Ok ovaries, I hear you!

9 days into stimms and my ovaries are flipping killing me!

I never experienced this amount of discomfort on either of my other cycles and it started early, after about 5 days on the Gonal F. I have no idea if this is normal or not but I can’t help but feel a little anxious about what tomorrow’s scan will show. Yes, of course I’m hoping for lots of lovely follies but I’m nervous that what I’m feeling is mild OHSS.

I’m not normally a hypochondriac, it’s just that I feel so different this time, in terms of discomfort, that I’m letting my paranoia get the better of me! The first two cycles went like clockwork – except for the negative pregnancy tests at the end! I’m scared to death that something will go wrong with this cycle and it will have to be abandoned.

Hopefully tomorrow I will find out that it’s all nothing to be concerned about and we’re on track for egg collection sometime next week.

In other news, tomorrow is also D Day for my husband. He’ll officially be getting his redundancy notice in the morning, although he should be getting another month to source a job in the company before he has to leave. It’s going to be a rubbish day (and month probably) for him and I wish there was something that I could do to fix it but I’m sure he’ll soon be sorted with a brand spanking new job, ruling the roost again!

As normal as can be

I’m a week into my down regulation injections and so far I’m free from any side effects. In fact I feel the same as I always do. This is pretty normal for me – I seem to be one of the lucky people that don’t get too affected by the drugs for IVF. In both my previous cycles the side effects have been minimal, only really showing their faces as I get further into the treatment.

Reading about other people’s experiences on the ‘wonder web’ (and believe me, I have read A LOT of other blogs on IVF) it would appear that some woman really do go through the mill when taking the cocktail of drugs needed to get our bodies in tip-top baby-making shape!

It always amazes me how us gals can differ so much! How can some of us get literally every side effect under the sun and others get hardly a hot flush to grumble about? Surely if these drugs are supposed to flood our systems and take control of our hormones, the outcomes should be the same for everyone. Not that I’m complaining, especially as I’m one of the smug ones that can sit back and read the stories of woman who turn in the female version of The Incredible Hulk within days of their first injection, knowing I’m still feeling like me.

* Disclaimer: I should probably note that I may be tempting fate and, as a result, have to retract the comments in this post. For this cycle I am, as I’ve mentioned in a previous post, using a different drug for the next stage of my cycle. I have no idea how I will respond to this but I pray that my good luck and lack of side effects continues. *

And so it begins…

So, here we go again…. let the fun commence!

This morning I did my first injection of Buserelin – day 1 of my down regulation drug. I have about 3 weeks on this one before going for a scan to check I’m ready to move onto stims. I’m pretty unfazed by injecting myself now so it went without drama. Having said that, as the weeks go by and my belly gets more bruised I do find I have to psych myself up before jabbing myself!

On another note (and completely different topic) I’m feeling incredibly frustrated and a little sad. Just over a week ago a came across a great blog. I spent a couple of days reading the archives and enjoyed the daily new posts. Last night I accidentally deleted the blog from the tabs on my iPad and for the life of me I can not remember the name of it! I’m such a fool for not following it, liking the posts or bookmarking the blog in my favourites. I was just silently stalking it and now I’m paying the price. I really wanted to the know the outcome of the appointment the blogger had today. Now I will never know! I have searched every possible phrase and topic I can think of but I just can’t find this damn blog! Oh poo!

Trouble on the horizon?

Life certainly likes to throw testing times at people doesn’t it! It’s obviously not enough that we’ve had 3 and a half years of poor health for my husband or the heartbreaking infertility journey that we’re still very much on. It now looks like my husband is about to be made redundant at work.

The thought absolutely fills me with dread but my husband seems quite laid back about it – I just don’t understand how he can be like that. I mean, I’m sure that he will get another job as he is a very intelligent man and brilliant at what he does but the current economic climate is not particularly healthy at the moment so the good jobs are few and far between. He will get another job, it’s just a question of when.

I am lucky enough to earn a reasonable salary in my job but I am far from being the household breadwinner! Without my husband’s income we will be in serious financial strife after a few months (less if his redundancy package is small).

So now we have something else to worry about and the timing couldn’t be worse. Stress and IVF treatment do not mix well.

The drugs are chillin’!

