The eggs they are a cookin'

The egg farm is busy! I have done 3 full days of stims so far, and one additional day of menopur (I do the Gonal F and Lupron in the evenings). I had my first follie check this morning. My little ovaries sure have been busy!

Dr M measured about 11 follicles on one side and about 9 on the other. Some of them were still pretty small, at 4 mm or so, but the largest one was at 9.5, and the closest smaller ones were at 8, 7.5 and 7 etc. Dr M. was a little concerned that the one that was at 9.5 COULD show a tendency of gaining dominance, but he said a lot would depend on the blood results. 

CCRM called back and said my blood work looked fine, E2 was at 162, and P4 was at 0.2. They want me to continue with the same dose - 75 iu Menopur, 150 iu Gonal F, 5 units Lupron, and Dexamethasone. 

I have to admit I was freaking out the whole time after the u/s visit till the phone call from CCRM. I was thinking I had spoken too soon when I said my body responds well to meds, and I was thinking "I knew it!! The low dose is what's messing everything up!" and I was imagining them calling and saying "OK, never mind, you have one dominant follicle and we are canceling your IVF!" 

I asked them if the one larger follicle was anything to worry about (even though it's really only 1.5 mm bigger than the next smaller one). The nurse said that in their perspective, it's not. She said everything looks good. 

DH says I am genetically tuned to worry. He thinks my brain NEEDS a reason to worry, and if there isn't anything to worry about, THAT becomes the reason. It's like a homing device in my brain - whirring around, looking for the worry objective! 

OK - I just wanted to update you guys on today's progress. I need to pack and do 1 million things before tomorrow, so I'd better get off my butt now. 

I will try and post an update once we reach Denver tomorrow night, but if I don't get to, and if I don't "talk" to you any more this year, here's wishing you a fantastic new year! May 2009 bring you and your family peace, joy, fulfilled dreams and much more! 

Hugs to you all - and thank you from the bottom of my heart for holding my hand and helping me keep my sanity (or what's left of it!) 

Mmmmwwwwaaaah to all of you!

The year in review

Dec 31, 2007 - We were in England, nearing the end of our WTF getaway after our m/c a few weeks before that. We spent New Years Eve with cousins at their home. It was a pretty quiet New Years Eve. We welcomed in 2008 with a strong hope of better things to come.

Jan 2008 - I continued to feel stressed at work. My job was client facing, and I needed to be projecting a smiling and happy face all the time, on phone and in person. I was finding that very hard to do, given that I didn’t have much to FEEL happy about. DH had quit his job a few months before that, and was working on launching a company. He was building the concept, and getting software development done. I needed to continue working to keep the money coming, and to continue my health insurance.

Feb 2008 - After a tough January, February didn’t seem to be getting better. The last straw was a discussion with my manager where she mentioned “Your team could have done better numbers in December”. I couldn’t believe that she was being so insensitive to what I had gone through in December. I had not even taken any time off after my D&C – I was back at work the very next working day! Had she mentioned my team’s numbers for January, I could have accepted that perhaps I was taking longer than usual to “get over it” and perhaps I should pull my act together and not let my work suffer. But to take things back to December was a bit too much for me. I also realized that if I was so stressed at work, I was not going to be in a positive frame of mind for my next IVF(s). And I was not getting any younger. I HAD to focus on my treatments and TTC more than anything else.

I spent the next few days thinking things through. We crunched our numbers to see if we could afford to live without a salary coming into the house. After several discussions between DH and me, and after several spreadsheets and number crunching sessions, our decision was made. I quit my job. We were scheduled to go to India for my brother’s wedding at the end of February, so I stayed on at my job till the end of February, training a couple of people to take over my role, transitioning out my clients and informing everyone that I was leaving (My manager wanted to tell the clients I was going on “leave for an indefinite period of time”, but I didn’t want to lie to anyone.)

March 2008 -  We were in India for my brother’s wedding. 2 nights before his wedding, we were all at a pub, drinking and dancing. I skidded on the floor, twisted my knee, and ended up with a stress fracture on my knee. I had to attend my only brother’s wedding in a full leg cast, on crutches! Further travel plans in India (to my hometown, to my in-laws’ place) were shelved. We tried to upgrade our economy return tickets to business class (because I couldn’t fold my leg to fit in an economy seat). Our cheap ass tickets could not be returned, upgraded, canceled or changed in anyway. So we ended up spending $6000 in new full priced business class tickets for both DH and me (the airline would not let me travel alone in business class!) And we had to get back because I had IVF#3 scheduled to start at the end of March.

We got back here, and asked my knee doctor if we could proceed with IVF. He allowed us to. We asked my RE if it was ok to go through IVF while I was still hopping around on crutches – and he said it was ok, as long as I was not on any medication.

