Enough Said

*Sigh....an update

First things first, Femara cycle #2 did not result in pregnancy but it did help me to ovulate, and hyperstimulate. I started feeling better halfway through my luteal phase which was my first indication that this would be another busted cycle. I was starting to actually come to terms with my mandated cycle break and was looking forward to a month off.

I felt myself starting to get down and usually can find some activities/hobbies to help me out of my funk. Day after day, I felt weepy and just generally like there was a black cloud hanging over my head. I decided to call my OB/GYN and have him run a Vitamin D level blood draw to see where my levels were at, knowing that a deficiency can play a part in depression. Ob had no issues running it and just as I suspected my levels were low. Low end of normal is 30 and my levels were a whopping 17. I was instructed to start taking 2000iu/day until my OB got back in town to give me proper dosage. So now add that to the mix of my body's malfunctions....(in order of diagnosis) Endometriosis, PCOS, Septate Uterus, and now Vitamin D Deficiency. I'm not asking what's next!

Which is apparently a good thing I didn't ask what's next because I got that answer anyways. My Ob had a chance to look over my charts I faxed in and indeed I am ovulating on the Femara, but he is not willing to prescribe it long term. The next step is to schedule a fertility appointment to discuss our options of pursuing further testing or IUI/IVF. Hubby and I have our views/opinions on Assisted Reproductive Technology and have decided that it is not an option for us. This now leaves us either looking into WHY we are not getting pregnant despite the meds making me ovulate or nothing. The appointment alone would be billed as fertility and as most know in this game, if it has ANYTHING to do with fertility, you are footing the whole bill, insurance won't cover a dime. In addition, the further tests would also be out of pocket expenses. My Ob has decided that he is not willing to prescribe anymore fertility meds without discussing our options and the options that we are now facing, are not even an option for us.

I did also receive a call from my primary dr who was sent the results from my Vit D and I was given a prescription for 50,000iu Vitamin D to be taken once a week for 6 weeks then resume OTC Vitamin D supplements. I am hoping that once we get my levels up where they should be that my body starts ovulating on its own, as at this point, that is going to be my only hope and chance for expanding our family.

As much as I was looking forward to this much needed break, the news of my dr assisted journey coming to an end has me heartbroken.

O me, O my, O WHAT?!?

Time for that update. I am currently on cycle day 21 with ovulation having taken place on cycle day 15. Now leading up to ovulation I had some mild discomfort that I just chalked up to having to do with ovulation. It was uncomfortable to sit, I would feel internal pressure when I sat and was just mildly uncomfortable. Days leading up to ovulation it got worse and the 'heavy' feeling got more prominent. 2 days after ovulation I was dying in pain, it hurt so much. At this point the heavy feeling became so much. It seriously felt like I was smuggling a 10 pound bowling ball in my uterus and ANY movement H.U.R.T!!!! I laid in bed all day, only to get up to work out, which about made me puke because of the intense pain I was in and all of the jostling around. After my workout, I went right back to bed where I stayed all day. This is completely out of the norm for me. The next day I called my dr and told them how I was feeling and asked if this was normal. I was concerned about the chances of it being Ovarian Hyperstimulation Syndrome, in which the meds work a little too well and overproduce follicle/eggs. With me having PCOS and having tons of immature follicles on my ovaries as it is, it generally doesn't take much stimulation to wake them up. And waking them up it exactly what it did! The nurse also agreed with me in that it did sound like Hyperstimulation and dr wanted me to come in for an ultrasound the next morning to confirm.

Ultrasound went well, as well as a vaginal ultrasound can go when one is in intense pain in that region!! The tech told me it appeared that I had a cyst rupture as there was a "large black hole" on my left ovary. Now knowing I had just ovulated I asked if that could be the corpus luteum cyst that is supposed to be there, since I just ovulated. Well yes sure that is a possibility. This was my first clue that maybe it wasn't a ruptured cyst after all. I got to see all of my insides, my abnormal uterus both horns and all, my polycystic ovaries, swollen and all. Yep looked to me the same as the last time I saw them.

