8dp5dt: nope.

Game's pretty much over. For some insane reason, Big Shiny Fertility Factory likes to do their betas two goddamn weeks after a 5-day transfer. This makes zero sense, except in the respect that it save them the effort of even dealing with women with short-lived chemical pregnancies. By 19dpo, either you're showing up good and dark on a plain ol' urine test, or you're negative and have been for some time. Which means that you've spent at least a solid week getting painful, expensive, and unnecessary rump-injections. Worse, many women (not me) may have spent an entire extra week consuming neither alcohol, caffeine, nor sushi.

I delicately pointed this out to my nurse, who agreed to let me come in on Friday (15dpo). Much better. At least I can spend the weekend letting my glutes recover.

I'm okay. I'm starting to try to wrap my head around the possibility that this may not be the story of my difficult journey towards the family I have always envisioned. It may be the story of my journey towards letting go of that vision.

I have an embarrassingly large collection of beautiful high-end baby carriers. I guess when the time comes I'll sell them and buy myself something really, really pretty.

5dp5dt: the evidence for and against

Data that support my being pregnant this cycle:

1. I did a super good job of distracting myself. In fact, we decided to up and get married with two weeks' notice, which definitely took my mind off Things.  The planning was a bit crazy, but the wedding was lovely. And three days after the wedding, we transferred two blastocysts to my uterus.
    
2. My lining rocked, which is to say that it was over 8mm, which for an Asherman's patient is awesome.
    
3. It would be hilarious if I got pregnant the same week I got married, so people could count back and make jokes about shotgun weddings.
    
4. I have been chock full of symptoms. Heavy draggy cramps, sore breasts, I got 'em. I have been quietly Sure for days.
    
5. My acupuncturist said I had really good energy. 

Data that support my not being pregnant this cycle:

1. It's 5dp5dt, or 10dpo, and my test strips are stark, stark white. I have been pregnant four times, not counting the lame-o chemical. I have never not had at least a faint line by now. Good betas, bad betas, I always had something by now.

There are 5 reasons why I am pregnant this cycle, and only 1 reason why I am not. The mathematically-inclined observer will note that 5>1.

Sadly, though, I think that single piece of evidence against rather outweighs  the five votes for.

Pills and newborns and ramblings

The first step to an IVF cycle is the taking of birth control pills, and believe me, the irony of this is lost on no one.

I hate this bit. They make me depressed, they make me nauseated, and I have the sneaking suspicion that they're not actually necessary. But I'm also apparently not interested in fighting it, so the little yellow pills I do pop.

I just got back from a solo cross-country visit with my best friend and her family, which consists of a husband, two preschoolers, a two month old baby, and an adolescent dog the size of a Shetland pony.

I had a great time. I was a bit nervous that my Crazy would boil over and get all over the newborn's sweet fuzzy head -- this is the baby that BFF was pregnant with while I was (briefly) pregnant with the Sea Monkeys, and I had so fondly imagined us being the mothers of newborns together.

But it was better than fine.  There was a certain leaning-on-the-bruise aspect, but it was far outweighed by the sensory delight of handling a tiny baby again. I got to wear him a good deal, and I love wearing babies. I smelled his head and stroked his wee crumpled hands and gave him bottles and it was not even bittersweet, just sweet with a side of wistful.

The only really painful moment was an unexpected one -- I was wearing him on my back and BFF and I were picking up the two older kids from nursery school. One of the other moms was chatting and airily said to BFF, upon being told that I was visiting "Oh, my best friend doesn't have kids either, it's great because they can help out, huh?"  It was a perfectly innocent thing to say, but I was just overwhelmed with ouch and couldn't say a thing back. I just froze. What felt like a year and was probably a few seconds later, BFF firmly corrected  her and said "no, she has a little boy at home with her partner".  And the world started again and everything was fine.

I mean, it wasn't a crazy assumption. How many mothers can just take off across the country to visit a friend? (Mothers of one who have a tolerant partner, that's who.) And how was she supposed to know, looking at me, that I am a mother? She couldn't see my c-section scar. I wasn't wearing a pin that said I gestated a child, ask me how!

I don't know why that spiked my grief, or why even remembering it now is so painful. Maybe because just for a minute it dangles me over the cliff of how close I came to not being a mother at all. It's becoming clear that my body doesn't love producing babies. Maybe our little guy was a complete fluke, a one-in-a-million. Maybe someone is going to show up and tell me that it was all a mistake and I don't get to keep him after all.  Nope. I don't care. I'm not giving him back.