Yesterday saw the lorry load of drugs for our next IVF cycle delivered. It really is quite daunting when you first see the 2 huge boxes arrive at the door. Ok, so most of it is packaging but there are still A LOT of drugs inside those boxes and they only have one place to go over the next 2 months… inside me… eek!! For now though, they are tucked up in the fridge. Just chilling out and waiting to do their stuff and make my body into the baby making machine that it really needs to be this time!

For this cycle I am taking all the same drugs except for the stimming meds. This time the clinic have prescribed me Gonal F instead of Menopur; I didn’t realise this was the case until I saw the prescription last week. I have no idea why they’ve changed me to Gonal F but, obviously, I’ve done my usual and spent hours researching the difference between Menopur and Gonal F on Mr Google! There seems to be a lot of conflicting information out there. Some say that Gonal F produces better quality eggs, others disagree. Then there’s the ones that say that the extra LH in Menopur makes cycles more likely to work, others disagree. I have no idea what to believe but I suppose each woman is different and no two cycles are the same so it’s impossible to predict what difference the Gonal F will make to our cycle this time.

I just snow this is the donor for us!

Greetings from a very snowy England!

This weekend has seen a huge amount of the white stuff land on our door step. Now this usually grinds the whole country to a stop but I have to give credit where it’s due – I think for once we were actually prepared for the snow. The roads have remained clear and life as we know it seems to be carrying on pretty much as normal. This isn’t all good news however – it means that there will be no ‘snow day’ for me tomorrow and I will have to drag myself to work! Grrr!

 

Seeing as it’s been 4 months since my husbands big op and his health is so much better, we thought it might be worth him having another sperm test to see if things have improved in that department. As it happens, it wasn’t meant to be. The results are in and there are still zero sperm in his sample.   I guess we were clutching at straws to think that he could go from nothing being found in an SSR to something being there now in an ordinary sample but it is still really disappointing. What did make me smile a little though was that my husband actually said that if there had been anything found he would have been slightly reluctant to go further with another SSR to try to get enough sperm to use for ICSI because it would have been so expensive. I know it may sound strange that him saying this made me smile but it’s actually the fact that he’s made peace with the fact that we need a donor that makes me happy.

Talking of donors, after we had our ‘commiserations appointment’ last month to discuss the failure of our last cycle, one of the things we discussed was changing our donor. The one we have used for the last 2 cycles requires ICSI which adds just over £1000 to the cost of the cycle. I always thought it was a bit odd using a donor that needed ICSI as surely this means that the sperm is not quite top-notch. The consultant agreed and said we should try a new one. Interestingly, when I called the unit to find out our options on other donors, the nurse I spoke to was adamant that our previous donor was fine and sounded irritated that the consultant had suggested it would be best to have one that doesn’t require ICSI! Anyway, she told me the options of the others available and there was only one that sounded ok. Here are the details of our new donor:

• Fair / medium skin
• Mid brown hair
• Green eyes
• 6ft tall
• 11 stone
• Career: Garden design / artistic
• Interests / hobbies: Sports, fishing
• Married

So, we now have this donor assigned to us and at least that means we are going to save a little bit of money on our next cycle. I just hope that our new donor brings us the result that we so desperately crave!

Happy birthday blog!

Wow…. it has been a whole year since I started this blog – and what a year it has been!

I read through all of my posts the other night. It’s so interesting reading back and seeing what was going on at that time and my reactions to it. I really do think its quite therapeutic to record your thoughts and feelings. I guess that’s why so many people do blogging.

So, happy birthday to my blog! Here’s to many more years of ‘Views from The Kiln’.

2013…. could 13 be lucky for us?

Hello my poor neglected blog… how have you been? I won’t bother with the excuses for my absence because I have none – other than laziness! Sorry.

Right, first things first, a quick catch up:

* IVF#2 = BFN     We had 7 eggs collected on 24th Oct. 5 fertilised and were still going strong on day 3 so we had a 5 day transfer on 29th Oct. I was a good girl this time and didn’t test early but my good behaviour was not rewarded. On the morning of our OTD (9th Nov) I woke up to find my period had started and surprise surprise the test was negative. We both took it much harder this time and it has taken a long while for the black cloud to lift.

* I’m going to be an auntie! My brother announced that he and his wife are expecting. This has been a double edged sword, however. I am obviously thrilled for him and my sister-in-law but I can’t help but feel a tinge of sadness that it isn’t me and my husband. It’s particularly difficult because the baby is due around the time that ours would have been if the last IVF cycle had worked.