Yesterday I finally got the results back from my ultrasound. Definite mild Ovarian HyperStimulation Syndrome. Crap man!!! So per doctor's orders, pelvic rest, nothing inside the pelvis, no strenuous exercise, and rest as much as I can. I will most likely continue to feel this pain until my period arrives. Or if I am lucky enough to get pregnant this cycle (now THAT would be my luck! Ha!) the OHSS will continue to cause me issues as it won't get a break to calm down, thanks to the pregnancy hormones. I am also to take next cycle off to let my ovaries chill with hopes of some of the follicles resuming normal size. Or what is normal for me anyways. If/when I get another period on my own (I doubt that one!!) then we can decide from there if resuming Femara is right for me. So here I am again, proving statistics wrong as Femara is supposed to have less chances of OHSS then Clomid. 9 cycles on Clomid and I didn't experience this not once. 2nd cycle on Femara and here we are! Oh fun!

Time to Let the Cat Out of the Bag

I have been putting off updating my blog for many reasons, the main one is that I lied, I did not put my trying to conceive journey to an end. Instead, quite the opposite actually. My hesitation comes from fear of being judged and in this case, my fear is of being judged as some crazy hormonal lady that can't make up her mind on what she wants. I DO know what I want in life, it's just I am not willing to sacrifice my sanity or emotional well being to achieve it. Well maybe I can spare a little bit of sanity?

So now time for the update. Since my last blog post I did some more investigating in regards to if insurance will cover Prometrium to induce periods. (A MUCH nicer and more natural version of what I have been using for the last 4 years) I wanted to inform my doctor of my decision of wanting to be done trying, for my sanity's sake. There was a little nagging voice (I have learned it is called HOPE) that would NOT leave me alone about checking to see if my insurance would cover Femara as well. So a call to my insurance was made and tears of joy fell when I heard those wonderful words in regards to Prometrium AND Femara, "It is completely covered, you won't have to pay a dime out of pocket." Seriously! That pretty much made up my mind for me as far as how these next few cycle's were going to play out.

I called my doctor and informed his nurse Becky of my wanting to be done. I also asked if Femara was an option as my insurance covered it. She hem hawed over it for a few minutes as I had not done the full Clomid course of 4 cycles WITH ovulation, so moving onto a new med wasn't really an option. I BEGGED and pleaded with her to not make me go back onto Clomid. For those that do not know, Clomid is freaking EVIL!! Don't get me wrong, it does what it is supposed to do, induce ovulation. However, it also comes with a whole slew of nasty ass side effects. The main one for me was uncontrollable raging surges. It was BEYOND awful and I refused to take one more single pill of that shit. She told me she would talk it over with the doc, as well as inform him of the side effects I was having and see what he thought. Prometrium was a no brainer, of course he would prescribe that for me. All I asked was for him to let me do the more natural version, the one that doesn't come with potential birth defect side effects. YES, he agreed without hesitation. I got the return call that day saying they would call in Femara, 5mgs to be taken on cycle days 3-7, progesterone draw done on cycle day 24 (since I tend to respond and ovulate later in my cycle) and go from there.

Femara cycle #1- Temps seemed stable in the beginning, and it didn't take long for me to get my first ever Smiley face on the ovulation test, indicating I was ovulating soon. That was the day after Christmas, what a fantastic surprise!! The next day, another positive and yet, no temp rise. Yes I was stumped. The next day, rinse and repeat. 3 days in a row I got positive ovulation tests, which of course made things very confusing for me. Long story short, first cycle of Femara resulted in my earliest ovulation EVER, cycle day 14! Perfect, just like a text book cycle. Which then changed things with the progesterone draw as to get accurate results it needs to be done 7 days past ovulation and if I stayed on my dr's requested schedule, it would put me near the very end of my cycle. So I called and asked when they would want me to get it done and they agreed 7 days past ovulation.

Progesterone blood draw went well and the ladies at the lab are starting to recognize me, and some now know me on a first name basis. A sign one has made too many trips to the lab, huh? The next day I got my results which only showed that I ovulated and that my progesterone levels were within a normal range. That I knew already since I chart my temps. What I didn't know is that a progesterone draw may not be covered by my insurance. So, that will be the last progesterone draw I have, especially since I can confirm ovulation, for FREE, via my thermometer. My doctor agreed and is more then fine with just sticking with me faxing in my charts to confirm ovulation that way. I have to say, I LOVE HAVING A SUPPORTIVE DOCTOR!!! It has been a long time coming!!! I no longer feel like I have to fight for what I want or need, instead I bring it up and he agrees. It is lovely!!!

