First u/s

First off- thank you all for your responses to my last post. I was feeling very anxious as you could tell. I asked for a fourth beta, which I had last Friday and the results were great (12,394). That made me feel better until an hour later when I went to the bathroom and found blood. It was a tiny amount so I tried not to worry but it did take away the comfort the beta had added.

Anyway...I made it to today which was the first u/s. I am 6 weeks and 5 days so we were hoping to see the heartbeat. I was so nervous that I thought I would puke (hah! Not quite the nausea I was asking for). The tech put the dildo cam in and I immediatley saw the sac. She quickly moved the wand to measure my ovaries and a bunch of other things. She put the cam back on the baby and I think she was measuring the heart rate but I couldnt tell. I was staring trying to see a heartbeat but couldn't see anything. Just as I was about to panic, she said this is the baby and if you watch here closely you will see the heartbeat!! And we did!! Before we knew it, it was all over. The heartrate was 128bpm, which she said was great and the baby was measuring 6w5d which is perfect!!

We have our first pics of our baby (though he/she just looks like a blob at this point).

I go back on March 9th but don't think there will be another u/s until the downs testing at 12w. Which seems so far away!!

How do you keep anxiety at bay?

A good friend of mine told me that she was PG the day before my third beta last week. I had been waiting (fearing) this announcement for a while. Not that I am not thrilled for her. I truly am. She and her husband had been trying for a while (slightly less than 1 year but still a while). She is very early and in fact is due 1 week before I am. When she heard our good beta results on Friday she was very excited exclaiming how awesome it would be to go through this together.

Here's the thing. Under "normal" circumstances I would totally agree. However, already at 5 weeks and 6 weeks pregnant the two of us have very different feelings/approaches to things. She is already feeling sick, outgrowing her clothes, tired, etc. I feel nothing. She is nothing but excited and has the attitude that come October she will have a baby. (I am sure she has some anxiety but not enough to make her cautious in any way). Me? I feel nothing. Not a single symptom. And I feel very anxious and weary that October will bring anything. I would love to have her attitude but with two previous losses, I can't stop the anxiety.

In fact, I asked my Dr today if I could have another beta on Friday. I just don't see myself being able to stay sane until next Thursday's u/s. She obliged so hopefully Friday things will still all be good.

I really don't want to be like this. I want to enjoy every second of this pregnancy. God knows I have wanted this more than anything for the past 2+ years. But how do I keep the negative thoughts out? How do I ignore that twice before I thought "this was it" and it wasn't?

Is this really happening?!

Beta #3 was today (finally, thought this day would not ever get here). My big envelope theory was correct again...I got a call at 1:30 with the excellent news that my levels have continued to double and is now 1131!!

I now get to have an u/s in just under two weeks. I am so happy that this baby is sticking around (at least for now)!

I really hope this is the one.

I also am looking forward to this long weekend as it has been forever since I have had a day off. I am still at work right now (bleh) but am leaving in 10 minutes and won't be back until Tuesday! How decadent.

Hope everyone has a happy valentine's day.

An analogy to small envelope, big envelope...

Beta #2 day. How I hate this day.

Having now had "good" news delivered three times by my doctor following a beta and 4+ times receiving bad news (all the second and third betas), I felt I had enough of a sample to try and tease out a pattern. And a pattern I found...

Remember when you were applying to colleges and would incessantly check the mailbox every afternoon? Everyone knew that you could pretty much determine the difference from the size of the envelope. Small normal sized letter...."We regret to inform you that you have not been offered a place in the Class of XXXX. There were so many deserving candidates this year and we could not offer a place to everyone. Best of luck." Large thick envelope..."Congratulations! We are very pleased to offer you a spot in the Class of XXXX. Your academic acheivements are outstanding and we believe you will have great success here at University of X"

What does this have to do with my beta results? Well the pattern I found was that the good news calls always came in early in the day (between 12 and 1:30) and the bad news calls always came in late in the day (after 3). This made logical sense to me seeing that the bad news calls first need Dr. input and getting a hold of the Dr. takes time! So on Monday I had convinced myself that if the phone did not ring before 2pm, it was NOT GOOD.

12:30 comes and goes...
1:00 comes and goes...
1:30 come and goes...shit I can't believe I am headed for m/c#3.

1:46...phone rings. Its the doctors phone number. As the phone rings, I am paralyzed thinking this is in the middle of the good and the bad news time zones. What does this mean??? I finally snap myself out of it and answer the damn phone. And?

Nurse...."Hi LanY, I actually have good news for you"
LanY...."I am sorry you must have the wrong chart"
Nurse...."No, its yours I promise. Your beta doubled"
LanY...."Really? What was the number" (Of course, I was thinking she can't multiply)
Nurse..."181"

181???!! That is more than double (as it should be since it was 72 hours between betas). I immediately go to betabase and find that yes I am still above the median.

I have never made it this far. I do not know what to do!!

My next beta is Friday (which feels like it will never come). I feel nothing...no sore bb's, no naseua, nothing. I did have some bad AF cramps last night, not sure what to think about that.

Anyway, for now I am in uncharted territory for me. I am trying to be positive and content but it is hard. The DFTs (dead fetus thoughts) keep trying to sneak in...

First week in February...moment of truth

I felt nothing during the 2ww. No sore bb's, no cramps, no naseau, nothing. During the other 2 cycles where I acheived a BFP, I didn't really feel much either, though this one still felt suspiciously quiet.

My beta was scheduled for Friday Feb 6 (12dpiui). I was debating all week whether to test on Wednesday, 10dpiui, Thursday, or Friday morning. I decided not to test on Wednesday as my past cycles have all had very low initial betas at 12dpo and 14dpiui. I tested Thursday instead, fully expecting a BFN.