This morning I was telling my boss about my trip and seeing the new baby. "It didn't give you ideas, did it?" she joked.

"Hahaha!" said I. "Ha! Ha."





It was a lovely trip. We ate stunningly good food, got massaged, got manicured and pedicure'd, and engaged in plenty of the activity I've missed most: chatting aimlessly with my best friend within hugging range. I'm awfully glad I went.

In Which We Receive Good News, but are Subjected to a Minor Annoyance

First and foremost: the HSG that I was so nervous about went really well. When I say "really well" I mean "did not hurt like a mofo" and also "had a good result."  I do think these two are related; I've had 3 HSGs in my life. Two of them were mildly uncomfortable, and deemed normal. One was excruciating and most definitely abnormal. It makes sense; stretching scar tissue is a lot more hurty than stretching a healthy uterus.

Anyway, the doctor said it was the best post-Asherman's HSG he'd seen, which made me feel a bit better about being so OCD about seeing a specialist, avoiding D&C, etc. Here's hoping it's a good sign!

The minor annoyance, on which I will of course expend a lot more text:

I went to have my teeth cleaned yesterday. I walked in and got my least-favorite hygienist, the one who seems to blame me for having a small mouth. As soon as she saw me she said "oh, are you pregnant?"

Me: ...no

Inappropriate Hygienist: Oh!

Me (coldly): I just carry all my fat on my abdomen.

IH: Oh, so do I, blah blah blah so hard to lose blah blah blah crunches blah blah.

Me:  You know, that's really not a good question to ask.

IH: I thought it was going to be a happy thing!

Me: I've had two miscarriages recently. I'd rather not hear that.

IH: Ohh... sorry. how are you doing? With all that.

Me (arctic): Fine.

IH: Do you have any kids?

Me: I have one, he's four.

IH: Well then, you're blessed.

Me: Yes.

IH: But you still want more?

Me (desperately): Can we please just not have this conversation?

IH: Oh.

IH leaves the room to get some supplies, comes back a few minutes later and asks about summer vacation plans. I spend the rest of the visit trying to pretend that she doesn't exist, which is pretty difficult considering that she's poking me with a sharp piece of metal.

The thing is, I do carry weight around my tummy. I have a Pooh-bear belly, and always have even at my thinnest. I mean, right now I'm less than 10 lbs over the NIH-sanctioned "healthy" weight, and I still have a gut. I ain't ashamed but I also don't find it particularly aesthetically pleasing, so I usually wear loose tops. This of course leads directly to pregnancy assumptions, because any woman wearing a loose top is probably pregnant, or at least would be pleased to discuss her reproductive status with complete strangers.

It's just one of life's little jokes that polycystic ovaries lead to both central obesity and difficulty achieving and maintaining pregnancy.

As the kids say on the internet, smh.

Here we go.

HSG is scheduled for tomorrow at 1:45 pm; I have to be there at 1 to rock the backless hospital gown.

I'm nervous as hell. Not only was the last one quite amazingly painful, but it was when I got the news about the Asherman's. It sucked. I'm not really looking forward to being in that room again. In fact, my last few visits to this particular hospital campus have not been the funnest experiences ever. Well. It already is what it is in there, it's just me knowing, right? And I always have to know.

In a few more months it'll be a cool two years since we started TTC #2. I won't say it's been a miserable two years, far from it! Over this time Small Boy has transformed from a toddling baby to a sturdy preschooler, full of ideas and plans and words and strategies. He's got enormous grey eyes and delts sculpted from playground tumbling and long, long legs on a rather short torso (sorry, kid, that one's all me). Sometimes it hurts how much I love him.

Other good stuff has happened. We got another four years of Obama, and my state got marriage equality, which means a tremendous amount to me.

It hasn't been the easiest two years, either. It's certainly had its moments. The ultrasound moment when the doctor said "I don't see a heartbeat. I'm sorry," feels like it's preserved in amber, but I hope that someday it will quietly dissolve.  The actual aftermath was not as terrible as that moment. In retrospect, it is something I'm kind of proud of. I worked, I researched, I stuck to my guns about the misoprostol. I was given a humane amount of pain relief and it was over quickly. I'm even glad I got to hold those two rather revolting little sea monkeys (although the positive nature of that experience was perhaps influenced by the aforementioned "humane amount of pain relief"). They were grody, but they were mine. I don't know if they were people. I know to some they would've been. But it's possible that they just weren't equipped to be people, they simply didn't have what they needed, there was no world in which they would've been people because they were just missing some vital ingredients.

