The Two Week Wait

*Warning: It’s going to be sweary people.

The two week wait (or TWW) is a bitch! It seriously messes with your head. Have you ever noticed every single little involuntary muscle movement and slight cramping or discomfort your body has? Ever been completely aware of the sensitivity of your whole body particularly your sense of smell, stability of your stomache and the feel of your breasts? This is just the start of what we women go through during the TWW.

And who the hell made pregnancy symptoms so similar to period symptoms? It’s like they spent all this time designing and developing this amazing reproductive system and then at the 11th hour it was like…

Tech one: Everyone we are officially out of time! Amazing work everyone, just put on the finishing touches and we will send it to be integrated into the body matrix.
Tech two: But… I haven’t coded the period symptom and menstrual phases yet…
Tech one: Shit bro, seriously?! Goddammit Mike, you had ONE job! Okay just copy paste the pregnancy symptoms and ramp up the cramps and nausea during the actual menstrual phase.

I mean please…

Symptom: Tender or swollen breasts = period or pregnant
Symptom: Nausea with or without vomiting = period or pregnant
Symptom: Food aversions or cravings = period or pregnant
Symptom: Headaches = period or pregnant
Symptom: Fatigue = period or pregnant
Symptom: Slight bleeding or cramping = period or pregnant
Symptom: Mood swings = period or pregnant
Symptom: Constipation = period or pregnant

That’s just the main ones… not to mention… no symptoms = period or pregnant. So frustrating.

So here we are, women who so very much want children that we put ourselves through needles (would you believe that the thought of just drawing blood used to give me serious anxiety before all this started!!) and prodding and poking and invasive procedures and crazy ass hormones just for the slight hope of peeing on a stick and being rewarded with 2 lines instead of one.

The fact that we want a child that much alone puts you in a desperate and hopeful head space, then you add on top all the hormones and pressure of daily life and age and whatnot and it’s just a fucking boiling pot of emotions and anxiety and crap.

To quote J.K. Rowling…

…but we do… and so much more. I tried to explain to my husband the other day the thought process I went through in a couple of seconds to get from the topic we were talking about to the question I asked him a few seconds later which seemed completely unrelated. I explained how I got there and he was like, “How? It was like 3 seconds? How did you think all that in that time?!”

I was pretty confident initially that the ovulation induction round would not work. To me it was only a slight step above assisted natural conception (i.e. the timed sex we have been doing for 5.5 years among Clomid and IVF) and to me even though both FS’s have said there is no reason for us not to conceive naturally it’s just not happening. So I sort of felt that the new FS was mostly ticking boxes with this.

That doesn’t mean that I didn’t want it to work with every fibre of my being and soul. That with each passing day my hope didn’t grow until it was this amazing cushy marshmallow of hope and goodness. Then AF came and it was like a butane torch to my marshmallow. I watched it crisp, burn and melt away… didn’t even get a fucking smore out of it.

So now… on to IUI

Just keep swimming!

 

 

 

 

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Day 6 – 1st cycle on Clomid

So I guess it is going well. I haven’t really had side effects thus far, well not really bad ones… okay, okay I cried in the middle of a restaurant.

Before you say anything it was not over spilled milk okay 🙂

They had the smooth grooves cable channel on at the restaurant we were in and this song came on I have always liked, but never seen the film clip too, it is called “Say Something” and is performed by A Great Big World and Christina Aguilera. It is a hauntingly beautiful song which on its own is quite sad, but then it turns out that the film clip is even more heart wrenching.

So when you get to the old man with his wife on the bed… all of a sudden I had silent tears streaming down my cheeks. Hubby freaked out because I am not a crier and was all, “Oh my god, are you okay? What is wrong? Did you cut yourself?” and I am all, “It’s just so beautiful and sad”. T’s like, “umm okay, what can I do to help you? What do you want to do?” and I just asked him to hand me a napkin. He did and said, “how about we order you Brownie?” hahaha ahh he’s a lovely man. He is so done in if we end up with a girl 🙂

Other than that I have found myself really impatient with stupidity this week, but to be honest I think that is more a symptom of AF than the Clomid. I have had some discomfit in my pelvic region today which is weird, kinda crampy and all. Who knows what that is? Could be digestion for all I know hahaha.

Fingers crossed this works

Fertility Meditation

When I was in High School studying for my Higher School Certificate I was stressed and distracted because whilst I was studying my Nan was also suffering from bowel and liver cancer and we had been told she would not come through it. Suffice to say it was a horrible time in my life. I found a lot of balance and perspective through meditation, it helped centre me and make me focussed whilst allowing me to emotionally deal as well. I get that it doesn’t work for everyone, but it absolutely worked for me.

Recently with the new job, attempted house building and fertility issues I am oh so stressed, which is horrible because though I don’t mean to, I know it affects those around me. I find it easy to focus and do my job at work, but at home etc. I am kind of scattered. I also have had problems sleeping, I started listening to sleep enhancing meditation music and have found that concentrating on the music makes it much easier to shut my brain up and get to sleep.

