Meltdown City

Saturday, June 2-
Well, I suppose you thought this post was going to be about Addison and her 3.5 year old meltdowns. I wish that were the case. Unfortunately.....I have been the meltdown queen. I suppose with the amount of hormones that are injected into me daily, this is understandable, but yikes. For those that come in contact with me, tread lightly or you'll likely see the waterworks start up. Just kidding but do heed this as a mild warning, it's possible. :-)
Meltdown #1- yesterday. 6pm rolled around and my phone alarm went off. Deb got all of the shots ready to go and started giving them to me. For some reason, the Follistim shot in my stomach really hurt, I would liken it to a stabbing feeling. As soon as Deb gave it to me she realized that the full dosage wasn't in the pen and we would need to start a new pen with a new med cartridge. Cue the tears. Instead of 3 shots, I got 4. She had to wait until I had stopped sobbing to do the last two. During this whole time, Addie is sitting by my side, holding my hand and telling me "it's okay mama". She was so sweet and reassuring and of course it was okay I just couldn't find the switch to halt the tears.
Meltdown #2- 1:30 this morning. I woke up thinking about today's ultrasound. After so many years of disappointments, I panicked thinking the follicles weren't growing. I burst into tears. 3am rolled around and I finally found the switch and fell back asleep only to have the alarm go off at 5 for our 8:15 appointment in Iowa City.
Meltdown #3- 11:30am this morning. On our way back from Iowa city after our appointments. Driving along highway 1, I burst into tears. Thinking about our appointment and how the follicles are growing is very exciting. The tears though were from remembering that Deb is going to be gone presenting at a conference next week for 2 days. At any other point in our lives this would be totally fine but I being the worrier, am a wee bit scared about having too many follicles grow and having a condition call ovarian hyperstimulation. The nurse today told us that it is likely that I will have some hyperstimulation but all I could think of in the car is, Deb is going to be gone. I can't lift more than 15 lbs, (Addie is 34). I have an ultrasound on Tuesday morning which is the same time Deb leaves for her conference. What if they give me important information and I can't remember it. Deb is our family expert on things medically related. In the end, everything will be fine. I have plenty of family and friends nearby that can help in a pinch. Likely, I just need a prescription for anxiety meds to get through this. I did ask the nurse about this and she laughed. Apparently this is all pretty typical for those undergoing IVF.

On to the good news. The good news is that the follicles are growing. There are currently 22 on my left ovary and 28 on my right. No worries. I will not be turning into the next octomom. Not all 50 of these follicles will continue to grow nor do they all have eggs.
Right now they are watching 11 of them that have grown to the appropriate size for where we are in the process. There will likely be more that will catch up. They've increased my Follistim back to 150 because they are growing a wee bit slower than they wanted but they have to be careful with me because of my PCOS. Heaven knows we do not want all of the 50 growing to maturity....that would be uber dangerous for me. I also had another blood draw with an estradiol level of 578. For those who like math, I have had the following:

• 3 Ultrasounds
• 5 blood draws
• 18 shots of leuprolide
• 12 shots of follistim
• 6 shots of menopur
• An estradiol level that over the course of a week went from 20-578.

I will head back to Iowa City on Tuesday, June 5th for another ultrasound and blood draw. They are thinking the egg retrieval will likely be towards the end of next week and we'll know more once they do the ultrasound and put these little suckers up on the screen. I forgot to get a picture today. They look like honeycombs with one circle next to another. Pretty cool.
Well, time to rest for a bit and catch a late afternoon lifetime movie. I'm sure that will do wonders for my crying issues. :-)

Being sensible

Deb really has the hang of these shots. My cell phone alarm goes off every day at 5:45pm and we head in to the bedroom. We've started calling her Dr. Shot. She gets all three shots ready to roll lickety split. Tonight Addie asked Dr. Shot if she could give me the shots in my belly button. Youch!
This morning Deb informed me that she woke up last night brainstorming ways for us to save money in case there's more than one kiddo from this IVF process. Here's her list:
-Get rid of our smart phones......what! What would I do with out instant access to my friends facebook statuses???
-Get rid of cable television.......what! Wait we just got cable television after a 3 year hiatus. And a new season of Sister Wives just started on TLC.
The two combined would add about $200 to our budget but would certainly take so much from my ability to stay connected to those people I haven't seen in 10+ years and don't get me started on it's impact on my Sister Wives relationship.
As usual, she's the thinker in our family already stressing over the cost of raising the triplets, ha, ha, ha if this works we will be having one more baby thank you very much.
That's about all of the excitement for today.

