No Bun In the Oven YET

Update and Last Post

2010-06-01T21:48:00.003-05:00

Hi everyone,

Yes, I'm back for one final post. :) I have received so many e-mails etc. asking if everything was okay because you never heard another word from me after my last post at 16 weeks pregnant.

I realize it was a really crappy way of ending things...out of the blue like that and for that, I am truly sorry. My blog was originally started as a place where I could vent and share my emotions about what we were going through, and once it felt like things were finally looking promising for us with a healthy pregnancy, I freaked out and was afraid of jinxing anything. I also had so many followers who were still fighting to make their dream come true and it just felt wrong to be talking about how happy I was. Nobody understands what infertility feels like until you have walked through it and felt how much it hurts. It is such an open wound. I really had a hard time accepting that it was finally okay for me to be happy.....it was hard to disconnect from the Tiff I had become for 4 years of struggling to get pregnant...and becoming the pregnant, happy Tiff. It felt too good to be true.

We finally had a happy ending to our journey on December 20th when we delivered healthy twin boys at 37 weeks exactly. They weighed in at 6 lbs. 10 oz. and 5 lbs. 14 oz. I was HUGE. We feel more than blessed to be their parents and we promise not to take anything for granted. I look at them every day and even though they are 5 months old now, I still can't believe they're mine. Mine to cherish, protect and love unconditionally.

To all of my friends who are still on their journey to become parents. My heart and soul are with you. I pray EVERY day for God to make your dreams come true and for your lives to be blessed the way ours have been. Please don't give up. You will be parents one way or the other....biologically, through adoption, through surrogacy, through egg or sperm donors, through fostering......but one thing I know for sure.....when you hold your baby for the first time, you will forget about everything you have gone through to get to that point. It will all just melt away and you will feel whole again. You will feel love that you have never felt before. It will all have been worth it. Every shot, every tear, every night you cried yourself to sleep, every BFN, every blood test, daily trips to the doctor, every painful procedure, that feeling of betrayal by your body......it will never be completely forgotten or gone because it has shaped you to be the person you are, but it will be pushed aside and overwhelmed by the new feelings of happiness you deserve to feel. I wish that for everyone.

Thank you again to everyone for all of the love, prayers and support over the last 4 years. We love you!

T & A ( and the boys)

16 Week Belly Shot and Update

2009-07-27T18:10:00.004-05:00

Well, I was officially 16 weeks as of yesterday! WooHoo!

I went to the Dr. today for my 4 month check-up. My cervix is nice, high and closed and I've gained 7 lbs. so far! She said I am right on track. :)

Baby A had a heartrate of 152 and Baby B had a heartrate of 150. It took awhile to get Baby B's because he/she was moving. :)

The funniest thing is that my belly is measuring equivalent to someone pregnant with just 1 baby at 24 weeks. :) I am going to be BIG by December. :)

Here is my belly pic:

Thanks for checking in and for the continued prayers!

Love,
T & A and the twins

14 Weeks Update & belly pic

2009-07-13T08:00:00.014-05:00

I've sorry been a little MIA the last few weeks. There really just hasn't been much to report. I'm officially 14 weeks as of yesterday and officially in the 2nd trimester! WooHoo!

I had a lot of strange cramping on Friday so I called my Dr. and described what was happening. I had actually just called to talk to a nurse to make me feel better that it was normal, but when I decsribed some other symptoms I was having, she called my Dr. and they had me come in anyway. My Dr. told me they don't take any chances with twin pregnancies, and even if they don't think there is anything to worry about, they would rather be safe than sorry. She gave me the typical "there are a lot more complications associated with twins, so we want to see you ANY time you have odd symptoms again." I love my Dr. She actually has triplets of her own, and completely understands everything that comes with a high risk pregnancy. She said she's not just a Dr. ....she actually lived it too. It makes her very easy to talk to.

She checked my cervix to make sure it was still nice and closed etc. I also got to hear the babies' heartbeats. Baby A was 150 and Baby B was 159. They wanted them to be between 140-165 at this stage....so they were right where they needed to be. I go back to the Dr. in a few weeks for my 16 week check-up.

The big news is that I've gained about 3 lbs. so far! WooHoo! I had actually LOST a pound in the first 12 weeks and was a little worried about it, but my Dr. was not concerned. If you think about it, how could I have possibly gained any weight, when I had been throwing everything up, including water. So I gained about 3 lbs. in 2 weeks........and am expecting it to keep piling on. :) Adam was laughing at me that I was excited about gaining weight. He said it's odd to hear a woman actually excited to gain weight. My belly is getting bigger literally by the second.

As for how I'm feeling. I'm exhausted all the time and am peeing every 15 minutes, but other than that and the occasional bout of nausea, I feel pretty great. :) I am feeling a lot of "flutters" going on in there and they get stronger everyday. I swear I have felt a few kicks over the last week or so. I just can't wait for them to get more consistant and stronger.

I am including belly pics starting at 10 weeks, 12 weeks, and now yesterday at 14 weeks.

We are so blessed and so lucky to have all of you to share this with! Thanks again for always being here and for all the prayers.

I think of my friends who are still fighting to become mothers EVERY DAY and pray that they're dreams come true very soon.

Love always,

T & A and the buns

12 week ultrasound

2009-06-25T19:44:00.012-05:00

We had our 12 week ultrasound today! (I will technically be 12 weeks on Sunday)

Everything looked great! Baby A has a heart rate of 174 and baby B has a heart rate of 167.

They are both measuring right on track and were moving all over the place in there! I am definitely going to be getting kicked a lot when they get bigger! I can't wait :)

Baby A was being shy during his/her 3D picture and had their arms crossed over their face and their legs crossed.....like "don't take my picture." Adam thinks Baby A is a girl. :)

Baby B found their thumb at one point and started sucking on it. Too cute! Baby B was head banging too, so we're convinced baby B is a boy. :)

We did the NTS scan today where they give you your odds etc. of the babies having down syndrome and a few other abnormalities. They measure the fluid at the back of each babies neck and then prick my finger and compare a few things between the measurements, my age, and the blood work. We should get the results back in about 10 days. They measured GREAT though, so the ultrasound tech and the Dr. didn't seem concerned at all. They like it to be less than 3......anything over 3 can sometimes suggest an abnormality. Baby A was .8 and Baby B was 1....which they thought was excellent. Hopefully the blood work will come back low risk as well.

Here are a few pictures of the ultrasound!

This is Baby A - 3D being "shy." You can see the little arms in an X over their little face...and their little legs crossed too.

Baby A

Baby B - 3D - arms over face too....apparently these babies don't like getting their pictures taken. They better get over that real quick! :)

Baby B with his/her leg in the air.

Overall, it was a great day! I will post some 12 week belly pics on Sunday!

We feel so blessed right now and I thank God everyday for these precious gifts. Adam and I are cherishing every minute of this experience and are taking it one day at a time.

Thanks for always being here!

Love,
T & A and the buns

10 Weeks Belly Pics

2009-06-14T20:50:00.004-05:00

As promised, here is my 10 weeks belly! (I'm going to be huge, but I guess that's because there are 2 in there.) :)

As always, thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A (and the twins)

High Risk OB Appointment

2009-06-11T17:09:00.002-05:00

We had our appointment with the high risk OB today and it went very well! He was wonderful and very patient with us while we peppered him with questions......Questions including one from a very concerned Adam...."Will I ever get to have "relations" with my wife again?" To which the Dr. busted out laughing. Just one of the reasons I love my hubby so much, but I don't think he got the answer he was hoping for with all the issues I've been having. Poor guy. Oh well, he'll survive. (Can you hear the sympathy in my words?) ha ha.

I have had a few more bleeding scares since the ER visit and he could tell we were very concerned. He ordered us an ultrasound today and got us in right away.

We saw the babies today and finally got to HEAR their heartbeats!!!! It was so magical! Baby A has a heartrate of 176 and was wiggling around in there, and Baby B has a heartrate of 171 and was moving his/her little arms. I will be 10 weeks on Sunday and they are measuring on track and looking good! I would post the picture, but honestly, they still look like little blobs and the picture is not very clear.....I think the u/s tech was moving around when she snapped it because it's super blurry. I promise to post the 13 week ultrasound pics though!

They finally think they have located the source of the bleeding as well. I guess I have a small bruise where baby B implanted and it's working it's way out. It's outside Baby B's sack though, so it is no concern to the babies at all. Apparently it's pretty common and most women never even know they have one until they do an ultrasound. On the other hand, for some women, like myself, sometimes it tries to correct and heal itself which can cause bleeding and spotting. It feels so good to have a "probable" cause. They said it should hopefully heal itself by the 2nd trimester.

We went over everything from travel restrictions, pre-term labor, monitoring, diet when carrying twins, risks etc. A lot of scary information, but he kept re-iterating that he is giving us "worse-case" scenarios so we're as prepared as possible. As far as travel restrictions etc. he said it will be an appt. by appt. basis.

We are heading to Detroit to meet Amy's family over the 4th of July, which we are really excited about. He gave us the all clear, barring nothing bad happens at our next appointment before we leave, however we have to stop every 2 hours so I can walk around and stretch for at least 15-20 minutes. He also told me to listen to my body and if I'm tired, lay down and not push it. Fair enough. :) My energy level is pretty low these days, so I'll probably be a big party pooper, but we're just glad we can still go! Chelovich's, here we come! All 4 of us! :)

We talked about delivery as well and he said believe it or not, because of all the monitoring these days, about 80% of twin pregnancies make it to 37 weeks. They will not let me go past 38 weeks though no matter what, so if we make it to December 19th, they will ask Adam and I to pick the birthday and schedule the C-section that week. We would prefer to not be in the hospital over Christmas, so we'll plan on hopefully doing it on December 20th, being in the hospital for 4 days because of the C-section, and bringing the babies home on Christmas Eve!!!! How cool! :) Of course, God may have other plans on when these babies will come, but if we could "plan" it, that's what we'll probably do. :) What a Christmas gift!

So we'll have our next ultrasound around 13 weeks right before we leave for Detroit around July 2nd or so and then we won't have another one until our 20 week ultrasound.

As far as how I'm feeling, I'm definitely showing. It's not just bloat either, definitely babies. I will post a pic on Sunday at 10 weeks. :) Adam and I are excited to do a little maternity clothes shopping! (Well, let me rephrase, "I" am excited to do a little maternity clothes shopping, Adam will probably just come along to monitor my spending. :) )

My nausea and vomiting seems to come and go now, so I'm hoping and praying it's on it's way out! My lower back is killing me constantly because the Dr. said everything is stretching so fast, but he gave me the okay to use a heating pad periodically to help....which I am super excited about. I of course, asked him 8 million times if it was safe and he said since it was not on my abdomen and just on my lower back....it wasn't possible for a heating pad to even get hot enough to do any damage. Since I'm such a freak lately, I'll probably keep it on low anyway, but it's better than nothing! I've been craving apples and meat. I've never been a big fan of apples, but I can't get enough of them right now. I also haven't eaten meat since last November, but have become a carnivore again. There are probably 2 boys in there......causing me to want cheeseburgers, turkey and any other meat I can get my hands on. :) I'm exhausted all the time and literally have to lay down and take a 20 minute nap in the morning after taking a shower and getting ready. I'm THAT worn out.

Adam and I feel so blessed right now. We have so many friends who are still fighting to make their dream of becoming parents come true. We got lucky this time and we just pray that they all get their turn soon. Whenever I read of someone else's infertility struggles, my heart literally aches for them and the tears begin to fall. I have been there so many times in the last 4 years, crying myself to sleep while Adam held me, wondering why this was happening to us, not understanding and searching for answers. I still can't believe this is really happening to us and I am grateful beyond words for these little "miracles." (literally miracles)

These babies are already loved and cherished so much and I pray everyday that they keep growing and thriving until we can hold them in our arms in December.

Thanks for being here and for all the prayers!

Love,
T & A (and our 2 little miracles)
(and Tenley and Cooper of course. )

First OBGYN Appointment

2009-06-04T20:02:00.003-05:00

I was released to my OBGYN! WooHoo!

