Fertilization Report!

I woke up this morning feeling like a truck ran me over... I'm sore! Like I did a thousand sit ups! But nothing a little Tylenol and heating pad can't fix! :)

My RE just called with the results of the ER.... out of the 17 eggs they retrieved, 15 were mature!!! Out of the 15, 14 fertilized normally!!! They froze 4 for future use (if needed) and will let the 10 grow normally. I am praying we get some good growth in the next 2 days for our transfer on Thursday! The RE said she would call tomorrow and let me know more details about the transfer.

I called Tommy right away, of course he was taking an nap!! So not sure how much he really comprehended, but at the end I told him we were proud parents to 14 children, and all he said was "that's good!" I'll have to tell him again when he comes to! :)

Egg Retrival

Well, egg retrieval was this morning at 7am. Got there, got in a room in the labor and delivery wing, the nurse came in and started an IV, then we waited... for almost an hour! My Dr. got there about 8am, then the anestesiologist came in and talked to me. I walked to the OR with my IV and sexy hairnet, booties, and gown. The last thing I remembered was going into the OR and them strapping down my arms on the table... then it was lights out!

Woke up at 9am in recovery with the nurse by my side... everything was over! All she could tell me at that time was they got 17 eggs! She said the average was 10-13, so I was happy with that. They will call tomorrow to let me know how they are growing.

After about 30 min. in recovery, they wheeled me back down to my room, where Tommy was waiting. I ate some gormet graham crackers and Sprite, and after about an hour, I had to pee. After that, got dressed, and away we went. We got home about 10:30am.

I am still in quite a bit of pain, even after the drugs they gave me, so I am just taking it easy on the couch. Hopefully the cramping will go away later today.

OK, enough for the update, I gotta head back to the couch! :)

We Are SET!

I had my third appt. this morning with the RE. Did more b/w and another gander with the DildoCam (hee hee, that's what she called it!). My eggs have grown, but still are a bit smaller than what she wants on one side, so I will do ONE more day of meds (tonight). I still had about 6 big ones on my right, and a gaggle of big ones on my left. But they are pleased overall at how I responded to the drugs!

Tomorrow night (Sat. night), I will take the hCG shot, which is the hormone that will trigger all my eggs to ovulate. After the shot, it takes about 36 hours for them to release. I am to report to the hospital, labor and delivery floor, at 7am on Monday morning for my ER (egg retrival)!! It's finally set in stone!

The protocol is that I will get there at 7am, they get me in a room, get an IV started, then the anesthesiologist will come in and talk to me. I then will walk down the hallway to the OR, where they will put the happy drugs in my IV. Meanwhile, Tommy will be there *ahem* doing his thing at the collection lab. I will drift off for about a 20 min. nap, while they take out my eggs. Basically, they take a long syringe and poke it into my ovary and suck out the eggs, both ovaries. They also use the ultrasound wand to direct them where to go. Once I wake up, a half hour or hour later, I will go to recovery until I can eat, drink, and pee by myself. Then we are free to go home! They said they will send me home with Tylenol (hospital strength) for any pain. Also she said I can use a heating pad to help with any cramping. I should be up and at em the next day. They will then have the emryologist call the next day to get me a report of how many they got, how many are mature, and how many fertilized. That will be the exciting part!

I will update again after the retrival to let you all know how it went. I'm so ready to get these things out of me... I feel so terribly bloated!!

The transfer is scheduled for Thursday, April 2. That will be a big day. I can't wait!!

2nd Dr. Appt

Had my second Dr. appt. and follie check today, and I'm still on track! The follies have grown even more, but still not ready. They want me to stay on meds 2 more days on the same dosage to see if they can get any bigger.

Right side:
8 total, biggest at 14mm
Lots of little ones

Left side:
7 big ones and lots of little ones
3 at 13mm
3 at 14mm
1 at 15mm

Left side definatly doing better than the right (they want them to be at least 18mm). My estrogen level is also at a good level right now, so so far so good. I go back in again Friday morning for another u/s and more b/w. Depending on that, ER is scheduled for Sunday, with the ET on Wednesday April 1!

Also, another good thing, that I didn't know my RE does, we are doing ICSI with the eggies and spermies! I can't remember what is stands for, but it's basically when they will inject the sperm into the egg to "force" fertilization, rather than having the eggs and sperm do it on their own. This way, there is a better chance for getting more eggs fertilized! This is also called "assisted hatching". Technology is totally amazing, isn't it!?!??

On a down note, my back is not any better, in fact it's worse that on Monday. I stayed home from work on Tuesday and layed down all day like my chiro suggested with ice on my back to reduce the swelling... Yeah, that didn't help much. I have another chiro appt. tomorrow, so we will see what his next step is. I am just so tired of being in constant pain. It hurts to sit or walk, the only relief is laying down... well, can't do that at work too well! He mentioned doing anti-inflamatory meds, but I can't take any of that because it will interfere with the fertility drugs I'm taking, so blah... I'll just have to suck it up for now!

