Last Shot!

For anyone who doesn’t know, when someone does IVF (with or without egg donor) the person has to take progesterone til there 10th week of pregnancy. Some women use suppositories and some give themselves a shot daily. Well, I started shots of progesterone to support the pregnancy back on May 26th (2 days before the transfer) and I am happy to report that today was the last one! At this point the placenta takes over and supports the baby with what it needs. …I will not miss my morning routine of sitting on a heating pad, heating both the progesterone in oil and the area I inject it into. I will not miss getting the needles ready, and I will definitely not miss sticking the needle in to my upper back hip every single day. I think it’s time to find a new normal.

In other news, I’ve been having crazy heartburn this morning but gladly have only had really, REALLY bad nausea once so far this pregnancy. Our next big appointment is July 31 when we do the nuchal translucency screening which tests for the possibility of down’s syndrome, spina bifida, and a few other things. This is a normal screening that most pregnant women have and should be completely fine since I used the egg of a 29 year old.

-H

We Graduated!

Today is a great day because we had our 2nd ultrasound in two weeks and all is looking good and healthy. Our little guy or gal is 8 weeks 5 days today and measuring perfectly in size and had a heartbeat of 174! Two weeks ago we got to see the heartbeat for the first time and at that time it was 127. This is all good news because it means we get to leave PNW Fertility after 13 months of ups and mostly downs. After all the heart ache of not getting my lining thick enough, the hysteroscopy, the first transfer that ended in DNC, the shots of progesterone, lupron, estrogen, and HCG triggers, the baby aspirin, tons of acupuncture and ultrasounds, and the months and months of doctor appointments we finally get to go to a normal doctor or midwifery group. I can’t tell you how excited I am to feel just a little bit normal for once after finding out about my 3 way translocation last summer. I know we aren’t out of the woods quite yet because it’s still early and it will still be a few more weeks til we tell the world but for now this is the happiest news we could hope for.

-H

Lots of Updates

Hello!

Well, it’s been a while since I updated this blog and there are a lot of new developments! We went on vacation in Europe in early May and while sitting at a cafe over lunch one day we decided to use our last embryo instead of moving forward with a new donor. I think after my grandma’s passing it just felt right and why let that embryo sit forever. If we had gotten new embryos created we probably would have never used it. Plus, we didn’t know what the timing would be if we started with a new donor either and it could have been a few more months before we could try again.

It turned out to be perfect timing with my cycle. My period started just before we left Europe and when we got home I went to the Dr. and everything looked good in an ultrasound and bloodwork wise so I started my shots of follistim, just as we did last time. By 8 days later my uterine lining was about to 8mm and the next day it was 8.07mm which is the thickest it had ever gotten. I did my HCG trigger shot Tuesday, May 22 which was our 2 year Wedding Anniversary and then for Memorial Day weekend I got to stay home and give myself progesterone shots. We finally transferred our last little embryo on May 28th (Memorial Day).

So far this one has felt a little different than the last to me…I don’t know if it’s just because I’ve been more relaxed since our vacation or what. I started peeing on a stick June 2nd and every day until yesterday. By day 2 I was seeing a faint line, day 3 was a little darker, and by yesterday it was turning quite dark more quickly. Today was my beta and I’m happy to report that my HCG levels were 291.6 and I am indeed pregnant!

Don’t get me wrong, I’m proceeding cautiously. I still worry that things will go wrong after the last transfer. I go back on Saturday (my birthday) and hopefully the numbers will double in 48-72 hours and then I expect I will come in again next week, good or bad. If all things proceed as they should our 1st ultrasound will be June 25 and we will be due Feb. 13, 2013.

Grow baby grow!

H

New Beginnings?

Hello! It’s been a few weeks since my last post. It feels like a lot has gone on and at the same time nothing has gone on since I last wrote. I don’t even know where to begin with this post.