I went for my first appt. today after being released by my RE. It was actually a pretty uneventful appointment. Since I've already had so much monitoring and tests etc. all she did today was talk to me about delivering twins, answered questions and did some more blood work. I was kind of relieved since my cervix seems to be easily irritated, I really didn't want anything done that could upset it further. I've still had a few bouts of red bleeding.....but more spotting now, instead of bleeding like before our ER visit last week. My Dr. seemed completely unfazed by it and said that 1 out of 4 of all of her patients experience bleeding in the first trimester and are fine. She said it's actually about 50% of women carrying twins or more though, so that made me feel much better. :)

My official due date is January 10, 2010, however since it's twins, my "twin due date" is December 19th. (37 weeks) She said if you haven't already delivered, they will schedule a C-section at 38 weeks. (The day after Christmas!) Twin pregnancies are ALWAYS C-sections with her practice and I would be delivering at Delnor in Geneva. It's much riskier and stressful on the babies to try a vaginal birth because it's hard for them to turn etc. when they're sharing such a tight space with another baby, so they automatically do C-sections. I had hoped I would be able to at least try to deliver the old fashioned way, but I have so many friends who labored for hours, only to have a C-section anyway. To be honest, I would rather just do the C-section and be done with it. :) Plus, I want to do whatever is safest for the babies no matter what.

We don't have another appointment with my Dr. until June 29th, however since I am officially categorized as "high risk" we are meeting with their high risk OB, Dr. Pombar, next Thursday. He will determine when our next ultrasound will be etc. They monitor twin pregnancies more closely, so Dr. Pombar will explain what they will watch for etc.

All in all, it went well.

We are SO lucky to have all of you in our lives and we can't wait to share our journey to parenthood with all of you!!!!!

Please keep the prayers coming!!!!

Thanks for being here!!!

Love,
T & A (and the twins)

Emergency Room Visit

2009-05-29T13:28:00.004-05:00

Last night was scary....VERY scary.

At about 9:30, I felt just "off." I can't explain it other than just "off." I'm sure everyone has felt that way before and know exactly what I'm talking about.

I went to the bathroom and before I knew it, I was bleeding.....I mean BLEEDING. Red, lots of it and with clots. (Sorry if too much information for some of the guys out there. :) )

I ran out of the bathroom and told Adam I was bleeding....not spotting.....bleeding. I started bawling and felt so nauseas, it took everything in me not to puke. Adam was pretty panicked too so we called the on call nurse at CCRM. She told me that believe it or not, there were several reasons I could be bleeding, but it didn't necessarily mean I was miscarrying. The only comforting thing I had, was I did not have any major cramping as I had with my other 2 miscarriages. She said we should just lay down, get off my feet, go to sleep and go in for my scheduled appointment the following morning. Yeah right. She also said that if we were really stressed out, we could go to the ER....which is what we did.

We got to the ER about 10:30 last night and got home around 2am. They did a pelvic exam to make sure my cervix was still closed...which it was, so that was good. They also did bloodwork which came back fine and what felt like a million years later, they did an ultrasound. They did the ultrasound and said the babies looked fine and had strong heartbeats, but they could not locate the source of the bleeding. That made us feel much better that the babies seemed to be completely oblivious to the drama that was unfolding around them. Little stinkers, giving Mommy and Daddy a heart attack.....I'm sure it won't be the first time. :)

Anyway, we came home, still nervous, but feeling better that the babies seemed fine....until this morning. The hospital faxed over the results from my ultrasound last night so I could take it with me to my appointment this morning. The measurements the u/s tech took showed that one of the babies was measuring a week behind where it should be. It said baby A had a heart rate of 167 bpm (good) and it was measuring 6 weeks 5 day....(not good, should be 7 weeks 3 days)......and baby B had a heartrate of 189 bpm (also good)....but measuring 7 weeks 1 day...should be 7 weeks 4 days. Panicked again, I called CCRM and since I was going in for bloodwork this morning anyway, they ordered another ultrasound.

I am SO glad they did the ultrasound. They explained that the ER ultrasound techs are not usually as thorough as they are and have been known to "mis-measure" the babies. This turned out to be true. My ultrasound this morning showed the following:

Baby A: 163 bpm (strong heartbeat) and measuring 7 weeks 3 days (right on track)
Baby B: 169 bpm (strong heartbeat) and measuring 7 weeks 6 days (a little AHEAD of schedule)

BOTH looked GREAT! Here is the new picture:

They've definitely gotten a lot bigger than their last picture. :)

They still can't locate the source of the bleeding and it seems to be tapering off now, but still there. My u/s tech this morning said that I do have some pockets of blood near my cervix, so to expect more bleeding over the weekend, but as freaked out as it will make us, just remind myself it's not coming from the babies. Ugh. The cause is still unknown.

My Dr. has officially put me on partial bedrest at least through the weekend and maybe through next week. I have my next OBGYN appointment on Wednesday.

So that's we're at....still needing lots of prayers and good thoughts for our precious babies!

On another note, I had my first dream about the genders last night and dreamt of a baby girl and a baby boy.......so we'll see. :)

Thanks for ALWAYS being there for us!

We love you all and appreciate your prayers and support more than we could ever tell you!

Love,
T & A (and our 2 little buns.......little stinkers :) )

First Ultrasound Pic - 6 weeks!

2009-05-19T17:05:00.004-05:00

This is the first picture of our TWINS!!!!!

I was nervous about my spotting yesterday, so I talked to my nurse from CCRM and she said we could have our ultrasound this morning instead of waiting until Friday! :)

We were SO nervous going into the u/s this morning.....I felt like dead man walking. (I know.... a little dramatic) I honestly thought something was going to be wrong and was trying to accept it.

The nurses there were wonderful as always and greeted me with a hug and a lot of reassurances. We went into the room, Adam started to sweat and it felt like everything was in slow motion as she started the ultrasound. She knew we were so nervous and apparently we were making her nervous too because she's gotten so close to us.

She told us she wanted to look at the screen first and assess everything. She studied the screen for about 30 seconds.....which felt like an hour to us. She told us that she doesn't normally get emotional with patients because they're trained to disconnect themselves.......well, she started welling up with tears and turned the screen and said "everything looks perfect and congratulations, it's twins." I started crying and Adam got pretty choked up. She showed us the flickering lights on the screen which were their little hearts beating away. It was an amazing site and I couldn't stop crying with happy tears.

Baby A (on the left in the pic) is measuring right on schedule at 6 weeks 1 day with a heart rate of 122 and Baby B is measuring 6 weeks with a heart rate of 115. She said everything looked as good as it possibly could for this early in the pregnancy and that the heart rates would get faster and faster as the pregnancy progresses.

She also found a small sub-chorionic tear which she said is causing my spotting. Apparently it's very common in twin pregnancies and is no threat to the babies.

Our due date is December 20th because it's twins, but she said they could basically come at any time during the month of December.

My estradiol level is 1,038 today which is good. They like it to be over 300, so they are changing my patches to 3 every other day, as opposed to 4.

My progesterone was 11.8, so I am still on the same dosages of progesterone.

I go back for more bloodwork on Thursday, but they didn't mention my next ultrasound. I will probably find out on Thursday.

I can't imagine a better Christmas present than our 2 little bundles of joy!!!! We are over-joyed and so thankful to God for these precious miracles!!!!

Thank you for all of your support and love!!!!!

Love,
T & A (and our 2 little buns!)

Vomiting and Nausea Remedies

2009-05-15T08:35:00.002-05:00

So remember how I was nervous because I wasn't feeling sick every day....only once in a awhile? Well, I am sick 24/7 now and vomiting about 10 times/day. I have a call into my nurse and will hopefully hear back soon.

Does anyone have any good remedies they used for all day sickness.....I don't know why it's called morning sickness because I have it ALL day and even woke up in the middle of the night to get sick. I'm miserable. (Still loving it in a twisted way though...because it tells me I'm definitely still pregnant :) )

These are what I've heard so far:

Brown rice with a tiny bit of cinnamon and sugar (from my Mom, which I actually was able to keep down for a few hours yesterday)
Toast, crackers etc.
Ginger Ale....which honestly makes me feel worse because of the carbonation
Preggy Pops....which I had to order online because I couldn't find them anywhere local. Hopefully they'll get here early next week
Suck on a lime with a tiny bit of salt.
Eat small meals throughout the day.......NOTHING sounds good and it stays down for 10 minutes, tops.

I'm hoping my Dr. can give me something for the vomiting. I feel like I've been hit with a severe case of the flu. I'm weak, dizzy and exhausted. No fever though.....so i know it's pregnancy related.

Anyway, does anyone have any other remedies they can share? I'm open to try anything at this point.....ANYTHING.

Thanks for being here!

Love,

T & A

Prayers Needed

2009-05-13T15:13:00.002-05:00

I debated posting this because I didn't want to worry everyone, the way I've been worrying.....but then I realized, we need some prayers.

I started spotting on Monday which has continued through to this morning. I am completely freaked out. I talked to my nurse at CCRM on Monday and she told me that it's completely normal when on progesterone vaginal suppositories. IShe said the suppositories can irritate your cervix and cause spotting. She said that unless it's a lot of bright red blood with severe cramping.....not to stress out. When you've had two miscarriages, which started with spotting....this is much easier said than done. I'm a mess.

I had to go in this morning to check my P4 and E2 levels anyway, so they did an HCG test as well. The nurses all assured me the spotting was normal, but I started sobbing during my blood test. They ran the pregnancy blood test and it came back at 9,364 which is right on track and right on target for where it should be. I don't have any severe cramping....just twinges and quick pains here and there which they said is my uterus stretching.....plus no major bleeding.....just a tiny bit of spotting. When you're pregnant though....ANY amount of blood is alarming.

My P4 came back at 13.8 which has actually gone up, which is a good thing. My E2 level came back at 868 which is great.

Anyway, I didn't want to make everyone else worry as much as we are, but we need extra prayers right now. God gave us this pregnancy as a gift and I am just praying every day that it sticks around for another 9 months or so.

Our ultrasound on May 22nd can't get here fast enough..................

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Question.....

2009-05-11T14:03:00.002-05:00

How am I going to make it until Friday, May 22nd for our ultrasound? I mean seriously, how?

I am driving myself...and Adam, crazy. Every morning, I look for symptoms. I actually get upset if I don't feel sick during the day. My symptoms come and go. One day, I feel fine, and the next I am so nauseas I want to cry. No consistancy and it's killing me. I even POAS this morning to check my pregnancy test. It was an extremely dark line which made me feel better. Then I threw up after breakfast this morning and was SO HAPPY! I know, I'm psychotic.

This little stinker....or stinkers in there are already messing with their Mom.

Our ultrasound is scheduled for Friday, May 22nd at 9:00am. I am officially 5w1day pregnant so I will be 6w5days pregnant at the ultrasound....but whose counting.

They asked me if we wanted morning or afternoon that day....and I was like, um, are you kidding me? We'll wait 3 weeks from finding out we're pregnant, so what's another day? Yeah right, I asked for the earliest available appointment that day. So 9:00am on the 22nd it is.

I go back in on Wednesday for my P4 (progesterone) and E2 (estrogen) levels check.

Please keep the prayers coming!!!!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

3rd Beta

2009-05-06T14:03:00.004-05:00

More good news!

My beta jumped to 819 today. They like it to double every 48 hours, so they would've liked to see it at 640, so 819 is GREAT!

7dp5dt: 47
10dp5dt: 321 (P4 = 10.5)
12dp5dt: 819 (P4=10.8) (E2=896)

The P4 (progesterone) might seem low so I asked my nurse about it, and she said that since I am on endometrin, which goes directly to the uterus, your blood level is always a LOT lower than what your actual P4 level is. They say to multiply your blood level by 6 and that's what your P4 inside your uterus is.....which is where it's the most important. :) So mine is estimated around 60....which is very good.

They won't do any more blood work to monitor my pregnancy hormone until the ultrasound, but they will continue the blood work to monitor my P4 level and E2 levels. I go back on Monday for the first monitoring.

As for me, I am still puking and not loving it quite as much as yesterday, but still loving it. I am also exhausted all the time and hungry, yet nauseas.....it's like I can't decide if I want to eat or throw up. I'll figure it out as I go. :)

Tenley also had her last eye surgery this morning. They successfully removed the oil from her eye and she is home recovering. She can see again and is a little groggy from the anethesia, but is otherwise doing fantastic!

Thanks again for all the love and prayers!!!! We are so overwhelmed with gratitude and love for all of you for cheering us on in making this dream come true.

Keep the prayers coming and we love you!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Let me start with a picture........

2009-05-04T18:09:00.009-05:00

Cooper and Tenley proudly spreading the news!

After 4 years……….(almost to the day we started trying)
2 IUI’s with Clomid
2 miscarriages
2 surgeries
2 hysteroscopies (tours of my uterus)
1 integrin 3 biopsy of my uterine lining
1 HSG
1 Saline Ultrasound for tubes
4 IUI’s with injectables
4 In-Vitro’s
Over 200 injections
Over 100 bloodtests
Over 100 doctor’s appointments
3 doctors
3 trips to Denver
And countless tears……………

WE ARE PREGNANT!!!!!!!!!!

