Monday, June 30, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Follow-up with Dr. M
First off, thanks to all of you for the comments on our most recent, seemingly unsuccessful month (no, my wife has not officially "started" yet, but is still spotting ... we have a long track record of hoping her monthly spotting is simply implantation bleeding, and I, an even longer track record of encouraging her to believe that it is implantation bleeding - but to date our hopes have gone unfulfilled)
She met with Dr. M this morning - as always, she remarked about what a nice man he is. He thinks the spotting is associated with low progesterone - our first Doctor's response to a description of my wife's early spotting was "it is not a concern" - again, a great divide exists between the worlds in which these two Doctors live. Dr. M offered my wife two options by which to remedy this problem. The first included upping her dose of Femara (from 2 to 3 pills a day during days 5 - 9 of her cycle). The second included a vaginal progesterone supplement (much like those she took after our IVF cycle) in addition to the Femara regimen.
She opted for the first option and Dr. M sent us on our way to TTC for a few more months. Recall that my wife has been taking Femara for four months now - it was prescribed for two reasons, one of which was to increase her progesterone, the other to ensure a healthy ovulation cycle. Dr. M said she shouldn't start spotting as early while taking the increased dose - we'll see when that time comes. Let's keep our fingers crossed that our perseverance will be rewarded, and remind ourselves that if we keep going through infertility treatments, we might just get pregnant.
She met with Dr. M this morning - as always, she remarked about what a nice man he is. He thinks the spotting is associated with low progesterone - our first Doctor's response to a description of my wife's early spotting was "it is not a concern" - again, a great divide exists between the worlds in which these two Doctors live. Dr. M offered my wife two options by which to remedy this problem. The first included upping her dose of Femara (from 2 to 3 pills a day during days 5 - 9 of her cycle). The second included a vaginal progesterone supplement (much like those she took after our IVF cycle) in addition to the Femara regimen.
She opted for the first option and Dr. M sent us on our way to TTC for a few more months. Recall that my wife has been taking Femara for four months now - it was prescribed for two reasons, one of which was to increase her progesterone, the other to ensure a healthy ovulation cycle. Dr. M said she shouldn't start spotting as early while taking the increased dose - we'll see when that time comes. Let's keep our fingers crossed that our perseverance will be rewarded, and remind ourselves that if we keep going through infertility treatments, we might just get pregnant.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Spotting
It appears we'll ride the infertility train for at least one more month - wife started spotting yesterday. IUI #1 is a bust. Bummer ...
She'll have an appointment with the Doctor to refresh her supply of Femara, and to be advised on the need to conduct laproscopy, or not. I'll keep you posted.
As it is, we're just happy to have sold our house - we have settled into our new place quite nicely, and are enjoying the community whilst reading about the upcoming 10 - 15% further price deterioration. So happy we found thosesuckers nice people to purchase our home from us (sincerely, they got a hell of a deal)
Cooper is getting a ton of exercise (I've spent the 45 minute morning commute time I've saved to take him on a walk) He is turning into a very sweet dog (outside of the biting fits, a fascination with socks and occasional dump on the floor) I think we're going to enjoy this summer a lot more than the last one, in which we climbed the learning curve of infertility, realizing that we were amongst the inflicted. Now that we've accepted it, we're sort of numb to the pain, and we trudge along through each month with a bit less sting ... at least that's true for me - my poor wife has uttered the phrase "it's not fair" to the point of exhaustion.
Hoping the good Doctor will help us in our quest. More to come later.
She'll have an appointment with the Doctor to refresh her supply of Femara, and to be advised on the need to conduct laproscopy, or not. I'll keep you posted.
As it is, we're just happy to have sold our house - we have settled into our new place quite nicely, and are enjoying the community whilst reading about the upcoming 10 - 15% further price deterioration. So happy we found those
Cooper is getting a ton of exercise (I've spent the 45 minute morning commute time I've saved to take him on a walk) He is turning into a very sweet dog (outside of the biting fits, a fascination with socks and occasional dump on the floor) I think we're going to enjoy this summer a lot more than the last one, in which we climbed the learning curve of infertility, realizing that we were amongst the inflicted. Now that we've accepted it, we're sort of numb to the pain, and we trudge along through each month with a bit less sting ... at least that's true for me - my poor wife has uttered the phrase "it's not fair" to the point of exhaustion.
Hoping the good Doctor will help us in our quest. More to come later.
Monday, June 16, 2008
IUI #1: Highlights
We conducted our first IUI on Saturday morning. Some highlights, if they can be described as such, follow (with much childish commentary):
Other than that the weekend was filled with lots of unpacking and family time - enjoyed it immensely.
Here's hoping that at least some of the guys reading this can participate in Father's Day next year - the view from the sidelines is nice, but would be better to be in the game.
- There were several other guys in the office when we arrived, each clearly waiting his turn to utilize the porn collection and plastic cups (lots of tightly fitted baseball caps) My wife's keen perceptions picked up on one guy who had his own porn collection in a messenger bag
- My wife also noticed that each guy took approximately the same amount of time to leave his specimen - perhaps a bit of fascination on her end with the whole concept of male self-pleasure?
- Porn collection consisted of Hustler, Barely Legal and Playboy
- Transfer was done by nurse, who showed us the milky, purple colored solution that would be injected into my wife's uterus via catheter (purple part was not from me ...)
- Wife had slight cramping after transfer, but other than that, it was relatively uneventful
- As my wife lay there for 20 minutes following the transfer, I rummaged through the drawers to show her the porn collection they offered - just after I tucked the magazines back into the drawer, the nurse returned to the room ... how funny it would have been if she had come back 5 seconds earlier to find me showing my wife porno magazines as if they were children's books ...
