Bittersweet

Things have been kind of hard the past few days. Our best "couple" friends had their baby on Monday morning. She got PG the first month off BCPs, didn't have morning sickness, or any other complications during her pregnancy. We went to take care of their dogs on Sunday night at around 11pm then went back to the hospital to wait in the visitor area for a few hours. We took them some food and then went back to our place too sleep. I got up around 8am and went back to the hospital to wait with their families. Rob joined me for a few hours too. Their baby girl was born at 11:30am and weighed 8lb 3oz and is named Cadence (Cadie for short). I had to go to the school for a few hours then I went back to the hospital and finally got the chance to go meet her. I held her for a few moments and it was so surreal. All I kept thinking was am I ever going to get to hold my own child? She was so peaceful; teeny tiny fingernails, beautiful little lips, so innocent. I left the room when they needed to check her over and I haven't spoken to them since. Rob and I have texted them and called to give our congrats and even asked if they needed any help. Our friendship I don't think will ever be the same. They have a new little one to take care of, and all of their plans will be based around her. I certainly can't blame them b/c I know that's exactly what will happen when we have kids, but it's still bittersweet. I am happy for them, but I have to admit, I cried when I got home that day. I cried because I wished with all my heart that it was Rob and I in that hospital room with our baby, not them.

I know we are getting closer, day by day, to our FET, but it's still hard to keep waiting. We have our appt on June 1, it can't get here soon enough.

FET#1 Has Begun

Well I got a lovely surprise after speaking with one of my best friends about the woes of Aunt Flo. Unbeknownst (don't you just love that word) to me, AF decided to show up at 11pm that very night. I have never been so happy to see AF!! I called the RE the following morning and have set up my CD13 U/S and B/W for June 1, and they tentatively told me my FET will be on Monday June 7. Gosh, June can't get here quick enough.

Our beach trip was wonderful. It was so nice not to have to look at a clock and be on a time schedule. We had alot of fun fishing and just being together. Rob's mom got a little annoying after a while, especially when she tried to tell Rob and I that the name's we liked weren't that great because we needed a stronger first name to go with our weird last name. Uh, excuse me??? Where does she get off telling us what to name our hypothetical children?? Anyways, I just let it go, b/c I didn't want to get into a fight over it especially since they were allowing us to stay at their rented beach house without paying for anything except for all the food for the week. I have to be greatful for that. We wouldnt' have been able to go otherwise. When we got home I told Rob if she even thinks about telling me about names again, I will set her straight.

Anyways, only done one patch so far, but by the 1st I'll be up to 4 patches every 2 days. What I didn't know was that I'll be on the PIO shots and the patches for the first trimester. I thought I was only going to have to do the shots, but I guess not. Hey, it's certainly better than more shots, one in the butt is certainly enough everyday.

Beach

I have been waiting for this vacation for months now. We are finally heading to the beach for a week of bliss. I am so excited. This week at the lab absolutely dragged by, it was such torture. I'm pretty sure I ovulated yesterday on my own. I was doubled over with cramps for about 10 minutes, and then they went away, gotta love those O pains. That being said, I'm still going to start my Provera on Monday. RE said even if by some small chance we get PG naturally, yeah right, the Provera won't hurt anything. Here's hoping the Provera does it's job and I don't have a greater than 40 day-long cycle. Once AF arrives I'll be calling to set up my CD13 U/S and B/W. I'll start my estrogen patches on Day 1 as well. This should be interesting, never done patches before so we shall see how it goes. I am thankful to not have to do 20 million injections before the FET. Gosh, it can't get here soon enough. Hoping our little embies will be strong enough to make it to blast so we can transfer 3 and re-freeze the others.

NIAW and RE Consult

This week was NIAW (National Infertility Awareness Week). A week for those of us that are going thru IF or have been thru IF. Finally we get the recognition that we deserve. Love to all my IF sisters, you know who you are.

Well, we had our RE consult on Wed and it went really well. Of course there's no way of knowing why the first transfer didn't work, but I'm dealing with it a little more each day. We've decided to thaw 6 embryos, allow them to grow to blast stage, then transfer back 3. If there are any remaining blasts they can re-freeze them for later use. If all goes well that would still leave 3 remaining frosties. In another week on CD21, I'll start Provera, so that my cycle won't be so long. The RE said he thought it would be just fine and probably save me having to wait another week or longer for AF to show. Once AF does show I'll start Vivelle patches for at least 13 days. On CD13 I will go in for B/W and an U/S to check my lining. Then they will go ahead and defrost the embies. If all goes well and AF doesn't show up late, we could have the FET as early as the end of May or early June. I'm getting excited again. I hate that I'm having to wait so long, but I know it will be worth it in the end.