Yesterday my sweet, beautiful 93 year old grandmother passed away. She was not in any pain but was in the hospital. I got to see her Sunday for a visit at her home and could tell that something was going on with her. She was more tired than her usual perky self and just didn’t look good. My dad and uncle took her to the hospital later that day but I didn’t learn of this until Tuesday afternoon. She was dehydrated and had a bladder and kidney infection but was doing much better. I even talked to her for a few minutes at 3:30pm Tuesday and it sounded like she would go home in 24-48 hours. She sounded way better on the phone and said her legs were wobbly but she had gone for a walk around the building and had just needed rest. I told her I loved her and said good bye thinking she was still going to be with us for a little longer. But around 4a.m. my dad and uncle got calls to come to the hospital because her health had declined. They were with her at 4:45a.m. when she died. All I can say is she was the best grandma there ever was. Never judged anyone and always was around to talk or give you a smile. Grandma, I’m going to miss you and your laugh and spunk.

As for the fertility stuff – we decided not to look at other Fertility Clinics. I’m not sure exactly why other than to say that it seemed like it would just take more time to get going again and cause more ups and downs. We have been looking at new egg donors this week and have decided on a couple of gals. My husband has to take a genetic carrier type blood test next week and that may determine who we pick if he and these girls are carriers for any of the same things. One of the girls is currently matched with another couple so we would have to wait a month in between her cycles before we could use her eggs and would push us out to June sometime for new embryos; the other girl is slated to give eggs to the egg bank at the clinic we are at but we could end up using her eggs as early as next week and have embryos created while we are away on a trip.

I also started seeing a therapist a few weeks ago. It has helped to have an outlet and someone to talk to outside of the situation. She thinks I may suffer from compounded loss since I’ve lost (now) three grandparents in less than two years and have had 3 miscarriages and 1 DNC in about one and a half years. We have talked about meditation and just taking care of myself. She is good at reinforcing and reminding me that it’s okay for me to not be working outside of the home right now or it’s fine if I go see a friend at 3pm for happy hour or take tennis lessons or not work full time on things I think I should be doing. She calls it “wringing myself out” for the next round, and boy do I need it.

I’ve also started seeing a new acupuncturist. I saw the Chinese Dr. twice but she did not acknowledge my chromosomal issues at all. I decided I was not comfortable with that and so have moved on to someone else. There is no amount of herbs or acupuncture that is going to fix my chromosomal issues. She thought that no matter what my chromosomal rearrangement is we could still get pregnant with her support and then if that didn’t happen then we should move back to egg donor options. I even brought in an inch tall stack of paperwork from my doctor records over the past year and my basal temperature chartings and she still didn’t get it. Now I am seeing Kristi Stoddard who seems wonderful. She is a little more of a drive for me but hopefully she can help with my uterine lining and sustaining a pregnancy next time around.

I think that’s about all for now. I’m excited for a 10 day vacation coming up, have been exercising and just trying to stay sane while my husband works crazy hours and tries to support me during all my ups and downs. In some sort of way I hope with my grandma passing away and with new egg donors in our reach there is a new beginning lying ahead of us with happiness, calm and a healthy baby to hold.

-H

Nothing New Really…

Not a lot going on in my world right now other than still dusting myself off and trying to make some changes for my sanity. I have started to watch Gaiam TV and do some yoga and pilates videos through there when I don’t get to the gym. I’ve been also trying to get to the gym 3-4x a week and have really been focusing on some areas that I’ve noticed could use some toning lately (back side, stomach…the usual for most people). I hope in a few weeks that I will notice some difference. I’m also trying to find some people to play tennis in the Seattle area now that the sun is out because that is always fun and takes my mind off of things.

Today I have my first appointment with a counselor to discuss some of the things I’ve been feeling with the infertilty and other things in my life. I’m hoping that I will only need 2-3 sessions or to go every couple of weeks for a short time but I’ve got a lot on my mind so I’m afraid that I might be going for a long time! I’ll let you know how it goes.

I also saw the Chinese Medicine Dr. this week. She was stern and strict just as I had pictured she would be. She gave me some Chinese herbs to take—she has a different tea mixture for each of the 4 areas of a woman’s cycle. I’m apparently in the ovulation zone right now. It has been 18 days since my DNC and just waiting for another cycle to start. The one thing I don’t think she really understood was my 3 way Balanced Translocation…I think she thought we could definitely get pregnant on our own and didn’t understand why we would do IVF/egg donor because I’m still young enough. Either way we are still doing egg donor so hopefully between the two we will get pregnant next time.

