Days 5 and 6 of stims

Yesterday, my E2 was a measly 194. I'm on track for my worst (least egg-ful) cycle ever.

My head is full of broken glass. I'm spending most of my time desperately trying not to think.

Day 3 of stims

After two days of 225 Follistim/75 Menopur, my E2 was a measly 64. My dosages were upped to 300/150, and we'll see what that knocks out of my ovaries.  Some people say that if your first E2 level is bad you should just pack up and go home; I don't know that I believe that, given that my low-initial-response cycle is also the one that ended up with the creature who is currently bellowing a rather atonal punk cover of "Old MacDonald" in my ear.

I'm just trying not to look at anything but the ground right underneath my feet.

CD 9, Stims Day 7

Things are proceeding apace. On Saturday (CD 7/Stims day 5) my lining was 6.something, and I had about 5 follicles in the 8-10 range. Now, on Monday, my lining is 8 (yay!) but the follicles are still only 9-11. Depending on the bloodwork, I suspect that we may be jacking up the dose in order to hurry the follicles along. 

All this rigmarole is for the sole benefit of my lining, so I'm glad that it looks like the stims are helping. I think my body's not a big fan of estrogen pills. I know my brain chemistry isn't.


Stims day 5 E2: 176
Stims day 7 E2:298. Raising Follistim dose to 150iu.

Day 10: the good and the bad

The bad:
At this point in the last cycle, I had 6 correctly-sized follicles. This cycle, even with more medication, I have 5. There is no way to know why my ovaries are so sluggish this cycle. For heaven's sake, on a lower dosage I got 21 mature eggs my first cycle. It could be the metformin, but I've never heard anyone else say that metformin ruined their response.

The good:
My estrogen is much, much higher than it was last cycle. This bespeaks of the possibility of lurking eggs. A couple more may well fatten up and surprise us. We're giving my ovaries another day to cook and cutting down the dosage.

Herein I enclose a table for my own record-keeping, enjoyment & convenience, because I find hand-coding HTML tables strangely soothing:

	E2
	Cycle 2	Cycle 3
Day 4	134	154
Day 6	445	491
Day 8	910	1401
Day 10	1938 (trigger)	3226
Day 11 (trigger)		4065 (trigger)

Of course, this also means that the risk for OHSS is going back up, but

1. It's less likely with so many fewer follicles, regardless of the E2;
2. I do not care.

Another scan tomorrow, likely trigger tomorrow night, for a Monday retrieval.

So that's the news. On the whole I'm feeling much much happier than I was a few days ago, when it seemed that even pumping up the dose wasn't doing anything to make this cycle different from last. At least things are moving. Or at least I'm high on estrogen.

Day 5 of Stims: not so good

My E2 was pretty low on Saturday, as low as it was last time with my "poor response" cycle, despite the higher dose of stims. It must be the metformin.

We raised the dose and I quit taking the metformin. If I have <10 follicles on tomorrow's scan we'll cancel this cycle and consider converting to an IUI. If you know anything about the issues here, you know that this would be a hideously hilarious choice for me.

Most people would only cancel a cycle with <5 follicles, but this is my last chance, my last insurance-covered cycle. I want it to be everything it can be. I don't even care about OHSS any more. I just want a big old crop of eggs.

I will admit that my first thought about canceling the cycle and trying again was oh crap, not more birth control pills.

IVF #3: Day 3 of Stims

Hey, I'm back!

Not a lot of excitement, other than the fact that the birth control pills made me vomit this time around. Yecchh. Sympathy to my heterosexual sistren.

They also, like last time, made me really, really depressed. I've been off of them for a week now and the miasma is finally starting to clear.

Anyway. Third day of stims, yeah. Having one underreponse and one overresponse under my belt, of course I'm eager to see where this one will land. We're using an "overreponse" amount of stims, but I'm on metformin, which will hopefully modulate my response enough to keep me away from OHSS.

I am also considering transferring two embryos. Maybe if I sacrifice my principles, the sacrifice will be deemed handsome enough, and I'll finally get to have a freaking baby. Don't you have to let go, open your hand, give up, just relax before you can get pregnant?

I don't believe any of that, of course. Of course.