I mean, it's also possible that they were perfect and my stupid Asherman-y uterus killed them, but whatevs. I can't know. I could've known, maybe, if I'd gone ahead and had the D&C so I could've had an analysis of the fetal tissue. But what would it have changed? I'd have been risking a future actual child in order to know more about what happened to these. So I guess I don't always have to know.

So here we are. In a lot of ways I'm in the best place I've been for two years. Calmer, happier, healthier. Ready to roll the dice two more times, and then, if I must, to put them down and walk away.

Gulp. Tomorrow I start rattlin' the bones.

Okay, breaktime's over.

I'm ready to start again.

It's been a good extra month. I am hypertensive, and there is a rather short list of pregnancy-safe medications (which of course I've been on temporarily for, oh, two years now while TTC). I was on a high dose of labetalol, which worked okay but made me super tired all the time and also dizzy whenever I bent down.

At the start of last month I thought "fuck it, I have to start living my real life, baby or no baby." So as part of the reclaiming-my-life project, I marched down to my GP and told her I wasn't happy on labetalol.  I've found an alternative (nifedipine) that appears to be working, and omg how much do I love not dreading buying something from the bottom shelf at the supermarket. I hadn't realized what a drag constantly trying to not squat or bend down was. I feel freeeeeeee!

My energy has come back, too. I'm in a positive feedback loop right now where because I'm not so tired, I'm getting a lot more exercise, which in turn energizes me. I've also put some major effort into upgrading my diet. Her Indoors was away for a whole week and I was rather afraid I'd starve, and so bought some meal-replacement spirulina-peatmoss-whatever protein shake mix.  That got me started on a smoothie kick,and I discovered that having breakfast and lunch smoothies seems infinitely easier to me than preparing and packing breakfast and lunch. I got a one-serve portable blender and have been going wild. For breakfast this morning I had coconut milk, soy butter, kale, and strawberries.  Lunch was avocado, kefir, spinach, cilantro, lime.  Nommm! I don't really do the protein powder shakes any more, but it's comforting to have them as a backup in case I just can't be arsed to cook (in the past, when I couldn't be arsed I'd just eat whatever random crapola came strolling by my desk). I haven't eaten this well in years, and I am actually approaching a so-called-"normal" BMI for the first time in about a decade.

And yeah, did I mention more energy? I've been taking Small Boy to the playground every day, which is awful good for both of us. Small Boy is an awesome small boy, and does something side-splittingly funny at least four times a day.

I dunno, things have just been good.  The last miscarriage is far enough in the past that it all seems like a dream now. Come on, what was I thinking? Pregnancy seems mysterious, remote, something that happens to other people.  Remote feels much better than just-outside-my-reach.

So of course, now that I'm feeling calm and happy and healthy, what I need to do is fuck it all up. Get back on that crazytrain of tests, hormones, appointments, waiting uncertainty, peeing on strips of cardboard, squinting at lines.

I'm expecting my period to start in the next few days. Between days 5-15 I'll have an HSG. If that looks okay (please) I'll start another FET cycle.

Really, with that much fun? How could I stay away?

Doom and gloom

So, there's a colleague of mine who for paperwork reasons became aware that I was doing IVF. She was really sweet about it, warmly wishing me luck. A few months later, she turned up pregnant for the first time (how do I know it was her first time? Because she announced it immediately. Women who've had a miscarriage don't do that.). She's in her mid-40s.

It was not a great leap for me to conclude that she had had fertility treatments, quite possibly donor egg, and that it was a long road for her to get there. She was due in November.

The other night, lying awake I suddenly thought "What ever happened to Nice Colleague's baby?  I never heard anything about... oh, god." I checked her online registry and only a very few things had been purchased.

And I lay there for a while, thinking about the fact that I don't know her well enough to sally up and say "hey, dead baby or what?" and feeling awful that at the end of what was probably a long journey, things turned out badly. And hurting for her for what it must have been like socially, given that she told everyone and then some.

So the next day I went to my friend who knows her a bit better and said, "hey, what about Nice Colleague's baby?" My friend furrowed her brow and said "Ummm... Ella? No, that's not it. Katie."

And that was that. Katie is fine. She was just low-key about it, didn't announce the birth to the whole world I guess, maybe had another registry someplace else or had friends who liked to buy things off-registry. She's fine. They're both fine. She and her husband are new parents.

I was staggered with relief. And then I thought huh, maybe I should try not to jump directly from didn't see a birth announcement  to oh, dead baby.

*   *   *

In other news, having an HSG next month to see if my pathetic periods are because my adhesions have returned, or because of who knows what. Please no adhesions. I would really rather not have to do all that again.