We are over the moon and praying everyday that this pregnancy continues happy and healthy for the next 9 months. I figured out my due date for 1 baby would be January 10, 2010 and twins or more would be December 20, 2009. (Twins are full gestation at 37 weeks) These dates are an estimate, and we would find out our actual due date at the first u/s.

We told everyone that the test wouldn’t be until Wednesday in case it didn’t work out. We would’ve needed a few days to deal with everything before I would be okay to post. Just trying to protect our feelings and be realistic. I hope everyone understands.

I had promised Adam I wouldn’t take a home pregnancy test without him, but I caved. I think he knew deep down that I would cave, but tried to have faith in me. He had no idea I had been testing, which made it even more fun to tell him the good news.

I started POASing (pee on a stick) with the cheapie internet tests on Wednesday (5dp5dt) and swore I saw a faint pink line on the HPT. I chalked it up as an evaporation line because I was cramping so bad that I thought there was no way I was pregnant. I definitely thought af was on her way.

I woke up Thursday (6dp5dt) and felt sick all morning. I thought something might be up, so I took another test and the same thing happened. I decided to go out and buy a few different brands of tests to try to see if I could get a more clear result. I went out and bought a FRER (First Response early Result) and a CBE digital (Clearblue Easy Digital).

The FRER came up positive pretty quickly and I almost fell over in shock. I decided to try the digital one too which flat out says “Pregnant” or “Not Pregnant.”
“Pregnant” popped up and I started bawling….I think my dogs were afraid of me. I laid on the floor with them sobbing while they gave me kisses.

It took everything in me not to pick up the phone and call Adam at work. I held it in ALL day. I ran up to Osco to pick up a balloon and card for him. I walked up to the balloon counter and asked the lady for a “Congrats Daddy” balloon. She asked me if I had just found out I was pregnant. I started bawling and told her all about the fact that it had been 4 years and that I promised him I wouldn’t test so he had NO idea and how surprised he would be etc. After she came to grips with the fact that I wasn’t a sobbing lunatic, she had tears in her eyes and told me she had the chills. She gave me the only “baby” balloon they had and I came home….still in shock….and still crying.

I went home and laid out a bunch of IU baby stuff we’ve had along with the card, the balloon and the 2 positive pregnancy tests on the kitchen table. The picture below is what Adam came home to when he walked in from work. ☺ He was SHOCKED and kept saying “I don’t believe you.” We both had a very emotional hug and we couldn’t stop smiling…..or crying. It’s been SUCH a long road to get here and it is still sinking in. Adam is going to be an amazing Dad. He is an amazing husband and has been by my side through EVERYTHING. I honestly don’t think childbirth will faze him at all after what he’s seen. ☺

He is my rock, my Soul Mate and now he is going to be an amazing father to our children. I am a very lucky woman and our children will be very lucky to have him as their Dad.

We called our families that night. Our Moms both cried, our Dads were thrilled and our sisters and brother were soooo excited for us, but we told them to keep it under wraps until our 2nd blood test today.

Since my blood test wasn’t scheduled until Monday, I called my nurse at CCRM, told her about my positive home pregnancy tests and begged her to move my blood test up to Friday. My nurse told me not to freak out on her if the number came back low…..because it was still so early. I promised I wouldn’t freak out on her, so she laughed and gave in. Our nurse, Dawn, has been so great through all of this.

I went in on Friday morning for my blood test and waited for the results. My blood test was at FCI since they do my local monitoring for me. I absolutely love everyone there and they all hugged me and had tears in their eyes when I walked in for my blood test. Apparently, when I had called the day before to schedule my appt., I told one of the nurses about the positive tests. She called everyone….including some at home….because they were all praying so hard for me. I adore them.

CCRM finally called that afternoon and told me I was definitely pregnant and my beta at 7dp5dt came back at 47, which she said was a very good number considering how early it was. Anything over 10 confirms a pregnancy. My progesterone was 15.8 which she said was also good. They will continue to monitor that throughout the first trimester as well. My 2nd beta was today and it came back at 321! (10dp5dt) They would’ve liked it to be around 150 or so….so 321 is GREAT! It could also indicate more than one little munchkin in there….uh oh!!!!! ☺ Dr. Surrey called us to congratulate us as well and said that based on our numbers he wouldn't be surprised if there's more than 1 baby floatin' around in there.......Adam's hoping for twin girls....or maybe even triplet girls.....hee hee.

7dp5dt: 47
10dp5dt: 321

I go back on Wednesday for one more beta test and then we wait for our ultrasound on Friday, May 22nd. That’s when we’ll find out how many babies we’re having. ☺

I feel nauseas, have already thrown up several times, am an eating machine and I am LOVING it. I am so bloated that I already look 4 MONTHS pregnant, not 4 weeks. I seriously can’t button any of my pants right now. There is something else that had gotten bigger as well….actually 2 things….that Adam is LOVING….not that I’ll let him touch me. Ha ha.

We still can’t believe this is really happening. We are both waiting to wake up from this dream. We’ve been here twice before and lost both pregnancies, so we’re cautiously excited. We’re trying to live in the moment and enjoy every second of this experience. I think we will both feel better once we see / hear the heartbeat(s) at the u/s. As for finding out the gender, we’ve decided to not find out if it’s 1 baby….but twins or more, we will definitely find out. We will need to plan and prepare as much as possible. Ha ha.

Please continue with the prayers! We debated on telling everyone so early in the pregnancy….but we kept it a secret the other 2 times and look where it got us. We figure we need all the prayers we can get right now and you’ve all been with us since the beginning…………we need your prayers more than ever.

One last thing, for those of you on facebook with us, please don’t post a congrats on our wall or anything…….for now. ☺

We LOVE you all so much and thank you again for the love, support and prayers for us and our little baby / babies. ☺ This baby / babies are already loved soooooo much!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A
(and our little bun(s) in the oven….finally!) ☺

Meet our triplets

2009-04-27T20:35:00.002-05:00

They are the most beautiful embryos ever as far as I'm concerned. They may or may not become babies, but we love them just the same. These are the 3 blastocysts we transferred on Friday. We have no idea which is which, but that's okay. Whether we become pregnant or not, we will always have this picture.

Isn't it amazing that we all looked like this in the beginning?

So as Adam posted a few days ago, the transfer went well. We arrived at 12:30pm for some blood work to check my estrogen and progesterone levels.

I had been drinking water all morning to make sure my bladder was full. We were checked into our room, where I took a wonderful and welcomed valium to help relax me and my uterus. The sonographer came in to do a quick ultrasound to make sure my bladder was full enough. It was VERY full, so she let me go and pee some out....a whole cup's worth. The hardest part is stopping mid-pee (try it sometime....NOT easy.....but I managed and felt much better afterwards.

Next, the embryologist came in to discuss our embryos. This is the most nerve-racking part because you have no idea what he is going to say. Is he going to say that we have 1, 2 or 3, or even none......and what quality are they?

The embryologist, John, was the same one I had completely lost it with sobbing on the phone when he had called to tell us we only had 1 quality embryo. This time, he said "I have good news this time" with a big smile on his face. He was probably thanking God that he didn't have to deliver bad news again considering my emotional history with him. Anyway, he told us that all 3 had survived the thaw. Anything over 75% is considered good. Ours were at 100%, 95% and 90% so we were really happy with that.

Next, Dr. Surrey came in to do the transfer. The funny part is that he has been our Doctor this entore time, calling the shots on dosages, protocols etc. for us, but behind the scenes because this was the first time we actually met him face to face. He was very nice and was pleased with our embryos as well. John wheeled this huge incubator into the room with a big screen on it so we could see our little embabies. Adam was allowed to take the picture above as long as the flash was off. They loaded them into the catheter and with ultrasound guidance of pushing on my full bladder, they dropped them right into the middle of my lining in the middle of my uterus. The whole process took about 15 minutes and was pretty quick and painless. I think the valium helped this time.

Dr. Surrey removed the catheter and I had to lay there for 45 more minutes completely still. After 45 minutes, they came in and told me I could finally go to the bathroom. I honestly think I peed for 3 full minutes.

I was on strict bedrest from Friday afternoon when we got back to the hotel until Sunday morning. My shower on Sunday morning felt so good. We finished our adoption paperwork...which took 4 hours, but it's ready to go if needed. We are ready to be parents either way.

We flew home today and per doctor's orders I had to use a wheelchair at both airports. It felt a little silly, but I was not going to risk walking the lengths of the airports when he told me specifically not to. I'm not allowed to lift anything heavier than 10 lbs. until the pregnancy test.

I am currently 3dp5dt (for those of you without a phd in infertility lingo, it means 3 days past a 5 day transfer) Our blastocyts are considered 5 days old at the time of the transfer. I am trying not to obsess over every little cramp, twinge etc.

I took some very important items with me on the trip. I took and wore my St. Girard necklace from my parents, my thumbring from my Gommers (which I held during the transfer), and my aromatherapy stress relief spray from Adam's parents. I also received some beautiful flowers from 2 of my very best friends, Kristi and Janna, which I kept right next to my bed to keep me smiling. I took turns smelling the stress relief and the flowers.

My very sweet and thoughtful friend Angelique had put together a care package for me before we left as well, which included snacks, a movie rental gift certificate and a hilarious book, which I loved reading.

I took everyone's love, thoughts, prayers and sweet messages with me and held them close to my heart, as I know Adam did as well. We feel so loved and know that no matter what happens at this point, we are very loved and supported.

Finally, I wanted to share something pretty cool with you.......
Adam and I decided to get out of the hotel on Sunday night since I was officially off of bedrest. We went out to dinner and decided on P.F. Chang's. We each received a fortune cookie at the end of dinner.....I cry everytime I read them.

Mine said "Nothing in life is to be feared; it is only to be understood." The other side says "girl." Adam's read "Adventure can be a real happiness" and the other side says "December." If we get pregnant, we would be due in late December / early January. If we adopt, we could definitely have a baby by December as well. The fortunes could mean us giving birth to a child or adopting a child.....but whatever the outcome we're excited to see what life brings us.....one sign at a time.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Transfer Info - from Adam

2009-04-24T22:09:00.003-05:00

People of the internet -

This is Adam. Tiff is currently laying horizontally and can't type, so I thought I would take the liberty to update everyone on today's big events.

Overall, today ended up being optimal conditions for us which was great. All 3 of our embryos were thawed and transferred successfully! Further, each of the 3 embryos were in great condition. The embryologist can tell you what % of the cells survived the thaw and 75% is really good. For each of our 3 embryos, we had 100%, 95% and 90% cell survival. Finally, the transfer went smoothly. So, it was a positive outcome on all fronts today. Now, we just sit back and hope we get lucky.

We got back to the hotel around 3pm Colorado time. Now, Tiff is trapped in bed until Sunday morning and can only get up to use the bathroom, brush her teeth, and wash her face. We didn't realize how difficult this would be. She's already tired of being confined to the bed. Further, I had to go out and buy some beer so I can make it through the next 36 hours as well. :-)

Anyway, that's all I have for now. If anything amusing happens on Saturday, I'll let you know. Otherwise, Tiff will blog again on Sunday when she can sit up straight.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T&A

Here we go!

2009-04-23T22:22:00.002-05:00

We are here safe and sound in Denver.

I think the universe may be messing with me. We went to pick up our rental car when we arrived......turns out to be an orange mini-van. A mini-van? Come ooooonnnnnn!!!! Such a "Mom" car! We asked for a compact car.......a mini-van? Seriously?

We walk into our hotel and the first thing we see is a huge advertisement for a Mother's Day brunch coming up. I am usually a HUGE fan of holidays.......Mother's Day, not so much. The only good thing about Mother's Day is that we adore our Moms so much that we can at least honor them....and of course our Grandma's......other than that, as far as I'm concerned right now, it's one of the worst days of the year.

So our transfer will be at 1:30 tomorrow (2:30 Chicago time). We have to be there at 12:30 for more bloodwork and to get me prepped etc. We should be back to our hotel around 2:30pm and ready for bedrest. I will sleep off my valium and Adam will find some sports to watch I'm sure. Then it's bedrest for me until Sunday. My nurse told me that strict bedrest ends Sunday morning, but to take it easy. Dinner or a movie would be fine on Sunday night though, so that's what we'll do. We fly home Monday and it's on to the 2ww for me. I loath the 2ww.

I had bloodwork yesterday to check my progesterone levels. They like it to be higher than 6 and mine was 12.6 so we got a "very good" report.

So that's where we're at. We'll update tomorrow when we get back from the transfer. Please pray that oour precious little embryos survive the thaw and are welcomed home in my uterus! I want them to make themselves very comfy for the next 9 months.....even if it means triplets!