Trying To Feel Better

Well it's been exactly one week since we got the BFN news. I can say that I'm starting to feel better about it, but it's not something I can easily just forget. I had supposedly 2 healthy embies and neither stuck. How am I supposed to be ok with that? They didn't live inside of me, they didn't grow any further inside of me, everything that was supposed to happen didn't. I'm really anxious to see what our RE has to say at our consult next week. I've basically thought about what I want to do and it boils down to more bloodwork to make sure I don't have any clotting disorders which would prevent implantation and the fact that we WILL be transferring 3 frosties for our FET. Rob and I are both adamant that this happens. In all honesty we don't want to have to do this again, we want multiples, and we want to be able to move on with our lives. Yes, don't get me wrong, if we end up with just one healthy baby, I will be beyond thrilled, but that means I will still have to pay more money to go thru another FET (and spend more on meds again) and we would have to start TTC all over again if we wanted more children. I'm an only child and hated it growing up, Rob and I both want at least 2 children, of course I would love more than that, but it may just not happen for us. AF finally started on Monday, exactly 5 days after my last PIO shot. It's funny that after two days of not doing the shots, my hips and butt on both sides finally started hurting. So not only do I get to enjoy the loveliness of AF, I get an ever so fun reminder that I was doing shots not so long ago to try and keep a pregnancy that never happened. Perfect.

BFN IVF#1

Well the title sums it up. Beta was 0.7, not even a glimmer of hope. The more I think about it the more I think those lines I thought I saw were just evap lines. I would rather think that I was never PG than think that I was PG and then lost them. Of the 6 ladies on a BBC Board that went thru IVF or a FET at the same time I did, I was the only one that didn't get a BFP. Love those odds. Did my RE hold his tongue differently when he did the transfer? Was it because Rob wasn't there for the transfer? Why? I know I will never know, but I feel like I'm entitled to a little jealousy right now. Having feelings of anger and jealousy are easier for me to deal with at the moment than feeling completely helpless. I have to wait for AF to show in a few days and then wait an entire "natural" cycle before we can do anything else. I'm super pissed about that, and please don't tell me that it will give my body and mind time to heal, I've heard it many times before and it still pisses me off, so please spare me. And the lovely nurse who told me the news said if your next cycle doesn't come in 45 days you can call for some Provera, oh thanks, I really appreciate that. So unless my body decides to be nice to me this next month, I could be waiting another 50 days or longer, that's just perfect. I know you can all tell from this post that I'm pissed off, but at this point this is my coping mechanism. I get angry, I've cried all I can cry, there aren't anymore tears left at least for this cycle. It's done, it's over, not a thing I can do to change the results. I'll be better in a few days or maybe a few weeks, just give me some time. Our RE consult is schedule for April 28.

11dp3dt

So it's been a really tough couple of days. I started POAS last week got a faint positive, then the next morning got a negative. I got another faint positive on Sunday, and then another negative yesterday morning. It pretty much drove me nuts. I luckily didn't POAS this morning and will not on Wed, since it's the day of my beta. My emotions have been all over the place; I've been really really down and then pretty optimistic, sometimes within the same hour. I've cried at least once everyday since Friday because I've been so concerned that since I wasn't getting a darker second line that something was surely wrong. I know that I brought this upon myself by testing early and probably testing at all, which my RE suggests we do not do, but it's a hard habit to break, especially when you've been POAS pretty much every month for 3 years straight. I'm doing better this morning. I have been at least keeping up with my BBT and over the past few days it's been getting really high for me. My normal baseline is 97.4. If I have temps over 98 usually right before AF and then they drop to around 97.8, AF is sure to come either that same day or the next. Since Friday my temps have been around 98.3 and this morning it was 98.65, the highest I have every gotten since I've been charting. Something is certainly going on, hopefully something good. I've been a big slacker at school these past few weeks and I know my prof is probably getting a little upset about it, but at this point I'm so focused on myself and Rob, I just can't do much else. I'm hoping that once I do get that BFP finally, no matter if it's now or after a FET, that I'll finally be able to breathe a little easier and get back to work like I know I need to. I've had some cramping off and on over the past few days, no spotting whatsoever, which I guess is a good thing. Wish me luck, this test could change my life.