Rookie lab tech

May 29th, 2012- off to the lab for my second blood draw. This time, the lab tech struggles to find a good vein. I curse myself for not getting up early enough and pounding water. Finally he finds one and I look over to see it is pretty much on the top of my arm. Yuck. I'm not one to like having my blood drawn and don't typically watch but it felt so strange to have him stick me on the top of my arm. I call into the PIL and find out that my estradiol is 138 which is great and am given instructions to start the third injectible medicine, Menopur (1 vial) tonight in addition to the leuprolide and follistim shots. That's two in my stomach and one in my thigh. Doesn't this just sound like a blast?! We all assume the position, Deb at the helm, preparing the three shots and me resting on the bed with Addie holding my hand. I've gotten used to the sting of the leuprolide and follistim but the menopur REALLY stings. Youch.  Trying to figure out where to place the shots on my stomach is also a bit of a challenge. Going clockwise, we try to disperse them so we avoid hitting a tender spot from the previous day. Thankfully, I have lovely little blueberry size bruises serving as little markers. Two more days of the leuprolide, follistim, and menopur and then back to the lab for another blood draw on May 31st, 2012.
It's amazing what women will put themselves through. I also know that we are just scratching the surface with these meds and should probably start doing all kinds of sweet things for Deb to pay it forward for the emotional wreck I'll likely be as this process continues. If you can picture how emotional we women can be around that lovely time period each month and then amplify that by 100, you can get a picture of the effect of fertility meds on women's emotions. How this plays out on my body, well as I type this, I can feel the tap of the keys in my ovaries as they have begun to swell. Talking to other women about their experience with IVF, I am frequently told that they were extremely aware of their ovaries. Hopefully they will swell with plump and juicy follicles that hold the possibility of new life and a successful end to this journey.

It's amazing what you'll do for your kids.