We have 3 blasts........from 3 cycles

Embryo #1: From IVF #1: PGD tested "normal", created in March '07...this little embryo has been transferred between 3 different clinics....little traveler.
None to freeze from IVF #2
Embryo #2: From IVF #3: Created on September 20, 2008........what would've been my brother Ryan's 30th birthday.
Embryo #3: From IVF #4: Created on March 3, 2009........created on my grandpa's (Gompers)birthday.

Please say a special prayer for each individual embryo. They mean more to us than you can imagine.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Last Shot

2009-04-19T19:43:00.002-05:00

Is it wierd that I got emotional last night when I stuck myself for the last time? I never in a million years thought I would be sad about that....but I was. I just can't believe this is the end of the road for trying for a biological baby for us. Sticking myself with needles, doctor's appointments, surgeries, blood tests and procedures etc. has been our life for 4 years, that it's wierd to think about not doing that anymore.

I started my tetracycline tonight, which is quite the treat. I have to take it 4 times a day and it literally feels like it is tearing my stomach apart, piece by piece. The first time I had to take this medicine, I learned the hard way that you absolutely cannot take it on an empty stomach. I vomited and dry heaved all day and had to force myself to eat something to make it stop. It was miserable. I am still doing 4 estrogen vivelle patches every other day as well. I started the progesterone this morning, which is 3 times a day and am already starting my headaches that come with it...fun, fun. I also started my medrol tonight, but that's just once a day for the next 4 nights.....so not too bad at all.

I still can't believe we're leaving on Thursday. It's very surreal and to be honest, we're ready to get it over with. The transfer is always my favorite day, because I can say I am pregnant as soon as they put those little embabies back in my uterus and we bring them home....or back to the hotel in Denver this time.

I'm really excited that CCRM gives you a valium before the transfer. I've never had that before and have always gone without anything. My cervix is a pain in the butt and very uncooperative. You also have to have a full bladder during the procedure and they tell you to stay relaxed to make it go smoother........yeah right. I've never been able to relax for the other transfers so I'm hoping the valium will help. I mean, seriously, you try relaxing waiting for the embryologist to come in and tell you how many of your embryos survived and what quality they are, with a FULL bladder, with 8 people in the room, in stirrups, while they dilate your cervix while poking and prodding you with a metal catheter.......seriously, come on. Don't get me wrong, the transfer is by far the easiest part of the whole process.....but I think I just tell myself that because you're literally on adrenaline with excitement at that point. The day of the transfer you are PUPO.....in infertility language it means "Pregnant until proven otherwise."

Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes. We definitely need them. I can't thank all of my family, friends, and blog friends enough for all of your support while I'm being a "negative Nellie" as they call me at my old RE's office.

I went to church with my Mom this morning and I got a huge hug from Pastor Melinda. She married Adam and I and has known my family for a long time. She has been following our blog and sending prayers to the Big Guy upstairs for us, which means a lot. I'm hoping she has some kind of "in" with him that we don't have. :)

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Transfer Update

2009-04-17T16:57:00.002-05:00

22 shots of lupron down and only 2 to go!!!! I'm also up to 4 estrogen patches every other day. The good news is that my body is responding. I went in for some more bloodwork and an ultrasound this morning. My lining is 9.5 which they said is "wonderful." Hey, at least they didn't say "perfect." :) My E2 level is 708, which is also right on track. So we're still all set for our transfer next Friday.....ONE WEEK from today!

So the wierd thing about only having 2 more shots left, is that it's my last 2 shots ever until we either have a baby or adopt one. It's still hard to believe that this is the end of the infertility road for us. 4 awful years and it's almost over. It's wierd that we've always had a "plan." Next time, we'll try a new Doctor, or maybe we'll try a new protocol....or we'll do special training on our embryos etc. ....this time we're done. Part of me wants to start sobbing with sadness and the other part of me wants to celebrate.

I had my support group last night and had a blast again. Lots of tears, but laughter at the same time. Those girls "get it" and it's so nice to have all of them in my life.

So that's where we are right now.

As always, thanks for being here!!!

Love,
T & A

2 weeks until Transfer

2009-04-10T16:12:00.002-05:00

So my arms and veins were feeling pretty neglected lately so I treated them to some bloodwork this morning. It was my first estradiol check since starting the lupron injections and Vivelle estrogen patches. 15 shots down, 9 more to go. Ugh....I hate lupron. CCRM called to give me my results and it was 328.....which she said is WAY above what they like to see....but that's a good thing, apparently. There really isn't a maximum at this point, just a minimum. I would normally be excited about this, but I'm super bitter instead. Woo hoo....way to go....yeah. The only time I will get excited about test results are when they result in a baby.....yet, those are the only tests that don't turn out to be perfect.......

When I went in this morning for my b/w and to see my FCI nurses...whom I love.....they were really sweet about everything. Since we're technically patients of CCRM and FCI just does our monitoring at this point, they didn't know what was going on. I filled them in about our one little quality blastocyst and how we're transferring all 3 of our little embryos....one from every Dr. we've seen. One from Dr. Morris, one from FCI and now the one from CCRM. It's like a smorgesborg of blastocysts. I'm sure I just butchered the spelling of Smorgesborg....but you figured it out.

I told them we're not feeling very hopeful and that we will be filling out our adoption paperwork while I'm on bedrest after the transfer.....they told me they understood why I was being a "negative nellie" so they would be my cheerleaders.

So, I can't believe our transfer is happening in 2 weeks. Our last "try" for a biological baby is happening in 2 weeks......that's if our little ice-babies even survive the thaw. Wow.....see how positive I am? Honestly, stick a fork in me, because I'm done. I'm done with all the needles and the drugs, done with all the hope and disappointment, done with the financial stress and done with the tears. Just done. I am so bloated, I could survive in the dessert for weeks with the amount of water I'm retaining. I'm like the pillsbury doughboy on hormones.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Pure Estrogen Baby!

2009-04-05T22:27:00.002-05:00

My "bonus" AF arrived right on time on Friday. I couldn't believe that my body finally decided to cooperate and follow the schedule CCRM gave me. My body owes me AT LEAST that.

So, I started my estrogen Vivelle patches tonight (CD3) and lowered my dosage of lupron. I'm sure our house should be a fun one (as if it could get any more hormonal around here) over the next few weeks with all the hormones flyin' around.

We finally booked our trip today too. We fly out on Thursday, April 23rd and come home on Monday, April 27th.

We went to a wedding in IN this weekend for one of Adam's friends from IU. You can almost read facial expressions and hear the questions running through people's minds when they find out you've been married for 5 1/2 years and don't have any kids yet. I was considering grabbing the microphone from the band and making an announcement like "Adam and I hate kids so we don't think it's a good idea that we have any" or "yes, married for 5 1/2 years and no kids....it's none of your freakin' business." I was actually pleasantly surprised that noone just came out and asked.....bless them.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

People Story

2009-04-02T11:03:00.002-05:00

Those of you who know me, know that I love my dirt magazines. US Weekly and People are my favorites. Anyway, I received this story from People in an e-mail. I love this story. It's so refreshing when celebrities are willing to share their stories too and bring awareness to infertility. Courtney Cox Arquette is one of them. She suffered miscarriages before conceiving daughter Coco on her 3rd IVF attempt. Nicole Kidman suffered several miscarriages as well. Those are just a few. Now Constance Marie is sharing her story as well.

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20269221,00.html?xid=email-peopledaily-20090402-20269221

They all have happy endings, but there are several that don't.

That song I posted earlier "I would die for that" says it all. I would die for a happy ending for us.

My biggest enemy these days is "hope." I can feel her creeping in every now and then....tapping me on the shoulder and whispering "you can't shake me because you want this so bad." Then I am reminded that she has always failed me in the past and I want to knock her out. Hope is not my friend. She has hurt us way too many times in the last 4 years and Adam and I are trying to go into this last attempt as unattached as possible. We both need to protect our emotions at this point.

I have my next support group meeting on April 16th and am already looking forward to it.

Thanks for being here.

Love,
T & A

Last BCP

2009-04-01T12:21:00.002-05:00

I took my last birth control pill last night! WooHoo! So now I am only taking my daily "hate" injection. My bonus af should be here on Friday and then we are 3 weeks and counting until the transfer!

Adam and I decided to bring our adoption papers with us to Denver, so we can fill everything out and have it ready to go when we get the bad news on May 6th. I will be on bedrest Friday, Saturday and Sunday, so it will give us something to do when we're stuck in our hotel room and sick of movies, TV and reading.

I had a rough weekend. I had a dream on Friday night that I found out I was pregnant and Adam and I were SO ecstatic, but then I woke up, realized I was dreaming and started crying. We were supposed to go to a birthday party for our friend's 1 year old son that night and I just couldn't do it. There were going to be kids, babies and pregnant people there, and I know it sounds lame, but I emotionally could not have handled it that day. My friend Lauren and her husband, Paul were MORE than understanding and it was very appreciated. They are such great friends.

I've been a pretty crappy friend lately. I've been so secluded. People have been reaching out to me in phone calls, e-mails etc. and I've been so selfish. I really need to start getting back into the land of the living. Sorry friends!!!!!

So, okay, the lupron not only makes me crazy these days, but it makes me have the craziest dreams. I could seriously give Speilberg a run for his money with the dreams I've been having. None of them have been fun or happy....with the exception of the pregnancy one. I woke up this morning shaking because I had AWFUL gut-wrenching dreams last night. Just so you understand exactly HOW scary we're talking here.....let me recap a few of them.

The first entire dream talks about a guy who was murdered. It's like there was a narrator in my dream talking....a creepy voice. This guy and his wife were hanging at a friend's house, when the narrator cuts in and says "when he went to get something from the pantry, a pillowcase was thrown over his head and he was waiting to be killed." It cuts back to the wife who is now looking for her husband and can't find him. The narrator voice cuts in again and says "How scared would you be if you had a pillowcase shoved over your head and you were just waiting for them to kill you, but you didn't know how or when it would happen?" "What would you say to your husband if this was the last time you would ever speak to him and the murderers gave you that chance?" So I woke up...trembling.

I finally fell back asleep only to have a dream that I was at my Uncle Larry's funeral all over again. I couldn't walk or breathe because I was sobbing so hard in my dream. The funeral was outside in a huge park and when I went out there, I couldn't find my family anywhere and had to sit by myself. The rest of the dream was me trying to frantically find my family. Instead of waking up trembling this time, I woke up sobbing.

You would think I had taken a hit of acid before falling asleep or something.

On another note, Tenley took her last pill this morning. She's still on a ton of eye drops, but this oral medication makes her sooooo gassy. It's awful. She's a little bomb dropper and Adam and I argue over who she snuggles with on the couch. We are so relieved that these pills are officially over!!!! :)

She seems to be able to see big things. Today is 3 weeks post-op....so hopefully she'll regain her full vision in the next 3 weeks.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Support Group

2009-03-26T17:15:00.003-05:00

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted. There has been a lot going on.

I went to my first support group meeting last Thursday night and loved every second of it. There were tears yes, but a lot of laughter too. There were 12 women who all happen to be at different points in their TTC journey. It was great support and before we knew it, 3 hours had passed. I plan on going again this month and am already looking forward to it. It was nice to be surrounded by women who truly understand the emotional roller coaster all of this is.

One of the things that was mentioned during the support group, was the song by Kellie Coffey called "I would die for that." It's a song about infertility and I've already listened to it at least 25 times since yesterday and I still cry everytime I hear it. Adam and I listened to it for the first time together and he held me while I cried and couldn't believe how much every word "hit home" for both of us.

I found a link to the song, if you would like to listen to it. If the video is too much, just listen to the words. It's so powerful, especially for my friends who are fighting the fight with Adam and I.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqfGqOx2iDQ&feature=related

The birth control pills are going as well as can be expected. I've gained 4 lbs. in 2 weeks and I'm crying one minute and laughing the next. Weight gain was always a fun little side effect of BCP's.....because I don't have enough to already feel betrayed by my body about. I start my daily injection of "hate" tomorrow night. (lupron) Can't wait for that. :) Poor Adam.