Other than that the weekend was filled with lots of unpacking and family time - enjoyed it immensely.
Here's hoping that at least some of the guys reading this can participate in Father's Day next year - the view from the sidelines is nice, but would be better to be in the game.
Friday, June 13, 2008
On Deck: IUI
We're doing our first IUI tomorrow - my wife got a positive ovulation test this morning, so I have to go into the office at 8:00 a.m. to leave my sample, after which the staff will wash it and then inject it back into my wife at around 12:00 noon.
Hoping for a positive result ...
Hoping for a positive result ...
Saturday, June 7, 2008
SOLD!
Successfully closed on our place yesterday, but the afternoon was not without incident. This post violates my unofficial rule of "infertility posts only", so spare yourself the time if you like.
Prior to going to the title company I had to retrieve a few odds & ends from our home, one of which was a bag of garbage. Michigan has been experiencing several days of 90+ temperatures, so this bag of garbage was particularly "soupy" having been thoroughly heated by these temps in our garage. A short, smelly drive ensued and I was at the title company with time to spare - time enough, it turns out, to find a dumpster to deposit my trash into. I found an office building with an unsecured dumpster, pulled up next to it and waited for a crew of gentlemen to return to their building after a Friday lunch out. When they were out of earshot, I stealthily exited my vehicle and retreived the garbage bag from the back seat. Then, holding open the dumpster lid with my left hand while swinging the bag of garbage with my right hand to get it up and into the dumpster, I made my move.
As the garbage bag pendulum neared the bottom of its arc, the bag material stretched and gave way, spewing its contents all over the parking lot in a loud, stinky mess. The crew of gentlement turned out to still be within earshot, and to prove it, stopped abruptly staring into my direction as I held the top half of a dripping garbage bag, still wearing my business suit. There were old chicken breasts, eggs, melted ice cream, etc. in the puddle of garbage before me. I ducked down, grabbed a few of the items and chucked them into the dumpster before getting into my vehicle to depart the scene.
I won't be surprised if I see a fine for littering in my mailbox sometime over the next two weeks. For the record, my wife and I returned to the scene after closing to put the rest of the elements into the dumpster, except for the broken egg shells, a few pieces of glass, and of course, the melted ice cream.
Now that the close is behind us, a quote from Charles Schulz, of Peanuts fame seems relevant:
Prior to going to the title company I had to retrieve a few odds & ends from our home, one of which was a bag of garbage. Michigan has been experiencing several days of 90+ temperatures, so this bag of garbage was particularly "soupy" having been thoroughly heated by these temps in our garage. A short, smelly drive ensued and I was at the title company with time to spare - time enough, it turns out, to find a dumpster to deposit my trash into. I found an office building with an unsecured dumpster, pulled up next to it and waited for a crew of gentlemen to return to their building after a Friday lunch out. When they were out of earshot, I stealthily exited my vehicle and retreived the garbage bag from the back seat. Then, holding open the dumpster lid with my left hand while swinging the bag of garbage with my right hand to get it up and into the dumpster, I made my move.
As the garbage bag pendulum neared the bottom of its arc, the bag material stretched and gave way, spewing its contents all over the parking lot in a loud, stinky mess. The crew of gentlement turned out to still be within earshot, and to prove it, stopped abruptly staring into my direction as I held the top half of a dripping garbage bag, still wearing my business suit. There were old chicken breasts, eggs, melted ice cream, etc. in the puddle of garbage before me. I ducked down, grabbed a few of the items and chucked them into the dumpster before getting into my vehicle to depart the scene.
I won't be surprised if I see a fine for littering in my mailbox sometime over the next two weeks. For the record, my wife and I returned to the scene after closing to put the rest of the elements into the dumpster, except for the broken egg shells, a few pieces of glass, and of course, the melted ice cream.
Now that the close is behind us, a quote from Charles Schulz, of Peanuts fame seems relevant:
"That's the secret to life... replace one worry with another...."What shall we worry about next?
Friday, June 6, 2008
4.5 Hours til ...
Our close is still on track, and is scheduled for 1:00 p.m. this afternoon. I've been a nervous wreck all week because of articles like THIS and THIS and comments from Wilbur Ross in a speech of his I attended in which he stated housing prices will slide by another 15% before they hit bottom. This is a grim situation, especially in Michigan.
Tie to infertility: The wait before closing feels exactly like waiting for the call from the IVF nurse with our post-IVF pregnancy results ... only, hoping for better news this time. If this closing fell apart, we'd be fairly devastated ... all our stuff is moved, we really like the new (rental) house and neighborhood, and we're really looking forward to shedding our mortgage payment.
No success with month 4 of Femara. Wife is going to see Dr. M this morning for an ultrasound, and prep for IUI. Full steam ahead!
More to come next week. Enjoy the weekend, and all your transfers, shots, drugs, "we have to do it tonight because I'm ovulating", etc.
Tie to infertility: The wait before closing feels exactly like waiting for the call from the IVF nurse with our post-IVF pregnancy results ... only, hoping for better news this time. If this closing fell apart, we'd be fairly devastated ... all our stuff is moved, we really like the new (rental) house and neighborhood, and we're really looking forward to shedding our mortgage payment.
No success with month 4 of Femara. Wife is going to see Dr. M this morning for an ultrasound, and prep for IUI. Full steam ahead!
More to come next week. Enjoy the weekend, and all your transfers, shots, drugs, "we have to do it tonight because I'm ovulating", etc.
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