* Christmas greetings and a NYE in style! We had a fabulous xmas, spent with my brother, sister-in-law, dad and grand parents. Lots of fun, food and drink was had by all (except my SIL of course!). NYE was spent in London, just me and the hubby. It was a great evening and an opportunity to see the fun, happy side of my husband come out to play – something that had been stolen by Crohn’s the previous 2 NYEs. It truly is great to have him back and able to go out and enjoy himself again. Long may it continue! My new year resolutions this year are: get pregnant/have a baby (of course this had to be on the list!), restore the affection that has dwindled in our relationship since the start of the whole Crohn’s drama, take more photographs, exercise at least 4 times a week, eat healthier, and grow nice finger nails. I’ll keep an update of my progress on these in this blog!

And that brings us to now. I guess I should add one more thing to my list of new year resolutions… blog more regularly. I will certainly try, that I can promise.

So… 2013… what will it bring? I like the start of a new year. It is a bit like a fresh start, a clean slate to do the things we perhaps couldn’t or didn’t do before but wanted to. Everyone is full of hope that the new year will bring them luck and a chance to realise their aspirations in some shape or form. The hard part, however,  is keeping that initial positivity and motivation going. As we go through January and get back onto the treadmill of normal life and back to work, it is so easy to get swamped and lose focus.

For me though, there is still one thing that I am whole heartedly focussed on and no amount of January blues will change that. IVF cycle # 3 is just around the corner – I start the first drug in 3 weeks. I am clinging onto the hope that the new year will bring a new beginning for TeamWMeister.

The last hangover (I hope)!

It’s true, I admit it… I’m a lightweight!

Last night I went for dinner and drinks with my husband, his sister and brother in law. We had a lovely evening and the red wine was flowing throughout. I saw it as my last chance to have a few drinks for a while (hopefully 9 months or so) before I start my stimming drugs on Wednesday. Well, I’ve paid the price for it today. Red wine is not my friend the day after the night before!

What I want to know is why do hangovers get worse as I get older? The headache, feeling queasy, the tiredness – they last all bloody day now! It’s enough to make a person not want to drink again (until the next time anyway)!

So tomorrow is my down regulation scan to see if the Buserelin has done its job and shut down my ovaries. Fingers crossed it’ll all go fine and then I can start the stimming drug, Menopur, on Wednesday.

Yesterday I started my avocado mission. I read in the newspaper over the summer that the ‘good fat’ found in avocados can triple your chances of IVF success. So I thought hell, what have I got to lose… If you need me I’ll be in the fruit and veg aisle at Tesco’s filling my trolley with avocados!

Minus one colon!

It’s been such a long time since I’ve posted anything. As usual, life has been getting in the way of my blogging and boy has it been a busy life since I last posted!

The most important thing that has happened is that my dear husband has been through major (and hopefully life altering) surgery. Over the summer, we enjoyed a relaxing 2 weeks in Spain and as soon as we returned back to Blighty, he was whisked into hospital to have a pan proctocolectomy. He also had his ileostomy re-sited and made permanent. Two amazing surgeons worked their magic – one to do the colorectal stuff and the other to do the plastic surgery to keep my husband’s bottom looking lovely. And a fine job they did too. He is now almost 6 weeks post op and doing amazingly well. The have been a couple of hiccups along the road to recovery, one being a lingering infection which is still draining itself now but is making progress everyday. In terms of my husbands crohns – he feels free of it… finally! The doctors are now actually saying that his blood results are showing that he may not have had crohns all along. It would appear that he has indeterminate colitis/crohns and they’re hoping that this op may well cure him forever. Whilst this would obviously be a dream come true it is difficult to believe at the moment. For now we just take things one day at a time and are enjoying the fact that he feels so much better than he has done in the last 3 years.

The other big development that is happening with us at the moment is that we are currently in the first phase of our second round of IVF (ICSI). I have been injecting the down regulating drug, Buserelin, since Saturday 15th Sept. I have one more week to go until my DR scan to see if I can start stimming. My husband says he’s feeling positive about this cycle, I have mixed feelings.

I plan to keep my blog up to date as I continue through this IVF cycle. So watch this space… and fingers crossed it has a happier ending than our first cycle!