So we proceeded with IVF # 3

April 2008 -  Chemical pregnancy. Low first beta, started falling at the second beta and was gone by the third. I was heart broken! But determined to get moving on. We scheduled IVF #4.

May 2008 -  I did acupuncture before starting stims for IVF#4.

June 2008 -  BFP!! We were overjoyed! Nicely doubling betas and everything seemed perfect. But even before the month was out, I had a strange feeling that something was not right. I requested for an early u/s, and they couldn’t find anything in my uterus. No yolk sac, no nothing. They repeated blood work and u/s a couple of times. No miracles happening in there.

July 2008 -  Plateaued HcG levels. I had numerous blood tests, while they waited for me to “miscarry on my own”. Finally on July 16, I had a D&C. HcG started rising after that! On July 18, I was given methotrexate to stop the growth of the embryo wherever it was – they weren’t able to find the embryo at all. The rest of the month was spent getting blood tests every second day, tracking my HcG down to 0. The process took 3 weeks!

August 2008 - WTF re-group with local RE, Dr. M. He suggested that we talk to CCRM (and I had been reading a lot about CCRM myself). We decided to go ahead, and had our phone consult with Dr. Schoolcraft the same month.

September 2008 -  Went to Denver for our one-day work up. Dr Schoolcraft felt my uterus was abnormally shaped and that before we proceeded with further treatment, he wanted to increase the room in my uterus.

October 2008 - Traveled back to Denver for my uterine surgery to fix my “sort of T shaped uterus”.

November 2008 -  Waiting

December 2008-  Post op visit to Denver. My uterus looks good. I started my shots for IVF #5. As of right now, we have 2 days to go before we leave for Denver on the 31st!

So it’s been an eventful year, to say the least. A lot has happened. We have survived the year, curtailing our lifestyle, living on a lower budget. We have survived on our savings. We have built stronger foundations in our marriage. Our “fair weather friends” have disappeared (though I’m sure if we invite all those people for a party even today, they’ll be here in 10 minutes!!). Our “true friends” have emerged and stuck with us. We have launched our company, in the midst of a shocking economic downturn, which we had not anticipated. We have not made any money yet, but are keeping our fingers crossed!

We have our fingers crossed for many things in our lives at this point. We hope our company does well. We hope our IVF works out and we get to bring home a baby in 2009.

I have a lot of hopes for 2009. I hope I’m not disappointed. I know that like me, there are many of you out there who are hoping for miracles and BFPs and babies in 2009. I hope and pray for all of us. I hope 2009 is our year! 

Let the games begin!

I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas! 

I had my baseline u/s and blood work this morning. If there's anything that responds the way it's supposed to, (knock on wood), it's my body on meds. Suppression check looked good. No cysts on the ovaries, AF came when she was supposed to, nothing weird going on. 

CCRM just called and gave me the go ahead on starting stims tomorrow. So I start with 75 iu Menopur in the morning, 150 iu Gonal F in the evening, reduce Lupron to 5 iu, and continue on the dexamethasone. 

I asked my local RE here about the lower doses, and he thinks it's fair to start low and see how I respond, and increase the dose if need be. Also he said that my ovaries are showing a decent number of antral follicles, and according to him, things are looking better than they did at my last couple of IVFs with him. 

I have my first follie u/s and blood work on Tuesday, and we are scheduled to fly to Denver on Wednesday! Wow - we just have 4 full days before we leave!  

2008 is drawing to a close as well. Actually I can't wait for the year to be over - 2008 brought with it many many trials and tribulations, and I'm ready to move on to the next chapter, the next calendar of events. Last year, after our m/c, we thought that nothing could be worse, and that 2008 would definitely be a better year. We know better now. Things COULD be worse, and they were. 

I'm looking forward to 2009 to bring us the change in the direction of the wind that we all so desperately need. 

Booty Call????

Anyone else hear about this? Booty Call service by Baby.center? 

So last night we were watching the local news. They kept giving these teasers saying "Coming up..... the latest high tech method couples are using to help them get pregnant!! Stay tuned!!" We kept watching, waiting for that piece to come on. Finally, it did.

I couldn't believe what they were saying! Baby.center has a new service called "Booty Call" where they send you SMS messages during your "ovulation window" to "remind you to have sex"!!! And the woman they had profiled was "Trying for our 4th child, I have a part time job, there's ballet lessons, soccer practice, day care and so many things to do, that I'm so short of time!!" 

4th child??? Lady, shut up and get off my TV set!!!!! I mean, seriously! If you guys want to do a piece on "high tech methods couples are using to help them get pregnant", do a real life piece! Do a piece that involves real high tech methods! Send your reporters to our blogs, you'll find all your material yourself!! 