Tenley went to the vet this morning for her 2 week post-op visit. They took out her eye stitches....but the best news is that.....it appears that she can see a little bit! She can follow a toy if you move it from left to right and she can walk around without running into everything. This is just what they would hope to expect at this point. They told us big things at 2-3 weeks post-op and smaller things at 4-6 weeks post-op. Hopefully she'll be good as new in about 3-4 weeks. The only bad news is that some of the silicone oil they use to hold the retinas in place has leaked to the front of her right eye. Basically, she has to go back in for a minor surgery to get the oil out or it can cause "cornea adema." Lord only knows what that's going to cost us. :) All in all, we're just happy she can see something again.....and she is such a HAPPY dog. Lots of kisses and tail wagging going on. She's making up for Mommy's bad mood I guess. :)

Anyway, that's it for now. We're still set to travel to Denver on April 23rd, do the transfer on the 24th, bedrest from the 24th through the 26th and fly home on the 27th. I took 2 weeks off of work to just lay around and relax when we get home. This way when it doesn't work....I can say I literally tried EVERYTHING.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Transfer Meds are under way

2009-03-17T17:40:00.002-05:00

Let's start off with some good news. Thank you so much to my sister Heidi for sending flowers for Adam and I and some special gourmet dog treats for Tenley and Cooper. That was SO sweet of you and a wonderful surprise. :)
I want to also thank my Mom and Dad, and sisters Sandie and Hallie for taking Cooper on Saturday for the day and wearing her out! She was so antsy being stuck at home with us and Tenley while she's recovering, that a day at Grandma and Grandpa's was just what she needed. She was EXHAUSTED and had so much fun. :)

Okay, now let's get down to business.....

AF arrived on Friday which was such a treat. Nothing like awful cramps after an awful week to just stick the knife in and twist it. :)

I remember when Adam and I were first married and wanted to wait a year to get pregnant. I was happy to see af and if she arrived late, it was a "scare." If I only knew then that we had built in birth control that we didn't even know about. I long for the naive days when I assumed that the first time we tried to get pregnant....we would. In fact, we figured out that the time of our last attempt at biological children with our embryo transfer in April, will be EXACTLY 4 years from the time we went on a cruise to officially start "trying." 4 years of our lives focused on starting a family and nothing to show for it except for heartache and bitterness. Unbelievable.

So I started birth control pills on Sunday night because it was CD3. Birth control pills are my arch-enemy. In fact, a more appropriate name would be "evil pills." I hate them and they hate me and they make me hate everyone and everything all at the same time. A lot of hate going around. One minute I'm laughing.....the next I'm crying...or screaming...or maybe even punching my pillow. It's not pretty.

I take these until March 31st, and starting on March 27th, I add my daily injection of my other arch-enemy, Lupron. I stop BCP's on the 31st, but continue the lupron injections until April 19th. So basically, a daily injection of "hate" for 24 days. Oh joy. Poor Adam.

In the midst of all of this, I should get a bonus af (nothing like an "extra" period to get the excitement flowing) on or around April 3rd. Once this happens, I will add in estrogen patches every day......PURE estrogen being pumped into my body through a patch on top of the "hate" injection. Hormones galore....but wait.....it gets better.

Starting on April 17th, I will add progesterone to the list of hormones. I will be doing that 3 times a day until the transfer.

Once the transfer takes place on April 24th, I will be on progesterone and some more progesterone....with a side of intra-muscular injections of progesterone until the pregnancy test 2 weeks later.

I'm basically going to be a big, giant, hormonal mess.

Tenley is doing MUCH better. The problem now is that she has her energy back and it's been really hard to keep her quiet. She has another appointment on Thursday morning to look at her retinas and see how they're doing. Hopefully they're regenerating and she'll be able to see in another 2-3 weeks or so.

We have received so many e-mails the last few days asking about Tenley and checking in on us to see how we're doing. My favorites are the ones that simply say "love you" or "thinking of you." It's not fair for us to expect anyone to be able to make us feel better or know what to say, and to be honest there really isn't anything anybody can say that would take away the pain of what we're going through. Just knowing we're loved is enough and means more than you know.

As always, thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Tenley - Finally some good news

2009-03-13T18:02:00.005-05:00

I want to start with a picture of Tens the day we got home from surgery. Poor baby.

Now after 2 days of IV fluids, 2 shots to control her vomiting / nausea, another shot to give her some pain relief, a spoonful of "force-fed" food and then some rice mixed with chicken bouillon and special food from the vet that mommy made at home......this is Tens now!!!!! This is how she welcomed daddy home from work.....and you can guess what came next....me bawling....happy tears this time. Isn't it sad that her eating and welcoming Adam home was the best thing that's happened to us in a long time? :) We'll take it though and are so happy she's feeling better!!!!!! Cooper is even happier. She's been so stressed out about Tenley that she hasn't been eating either....and she is one to NEVER miss a meal. She scarfed her special mixture down too, is playful again and all is well in our little family again....for now. :)

Now, let's hope she keeps the food down and gets a good night's sleep.....for both our sakes. :)

Thanks for being here! Future posts will be about fertility stuff again, as it was meant to be all along. :)

Love,
T & A (and Tens and Coop)

Tenley is home!

2009-03-13T14:17:00.002-05:00

I just got back home with Tenley and she is on my lap as I type this. They gave her some more IV fluids all day and a really strong shot to stop the vomiting. They also gave her a shot for pain because it's very obvious that her muscles are sore. Everytime someone picks her up, she winces and whimpers. They also managed to get a tiny bit of food in her through a syringe. We are supposed to give her rice mixed with the special food they gave us periodically, a little at a time tonight. I can tell she still doesn't feel well, but she did wag her tail when she heard my voice and I took her from the nurse. So now we keep our fingers crossed that she will be back on the road to recovery in the next few days. My poor baby. I'm taking her back in the morning as well and they will probably give her one more shot for the pain she's in. I'll keep you updated.

Love,
T & A

Another rough night....

2009-03-13T09:01:00.002-05:00

Tenley has not improved at all. They gave her IV fluids all day yesterday and we were able to bring her home last night. I slept with her again, or at least laid with her since neither of us actually slept and she is still miserable. She still can't stop vomiting and threw up twice last night and 3 times this morning. She is back at the vet today with more IV fluids and they are going to give her something stronger to settle her stomach before they force feed her. She needs to get some thing in her stomach, but she won't eat because she's so nauseas. She hasn't eaten since 6pm Tuesday night. I am waiting to her from her surgeon because the other concern is the vomiting could hurt her chances of her retinas re-generating and the surgey could fail because of it. I have gotten pretty snippy with the vets lately telling them that poor Tenley is going through hell and they need to stop her vomiting or she will go through it for nothing and she still won't be able to see. I want my sweet little Tenley back. I did get a few kisses in the middle of the night while I was petting her at 2am trying to get her to sleep. She was shaking when we walked into the vet and she could smell where we were. It broke my heart to hand her over to them again when all she wants to do is lay on my lap. She whimpered when the nurse took her....which you know what happened next....me bawling. They're going to call me in a little while to let me know how she's doing. I'll keep you posted.

Tenley Update

2009-03-12T13:18:00.002-05:00

Tenley is not doing well. It was a long night for all of us. I got maybe 2 hours of sleep because the poor thing was so miserable and could not get comfortable with the e-collar on her head. The only place she is comfortable is next to me with her head and chin resting on my stomach. Cooper thought it was a big sleepover party and insisted on sleeping on my head all night.

I took her to the optometrist for a follow-up appointment today. She threw up on the way there and cries out in pain whenever she's picked up. She had projectile vomiting all over me in front of the Dr. and they immediately rushed her back for some IV fluids. She threw up again, so they gave her a shot to try to settle her stomach. They told me that it's been a LONG time since they've seen a dog this sick from anethesia and they do a lot of surgeries. So I start bawling in the vet. They tell me that they have to check for pancreatic inflammation which can happen from the amount of vomiting she was doing. It turned out to be okay, but she is in really bad shape. They called our regular vet and sent me over there. They were waiting for me when we got there and took her back. They are keeping her there today and maybe even overnight and are going to start her on an IV drip. The Dr. is going to call me around 4pm and give me an update, but I am allowed to call and check on her whenever I want. I took her favorite blanket up there and haven't stopped crying....again. All I do these days is cry and I'm starting to wonder when it will end. Hopefully soon. I'll update you again later.

Tenley's Surgery

2009-03-11T19:22:00.003-05:00

Tenley had her surgery today. Everything went as "well as it possibly could and very smooth" according to the Dr. Her retinas were both in good shape still and easy to re-attach. Now her body needs to accept it and re-generate the "signal" endings to her optic nerve and she should be able to see. :) She was given an 80-85% chance of success with her right eye, and about 50-60% for her left eye. I know you're all thinking the odds are in her favor.....but we don't look at it that way......not anymore. We've been told that everything was perfect so many times and then crushed later on. Adam and I always seem to be on the crappy end of statistics with everything, so we're trying to be optimistic, but I'll believe it when I see it. She's doing okay, but pretty out of it. She's taking after her mommy with the amount of drugs she has to take over the next 3-6 weeks. She has 3 sets of eye drops several times a day and 3 other medications during the day as well. Thank God it's all in writing.

Her eyes are sewn shut 1/3 of the way to protect them. She will be in her kennel whenever we're gone to keep her and Cooper seperated. She hasn't been in her kennel since she was 10 months old, so she's probably going to be pissed.....but will hopefully forgive us when she can see again in 4 weeks. :)

Cooper has been an angel. We were really worried because she's still so playful and VERY demanding. She is the definition of bitch....she's a cute bitch, but a bitch nonetheless. We thought for sure she would attack Tens when we got home to play. She has been the sweetest little dog. She hasn't touched her once, except to gently sniff her and kiss her cheek.....so sweet. Tenley feel asleep on the floor because she can't seem to get comfortable with her e-collar on her bed or the couch and Cooper has completely left her alone. We can tell she's concerned because she just sits in front of Tenley and stares at her in such a loving and concerned way. We are so relieved. Cooper is usually such a stinker so we are so proud of her!

I am still in a complete fog. I had a breakdown with Adam last night that I really needed. I've felt like I was drowning in bad news and heartache lately, and haven't been able to catch my breath. I felt much better after Adam held me while I sobbed for 2 straight hours last night. He is such a wonderful husband. Sometimes, I have to remind him that he's going through this too and he needs to grieve too. I honestly don't know what I would do without him. I feel bad that I just can't talk to any family / friends yet. I know they love me, and I can't explain why I handle things this way. I just feel like I'm okay one minute and as soon as I start thinking about it, I start crying. When I talk about it, I start crying. When I get an e-mail, I start crying and it just never ends. I'm in such a weak emotional state right now, that I need to try to get stronger before I can handle facing anyone else.

I talked to my CCRM nurse, Dawn, tonight. Our embryo transfer date will be Friday, April 24th. We will be in Denver the 23rd through the 28th. I'm not even excited. I'm terrified, sad, stressed and everything else that comes with your literal "last chance" at a biological child.

I just really wanted to let everyone know that Tenley's surgery went well and we'll know if she can see again in 3-6 weeks.

Thanks for being here,

Love,

T & A

I'm sick of this shit

2009-03-09T12:16:00.002-05:00

As you can probably tell, we got some really crappy news today. Out of 24 eggs, 16 original embryos and 13 that were still "normal" as of Friday....we have ONE that was quality enough to be biopsied today. Let me repeat that, ONE that made it to blast. We actually have 5 blasts....however, 4 of them are of the lowest possible quality you can have. The cells that would eventually become the baby, are completely in disarray.

So after bawling on the phone with the head of embryology lab and then bawling again on the phone with Dr. Surrey who called me personally because I'm sure John from the lab told him I was a disaster........we've decided to skip the testing on our one little quality blast. I mean, does it really matter at this point? If it's abnormal, it just won't implant. We paid $5,350 for this additional testing out of pocket and with our luck we would waste that money just to be told, with our luck, that's it's abnormal? They already biopsied it, but are going to refund us the rest, minus the cost of biopsing because they haven't shipped the cells yet. As I was bawling, I told Dr. Surrey we neded that money to adopt and it would be a complete waste. He agreed that at this point, we should just go ahead with the frozen transfer of our 3 frozens and be done with this shit....shit was my word, not his.

We went to CCRM because they are the best in the country and we were hoping to get some answers. I think we definitely got some answers....some really sucky ones....but answers nonetheless............we create crappy embryos together. Plain and simple. He said that neither of us is necessarily the "problem." Adam's sperm and my eggs just apparently hate each other. As individuals, they are each great, but they come together and just don't mesh.

We've decided to do a frozen transfer of our 3 embryos we have frozen. We have 1 frozen and PGD'd from IVF #1, another one frozen from FCI from IVF# 3 and now one frozen from CCRM from IVF#4. Basically, one from every Dr. we've had over the years. So now we wait for my period to start and start prepping for the transfer, which will be a lot sooner than early June now. Is there a chance, it could work? Yes.......but a much higher chance that it won't or i will just miscarry again. The sooner the better as far as we're concerned. The sooner the transfer won't work or our embryos won't survive the thaw, and our hearts can be broken again, and the sooner we can move on to adoption. Like I said, I'm sick of this shit. $25,000 down the drain with this ONE cycle.....at least with adoption, we pay $30,000 and we WILL get a baby out of it. We will actually GET to be parents.