A while ago, when I was trawling the internet for depressing videos, I found one called "The Slow Path to Motherhood". I can't say the video spoke to me, but the title has stuck in my mind. The slow path to motherhood. This is the path I'm on, and the implications of that tumble around in my head.

Is there some way spin it positively, to find meaning in the fact that I'm on this path? I've toyed with the idea that maybe I'll appreciate motherhood more, having arrived this way. But you know, I think most parents love their children pretty much to the max, regardless of whether it was easy or hard to get 'em.

I don't think it's made me a better person. I think it's made me a worse person. I liked myself a lot better two years ago.

In conclusion: the only lesson I think I have learned from this path is that this is the path I'm on. Gracefully or gracelessly, this is the path I have to stumble down, and hope that what's at the end is what I want it to be (hint: live squalling infant, stinky diapers, hysterical toddler, condescending teenager).

And if there isn't? That will be the path I'm on then. And I guess I will find some way to walk it.

Day 3 of Stims

Thing's're going well. I'm feeling pretty good. The morning Lupron shots are now warm and familiar enough that, even half asleep, I scoot over to the side of the bed and assume the position my quite willingly. The volume's down by half (.05 now) and my darlin brought me home a bunch of 28 1/2 ga needles, which are so very tiny that they can barely be felt.

The evening's entertainment has been the stim medications. There's certainly a satisfying amount of pomp and circumstance in this procedure. Before the shot I carefully arrange all the supplies -- Follistim pen, vials of Menopur and sterile water, 3cc syringe, 22ga 1" needle of mixing, 27ga .5" needle for injectin', Q-cap for mixing, alcohol swabs, sharps container. 225iu Follistim, 75iu Menopur, .5cc water, mix, shoot up. It hurts more than the Lupron -- not so much the needle stick, but there's a distinct stinging sensation as it's injected, and since there's a lot more of it, that last a little while. It doesn't hurt very much on any absolute scale, though.

After the shot I lie down for 20 minutes or so and listen to this meditation cd I bought because I am a sucker okay. It's a pretty standard guided meditation, except it leads you through picturing the medications gently coursing through your blood (I think of it as little dollar signs mixing in with the red blood cells). The medicated blood surrounds your ovaries, coaxing out a bounty of healthy eggs.

I like it. I'm skeptical enough that when she says something about "bringing forth new life" I always have to say out loud "maybe". But it's a nice time to lie there and visualize metaphors. I think right now the one I'm grooving on is forcing seeds. Because that's what we're doing, see. The Follistim is the Gro-Light, and my ovaries are some nice rich potting soil, and hopefully tons of little seeds will spring forth. Unfortunately I know even less about gardening than I do about reproductive endocrinology, so that's as far as the metaphor can go really.

My first follicle scan is on Tuesday. Think big, people. Lots of nice follicles pls. They don't have to be fast-growing, slow is fine, but I want a lot of them.

In other news:

Things I like about Blogspot
How easy it is to post pictures without worrying about hosting
Being able to get actual names from nonmember commenters
The interface, in general
The fact that it's not Livejournal.

Things I dislike about Blogspot
The lack of THREADED COMMENTS. I had not anticipated how much I'd hate not being able to easily reply to comments. Instead I have to go like this:

Dawn, I love that picture! My favorite wedding dress designer (is it sad that I have a favorite wedding dress designer?) is Atelier Aimee, whose main gag is pinning a lot of silk roses to things. I throughly approve.

Big love going out to Emily and Shannon and Kristy and Lizzies. Your presence as we go through this krazy kaper is something I'm very grateful for. HART.

Sarah/Mrs Bluemont, thank you so much, and welcome! I've enjoyed your blog for a while now so I'm very glad to finally make your acquaintance.

Cowgirl, thanks! And I am so glad to be off the BCPs -- they made my breasts so sore that my dog would brush one with his paw during the night and I'd wake up hissing in pain. I started sleeping with a pillow protectively covering them. No fun.

Now see, that would have been a lot easier on LJ. Has anyone come up with a threaded comment solution for Blogspot? Or is the answer "move to Wordpress"? I kind of like the Googley oneness of Blogspot, but the lack of threaded comments is really really annoying.