This is the silly crap they dish out to people, and that's what the normal public believes! The baby.center rep was talking about this service "We send you a text message once at the beginning of your ovulation window, once three days after that, and once right at the end of your ovulation window. Your husband gets the exact same text message. This way, you are both aware of the best time in your cycle to make you pregnant. We know that people have busy lives and don't have time to track their calendars."

How I wish our reason for not getting pregnant was just pure simple "Lack of time to have sex!!" Oh, I'm so busy running from ballet lessons to soccer practice to PTA meetings for my 3 children!!! Yeah, right!!!!

OK - rant over! :-) And by the way - I don't mean to sound rude to anyone who has children and is trying for a second, third or even fourth child. I mean, if you're "trying" and having trouble, I totally get you, and I fully support you. But if your "trouble" is that you have no time, then I'm a little peeved!

On another note - I'm over being angry about having to wait for FET. Yes, it will be 6 weeks longer, but what are we to do. I don't want to pressure CCRM into doing the biopsy earlier, or anything like that. I know they're doing what is best for us, and I know we'll be ok in the end. Thanks all of you for your support yesterday. DH was so cute - he cooked dinner for me, cleared up after dinner, took me out today, and basically helped me calm down. So I'm ok now :-)

Lord, how much longer!!!

I was wanting to write a post about all the nesting instincts I was having recently. I was counting the days in my mind, thinking of all the "clearing up" and "sorting out" I had to do before we leave for Denver, because "When we come back, I'll be in my 2ww, and then I'll be pregnant, and won't be able to do a lot of the stuff I want to do". 

And get this, I even started knitting!!!! If you're someone who knows me, you'll know how UNLIKE me that is! Knitting! I have nothing against it, and have a lot of respect for people who can create beautiful things out of yarn and needles. My mom knits, and I love the stuff she makes for us. But somehow, it's never been something I would pick up on my own to do. Yet, this weekend, I had this huge urge to knit. I went and got yarn, and needles, got on the internet, learnt how to cast stitches, and began to knit. It's not a very ambitious project, it's just a scarf, but hey, for me, that's the most "nestive" I've been!! 

And then today, we got a call from the genetic counselor at CCRM. Apparently they have decided we are going to do a freeze all cycle. So essentially, POOF!! There goes my visions of coming back from Denver during my 2ww, and getting a BFP after that. I need to re-adjust my vision to - come back from Denver after ER, and go back in 6 weeks AGAIN!!!!!!!!!! 

Let me explain what they are planning to do. See, because DH has a balanced translocation, our embryos need to go through PGD. The process of PGD requires a biopsy - where they remove one or more cells from the embryo, and then a FISH analysis, which is the process by which they do the actual testing. 

So far, the local clinic (and most other clinics in the nation) do the biopsy on day 3, get the PGD results back by day 5 for a transfer on day 5 itself. 

Dr Schoolcraft and CCRM's embryologist / geneticists suggested that we try a slightly different approach. They said they would biopsy the embryos on day 5, instead of day 3. This could be helpful in 3 ways:

1) On day 3, the cells are not yet divided into the inner cell mass and the trophoblast. (The inner cell mass is what forms the baby, and the trophoblast forms the placenta and membranes around the baby. The genetic material in all these cells is the same) So when they biopsy, they could be taking out a cell which would potentially have grown to form part of the inner cell mass, which forms the baby. (Note - there is no evidence that this harms the baby, but in the event that it COULD, the RE was wondering if we could avoid the biopsy on Day 3)

By day 5, the inner cell mass and trophoblast are defined, and the biopsy could be done such that cells are removed from the trophoblast only. 

2) Since by day 5, the blastocyst has 60-80 cells, we COULD take more than 1 for biopsy. This way we can reduce any error rates the lab may have. If they have a doubt, they can have a backup cell or two to repeat the tests.

3) By day 5, we will also know much more about the general health of the embryos. 

So they plan to do the biopsy on day 5. At first they told us we would do a day 6 transfer (which could be touch and go, because embryos MAY not survive in the lab culture beyond day 5). Even for a potential Day 6 transfer, we were going to have to really hope and pray and keep our fingers crossed that the results came back within the 24 hours between the biopsy and Day 6. 

Well, CCRM has decided to leave the guessing out of the game. They have decided they will biopsy on Day 5, and vitrify the embryos right then. It could take 24 to 48 hours for the results to come back, but they want us to come back maybe in 6 weeks for a FET. 

Advantages of FET under these circumstances:

1) We aren't going to be left wondering if the embryos will survive in the lab culture beyond Day 5. 

2) My body will have time to get rid of the effects of the stims that I will be on, and will have time to prime up my uterine lining for ET. 