Instead, the digital came up PREGNANT! My first reaction was, damn I am becoming a fertile infertile. Second reaction was this means nothing as I have gotten here twice and yet still no live babies.

The beta the next day was 51. Not terribly high but at least for the first time I was above the median reported on betabase! Small victories :) My focus really was on Monday, which would be the day I have never gotten good news.

Stay tuned...

January...getting back on the wagon

January brought with it a new cycle!! Little did I know that this would be the most messed up cycle ever (at least for me, I am sure some of you have dealt with much worse!).

Cycle #22 began on January 5. Of course this was a terribly busy work week with client meetings off-site. There was no way I could do CD3 b/w and u/s. The doctor kindly agreed to CD4 instead. I am one of the lucky few who have IF insurance coverage but fertility meds have to come through a specialty pharmacy that then mails the meds to me. The IF nurse that coordinates everything for my doctor is out on Thursdays (which of course was when CD4 was). I had spoken with her on Tuesday and she had said she would call in my Clomid Rx that day so I would have it for CD5. Come Thursday, I have not heard from the pharmacy so I called them and lo and behold...no Rx. Friday morning I call the Dr. and she calls in the prescription again. Of course I now need it that same day. Well the pharmacy won't deliver it same day because it doesn't cost enough. After many phone calls and hours later, I find a Walgreens that has the drug and get the Rx transferred there for me to pay out-of-pocket. Clomid thankfully doesn't cost that much.

Everything goes smoothly and CD9 (a Tuesday) arrives. I realize I haven't heard from the nurse on what time my CD10 monitoring appt is so I call her. Her voicemail says she has changed her hours and is now off on Tuesdays and Thursdays!! Great. So I call the other nurses and leave a frantic message. They call back and say that the only time still available is 11:45am. I normally go before 7 and that way it doesn't affect work. Now, during a huge emergency at work, I have to drive myself to 30 minutes out to the Drs and 30 minutes back for a 10 minute monitoring. Grrrrr. Oh and of course the monitoring shows I have no follicles bigger than 10 and so am still have a long way to go.

Next snafu, the nurse is supposed to call in the trigger shot on Wednesday so that I have it on hand whenever the appropriate day arrives. Saturday comes and I still haven't heard anything so I call the pharmacy. No Rx on file. Great. Turned out to not be a big deal as CD15 monitoring shows the biggest is a 10 and I am still a long way from being ready.

Of course the Dr. predicts the next Saturday will be the IUI day. That particular weekend is my company's ski weekend and we are supposed to be 4 hours away in VT. I proceed to have the assistant that is planning the weekend, change everything around for me and DH so that we are no longer skiing and instead are getting massages late Saturday afternoon (so that we can drive up following the IUI).

I am not sure what I was thinking as of course my body is too unpredictable to make plans around. Thursday comes (what should be trigger day) and I still have no follicles big enough to trigger. Go in again on Friday and finally we are ready to trigger. IUI will be on Sunday CD21!!

Now what do we do about the ski trip. I mean really its so not a big deal compared with the IUI but the sucky part is that we have already paid for it. So I feel we should still go on Friday night and drive back Saturday night, which is what we do. Big mistake. Driving 8 hours when both DH and I are exhausted from the hectic week is excrutiating. The massage was WONDERFUL but the drive back late at night was not fun. Never again.

The IUI went very smoothly, thankfully. Though I did manage to come down with the worst cold the day after. It was awful.

And with that January ends with 1 week down on the 2ww.

December, short and boring

Not much happened in December. It was almost a complete break from TTC as we were just waiting for the next cycle to begin (which wouldnt be until January). We did have the recurrent loss testing done on the 29th but other than them taking a whole lot of blood, that was uneventful.

We survived Christmas. It was a little tough with my sister-in-law having just found out the sex and my cousin introducing her newborn to the family but we survived and it was nice to see our families.

I could not wait until 2008 was over and had a lot of anxiety in the days before New Years as 2009 could not come fast enough. I don't know why I thought that a New Year would bring some sort of closure to the losses in 2008. It didn't.

Oh yeah, one really good thing in December...I got promoted at work!!! It was a big promotion and unexpected as I really hadn't been in the old position long enough but they made an exception because they thought my contributions far exceeded the criteria for promotion. Yay!

The rest of November was dark and cold...

After we found out that we would m/c #2, November became a very dark month. I did finally tell my mom about our IF struggles and losses. Prior to that only a few good friends new anything. I am not sure I felt any sense of relief or comfort from telling her like I thought I would. It was nice in a way to know that she knew and was there for me but I just really didn't want to talk about it and she of course did as she had so many questions.

Thanksgiving was uneventful. We started out with DHs family and things were fine until my 5 year old neice said we had to go around the table and say what we were thankful for. Of course my in-laws obliged because they would never say no to her. I nearly lost it at the table but managed to keep it together (my in-laws still know nothing).

We then went over to my mom's house and just missed my step-brother and his pregnant wife (shucks!).

Before the m/c, I had agreed to make the invitations for above sister-in-laws shower in February. More to come on this later...

In other IF November happenings, the doctor agreed to do recurrent loss panel testing to see if there was anything chromosomally wrong with DH and I. So we scheduled that for the end of December.

Is anyone still out there? Its been a while

I can't believe its been over 2 months since my last post. I think everyone can guess how that cycle ended. I had another m/c. I was so devastated that I just retreated into a personal cave of sorts and couldn't talk about it. I tried to stay away from all things baby/TTC related (except others' blogs, which I kept reading but commenting was sparse).

There is so much to update on over the past two months, I am not sure where to begin. I think I will do a post for each month (Nov, Dec, and Jan) to get caught up.