So needless to say that cycle did not result in a positive or this post would have gotten to that point already. It did manage to restore my Hope in that we may have found our golden ticket to conceiving our next baby. I am now on cycle day 13 of a new cycle, Femara 5mgs cycle days 3-7 and now just waiting. Since we have been at this baby making journey for so long, and even despite my body's lack of ovulation naturally, we HAVE been able to get me to ovulate with meds. Even with prefect timing with every cycle, we still have not been able to get pregnant. My doctor wanted my husband tested after my last round of Clomid, but since we switched meds, he decided to hold off one more. This cycle, it was time for hubby to be on the hook for testing.

Now let me say the last time we were trying, (for our second child) when it came time to do his part, it was like pulling teeth from a gator. He was just in that denial stage that nothing was wrong with him, so the test was pointless. The lab order and sterilized specimen cup sat in our house for over two years before he finally sucked it up and got it done. Maybe it was all the years of me bitching that finally did it?? So imagine my surprise when he was very supportive in telling me that he would do this for me. I did inform/remind him of all of the tests and junk, fake hormones, mood swings and all I have endured for the last 4 years and his one little test, that involves ENJOYMENT on his part, is the least he could do for me. Without hesitation, two days ago after work he came home and did his thing.

Semen analysis- I knew hubby would be embarrassed enough to have to do this sort of test and lucky for him he was able to um, get his sample, at home, so I volunteered to be the courier of the brown bag of goodies. Afterall, I get to go see my favorite ladies at the lab again. Now for those that don't know about semen analysis, it is a time sensitive thing as sperm start dying after a short while outside of the body. Sperm also needs to stay at body temperature and outside of light. So picture this, I have my husband's goods, in a brown bag, tucked in between my cleavage with my jacket zipped up to my neck. Mostly to hide the fact that I was concealing a bag of sperm in between my boobs! ;) The specimen needed to be checked into the lab within 20 minutes, so I rushed to the lab, the lab that is seriously 2 miles down the road from us. As luck would have it, I hit every damn red light on the way!!! Finally got there right at the 15 minute mark, and I was made to sign in and take a seat while the ladies behind the desk were clearly not busy. One was making a personal phone call and the other left on break! After about 2 frantic minutes with sperm still resting contently between my cleavage, I walked up to the desk and said, "I don't mean to rush this along but I have a time sensitive specimen here that I need to drop off." At that time I busted out my brown bag of goodies and handed it over. Her eyes got big and the rush began. She grabbed my paper work and literally RAN the specimen to the lab. Well thank you lady! ;) After that I could calmly resume my wait to be checked in and paper work to be done. MY part was done, the goods were delivered, safe and sound.

Semen Analsys results- we got hubby's results back yesterday and most were good. His count was 59.3 million, which is great! Motility was 70% and it needs to be between 60-100%, so also good. Morphology was a tad low at 67%, when it needs to be between 70-100%. What does that mean? It means out of the 59.3 million sperm my husband produced, only 67% of them were normal, with the other 33% being abnormal, not good sperm. My doctor doesn't feel it is anything worth worrying about and we are to proceed like we have been doing, ovulation inducing meds for me and good timing.

I did have an abnormal to me occurance this cycle that I did inform Becky about as I wanted to confrm it was a Femara side effect or not. I had my normal 5 day period but then continued to spot for another 5 days after that. Completely out of the norm for me. She informed me that that particular side effect is not something she typically sees on Femara and wants me to monitor the rest of my cycle for anymore weirdness. It may boil down to we may need to change up my meds for next cycle. I'm hoping not, as we have finally found something that works for me.

So that's it, you're all caught up now.

The time has come....

to put my trying to conceive journey to an end. It appears as though 100mgs of Clomid this cycle did nothing for my body as far as making it ovulate. Hubby and I have had another one of our long discussions, in regards to being done with trying, and I feel my heart is not in a good place right now and hasn't been for quite a while. I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want the artificial hormones flowing through my body, I don't want to be acting like a certifiable loony person because I can't keep my emotions in check (due to said artificial hormones) but most importantly, I don't want to put my husband and family through this anymore. I can't. My husband is fully supportive of my decisions, whichever they may be. He has left it up to me to decide what I want to do. For now I want to be done. I'll still temp, so I know if I ovulate on my own or not, so I know when to bring on a period with Provera. But as far as taking meds to ovulate and taking meds to try to fix my cycles, I'm done. I think I need some time to rid my body of all of these hormones and get my emotions back under control. I need to find myself again and return to my happy state that trying to conceive for almost 4 years has robbed from me.