We were worried that since we usually have only 1 or 2 normal embryos after PGD, and since the thawing process kills 30-40% of the embryos, what if the 1 or 2 good ones die? But they tell us that the new process of freezing that they use - flash freezing or vitrification - has ensured that they haven't lost any embryos to thaw related deaths. 

My first reaction when I got off the phone today - complete anger and frustration! How much longer must this whole thing drag out??? In the time that I have been waiting to get started since my ectopic pregnancy in June/July - people have almost their third trimesters of their pregnancies!!! 

CCRM had told me when they gave me the IVF calendar that we COULD freeze all, and that we would decide that after ER, depending on how the embryos are growing, and how things look then. So we could have received this news right at the nth hour. 

Somehow, even though we have advance notice of it, I'm still mad. I'm mad that this whole process is so much out of our control, and that there's nothing we can do to change that fact. I'm mad that I've put my whole life on hold - all of 2008 has gone in just waiting. 

I know I will have to accept this, and that it's probably for the best, and that the doctors are doing what they can to improve our chances, but I'm just feeling so impatient right now! I know I'll be more relaxed about it tomorrow. I know that I will take this too in my stride tomorrow - but right now, I feel like screaming. 

I'm honored and touched

Heavyheart from "Empty Hug" put me on such a pedestal today! Read this! I'm floored - totally floored! Thanks HH, I can't tell you how much your post meant to me today! Thanks for being there and helping lift my spirits when I've felt low and hopeless. Thanks for letting me be part of your blog and life, and I hope that soon our blogs turn to pregnancy and parenting blogs and we can continue to share each others' journeys.

Margelina also nominated me for a bloggy award - thanks Margelina! 

The rules for this award are to list your 5 addictions and to pass the award on to 5 people.

5 addictions?? Umm - let's see here......

1) Definitely the internet. I don't know how I survived before it came around. Blogs / email / google - they are like the fix I need to be able to face the day! 

2) My morning cup of chai (tea). I know I am supposed to cut out caffeine from my diet, and believe me, I try. But I can't. The thing is, I don't have tea or coffee or soda or anything all day long. I need that one cup in the morning. I have physical withdrawal symptoms if I don't have my cuppa tea in the morning! My head hurts till I give in. 

3) "Friends" - I was so sad when the show ended. I still watch the re-runs sometimes. 

4) "Health" magazine. I love it. I don't know why, but I love it. I subscribe to it, and religiously read it, cover to cover every month! 

5) Sadly - researching IF. This has become an addiction over the years. I can't read and know enough. I'm constantly researching topics, reading up on medications etc. 

I would like to give this to HeavyHeart, April, Lisa, Dora, and Nity. 

I do have a couple of things to talk about - will do so later today or tomorrow. 

9 days to go

We are scheduled to leave for Denver in 9 days, on 12/31. That is, provided all goes on schedule, and my body behaves itself. I have my baseline u/s and bloodwork scheduled for this Friday. So far (knock on wood), I've never had an issue with cysts or anything, and I'm hoping no surprises get sprung on me this time.

Assuming all goes well, I start stims on Saturday. So starting Saturday, I will be moving to 3 shots per day, as opposed to the one per day I'm on right now. So far, Lupron has not turned me into a lunatic. (DH may very promptly disagree here - yes, I've snapped at him for no apparent reason a couple of times recently - but hey, you take all these meds and shots, and then let's see!)

 The Dexamethasone induced insomnia seems to be adjusting as well. I guess my sleep is way too precious and overpowering for a tiny pill to be able to ward off for too long! I've been sleeping better for the last couple of days, compared to when I started the medicine last week.

Overall, I'm feeling calm. Very calm. It's strange, but I'm always very calm during my treatment cycles. I'm not feeling any "what if" panic attacks coming on. I'm not feeling "Yippeee - this is going to work and I know it!!". I'm just feeling "still" and calm.

I don't know the outcome of this IVF. I don't know what frame of mind I will be in, one month from now, 2 months from now, 1 year from now. I do know that I'm doing the best that I can, given the circumstances.

I have a little external panic situation going on though. I am FREAKING out at the thought of the weather in Denver! See, I'm a sorry combination of being an owner of a "It never snows in the Bay Area, CA" wardrobe, and "I'm from the tropical heat of India and I cannot IMAGINE temperatures like those!!"

We don't have any experience with scraping snow off our cars, nor do we have experience with driving in the snow. To make sure we weren't signing up for a sure shot disastrous trip (what with a rental car and everything), we checked if the hotel we're at has a shuttle service. Thank goodness they do! And thank goodness CCRM is as popular as it is, because the concierge on the phone even told us "Just tell us the timings of your appointments, and we will make sure the shuttle is available!" Sweet!!

My "to-do before leaving for Denver" and "to-do for Denver" lists are getting ready, and items getting crossed off already. The days are rolling by, and time draws near.