As for when next time is…there is no time line yet. My husband and I are going to look into some options with some other fertility clinics in late April. There is a program where you can get up to 3 donor egg frozen cycles and pay one fee and if you don’t take home a baby after the 3rd attempt you get your money back. Whether we will qualify I’m not sure but we have to have a consultation first before we can even talk about the financial aspect. Our current clinic does not offer this program and since we are looking into getting a 2nd egg donor it makes sense to look at other options. I do worry that the other clinics we are meeting with are too big and “corporate” feeling. I like my current doctor quite a bit and trust that they are doing a good job with us. It’s hard to think of starting over with new people and even just filling out the paperwork brings up all the past miscarriages and everything before; I just really don’t want to start over.  In the meantime, I have not heard about any new egg donors yet from our egg donor coordinator so I guess we’ve got some time. I feel like we are in limbo and I would love to have a plan.

-H

A Long Overdue Update

I have not updated in a LONG time. Partly I think because I have been so involved in trying to get pregnant, and partly because I have been feeling guilty and a little ashamed that we even have to go through what we go through.

To sum up the past few months….intimidating, sad, long, hard, hopeful, all time consuming, draining – mentally and physically. Since November it took us another 3 months to get my lining to thicken up. In December we did the same protocol as November but without the lupron shots. Apparently my ovaries were supposed to still be “quiet”, not producing my own eggs at that time. We started off with estrace (estrogen pills) again but they caused some fluid in my uterus (same as in November) almost immediately. I was also still doing Vivelle patches. 2-4 every day. Then I got the pleasure of injecting myself with estradiol in my hip/butt area every 3 days. I just called this practice for the progesterone injections that come with IVF/FET (frozen embryo transfer). Turned out my lining still didn’t get thick enough by the time it was supposed to be, in fact it was thinner at just 6.5mm in December.

Move on to January when we did a natural cycle. We decided my body doesn’t like being manipulated by the drugs—fake estrogen just wasn’t doing it for me. Go figure. I had mentioned to my doc that I read that follistim works for some women on the balanced translocation group forum I’m on so by day 4 or 5 of my cycle I started these injections. The follistim medication is interesting because it is expensive….my rounds with my insurance company is a whole other topic I could write about…, it has to be refridgerated, and it looks like you are sticking yourself with a big ink pen in the stomach, everyday. It really is amazing what we do to our bodies to try to get pregnant. Well, by day 12 of my cycle nothing…absolutely NOTHING …. was happening. My estrogen levels didn’t even perk up a little bit from blood draws that were taken day 9 to day 12. Canceled cycle, over and done. When this happens they put me on provera (another type of progesterone) to get a period. I think by this point this was the 3rd time I had to take this for 7 days. Aunt Flow came 2 days after I stopped provera.

Fast forward to February. Another natural cycle. We had a trip planned to Atlanta as a surprise for my brother-in-law at the end of the month and I was very worried that with the timing they gave me we might have to cancel. Not a huge deal in the grand scheme of things, but it would have been a little disappointing. Well, turns out I started the follistim on day 2 of my cycle, which started conveniently on day 1 for keeping track of things. I took follistim religiously for 10 days and guess what!..IT WORKED! I had blood draws on day 6—my lining was already almost 5mm, day 9—7mm, day 10—7.8mm (THICK ENOUGH), day 11—still thick enough and then I got to take my HCG trigger shot at 3pm that day. We were finally where we needed to be to get the FET on the road! I though this is it! Finally we’ve gotten over the hurdles and we can get pregnant. On February 17, we were able to transfer.

That week went great before the transfer. It’s funny to me how I got so used to going to the dr. that it’s weird when I don’t have to go. One week you go four times and the next you just wait for the end of the week with no checkups in between. So friday, the 17th came. By then I was doing progesterone injections everyday in the butt/hip area, which you continue til week 10 of a pregnancy after transfer. Let me tell you, they aren’t pleasant. I had to drink 1.5 liters of water before the transfer, take 2 valium at 1pm, got picked up by my husband at 1:30pm, check in at 2pm and the procedure was done at 2:30. We got a picture of our embryo that was taken 1 hour before transfer. It is a crazy think to see what we all look like at just 5 days old…just a big blob of cells, really, that could form in to a beautiful baby. The transfer went like clockwork…they showed us what they were going to do and we could see the embryo on the screen starting to hatch even before it was transferred, which is supposed to be a good sign. They put up the catheter, which looks like a long spaghetti noodle, position it in the uterus and inside goes the frosty, ready to attach in a few days and burrow in to momma. I laid there after the transfer for 15 minutes and then I was free to get up and finally use the restroom. My hubby took me to my acupuncture appointment I had scheduled after and I fell asleep and relaxed. Then went home and sat on the couch for two days, ready to get pregnant.