We haven't told family/friends yet of our decision and honestly I don't even know how to. The one that is going to be the worst emotionally is telling my mother-in-law. She has been extremely supportive despite all of her little comments of, "When is it going to be Laura's turn to get pregnant?" or "When are you going to give me a grandson?" She has followed my journey and cried tears with me along the way. So to tell her that we are putting this to an end, will crush her as much as it is/has been crushing me.

I want to thank all of you for your support along the way. It has meant a great deal to me. I wish my journey had ended a better way, with a greater result, but I can't walk away from this without seeing the positives. I have helped MANY women throughout my 4 year journey, helped them to discover things about their body, provided support for them and the knowledge they needed to achieve their goals of expanding their family. I feel very accomplished.

Onto the next one!

So after getting what appeared to be a very faint shadow line on a pregnancy test, the (expected) unexpected happened. The dreaded witch showed up, two days early. Which means the line on the test must have been another evap. I am growing to hate testing each cycle as I swear I can see lines on just about every test I take. They are such a thrill to do in the first place though. I compare them to scratch it lottery tickets. You wait eagerly to see if you are a winner, with suspense rising with each passing second until you get to the realization that it was a complete waste of time and money and you want to rip it up and toss it in the trash to never be seen again. Yep, THAT is how I feel with pregnancy tests. I love the thrill and excitement of watching the dye pass through the test but once it comes time to realizing it is negative, first denial sets in. (that is when the subject then passes by every light source in the house hoping to see a second line pop up) Then when aunt flow shows or acceptance that it was negative, you become angry that you even let your mind go there. That's where I am at, and oddly enough I am not upset that this month yet again, resulted in no pregnancy, but that I started early! With this cycle's confusing temps and ovulation day, even that doesn't surprise me though.

So, onto the next cycle, 100mgs of Clomid this time, starting tomorrow. I still have to call my dr today to have them call in my script and then I will yet again, confirm my dosage just to be sure we're both on the same page this time. Here's to hoping that 100mgs makes me ovulate sooner and the side effects are mild this time.

Isn't that how it always goes?

Just when I give up all Hope, my body plays a cruel trick just so it can say, "Neener neener, gotcha!" As of my last blog post, ovulation was unclear as my temps are just not as they used to be. Usually I have a fallback rise, where one temp goes over the coverline, the next day it falls back down, then the following day it spikes up and stays up. So imagine how confusing it is when your body decides to switch things up on you and do a slow rise. Slow rises are just that, they slowly rise, usually .1 degree for a few days, THEN you see a temp spike. As seen in my chart above. Now the beginning of this cycle was full of pain, TMJ pain, headaches/migraines and even more pain. That is why all of those temps are X'd out. So it wasn't until I disturbed those temps and added my positive Ovulation Predictor Kit result, that I got confirmation of ovulation.

Having ovulated now changes the game plans. I faxed my charts to my doctor on Cycle day 28, as per his request and he confirmed ovulation has taken place when my chart says it did. I am now to ride out the rest of this luteal phase and wait for my period. If no period, then of course proceed with a pregnancy test and we'll go from there. If I do start then I will call back and we will bump up my dose to 150mgs. I questioned that dose as usually Clomid is bumped up by 50mg increments, and I am currently on 50mgs. Which led to an interesting conversation. 

Last cycle there was a miscommunication problem which led me to taking 50mgs, instead of the 100mgs my doctor wanted me at. So we proceeded with that cycle. So when this cycle came to be and it was time for my next Clomid round, I was kept at 50mgs, since I ovulated, although later then what is typical with Clomid. When I got to the pharmacy this time, they tried giving me 100mgs, in which I explained that no I was supposed to have 50mgs. (deja vu of the second go round) It was fixed with the pharmacy and I got my 50mgs. I left the store and immediately called my dr to confirm, yep 50mgs. So when the nurse told me we were bumping it up to 150mgs, that is why. In their system they have me as having taken 100mgs these last two cycles! Hopefully this will be the end of this communication issue and we all are now on the same page.

Game plan now is, 100mgs of Clomid cycle days 3-7 and hope for the best! My husband is actually off the hook for his semen analysis this cycle as my doctor first wants me to get ovulating earlier, so we can have a chance at conception. That bummed me out honestly. I was so hoping to sit this cycle out!! I wanted the pressure to be off of me, just for one month. I wanted to live carefree and not have to piss on sticks, check when I most fertile and hope hubby has enough energy to be able to perform when the time is needed. *Sigh I will keep pushing further, but something inside of me is shouting, "I just want to be done!!!!"