In other news, I had to take Cooper to the vet this morning because she now has bronchitis. Just what we needed. I have one freakin embryo, a blind dog and now a bronchitis infected dog on top of it. Life just doesn't get much better than this.

Adam and I are requesting no calls today. Neither of us really want to talk....at all. Adam is stuck at work, completely devastated. At least I can be home and cry. He has to stay at work and try to get through the day because of meetings etc. He is trying to come home early, but doesn't think he'll be able to. I want to just shut myself off from the world for a little while and deal with this on my own. I don't want to hear anything about a plan for us, or there's a baby out there for us, or any of that crap. The bottom line is that all my life I've wanted to be pregnant and give birth to the man I love's baby and that's clearly not going to happen, so please just let me deal with this overwhelming sense of loss and deal with it on my own terms and in my own way.

Love,
T & A

Tenley Update - Surgery Scheduled

2009-03-07T16:05:00.002-06:00

Tenley's surgery has been scheduled for Wednesday at 11:00am. We have to be there by 8am so they can run a few tests and prep her for surgery. The surgery will be 2-3 hours long. She'll be in recovery for about an hour and we'll be able to bring her home that afternoon. Adam talked to the Dr. again this morning and we asked a few more questions. We feel very confident in the questions we asked. I researched the Dr. and we're very confident he will do a great job.

He's giving her a 75% chance of regaining her vision. The 25% failure comes in because what happens is that even though he can re-attach the retina, it's up to the body to accept it and re-generate it. Sometimes the body rejects it for some reason. The surgery can go perfectly, but for some reason, the body won't re-generate the retina once it's re-attached. I also asked if it was hereditary and he said there is not enough evidence to say yes. He said it's similar to humans where a child can develop a disease with NO family history of that disease at all. He has traced detached retinas back several generations of dogs before through breeders and more often than not, there is no history of it in the dog's family. Interesting stuff.

As far as one or two eyes, he will be able to tell us that morning, before surgery, if both eyes have a chance, or just one eye. Wednesday will be a long and stressful day. She should regain her sight within 3-6 weeks after surgery. Keep your fingers crossed for our little "Tens!" We just love her so much and want her to be able to see again!

There are no more updates from CCRM until Monday on our little embabies, but I promise to post as soon as I hear anything.

Thanks for being here,

Love ya,
T & A

Some pics from our trip

2009-03-06T22:19:00.013-06:00

I thought I would add a few pics from our trip. :)

This is Adam....waaaayyyy too excited to stick that thing in my rear on trigger night. :)

This was what my stomach looked like the night before retrieval.....man, was I bloated and swollen. I hope the next time my stomach looks like this, it's because there's an actual baby in there...not just a bunch of eggs! :)

Before Retrieval.......

......and now the picture you've all been waiting for........While I was in the retrieval, Adam made a visit to "the room." This is his "view" from "the chair." Can you feel the romance? This is our reality....poor guy.

After Retrieval....trying to give the thumbs up sign.....I don't even remember this. :)

Finally enjoying something to eat and drink! What was with me and the "thumbs up?" I think Adam was encouraging me. Too bad I puked all of this up about an hour later.....oh well.

The view from the balcony of the condo we stayed in. Not bad.

Nothing exciting, just a few pics from our 4th and final retrieval experience!
I am hoping to save all of this for our baby / babies one day!

Love,
T & A

Some fun news from today

2009-03-06T17:35:00.003-06:00

I wanted to dedicate a special separate post to this, because after the awful couple of days we've had about Tenley and emotional couple of weeks we've had, I got some really great news today. My brother-in-law, Aaron (Adam's brother) recently got engaged which the whole family was so excited about. Adam is excited to be Aaron's best man and his fiance' Amy asked me to be a bridesmaid in their wedding today and it was just what I needed to make me smile today! I am so honored and excited to be a part of their special day! Thank you so much Amy! It means more to me than you know! Looking forward to June 12, 2010! Love you both!

Love,
Tiff :)

Day 3 Fertilization Report & Tenley update

2009-03-06T16:57:00.003-06:00

CCRM called this afternoon with our day 3 embryo update. Out of our 16 embryos, we have 13 that are within "normal" range. They say "normal" if the embryo has between 6-10 cells and less than 20% fragmentation. So overall, we're happy with that. Now the big test comes as they develop over the weekend and we find out Monday how many were able to be biopsied, frozen and sent for testing. Some will be biopsied on Sunday and others on Monday. Our 2 frozen embryos arrived there safe and sound as well. One of them will be biopsied with the others on Monday and the other will remain frozen since it's already gone through PGD testing and was determined "normal." Our goal is to have 8 embryos make it to blastocyst stage and get biopsied for testing. Please say prayers and keep your fingers crossed! :)

I want to say thank you to my best friend Kristi and Jeff and of course their precious little Addie for the letter and homemade cookies they sent us to welcome us home! They figured that after eating healthy for so long, we needed some junk food. They were definitely yummy. Thanks Mansfields!

I also want to thank everyone again for all of the VERY sweet and encouraging e-mails we've received over the last few weeks. I know I've said it a million times before, but we are so lucky to feel so loved by our friends and family. I have made several friends online through my research and fertility forums who are battling infertility as well and it feels so great to exchange stories and words of encouragement with each other. It makes all of this a lot less lonely. :) THANK YOU to everyone who remains by our sides through all of this!

So, the veterinary surgeon called about an hour ago and I was able to ask a million questions so I will just touch on the main points. He sounded wonderful and was so great about answering all of them. He said that out of all the dogs that have the surgery, 75% of them regain their vision. The surgey is about 2 hours / eye. They can get her in next Tuesday or Wednesday if we decide to go ahead. She would have a 3-4 week recovery where she would have to be kept as quiet as possible. No jumping on furniture or even going up and down the stairs etc.....she doesn't really do any of those things right now anyway since she can't see so she would be okay. No playing with other dogs either. He was fine that we have Cooper, but said that they would need to be seperated if play time erupted. They could snuggle at night still etc.....but as soon as any play started, we would have to seperate them. So sad. :( It would be worth it though if Tenley can eventually see again. Within 3-6 weeks she should be able to see again.....but if her vision doesn't come back within 6 weeks....it most likely never will. She would get to come home with us the same day after surgery though which is nice. He said it's not a real "painful" recovery either. She would be on eye drops and other meds, but for the most part the meds would keep her pretty comfortable. She will have to wear an e-collar for 1-2 weeks, which should be interesting...since she hates wearing ANYTHING. The other thing he mentioned, without knowing her history at all, was that a common denominator with dogs who have detached retinas is that they are "toy shakers"...not just shakers, but violently shake their toys as if they're trying to kill the toy.............um, that sums Tenley up in a nutshell. She has ALWAYS done that since she was 8 weeks old. Wish we would've known. He said not to beat ourselves up about it though, because it's not like we could take every one of her toys away from her or something. Anyway, Adam and I are discussing everything again tonight. The Dr. gave us his cell phone number directly if we have any more questions, which I thought was so nice. I'm sure Adam the auditor will have more questions for him. :) We have to call him as soon as we decide and she will be scheduled for Tuesday or Wednesday since time is of the essence. :)

Please say some more prayers for Tens and our little embabies!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Apology

2009-03-05T13:27:00.002-06:00

I wanted to apologize for my "whiny" post a few minutes ago. I am in a really bad emotional place today and it came off really whiny. I am fully aware of the fact that especially with the economy the way it is right now, there are people out there struggling to put food on the table to feed their kids and people with medical bills piled up from fighting life-threatening diseases and people about to lose their homes because they are unemployed and can't pay the mortgage. I sounded like such a whiny brat on my previous e-mail. Yeah, we were saving for a bigger house....but we're lucky we have a nice house as it is. Yes, we would love to be able to make love and bring a baby into this world instead of paying thousands of dollars to do so, like the lucky ones do, but that's just not what's going to happen for us so we've accepted it the best way we can. The bottom line is that even when life seems so unfair, we are very lucky at the same time. I have to have faith that Tenley will be okay and that we will be parents very soon. It just may not be the way we had hoped and planned for. :)

Thanks for listening,

Love,
Tiff

Fertilization Report Part #2

2009-03-05T12:49:00.004-06:00

Today has been a day of good news, bad news and lots of tears.

The good news is that of the 8 eggs they were able to mature in the lab, 4 of them fertilized normally. So the good news is we have 16 embryos!!!! I will get a day 3 report tomorrow to see how many are still developing and how many we have lost. It's a great starting number though. :)

24 eggs
12 mature on day of retrieval
12 fertilized
8 more eggs matured overnight and were ICSI'd on day 2
4 more fertilized
= 16 embryos. :)

I will post the day 3 update tomorrow. :)

The bad news today is that I've been crying pretty much non-stop all morning. As you know, Our 5 year old Pug, Tenley lost her vision a few weeks ago pretty much out of nowhere. After a trip to the emergency vet, several trips to our regular vet and a trip to a veterinary opthamologist specialist today...she has 2 completely detached retinas and is completely blind. They ran some specialized tests today and were able to scope her eyes to find her retinas completely detached. The poor thing just shakes and has a hard time walking around because she can only see light. Surgery is an option. There are only 4 doctors in the country who do retina reattachment surgery and luckily there is one in Chicago. The cost.....$8,000 for both eyes. Thank God we're good savers. Unfortunately, with the $50,000 + out of pocket we've already paid over the last 4 years to start a family....something most people get to have sex and do.....plus this bill, I really hope we don't have to adopt. That's another $30,000. So much for being good savers to buy a bigger house or for me to stay home with our kids one day. Our savings just goes to "life" for us. We'll be okay, but it just never seems to end. My only wish from this post is for people to TRULY realize how lucky they are and to not take anything for granted.

So that's been my day. Good and Bad...but such is life I suppose. This was the hand we were dealt and we're going with it...1 dollar at a time. :)

Tenley will be having surgery in the next few weeks because they like to do it as soon as possible from the time of detachment. Please say some prayers for our little "Tens" and for our embabies.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Fertilization Results

2009-03-04T12:23:00.001-06:00

Have to get on the plane:

24 eggs
12 mature
12 fertilized
8 more matured overnight and are being fertilized today...will get the report tomorrow.

Will write more later!

Retrieval Details

2009-03-03T17:15:00.004-06:00

So I'm feeling a little better than earlier. Still super crampy, but I would think that's to be expected after carrying around 24 eggs. :)

So we arrived this morning around 8am. They took me back and after a few sticks and tries, finally got my IV started. Adam came back and stayed with me until the anethesiologist came in to start the "happy juice" and wheel me away to the O.R. I remember giving Adam a kiss goodbye and getting on the table in the OR. I remember following a few instructions....and then......nothing. I woke up in recovery with my adorable hubby there. While I was in the OR, Adam got to make his fairwell visit to "the room" to make his contribution. He says it went well and I believe the word he used to decribe everything was "stellar." The embryologist came in and talked to us after I had woken up a little bit and told us they had retrieved 24 eggs and that Adam's sample looked great....of course, Adam prefers the word "stellar."

So they will fertilize them this afternoon and call us in the morning with a fertilization report. They usually expect about 75% of the eggs to be mature and about 75% of the mature ones...to fertilize. Hopefully we 'll end up with about 15 embryos tomorrow. After that, about 50-60% of the embryos won't survive until day 5 blastocyst stage where they are biopsied. Then once we send the biopsied cells off, about 50% will come back abnormal on average. In the end, after 24 eggs, if we can have 3-4 normal embryos come back from testing......it would be considered FANTASTIC. So that's our ultimate goal.

The test results take about 6 weeks so hopefully around April 19th, we will find out how many normals....if any...we have to transfer. We will get a phone call on Monday to tell us how many we had biopsied and how many were sent for testing. I'm going to be a mess until then. I have no control over anything at this point though, so I'm trying not to stress about it.

So Adam's swimmers are going through the ironman competition this afternoon as we speak...all competing to be the "chosen" ones. They are put through the ringer in tests. They are observed, washed, observed again, forced to swim up a tube, observed again, forced to swim towards some sticky stuff, then observed again and looked at closely....then chosen one by one out of several hundred million to fertilize each of my eggs. Crazy isn't it?

Today is my grandpa's (Gompers) birthday. Our potential future children are being created on his birthday. :) We also have 2 frozen embryos on their way to Denver as we speak from Chicago and they should arrive tomorrow. One of those was created on IVF#3 on what would've been my brother Ryan's 30th birthday. So hopefully he's watching over us and sending good vibes to our little embryos.