First Follie Check

I had my first follie check this moring at the RE's. This is to check my progess of how many follicles I am producing on my ovaries. They also did bloodwork too. Of course, I had to be there at 7am this morning (blah) the morning after going to a rock concert with a bunch of friends. It was hard to get up, I'll tell you that!!

Anyhoo, my Dr. called back to let me know I am "cookin' along" just fine! On my left ovarie, there are 6 big ones, and on my right, there were several at 10mm (18mm is the goal, those are considered mature). So they are keeping me on the same dose of Gonal-F (300iu), and starting Tuesday night, I will start another med on top of that, Ganarelix. That is a shot that I will give myself in the upper thigh. It's to stop ovulation, in case I would start to go on my own. I will take that for the next 3 days after that.. depending on when egg retrieval (ER) will be.

I sure have been feeling it though, my sides ache all the time! So I know I'm growing something in there! The meeds also gve me a slight headache after I inject them, but other than that, no side effects.

She wants to see my again in Wed. morning for the next follie check. With that appt., they will probably determine when ER will be! It's getting so close!

Ugh, shots!

Well today will be day 3 of stims.... ugh. It's been a little while since I've done shots, so it took me a minute to remember how to property mix the drugs, when to switch needle sizes, etc. I did finally figure it out, and my first one went off without a hitch.. or at least I thought. I woke up the next morning with a HUGE bruise on my belly where I gave the shot! Ooops! Not sure what I did, but won't do it again! ;) Last night's shot was better, no bruising this morning!

I am on 300iu of Gonal-F, which is almost double the amount I was on for the IUI's (175iu). Let's hope lots of nice mature follies grow!! Still on track for a Sunday morning follie check!

One thing that has really been bothering me latley is my lower back.. I've been going to the chiro and icing it down, like he says, but it still hurts. I have always had lower back problems due to my long torso, but geez, I'm in constant pain now. Tommy tells me I need to get this fixed before I get pregnant, because it will only get worse! I hope more therapy and ice will do the trick!

First Appoinment

I just got back from from the RE for my first appt. Aunt Flo started this morning, so I called in to report, and they wanted to see me for bloodwork and a measuring procedure. They had to measure the length of my uterus to determine where exactly she is going to place the embryos for the IVF procedure.

She was so sweet when she came in the room, she gave me a hug and asked me if I missed her! LOL I told her I've been trying to get healthy and work out in the 3 month break we took, and she told me to scale back from now on. Only walking on the treadmill (no more than 3 hours a week), swimming, and light weights to keep toned, but no running or hard excercise. Oh darn! ;)

She also did an ultrasound, and everything looks good, so they will call me this morning with my blood results, and from there determine what dosage I will start with the Gonal-F. She said I will start tomorrow, and go for 5 days, and be checked again on Sunday morning.

Here we go! Pray for us!

Meds!

Well, the pharmacy called this morning and we filled my prescriptions for my meds. After the nice lady on the phone told me what all I will be taking, and the TOTAL, I about screamed ($2943.00)! It was about double what I had paid for my IUI's! So I asked if I could call my Dr. to verify that I will need ALL those meds. I got a nurse on the phone at the RE's office, and she told me I might need all of it, but this is what you can order now and see if you need the rest later. It all depends on how well I respond to the drugs!

So I called the pharmacy back and told her I was only going to order part of the prescription. Still, for 2 multi-dose vials of Gonal-F (to stimulate my ovaries to produce eggs), 2 vials of Ganarelix (to make sure I don't ovulate on my own), 1 vial of hCG (to trigger ovulation once the eggs are mature), and 2 vials of the wicked Progesterone in Oil (to help keep my progesterone levels high after the procudure... my body doesn't make enough on it's own), the total was $2000.50! Ouch!

My friends at work who know what's going on keep threatening to put up a website called: getheatherknockedup.com. For donations! Knowing them, they probably would do something like that! Crazy kids!

So they are scheduled to arrive on Tuesday, St. Patrick's Day. I just hope they come with the Luck of the Irish that day!

Next step forward

On my way back to the office after having lunch with one of my friends, Jenn (it was so fun!), I got a phone call from my RE's office (RE stands for Reproductive Endocronologist). Our pre-IVF lab work (blood) came in normal (I figured they would, not really worried about it!) So now the nurse was going to get my prescription sent to the pharmacy so I can order my meds either today or tomorrow! It's all getting so real! I really can't wait to get going now... we're both sooo ready!

