have a son, I often wonder what would happen if he was accused and/or arrested for sexual assault. I have a distant friend who’s son is serving a whole lot of time for child pornography. It is clear that she still loves her son as she is fighting to get mandatory minimums reduced for first time offenders but when he was going through his trial she posted a lot about coming to terms with her new reality. It was painful and eye opening to witness.

I don’t doubt my ability to raise a son to not be a rapist. I don’t doubt my ability to raise a boy to not be a misogynist. But what if I do everything right and he still fucks up. What if?

Loop De Loop

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It is done. Everything went according to plan and I’m comfy on the couch relaxing.

Well everything didn’t go swimmingly but it ended well lol.

We always give ourselves 2hrs to get there. So we left at 6 for my 8am acupuncture appointment. Unfortunately it was raining and everyone got into a car accident so we had to take a million back roads and we pulled into the parking lot at 8am!

I ran in an dived onto the table just as she was about start sticking the needles in (haha). I struggled to relax of course but I kind of think it’s difficult to lay still and relax for 30 minutes if it’s just you and your thoughts and plinky plonky music. Am I wrong?

After acupuncture I went back to the waiting room and started chugging water. At our last transfer they were running late so I wasn’t too worried but after glass of water #2 they came to get us and I wasn’t nearly ready to pee yet. Yikes.

They didn’t even take us to another room first to fill out forms, the took us straight to the transfer room. It was all happening so quickly. By the time I came out with of the bathroom the doctor was already in the room introducing himself. Dr T. What a joy he was. The personification of awesome bedside manner. The sonographer was the same one from our last transfer. She was lovely as well. The room just fell warm and fuzzy and I loved it.

But my bladder wasn’t full at all so it took some doing. She was pushing so so hard on my tummy. That plus the speculum pain. I was holding N’s hand in a death grip. I was watching the screen and usually you can make out the catheter at the very least but I couldn’t even make that out. I was starting to get nervous because they seemed to be struggling to find the catheter in my uterus. The embryologist came in and he put the tube in and they still couldn’t find it on the screen. It was a tense few seconds. Then it appeared. Dr T said “Oh there it is. It seems to have done a loop de loop to get into the uterus”. He’s delightful. Who said loop de loop anymore?

Then we saw the flash of the embryo being popped out.  The embryologist took the tube to see if there was anything it while Dr T took everything out of me and the sonographer wiped my belly. “That was a perfect transfer Dr T!” shouted the embryologist. He stood up and proceeded to applaud. Just delightful.

Afterwards, they gave us the room to do the progesterone shot then I went to do another round of acupuncture. Then N and I went to a nice lunch and then we had dentist appointments and finally made it home to relax clean Lucky’s car seat because he’s sleeping at grandma’s tonight. Car seats are gross.

At the dentist N and I took a bet to see who could get to the car first because we disagreed on which was the quickest route. Once we got out, I took off and ran to the car. I won (of course) but when he got there he asked if I should be running. I completely forgot I had an embryo on board. I totally had an internal panic attack for the drive home but my goal for this cycle was to try to forget. I don’t want to do crazy symptom spotting like last time. I want to try and fill these next ten days with happy distractions. Last time I was too obsessed. So I’m a little relieved that I ran to the car. In that brief moment I was happy. It was a fun day with N all in all. I’m going to try to keep that trend going. With a bit less running maybe :).

It’s going to be a very long week next week. Just work work work bleh. I’m going to see if I can do daily random posts to get my mind off things.

Okay my friends. It’s bed time over here. I’ve been up since 4 and I’m ready to crash. Thank you for being there for me again and again.

❤ ❤ ❤

Science

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We’re about a week an a bit away from transfer. I’ve started taking 2mg of estrogen 3 times a day. I’m still on Lupron but I think that will end on Thursday. My next and possibly final monitoring appointment for this cycle is Thursday morning. Things are running smoothly as usual. And I expect we’ll transfer on the 6th.

One thing we did differently during this retrieval was we joined a study that would tell us whether our embryo(s) had N’s translocation or not. At the time I just signed up for the study because I want to help the science evolve on this. I actually forgot about it. We would have to test the baby once it’s born to confirm any results so I think I just imagined that we would just get results closer to birth or whatever. I don’t know. I just forgot about it.

On Friday our RE called with the results. The embryo has the translocation. We took the phone call in our bedroom. Me standing next to the bed getting dressed for a night out and Lucky and N on the bed watching cartoons on mute. I don’t know how to feel about the news. We’re still going through with the transfer. But my feelings are complicated. My thoughts are muddled.

The only part of the conversation that didn’t sit right with me, that I keep coming back to is he said that since we only have one embryo, these results are just informational. If we’d had more and one or more of them didn’t have the translocation we could opt to use the normal embryos first.

Normal.

I didn’t like that. I immediately felt protective of my little Dandelion. If it had been in a batch with other embryos who didn’t have a translocation it wouldn’t get picked first. Fuck you Dr P! I mean, I love you and you’re the best doctor but geez man. Our embryo is normal. What is normal anyway?

I just didn’t like when he said that.

But here we are with this information. It’s not going to make us love our child any less. It just is what it is.

Again, I’m still coming to terms with it and my thoughts are too muddled to write coherently. But the bottom line is that Dandelion, for all intents and purposes, is perfect. And genetic testing is a fickle scientific gift.

That is all.