With the timing of the transfer we were able to go on our trip to Atlanta and had great time, surprised my husbands brother and stayed 5 days. I was peeing on sticks later in the week we were there and I was getting 2 lines! I also had sore boobs, a bit of nausea (only once), and was getting tired in the afternoons. I was pretty sure I was getting preggo but I didn’t want to get my hopes up or tell anyone til we came home and took the blood test at the dr. So Weds, 2/29 I went in and got a great beta of 227! We got preggo!

But before you get excited out there, I had another blood test on Friday, March 2 and my numbers only went up to 254. Not good because usually hCG numbers double in 48-72 hours. It was a long weekend and I tested again yesterday, 3/6. My numbers went down to 171 so the embryo stopped developing.:( I’m going to miscarry.

I’m angry that it didn’t work. I’m sad. I feel guilty that I may have done something wrong in the two weeks post transfer. I’m worried that maybe my body, with the 3 way translocation, is rejecting pregnancies. But sometimes it just happens. Embryos don’t always form into beautiful babies. We knew there was always a chance of this happening but after having to go through so many hurdles the past 4-5 months this had to work. IT HAD TO.  It didn’t. And I’m bummed. So bummed. The amount of time, effort, thought, money, energy, medications, we’ve put into this is just exhausting, draining, disheartening. I feel guilty, like maybe I’m a bad person who doesn’t deserve a baby. Did I hurt the baby by traveling or hitting a few tennis balls in GA? Did I eat something wrong? I assure you, I relaxed, I slept, I ate well. I’ve done everything up to this point that I should have and yet it didn’t work out. And now all we can do is try again with our one remaining embryo.

Today I woke up angry and cried as my husband held me and then had to go to work. Since then I’ve chatted online with a few friends and called my mom (who is not the most comforting person in the world). But I’m feeling a bit better. I do think I will cry a little more before I start to get over this but the grieving has begun. I will start a new cycle in a few days and have a follow up with my dr. next week and see what is next, if there’s something we do differently next time and go from there. They say I have have to go through two cycles before we can start anew so we will probably not transfer again til at least June. Which I think is fine…it will give my body some time to get back to normal, take a vacation that we have planned and refresh. I don’t know what’s next but I hope this path we’re on straightens out soon.

-H

Week 2 of Shots

We are well on our way towards IVF with our egg donor. Today was the 11th shot I’ve given myself in the abdomen and now I get to add progesterone patches to the mix.Yesterday I went to see Dr. Lamb for an ultrasound to make sure my ovaries are “quiet”, plus I had some bloodwork done to make sure my estrogen levels are low. Everything is going according to plan so I put on two patches yesterday afternoon and switch them out for two more tomorrow. They are kind of like putting clear stickers on my tummy and they are very sticky on one side but feel like plastic on the other. I’ve been told they may leave a sticky residue on me and I should use some sort of sugar scrub to get it off (sounds like an excuse to go shopping for something).

My doctor also told me that she is very excited about the egg donor we picked. She said she is the sweetest person in the world and she has been good at getting other couples preggo. I’m keeping my fingers and toes crossed that that is the case for us too. She starts her meds next Friday and only about three more weeks til my DH goes in to give his “collection”. It really is going to come up quick!

We are heading to Portland OR this weekend for a little fun (although my DH may have to work some). I have to bring my lupron and patches and syringes with me so need to figure out a way to keep the lupron cold for the trip. I called the hotel and we do have a fridge in the room so that’s good. I hope it is a relaxing trip.

Happy Weekend,
H

Here We Go…

Well, today I started my first round of shots. This all didn’t seem real until about last Friday when I got the box of medications, syringes, sharps box, etc. from Walgreens delivered to my door. And today I took the box to my clinic’s office and met with our nurse, Resa. We sat in a little office room at a desk and poured everything out and went through what everything is. The big needles will be saved along with a vile of progesterone for the end of November, which my husband will have to give me every morning (up to the 10th week if we get preggo). So for now I am giving myself a small shot of lupron in the tummy each day. I got to do it right in front of the nurse and it really didn’t hurt at all—the size of these needles are very small. I continue to do this until next Thursday and go in then for my first ultrasound and blood work and get to halve the dose that day. After I get my results back later that day I start progesterone patches on my tummy or lower back and have to replace them every other day, plus add one up to four over time.