I have been wearing a gold thumb ring as well for good luck. My grandma (Gommers) gave it to me at Christmas for good luck and is wearing a matching one. She is so cute. :) My Mom and Dad had given me a St Girard necklace (fertility Saint and protector of mothers) as well about a year ago and I have been wearing that non-stop as well. We're not Catholic (we're Presbyterian), but we figured God would be cool with it. :)

So Adam is going to get me some cheesefries now and I couldn't be more excited. :)

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Egg Retrieval

2009-03-03T12:57:00.003-06:00

We're back from the retrieval. We got 24 eggs, which is more than we've ever had. I'm feeling pretty crampy and pretty out of it, but glad it's over with. I'm off to find my heating pad and will update with more details later.

As always, thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Egg Retrieval tomorrow morning!

2009-03-02T12:13:00.002-06:00

So we went to my Dr. this morning for my final blood test. Only one more "stick" to go! My IV for my retrieval tomorrow. We got really lucky and are apparently the first retrieval of the day in the morning. Since I can't eat or drink anything after midnight tonight, I'm glad we're early. It normally wouldn't be a big deal, but since I feel like complete CRAP and my throat hurts....not drinking anything for that long is not going to be fun. The trigger shot is an HCG shot....which is the pregnancy hormone, so I have been nauseas now too. Oh joy. Let's just say I'm SUCH a treat to be around right now. Poor Adam.

*Angry post warning*
.....At this point, I would like to extend a special "shout-out" to anyone who insists on going to work or out in public in general while they're sick. Thanks to you, Adam got an awful cold....who in turn gave it to me. I understand that work needs to get done, but for the love of god, please work from home or something. I know some people don't have that option, but if you do.....don't drag your sick rear to work just to get everyone else sick. See? See what a "b" I am today? Okay, I'm done. :)

Dr. Adam did a great job on my trigger shot last night and I got a great picture of him coming at me with the injection. :) Picture "mad scientist."

So after watching 7 hours of the Golden Girls yesterday, while Adam wanted to jump off the balcony, I'm bored out of my mind. We decided that since our procedure was pushed up to tomorrow instead of Wednesday, we are coming home on Wednesday instead of Thursday now. I miss my bed and my girls, Tenley and Cooper. This trip was never meant to be a "fun" trip, but we never imagined we would be miserably sick the whole time. We're looking at it as more of a business trip. We thought we would at least be able to get out and see a few things, but that never happened. Oh well, let's get these eggs out of me so I can come home and start feeling better.

That's enough complaining for now.......

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Stim Check #5 and Trigger tonight!

2009-03-01T15:27:00.002-06:00

I officially feel like crap. I'm sick as a dog and bloated and sore as hell, but the good news is we trigger tonight!

My ultrasound went well this morning and my E2 level has climbed to 4,400 so instead of letting it get much higher and get dangerous, they would like me to trigger tonight with the egg retrieval on Tuesday morning. I have been craving cheese fries like crazy for the last few days, but since I'm trying to eat so healthy.....I can now look forward to some on Wednesday once these little eggies are out of me. :)

Dr. Adam has to give me my trigger shot at exactly 10pm tonight. This is the fun one in the rear with a 1 1/2 inch intra-muscular needle. woo hoo! We have to be there at 8am on Tuesday morning and my retrieval is scheduled for 9am. For those of you unfamiliar with trigger and retrieval. CCRM does the trigger shot exactly 35 hours before the retrieval. Everything is timed just perfectly. Please just pray for lots of eggs!!!!!

So my instructions for tonight are to take the ganirelix shot as usual, followed by the trigger shot at 10pm on the dot. I go for bloodwork in the morning....and then no more shots!!!!! My IV for the egg retrieval surgery will be my last "stick" for awhile.....at least until we start prepping for the Transfer in a few months. :) The light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter and brighter!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Stim Check #4

2009-02-28T12:36:00.002-06:00

So after 7 days of stims, my e2 level is 3,700. My ultrasound this morning still looked great. She asked if I was feeling "full" and sore, as she was pushing on my ovaries, which feel like giant bruises at this point....so I managed to squeak out a "yes." :) I probably sounded like a 12 year old boy whose voice was changing. She said there is a lot of swelling and it was hard to count how many were actually in there because they are so smashed together at this point.

I got my bloodwork results earlier than usual today because it's Saturday and they close earlier. :) They are lowering my dosage of Gonal F tonight from 150 to 37.5, but other dosages stay the same. Still taking the Ganirelix tonight with the Gonal F and 75 IU of Menopur in the morning. I got the OHHS speech this morning because of the number of follicles and my E2 level being so high already, so I have to take it easy as much as possible and stay hydrated. I had mild OHHS with our first IVF and it was awful so I will do whatever they tell me to do to avoid it this time. So 17 shots & 5 blood tests down and about 8 shots and 2 blood tests to go. Then retrieval! There is light at the end of the tunnel. :)

Adam is feeling much better, but I have managed to come down with the cold he's been fighting. Doctor's orders are to stay in today, push fluids and rest. I have to do everything possible to keep it from getting worse. So, we're pretty boring today.

We want to send a special thank you to the Antonsens and the Cliffords for sending us a surprise package that arrived today with some yummy goodies inside. They are delicious!!!!!! THANK YOU from the bottom of our hearts!

I'm an emotional mess these days.....can you say hormones? Everytime we receive these special treats from our friends or receive an e-mail or a phone call, I am overwhelmed with emotion, usually start bawling, and feel so lucky to have such a wonderful support system. I can't thank you enough!

Love you all!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Stim Check #3

2009-02-27T21:05:00.002-06:00

So everything is still going well. Today is my 7th day of meds. So after 6 days of stims, my ultrasound went well this morning. Still showing about 19 eggs. My bloodwork showed my E2 level this morning was 2600 so it was a nice jump from yesterday. I was instructed to continue the same dosages for tonight. I did my shots and we decided to get out and have some dinner. It was nice to get out, but my ovaries are happy to be back in my comfy and loose jammies and relaxing at the condo. Adam seems to be feeling a little better which is good because he was told today that he isn't allowed to take any medications....except Tylenol. They don't want his swimmers to be all drugged up and out of it when it's time to get their job done. We are doing a procedure called ICSI.....for those of you who are lucky enough to NOT understand what that means.....it basically means they inject a sperm into each egg to fertilize it, as opposed to putting a bunch of swimmers in a petri dish and letting nature take it's course. The funny thing is the way they ultimately choose which swimmers are the "chosen" ones. They are put through a battery of tests......kind of like sperm boot camp. The ones left standing...or I should say still swimming in a straight line with one head and one tail, will win and be chosen to fertilize the egg. It's crazy.

Anyway, that's it for now. We're exhausted and have a really early appointment tomorrow morning for my daily wanding and sticking so we'll probably go to bed pretty soon.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Stim Check #2 (@ CCRM)

2009-02-26T18:41:00.002-06:00

We arrived in Denver last night. Nothing exciting to report. The landing was pretty rough due to some high winds, so as soon as I got off the plane, I puked. I think it was a combination of feeling awful lately and the topsy turvy landing. Anyway, once I threw up I felt better. :) Great info. right?

We went to CCRM this morning for our first stim check with them. I have 10 follicles on my right ovary and about 9 on my left. No wonder I feel like I have to pick my ovaries up off the floor every time I get up. They are hoping to get at least 19 eggs out of me at retrieval. Keep your fingers crossed! The more the merrier! My blood work came back at e2 level of 1760, which is a good jump since Tuesday. I got my IVF physical out of the way today as well. When the nurse apologized that she was going to have to prick my finger to check my iron count, I started laughing. Seriously?

Adam got to visit "the room" again......I believe he described it as a prison cell with some excitement last time. He had to give his "back-up" sample today. They freeze this one just in case something happens between now and the retrieval day. They will ultimately use his fresh sample he will be providing on retrieval day though. I had him sneak the camera in to get a few pictures....nothing X-rated of course, just a Hustler magazine in the background. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait to see the pics until we get back to Chicago though. We'll do a little montag when we get home.

We also met with the genetics counselor this afternoon for 90 minutes to go over the Micro-Array testing we will be doing on our embryos. Adam and I both had to give blood for that as well because they freeze it and ship it off with the biopsied cells. It's their way of distinguishing paternity and maternity to make sure the embryos are eventually transferred into the right couple. That's refreshing to know. If I eventually give birth to a baby with anything but blonde hair and blue/green eyes.....something's up. Adam wasn't thrilled about his blood test, but got over it when the nurse reminded him that I had blood drawn TWICE today, got my finger pricked and have to give myself 3 shots today. :)

I actually feel awful for him today. He's not feeling well at all and has come down with a really bad sinus infection / cold. He looks and sounds awful. I'm staying away from him, that's the last thing I need right now. The anethesiologist would not be happy if I showed with a cold for the retrieval. :)

So, we go back tomorrow morning. I have another ultrasound and more bloodwork and I'm up to 3 shots a day now. The good news is that I'm progressing so well, the retrieval will most likely be pushed up to Tuesday now instead of Wednesday.

I want to say a special thank you to our friends Brian and Kristy for taking the time to put together a care package including some research on fun things to do while we're here. That's SO sweet! It was such a nice surprise to receive when we got back to the condo after a long day.

Thanks again to all of our friends and family for all of your love and support! We are so lucky to have all of you cheering us on!

Breaking news.....Adam just announced he will be doing a post of his own later tonight....so stay tuned for that!

Stim Check #1

2009-02-24T17:33:00.003-06:00

So after 3 days of meds, I had my first monitoring appointment this morning. My ultrasound looked good with 6 good sized follicles (an egg is inside each follicle for those of who are not up on the infertility lingo :)) and about 7-8 smaller ones that will hopefully catch up eventually. My E2 level was 776 today which is a GREAT start according to the nurse. I am definitely starting to feel the pressure, heaviness and pains in my ovaries now. I am also peeing every hour.....my ovaries are swollen, therefore they push on my bladder etc. etc. Similar to the uterus pushing on the bladder during pregnancy I've heard. :) So I've got that going for me.......which is nice. I keep thinking that all of this has definitely prepped me for pregnancy and childbirth. Hopefully, I'll be like "seriously? this is it?" Probably not, but a girl can hope.

We're just about packed and set to fly out tomorrow afternoon. I can't wait to go through carry-on security with my bag of fun.......needles, syringes, alcohol wipes, a cooler to keep my meds cool, vials of drugs. Should be a good time. I had my nurse e-mail me a letter I can carry with me just in case they give me a hard time. If you see us on the news as the couple who tried to board the plane with weapons....it's all legit, I promise.

I had a massage today at my chiropractor which was WONDERFUL and very relaxing. I cleaned the house today too. I have this wierd thing where I can't go on vacation if the house isn't clean. I just love coming home to a clean house after being away. I'm starting to get sad about leaving my "girls," but I know they will be in good hands at my parent's house. They are so spoiled over there. :)

An update on Tenley. We took her back to the vet last night for a follow-up and the vet thinks she's improved about 10%. Her pupil reaction is a little quicker than it was so we're moving in the right direction. I've never seen her so calm at the vet before. We usually have to hold her and comfort her up on the table for the vet, but this time she just sat down and relaxed on the table. It was almost a defeated..."let's get this over with" look. She looked completely disgusted. We're holding off on the opthamologist for now because our vet doesn't think it's necessary to spend thousands of dollars at this point when she seems to be getting a little better. She can see enough now to get around. When we throw her toy now she can see the general direction it goes (which is a big improvement), but still can't see it when it's right in front of her. She has to smell for it. It's so sad to watch. Her eyes also look really bug-eyed still. I know, I know, Pugs have big eyes anyway, but her eyes are really swollen and are definitely bigger than normal. Poor baby. She is on a daily medication now to keep the swelling down. We'll take her back in when we get back from Denver for another follow-up and if things haven't improved, we'll take her to the opthamologist. What's another couple of thousand dollars at this point? :) That damn rubber chicken she got for Christmas........thanks Santa! (Adam :) )

I've had a few questions regarding why we're not doing the transfer right away. We're doing what they call a "freeze all." We are trying to grow our embryos out to 5 days where they are called "blastocysts." Once the embryos reach blastocyst stage....which is tough to do in a lab, the cells that will eventually become the placental cells will be biopsied and sent out. It takes about 6 weeks to get the results back. This testing is called CGH testing, which tests all 23 pairs of chromosomes. The test is ideal for us because of our miscarriages and our failed previous cycles. Once we get the results back, then we "prep" for the transfer, which will probably be in early June. Hope that's a good enough explanation for now. :)

I can't thank everyone enough for all of the e-mails we've received wishing us well. We have the best families and friends anyone could ask for. I bought a new laptop bag yesterday and even the Macy's salesperson said he would pray for us. How cool is that.