Addison wants to be a big sister. Her mommie's want her to be a big sister and want to grow their family. Unfortunatley, my body hasn't received the memo. Diagnosed with PCOS in college, I have always been told that getting pregnant would be a challenge. Well, Addison was certainly a surprise as we got pregnant on our second month of trying with the help of Femara. After an amazing 9 months with her in our lives, we decided that it was time to start trying for #2. Knowing that it could be challenging because of the PCOS and my age, I wasn't getting any younger, we started with Femara again. After 6 months of trying on our own, we sought out the help of my OB/GYN. We then began the process of IUI's in the doctor's office and added injectible medicine to increase the amount and size of my follicles.  After almost two and half years of failed IUI's with doctors shrugging their shoulders and offering no reason for the failures,  we requested a referral to the University of Iowa's Reproductive Department. This blog is about the in vitro fertilization journey we are on to grant Addison's wish of being a big sister and our wish to grow our family. Our journey to conceive began in June 2009 and after many tears and dissapointment, this is the new road we will travel. Over the next three months, our lives will run parallel with the IVF process, we'll attempt to resemble our typical routines as we add trips to Iowa City for ultrasounds, trips to the lab at Mercy hospital for blood draws, oral medicines, injectible shots, etc. Hopefully after all of this, we'll head back to Iowa City in early June to have the mature eggs retrieved from my ovaries, injected with swimmers, fertilized and then placed back into my uterus. And in the end, we'll do the painful two week wait and another blood draw which will hopefully result in a pregnancy.
On April 5th, 2012- Deb and I drive the 84 miles to Iowa City to meet with two infertility specialists, a psychologist and a financial counselor. After a 5 hour appointment that included meetings with all of the above mentioned specialists, an ultrasound and a practice run at placing a catheter in, our brains are overwhelmed with information. Thankfully they gave us hand-outs of all of the information. We are cautiously hopeful, the doctors are hopeful giving us much higher success percentages and long discussions about multiple births and so on. We have been here before with the IUI's. We nod our heads and hope that this will be it. We take our folder of information, my prescriptions and drive the 84 miles home, all the while talking about the what ifs.
April 8th, 2012- I start taking the birth control pill (BCP). From the day I started the BCP, I counted down the days until I could stop taking it. The first 3 weeks of the pill were terrible. About 5 days into the pack, I started throwing up. And if by throwing up you mean, projectile vomitting and puke coming out my nose, then yes you have a firm grap on the art of throwing up. This lasted for 4 days. After Iowa City called in a prescription for suppositories that were supposed to go in my donkey (Addie calls her butt her donkey so we'll use this very technical term), my body got itself together and the puking stopped. I stayed on the pill for 42 days all of which including the lovely symptoms of nausea and headaches. Fun stuff.
April 26th, 2012- we head to Iowa City for an ultrasound to make sure everything is clear in my ovaries and we are given the thumb up to get the ball rolling. We brought Addie with us hoping she would be our good luck charm. She of course had to bring her baby stroller and both of her bitty babies. As soon as my name was called, we got up to meet one of the fabulous infertility nurses, who immediately said, "oh, I hope that is not a sign" pointing to Addie's twin bitty babies. We agreed. The nurse sat down with us and walked us through all of the shots and meds we will be using. After we are thoroughly educated, we are handed a list of prescriptions to pick up from the hospital pharmacy. We arrive at the pharmacy and handed a large brown grocery bag, FULL of oral meds, injectible meds, syringes, needles, etc. I'm fairly certain my blood pressure shot through the roof and the pharmacists voice was drowned out by the blood beating in my ears. We knew there would be a lot of meds and shots but actually seeing them all there was overwhelming. The best part about this experience was watching the pharmacist total all of the meds up and watching the cash register stop at $218. We had been told to expect the meds to cost around $2500. Our insurance, that covers none of this IVF process, had covered a majority of our meds. My mouth dropped wide open. I asked the pharmacist to run it through again and just about took off running with the meds before he could catch the error and retotal it. Amazing! There was no error!  We have taken out a home equity line to afford all of this and this surprise co-insurance took some of the pressure off. Now if we could just get them cover some of the other $18,000 we would be set. :-)
May 16th, 2012- we start the Leuprolide shot (20 units a day). Leuprolide is a med that keeps my body from ovulating too soon and releasing the immature follicles. It is a sub-q shot which means it is given with a short needle and can go in my thigh or stomach. I will get one of these every day until we hear otherwise. We have decided to do the shot in my thigh and save my stomach for the other two injectible meds, Follistim and Menopur. So far, the shot has given me a skin rash reaction that lasts about a day and is super itchy. Then it turns into a small bruise about the size of a blueberry. What makes that shots doable is the fact that Addison has always been my sidekick with shots. She holds my hand and always kisses the spot where I get the shot. I focus on her little hand in mine, her big brown eyes staring into my mine, the little smiley smirk on her face and the question she asks after every shot, "Mama, is their a baby in your belly yet?". "Soon, Addie. Soon".
May 22nd, 2012- off to the lab for my first blood draw to check my estradiol level. A phone call to the automated Patient Information Line at the U of Iowa tells me my level is 20 and is right where it should be. Next step, start the Follistim shot daily on Saturday, May 26th and return to the lab for another blood draw on Tuesday, May 29th.
May 26th, 2012- we start the follistim shot. This shot helps stimulate my ovaries to develop many follicles and mature eggs. It is also a sub-q shot and goes in my stomach. I think Deb really likes giving shots. The Follistim comes in a pen that you dial up, much like a pen someone with diabetes would use. She dials it up to 150 and then sticks it in my stomach and we watch as the little plunger spins in a circle as the meds go in.