Everything doesn’t seem so bad so far. We will see how it goes. I’ve got my 5th acupuncture appointment tomorrow and lunch with a friend who has gone through a lot of this already and is now pregnant. I’m excited to hear how her pregnancy is going and see if she has any tips for me.

-H

We Have Dates!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted on here but since we decided on an egg donor we now have official dates of when we will have embryos transferred! Right now it is looking like either November 30th or December 1st!

Right now it still doesn’t seem real but I start my shots in just 15 days from today. I have a calendar our nurse sent us which tells me what type of medication to do each day. I start on October 25th with a shot of Lupron in my stomach, which I will have to go into the doctor’s office to learn how to give myself. I also continue my birth control pills at this time for 5 days. I continue the Lupron shots and then on November 3rd I have to go in for an ultrasound and blood work. I guess if everything looks good at that time I start to halve the amount of Lupron each day and then start Progesterone Patches that are replaced every other day, and sometimes you add one…so I start out with two but by the time I’m finished with them I do 4 patches every other day. I head back to the doctor Nov. 17th for another ultrasound and blood work. Then I continue with Lupron and the 4 progesterone patches every other day until the donor is ready for retrieval. And then comes the nasty progesterone shots I’ve heard about which my hubby will have to give to me. 5 days after the egg donor goes in for retrieval and my husband give his sample we get one or two embryos transferred. It’s very exciting and I so hope it works.

I’ve also started acupuncture over the past few weeks for fertility. So many of my friends have done this in the past and who knows if it really helps in the long run but I have to believe it can’t hurt so I’m doing it. I’ve been going in once a week and tomorrow is my 3rd appointment. I also decided not to do the mayan abdominal massage for now. It is expensive and I talked to my acupuncturist and she didn’t really see any reason for me to do it since I haven’t had adhesions or endometriosis.

Sometimes I still can’t believe this is all happening and we have to endure so much to have a family but I’m sure it will all be worth it one day.  I’ve asked my parents to get tested for the chromosomal translocation that I have. They’ve both agreed to do it but just may take some time. My mom doesn’t have a doctor she goes to regularly so she just needs to find a place she likes and get an appointment. My dad is doing some blood work for his diabetes this month anyways so hopefully he can get tested at the same time. There’s no real medical reason for them to get tested other than it might complete part of my puzzle — I think it would answer if I became this way because one of them carried these genetics or it just happened (which they call de novo). I would just like to know either way.

-H

Unique

Back in June I had a bunch of blood tests to find out why I was miscarrying. Everything came back normal except for the Blood Chromosome Analysis, which is how I found out I have this Balanced Translocation. Over the past few days I joined a group online called Unique. I wrote a staff member there with my name, address, email, etc. and explained that I have a three-way translocation. Beverly got back to me by the next morning and had added me to the group and asked for more details on how I found out about this and what my exact karyotype is. I got out all my paperwork last night and wrote her back with it and all the testing they did to get this. This is my karyotype with all the breakpoints:

46, XX, der(1) t(1;21;3) (q12;q11.2;q12), der(3) rea(3) (?p26) t(1;21;3), der(21)t (1;21;3)

It really just looks like a bunch of gobbledygook to me so I spent last night on Unique’s website trying to figure this all out. At the bottom of this page is a list of information describing what some of this means. I tried to decipher it but it’s still another language to me and I really don’t get it all.

I also asked my parents over email last night if they would get tested because my paperwork recommended that I have my first tier family members get checked. We’ll see if they go for it and since my brother was adopted 5 years earlier than I was born they are the only people I can ask. It could be a lot of money for them to get tested and I’m not sure if their insurance would cover it, but it would be great to get more answers and see if they passed this on to me or if it just happened when I was created. I’m also interested to see if it could have been my dad because he had lymphoma 6 years ago and sometimes translocations can cause that.

When I got up this morning I had a new email from Beverly saying that she thinks my karyotype is “Unique”. She is going to do some research and get back to me soon. It’s pretty crazy to think of all the people in the world and I may be the only one with this particular genetic makeup.

-H