So I started wondering whether the positive outcomes I got from meditation in my HSC and shutting up my brain at night could also help with day to day stress of my current life and maybe even help with my waning positivity in regards to fertility.

When I first started looking I was trying to combine one that I could listen to as I was sleeping that would also help me with fertility. I found one, but a lot of it was tones and a sound like leaky taps that just made me need to pee… not exactly the result I was looking for hahaha.

So I began looking around this morning and found some that sounded interesting. There was one that only went for like 5 minutes and it was a guided meditation. I was dubious, but decided I certainly could spend 5 minutes on trying to reduce my stress levels 🙂

I am writing this post just after having finished this meditation and I feel pretty damn good, kinda weird and floaty, but relaxed and not at all anxious which is great. I think part of me having such a good result was that I figured if I was going to do this I had to have a completely open mind about it and I did. I did everything the woman said. I think being able to find my centre and get in the zone was easier for me having done pilates before, but even so I think anyone could do this.

A lot of the ladies that are in our little online infertility circle here I imagine often feel as stressed out as I do so I wanted to put it on here and suggest that you guys take just 5 minutes and really give this a go. I hope it makes you feel as relaxed as I do because seriously right now I feel like I could languish in a bubble bath with a book until the water went cold… this is not something I have done in years!

Here’s the video:

A fabulous bald woman who is all about earrings

* DISCLAIMER: I’m probably going to swear guys, fair warning 🙂 I am a sad panda today.

This morning after a return call from my specialist I was frustrated to the point of almost having a cry, but you can’t do that at work right? So I didn’t. I did that stupid tip your head back so the tears go back in move that you know doesn’t work, but you do it anyways. I am on so many drugs for PCOS & Insulin resistance as well as other crap. Currently I am supposed to be taking the following: Metformin, I-Folate, Vitamin D, Eutroxsig, fish oil. I think that is it, but who knows these days. Now this post is not about the amount of money I spend on medication, it is not about timing my day around said medication… in the paraphrased words of Elle Woods, this is about something that is much more important… my hair!

The specialist prescribed me Eutroxsig in December, he never discussed any possible risks or side effects of the drug with me – which it seems is pretty par for the course these days. So I have been taking it since the end of December. Over the past month I have lost between 30 & 40% of my hair and it’s still falling guys. I used to do my bathroom floors once a week, but since my tiles now resemble shag pile carpet I am having to do it more often. It is bad guys. It was only that the Pharmacist discussed possible side effects of the drug with me that I twigged that it must be that. So I called my specialist and said I wanted to stop taking it, I was told that he felt it was a side effect of the condition and not the drug. I explained that I had had the same condition for many years and this had never happened before. I just got a call back this morning and was told that he still felt it wasn’t the drug, he has asked me to go and get my thyroid re-tested (YAY more money) to see if there is any change and then ask my GP for a referral to a hair loss specialist. A hair loss specialist? What the fuck?! Why do I need to go see yet another doctor for something that wasn’t a problem before I started taking what this guy told me to? Are they trying to send me to a hair loss clinic like Advance Hair or something? I don’t need Shane Warne’s buddies, I just need my hair back. So with this anger/frustration rolling around in my body I decided to put my Research Librarian skills to good use and look up the other possible side effects of the drug. Holy shit you guys, holy shit! There are 70 of them! Granted some are listed as really rare, but still, OMG! Then I realised that I have been having some of the side effects that are listed, I just didn’t pay attention or assumed they were linked to PCOS or IR. Here are some of the things that have been happening:

• Extreme fatigue – I had fatigue already due to PCOS/IR, but over the past two months there are days where I feel capable of nothing.
• Irritability – Only when I am awake. My patience has never been so low. I try very hard to not snap at people, very hard.
• Sweating – Ha, sweating. That’s putting it mildly; I have been creating rivers that no person ever wants to visit.
• Blurred or double vision – this isn’t too bad, but it does explain the random fits of blurriness I seem to get every now and then.
• Headaches – yup they are pretty regular.
• Crying – I feel like crying a lot. A real lot! And not just a delicate single tear rolling down my cheek, I am talking red faced ugly crying here people!
• Hair loss – I feel like I have lost more hair than some people have. Thank god I had uber thick hair to start with or else by now I would be one of those fabulous bald women who is all about her earrings.
• Feeling not well or unhappy (who writes this crap) – this is pretty regular. Over the past two months I am not able to deal with day to day things as easily and effortlessly as I used to. I thought it was my depression rearing its ugly head, which it could be – it certainly feels like the same thing. But it could be this too. I have also been rather paranoid lately, this can be a symptom of depression, but one of the other side effects is ‘Suspicion or distrust’. So who knows.
• Rapidly changing moods – Oh. My. God. YES. All the time! I change moods quicker than I change radio stations when Bieber comes on! It’s bad guys, way worse than normal PMS.

