Monday, February 27, 2012

Back in the Two Week Wait

We had our IUI this morning and I'm cautiously optimistic about our chances this cycles, everything has gone right. Saturday's ultrasound revealed three follicles, one at 21, one at 16 and one at 11. They loved the 21 and were pretty sure the 16 would catch up but thought maybe the 11 wasn't going to do anything. That afternoon they called to tell me to trigger that night and come in today (Monday) for the IUI & that my e2 came back at 335!! (I know this doesn't sound like a lot but for me it's great, I don't think I ever cracked 200 before.)

I was a little nervous about the new bank because we've had so many problems with low counts recently but cryogam totally came thru with a count over 40million! Yeah cryogam!

So now we wait, I've never been good at waiting the full 14 days but I'm going to try not to test too early, it's so freakin disappointing. If I make it to next Saturday I'll be 12 dpo, I'm hoping that will be enough.

To keep me busy I get to experience the joys of progesterone suppositories starting Wednesday, yeah me. Ive heard from a couple of you that they are a mess to deal with and cause some delightful side effects so I'm guessing my husband is going to love this but hey, at this point who cares. Can it really be worse than the hormonal ball of nerves he gets to sleep next to now?

The one thing I've learned thru fertility treatments is my husband will never leave me because if he was going to he would have left already.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Oh Pinterest, I didn't know what I was missing

I decided to check out Pinterest after hearing all these good things and my oh my am I a happy girl. I have so many photography ideas, sewing projects, nursery ideas, announcement ideas, craft projects, etc that I'm overflowing. It's a wonderful distraction from obsessing about getting pregnant. It creeps in, all the wonderful little ideas like buying cheap wall mounted spice racks, painting them fun colors and using them for kids height bookshelves or how to turn colorful knit socks into a cute little stuffed bear but it's so much more relaxing that googling 5th IUI success rates.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

And today's crazy is brought to you by the letters Rx

Its been my experience that women get a little nutty about two things: weddings and babies. The retail world knows this and in true predatory style mark up all things wedding & fertility crazy amounts because they know we'll pay. Have you ever noticed that you can book a hotel meeting/reception space for a business meeting or reunion for MUCH less money than a wedding reception? Next time any of you are planning a wedding call one of the places you are interested in and get a quote for a family reunion, call back and ask for the same space for a wedding reception and see how much more they charge. It's ridiculous but we keep paying it so they keep overcharging.

Today I decided to do some calling around to see where I can get my trigger shot (ovidrel) at the best price. A bunch of these places don't have weekend hours but here's what I found for the ones that do:

Freedom Pharmacy: $95 ($65 + $30 for shipping since I'm not ordering anything else)
Health Warehouse: $95 (never heard of them before which makes me nervous but good price)
Target: $123.99 (this is the best non-mail order price around, go Target!)
Walgreens: $205
RiteAid: $210.79
Kroger: $216.99 (this bothers me because last time I priced this with them it was much less)
CVS: $243.99

I've read online that Ascend has a good price, maybe even better than Freedoms but they have crappy hours and weren't available when I was calling around. I used to get it from Costco for a good price but I'm not a member anymore and so I need to see if they will still sell to me.

CVS's price is 250% higher than the cheapest option. Geez CVS, take advantage much? Shame on you.

ETA: Costco has the best price avaliable ($95) and you don't need to be a member to use their pharmacy. Ascends price ended up being more than Freedoms at $99. Technically Freedom and Health warehouse are the same as Costco but you have to be home to sign for them, at Costco you can just swing by when convenient.

Friday, February 17, 2012

Day One

Today is day one of my cycle. I know it's weird but I was actually happy to get my period. I called my RE's office and they got me scheduled to come in Sunday morning at 8am (yuck) and get bloodwork and an ultrasound (super-yuck) We'll start shots that day. I'm going to try to start the shots at a time that hubby will be around to give them because when I give them I end up with an almost black bruise that's 1"-2" big. If I have to do that to myself 7-10 times I'm gonna look like a battlefield. For some reason when hubby gives them I don't bruise, our doc says its because I hesitate. I'm not sure how I feel about the fact that hubby can jab me without hesitating.
And so the crazy begins. Every cycle we TTC I say, I'm just gonna relax, do what the doc says and try not to think about it until AF is due again. Instead I end up a hormonal hot mess who reads too much into every twinge. So this time Im taking a cue from one of you and I'm allowing myself 30 minutes of crazy a day. It's my allotted time to scour the Internet for hopeful tidbits, feel myself up too see if my boobs are unusually achy, sketch nursery ideas, etc. I know it's crazily optimistic but I couldn't help myself, today's allotted crazy time was spent by going online to a due date calculator and if this cycle works our baby is due on hubby's birthday :-)
With everthing that has gone right for us lately I'm really hopeful that after reloading our emotional and financial tanks with a break from TTC and a new protocol that we'll get our baby with this try.

Monday, February 13, 2012

Here we go again

After a LOONNNGGG break from TTC we're getting ready to try again. After a lot of debate we decided to order two vials from the new bank. That's a lot of money to waste if we get a bfp but we think having an extra vial available to thaw if the counts are low on the first one makes it worth it. We've never used this bank before and it's a huge investment of money for meds and doctors visits with this protocol. I'd hate to ruin all that money and effort with a bad vial and after everything we've been thru with less than promised post thaw counts the peace of mind is worth it. Plus, after all the money we've spent to date I'll happily waste $350 on an unused vial.
I've searched my house and can't find the sheet of paper with the new protocol on it. I know we have to call when AF shows and schedule a CD3 ultrasound (delightful) and that we start shots that day or the next. We'll do 150iu shots every day with monitoring ultrasounds and bloodwork every 3 days or so. It sounds like a lot but I'm sure it will go by quickly. What won't go quickly is that damn two week wait. I may have to take a trip for work and as much as I hate these trips I'm hoping it happens just to pass the time quicker.
We need all the prayers we can get that this is finally the protocol we need to get our bfp. Think positive!

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Write it down

Back in September hubby and I sat in the parking lot to the local mini-golf place waiting for my niece to get there for her 8th birthday. We had a little time so we made a list of our wants. Our realistic wants not dreams like a 5 karat Tiffany diamond but things like a new flat panel tv for the bedroom, etc. Since September we've already knocked off about 75% of the things we wrote down that day. Simply writing it down gave us a goal and when one of us worked a little overtime or something we bought something off our list instead of blowing it on eating out or something frivolous.
The thing about this that makes me happy is we are about $2,000 worth of stuff, a new car and a baby away from having everything we want. I wonder how many people can say that? I know people probably see things about my marriage that they think they wouldn't like but I can say without reservation that my husband is my best friend and I believe our relationship one I wouldn't trade for anything.
I'm about two weeks away from having what I hope is my last period for a while. We finally picked a new donor and got our paperwork in order so we should be ready to go. I'm going to stay positive if it kills me. I added 'have a baby' to our list of stuff and I can't wait to move it to the 'done' list.
For now I'm going to go curl up next to my husband and enjoy what I have.