No worries

After a nice long talk last night, we are a full go ahead for IVF. Tommy pays the bills, so he knows exactly our financial situation, and I guess I was just assuming it was worse off that it really is. So he assured me we will be fine and to quit worrying and to get ready for the procedure!

And with that good news, I decided to paint this weekend in our house! I'm painting the upper and lower hallways a tanish color, with white trim. I'm excited! Then next, our bedroom. Then after that, hopefully the nursery ;)

And reality sets in...

We have been pretty positive about our decision to go ahead with IVF. Now I'm not so sure. Last night when I got home, and got the mail, there was a letter from Methodist hospital. It was a letter threatening to send us to collections for our past medical bills! I thought, "Isn't Tommy paying these bills?" When he came home, I asked him about it and showed him the letter. Yes, he has been paying the bills, just a little at a time (he basically lost his job with Visinet over the winter and is barely working 15 hours a week).

So what's the problem? He was furious. So I called and talked to a very nice gal at the hospital. Apparently, there is a minimum payment due every month, and we have been making payments under that amount. Well, it would be nice know what that payment about was!! We are both praying it starts turning green soon so Bigg Dogg can start up again!

I told him I don't think we should do this if we can't afford to pay off the bills we have already racked up from all the previous fertility treatments. He said we should just move ahead. I'm not so sure that's the best idea. I just don't know what to do. It's a horrible, horrible feeling to know that money is a barrier to being parents. Especially when there are sooo many people out there that get pregnant by an "oops" and who do not deserve or appreciate it.

As of now, we are still a go, but we only have about a week to decide. I start meds next week. God, I pray this works.

OK, so I suck at blogging....

Alright, so it's been umm.... 3 months since my last blog, shoot me. It's been a crazy, hectic 3 months.... I will do a quick update, so then I will be up to date.

Well, long story short, we have been trying since we got married, April of 2007. The first few months, we were optimistic. Then it slowly faded, and dissappointment set in. I called my OB, she said we could do some fertility testing, so that's what we did. Nothing. Nothing is techinically wrong, so we were labeled with "unexplained infertility". What a label.

We then moved on to IUI's...first one with Clomid. Failed. Next 2 with Fermara. Failed. Moved on to Dr. Maud Doherty. She's awesome! Tried another IUI with injectible meds, where I had to give myself a shot in the stomach every day to stimulate my ovaries. Failed. We thought we would try one more IUI with injectibles... it worked!

We didn't want to jinx it, so we didn't tell ANYONE. I found out 2 days before Thanksgiving 2008. Our first ultrasound would be December 12, Tommy's bday. We were so excited to see our little bean on that ultrasound machine. Only the nurse didn't find anything. Well, not in the place it should have been. It had implanted way up by the entrance of my tube. We were told we would have to abort the pregnancy, as it would eventually cause problems for the fetus and me. We were crushed. I will never forget that day.

Yep, it finally happened, we finally got prgnant, and then it was taken away. And of course, all this happened on Tommy's birthday. I felt horrible enough, but for it to happen then... So I had to have a D&C, scheduled right before Christmas. Then I was put on medication to make sure all the tissue would be removed. We couldn't even try again for 3 months, so I was put on birth control pills. And now looking back, it was a blessing in disguise to take a break. I think we both needed it to keep our sanity. We never got to tell anyone about this pregnancy, until now.

I also decided this was as good a time as ever, now that I'm not on any fertility drugs (which can cause weight gain), to try and lose some weight. I am proud to say, as of Jan. 1, I am down 18 lbs! Woo hoo!

During the past 3 months, work got crazy... we had to let go of a girl on New Years Eve, so I took on part of her workload, and it was nuts... for 2 months, it really sucked. We finally hired someone capable of taking over, so now my life has finally slowed down a bit at work! Also during this time, I was helping Tommy get ready for spring aerating and lawn season, so that took my time. Oh yeah, and I designed a totally new website for the business. Check it out if you want, http://www.biggdoggservices.com/

So here I am today, on my birthday, thinking, this was NOT how I planned my 35th to be. Don't get me wrong, I really am having a great day, everyone has made me feel really loved! I just thought I would have a family by now. So after all the fertility treatments we have tried, and ultimatly failed at, Tommy and I decided to go for it, all or none...... IVF.

Yesterday, we went in for our pre-IVF blood work that checks for HIV, Hepatitis B & C, and something else I can't remember. So once they come back clear, we will start the process on my next cycle, which according to my calendar, should be around March 17th.

So I will try and keep everyone updated as we go through this interesting process so I have some outlet. I only ask that you keep us in your prayers, as we go through this journey neither one of us thought we would ever have to travel down. They say life's a journey, not a destination... that is no lie. I am only so thankful I have the best husband in the world to go on this journey with, no matter how trying it will be.