Here’s one that P’d me off good…

• Trouble getting pregnant – Uhhh excuse me? What did you say? My fertility specialist put me on medication whose side effects include ‘trouble getting pregnant’? What the fuck?!

Here’s a couple of the weirder side effects:

• False or unusual sense of well-being – Umm… how would you know if it was false? The only way to test that would be to put yourself in a dangerous situation and see how you felt about it. Jump in a tank of hungry sharks with a bleeding finger and feel as though it is the same as enjoying your morning coffee? Well then… you might have a problem.
• Feeling things are not real – Is this real life??

On top of all this we found out that the debilitating pain my Hubby is getting in his upper back is due to bone spurs growing inwards on his C6 & C7 vertebrae which are then affecting the nerve. Joy. So I don’t know whether the symptoms I have been having over the past couple of months are because of stress or the meds. I don’t know, but I do know I am over it. I have had enough. I just want to crawl into a little me cave for a while. I know I am not someone who usually feels sorry for herself, but right now I am facing a bald, childless existence and I am kinda pissed about it.

Absolutely pissed about it in fact. Side note: pretty sure this post demonstrates that I am not suffering from a ‘false or unusual sense of wellbeing’.

Period and Ovulation Tracker

Yes this is a thing for those of you who are unaware. I am not sure what the “best” one is, but it is basically just counting right so how hard can that be hahaha.

I have decided to put an app on my phone so that I can keep a track of supposed ovulation times etc. mainly because we have finally got to a fertility specialist and what he did at the first meeting was say exactly the same things that we’ve heard already, then he arranged for us to have some tests done. Most of which we have done previously, but apparently having the results on file was not good enough, we had to do it again so our results can… go on file? Maybe he just likes receiving files with this name as the “attention to:” person on them. I don’t know. I do know that I was majorly PO’d that I paid over $350 for him to parrot back crap I had already heard at us. SIGH. So I figure it I can give him data he can eat his words. Therefore I am looking for a menstrual cycle tracker and a calorie tracker so I can stick the data up his nose when I go back in a couple of weeks!

Anyone got some suggestions. I will be honest and tell you I am looking for $0 cost – especially considering the amount we have paid not only for the initial visit, but also for the follow up testing we had to do.

Breakthrough!

Do you ever feel like you are bashing against an endless wall of incompetent medical babble desperate for some real help?

Yup, just like this! Source: http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/banging-head

I have felt like this for at least a year. Hubby and I have been trying for a baby since NYE 2011; about 20 months ago I convinced him that we needed to seek further help. It has taken than long and a barrage of tests, most of them blood tests, checking a whole range of stuff and several different doctors for me to finally find one that listened to me.

I went to this new Doctor a couple of weeks ago and told him straight, “we can’t conceive, please help us” we:

• Stopped using birth control immediately
• Have been eating well
• Well “I” have been taking pre-pregnancy vitamins
• Haven’t been drinking and neither of us do drugs
• Have figured out my cycle
• Avoid the positions where semen is not encouraged to travel towards the uterus
• Have had Hubster checked out
• Have been exercising
• Have not killed the million people who told us to relax

Here are the conception techniques we have tried:

• Charting body temperature
• Sperm meets egg
• Mucus investigation
• “Laying low” after sex
• Combination of all of the above

Sperm meets Egg

In spite of all of this I am still not pregnant and have been putting on weight pretty steadily.

He took me really seriously, he believed me when I said that I didn’t seem to be able to get my weight in check (we are talking about a lot of weight guys!) even though I am exercising for around an hour every second day! He immediately sent me for bloods (AGAIN), but this time he was checking EVERYTHING – this was something I had asked other Doctors for several times, but apparently they didn’t actually do it. I also demanded a referral to a Gyno who specialises in fertility issues and he gave me that, I see her this Friday.

I went back for the results of my bloods yesterday and he informed me that I did not have PCOS (quite relieved), but my insulin level was scary high and I had to go on medication immediately. I mean seriously scary high you guys, people are supposed to max out at 10… I am freaking 57!!! [He was also pretty unimpressed that when I had gone to see Dr. Evil a little while back he had not put me on medication immediately – more evidence of his large douche factor!]

He explained Insulin resistance to me and all of the symptoms I have been suffering for many months are on the list;

• Intestinal bloating
• Fatigue
• Increased appetite
• Inability to focus
• Weight gain, difficulty losing weight
• Increased blood pressure – this is only very recently
• Depression

He immediately put me on Metformin 500mgs, this should not only help with the Insulin resistance which in turn will help with weight loss, but it should also aid conception.

I certainly feel like the other docs over the last 18 months have seriously wasted my time and health. If they had have been as thorough as I asked them to 10kgs ago I wouldn’t be in such a scary position now!!!

But I can see some sunlight slipping through the clouds at last 🙂