Love you and thanks for being here!

To clarify

2009-02-22T21:21:00.003-06:00

'Heavy post" warning.......

I just re-read my line about God abandoning me and I wanted to clarify. I actually started crying when I re-read it because I don't think my thoughts came out the right way. I am not an overly-religious person, but I do believe in God with all of my heart. Talk about emotional huh?....must be all the drugs. :)

Anyway, what I meant to say was that over the last 4 years, my relationship with God has been tested. I'm sure it's a similar test that anyone dealing with anything that seems unfair has been through, and yes there have been times where I have felt completely abandoned by him. Infertility is not fair and has left me with a lot of questions. I mean, why me? One in every 10 couples goes through this....so why did Adam and I have to be in the category who is the 1 of 10? I have wanted nothing more than to be a Mom my entire life and Adam will make an amazing Dad.......so why us? Just because I have questions for God, doesn't mean I have lost my faith in him. To be honest, if anything, all of this has started to bring me closer to God again. I find myself praying a lot more and I also find that I am so much more thankful and AWARE of all of the good things he HAS given me in my life. My adorable and loving husband, my strong and close family, my unbelievable friends, my dogs who I love so much, my job, my home.....etc. etc. I am a VERY lucky girl. I just get frustrated when someone is given the precious gift of a child and they take it for granted....or worse, they abuse or abandon the child.....and then the anger and frustration builds up inside me and cuts me to the core with pain. Infertility is such an open wound. Everytime someone announces a pregnancy or has a baby, it hurts. Every time I see someone who is pregnant, it hurts. Baby showers....hurt. Don't get me wrong, I am genuinely and honestly happy for all of my friends and family who are blessed with a child, but sometimes, well, it just hurts and the questions start all over again. Anyway, God and I are on good terms lately and all I can do is have faith in him at this point, so even though I don't understand why Adam and I are being put through this journey.....I still have my faith in him and I guess that's all the matters. :)

Sorry to get so "heavy," but it felt really good to write this post. :)

2 days In

2009-02-22T20:22:00.004-06:00

So I started my shots yesterday. I'm taking 75IU of Menopur in the morning and 150IU of Gonal F in the evening so far. I'm also taking a steroid called Dexamthesone. As we go along, I will be adding a 3rd shot everyday, but not yet. :) I wasn't happy that the first shot I did, was bleeding pretty badly. I consider myself somewhat of an expert shot giver / taker and this was definitely not my best work. The rest have been fine though. :)

Two days down and about 8 more to go. I can definitely feel some twinges and pains in my ovaries which is a good sign that there is some activity going on in there. Hopefully there are quite a few eggs growing in there and my ovaries are slowly waking up. I compare the medications to coffee. It gives you that much needed jolt of energy to get going. I imagine my little ovaries drinking some gonal F and menopur out of their little Starbucks mug.

The more eggs the merrier. Our first IVF, we retrieved 19 eggs. Our 2nd IVF, we retrieved 18 eggs and our 3rd IVF we also retrieved 18 eggs. If there's one thing I'm good at in all of this, I'm pretty consistant. I am on lower dosages this time because I seem to stim really fast which is not such a good thing. Stimming too fast could affect the quality of your eggs, so I'm happy we're trying to slow things down a little bit this time. My only concern now is that we won't have as many eggs form because of the lower dosages. The other difference is that with my previous IVF's, I took my shots all at the same time every evening. Now, I am taking one every 12 hours essentially. Who knows what will happen.

The only thing I do know is that all of this is out of my hands and I just have to go with it. I need to have confidence in my Dr., in myself, Adam, and most importantly, God.....even though at times it's felt like he has abandoned me completely. I know this isn't true though and I just need to have faith.

I'll update again after my stim check on Tuesday.

In other news, Adam and I had a very scary night on Friday night. Our 5-year old Pug, Tenley, was playing with her toys one minute and completely blind the next. It was awful. She was shaking and couldn't walk because she suddenly couldn't see and was scared. We took her to the emergency vet, who told us her eyes were completely fogged over and he could see blood behind her eyes, along with a "tortured vessel." He also mentioned something about swelling of her brain and asked if she had suffered any trauma like hitting her head on something. We couldn't think of anything. They did bloodwork to rule out kidney or liver failure, seizures, diabetes etc. The bloodwork came back normal. So they sent us home, me bawling uncontrollably, and told us we should take her to a veterinary opthamologist. It was a LONG night for all of us. Adam and I couldn't sleep because we kept checking on her. We called our regular vet the next morning and they got us in right away as an emergency. Our vet looked at her and noticed swelling on her eyes too. He gave her a steroid shot and some antibiotics in an IV to help with the swelling. He also mentioned trauma and that's when it hit us. She has this rubber chicken toy she got for X-mas that is pretty heavy. Anyway, she loves to shake it.....not just shake it, but violently shake it. She holds it by the neck and whips the rest of it around...sounds lovely doesn't it? It's the hunter in her. She had hit Adam and I with it a few times while she was playing with it and shaking it, and it actually really hurts. Our vet thinks she may have hit herself "just right" with it while shaking it and caused temporary vision loss. The opthamologist wasn't open over the weekend, so we are just waiting to see how she is tomorrow when we take her back to her regular vet for a follow-up. She still can't see very well, but she can see enough now where she can get around etc. We won't know if she caused permanent damage for awhile. Anyway, it's been a very emotional and stressful weekend. I'll keep you posted after her follow-up appointment tomorrow. Basically, our family needs prayers all around.

Thanks for being here!!!!

It's a Go!

2009-02-20T18:30:00.008-06:00

AF flew in on her broom, pissed off as ever yesterday.

Since she arrived yesterday, it would be considered CD1. I had my CD2 ultrasound and bloodwork this morning. My u/s looked great. No cysts, antral count of 18 and thin lining......exactly what it's supposed to look like. My bloodwork results came back this afternoon. My E2 level was 51.....apparently they like to see it 50 or below...so 51 was "no big deal" at all according to my nurse....close enough to 50. :)

So the fun begins tomorrow morning. I will be taking my Menopur injection every morning and my Gonal F injection every night. I will also take the Dexamethazone every night as well. My nurse said it may cause dizziness so to take it at night. So basically, I'm going to be a severely bloated, bruised, crabby, dizzy bitch for the next 2 weeks. It's a good thing I'm not a big complainer (yeah right).........Adam is such a lucky guy.

I will take the above injections Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Tuesday morning will be my first monitoring u/s and bloodwork. My Dr. will call me with any dosage changes on my meds etc. on Tuesday afternoon. Then we fly out on Wednesday! Yes! Wednesday, February 25th is our official travel date to Denver. We have to be at CCRM on Thursday, February 26th and pretty much every day after that until retrieval. My estimated egg retrieval date is Wednesday, March 4th and we would fly home on March 5th.

Tenley and Cooper's reservations have been confirmed at hotel "Grandma and Grandpa's" in Geneva. I can't tell you how much easier it is to leave "our girls" when we know they are having so much fun at my parent's house. We also confirmed our limo to the airport......his name is Bill.......aka Dad. :) Thank you for everything and we love you Mom and Dad!

I thought I would include a picture of our babies. :)

We also confirmed the condo we will be staying at in downtown Denver. We decided to stay in a condo instead of a hotel so it would be more of a "home away from home".

So we are booking our flights tonight and planning a few sight-seeing adventures. I will keep you posted as we go. :)

Thanks for being here!!!!!

Love,

T & A

Drugs anyone?

2009-02-10T18:35:00.008-06:00

Let me start by apologizing for not posting lately. To be honest, there really hasn't been much to update. I highly doubt anyone wanted to hear about Adam and I taking our 2 pills a day of antibiotics and finishing them. First, we put the pill in our mouth and washed it down with water.....then, ....blah, blah, blah....boring.

We celebrated my 32nd birthday on the 3rd, but to be honest, all it did was remind me that I am celebrating yet another birthday and am still babyless....see?.....completely depressing, which is why I spared all of you with the details.

So, some exciting news......my drugs arrived today! I am torn between 2 emotions.....excitement and dread.

Excitement because we are starting again and are hopefully on our way to becoming parents. Dread because I am reminded of everything that comes with these drugs, including:

Bruises and welts all over my stomach

Bruises all over my arms from the daily bloodwork

Gaining 10 lbs.

Feeling flu-ish

No fast movements because of my aching and swollen ovaries

Headaches

Mood swings

Bloatedness, bloatedness, and more bloatedness.

Then I get excited again, because these drugs also bring:

The possibility of becoming parents

The creation of our little embabies

Hope

Dreams

Closeness and unconditional love with my hubby as we go through this together.

On another note, I have saved every syringe from every injection I have given myself or Adam has given me in our past 3 IVF's and IUI's. So I laid all approximately 130 of them out and took a picture. Someday, when our child / children are being punks, I want to show them what we went through to bring them into this world. They probably won't care since teenagers think the world revolves around them, but it will remind Adam and I of the very special appreciation we will have for our child / children that we worked so hard for and we will feel that much more blessed.

Here are a few pics:

We will be adding about 100 more if I end up pregnant and about 40 more if not. This is because if I do get knocked up....oh please God, please let there be a baby at the end of this one....I will continue a daily progesterone injection in the rear....administered by Dr. Adam himself, until I am at least 12 weeks pregnant.

I have to say that Dr. Adam has gotten very good at giving me my progesterone shots in the butt. Sometimes, I think he enjoys it...a little too much. It's so sad that since I always feel so crappy from the meds, the only action the poor guy gets is a quick glimpse of my butt as he jams a needle into it and massages it afterwards to spread the medicine out. It just doesn't get much hotter than that does it? It's okay to be jealous guys.

My af is supposed to show up on February 18th. I can hear her knocking though and am thinking she may show up early, so we'll see. We will travel to Denver about 7 days after she shows up.

I will let you know when she shows up....she better be on time because I am in no mood for tardiness.

Thanks for being here!

Protocol Set by Dr. Surrey

2009-01-28T18:31:00.002-06:00

Dr. Surrey called for a "wrap-up" consult last night to discuss all of our test results. I was at work, so instead of having everyone listen to my conversation about numbers, suggestions and whether or not Adam should be exercising on a bike because I was worried about potential "damage," I sat in my frozen car for the call instead. For the record, Adam IS allowed to exercise on the bike, for now. Win for him.

So Dr. Surrey was very happy with our test results and very happy to hear we had chosen to do the CGH testing on all of our embryos. This is where they test all 23 pairs of chromosomes to make sure they are "normal." He decided to put us on an antagon protocol. He decided against the long lupron cycle...thank God....because Lupron and my body hate each other. So this is what our protocol looks like so far:

Period is due February 18th which is CD1 (cycle day one)
CD2: Bloodwork and ultrasound (suppression check)
February 20th (CD3) : 1 menopur injection in AM and 1 Gonal-F injection in PM (this will continue every day until trigger shot and retrieval)
CD4: Same as above
CD5: Same as above
CD6: Bloodwork in am, plus ultrasound........depending on results, dosages for injections may change that night
CD7: (February 24th) Travel to Denver! (plus injections)
CD8: Stim Check (Bloodwork and u/s) .......injections with dosages based on stim check
from here on out, I will do my injections and have bloodwork and an ultrasound everyday and
depending on follicle development and bloodwork, I will be instructed to take my HCG "trigger" shot....egg retrieval will be 35 hours after trigger and we can come home.
My estimated egg retrieval is March 3rd, which is my Grandpa's birthday so hopefully that will bring some good luck to our embryos as they are created that day. :)

So that's it for now. We both have to take an antibiotic for 10 days starting tomorrow and wait for my period to start. Hopefully the witch will be on time.....I feel like it's the least she can do.

In other news, I almost clocked a girl at work yesterday who just found out she is pregnant with her 2nd child. She flat out said and I quote "I'm not excited, I didn't want to have any more kids...ever." This conversation prompted me to have a little convo with God on my way home.........it went like this....

"Uummmm.......excuse me God? I know you're a little busy up there running the world and everything, but do you think you could throw me a bone and stop putting ungrateful morons in my presence? Oh and a baby would be nice too........for me, not the crack addict down the street, or the person who has 12 kids they can't take care of, or even the Duggars who have 8 million kids, but maybe this time it could be our turn? That would be great. Thanks.....and oh yeah.....love ya."

CD3 Bloodwork Results

2009-01-26T09:51:00.003-06:00

So I don't really have very many details because we have a follow-up phone "regroup" appointment tomorrow with Dr. Surrey, however I just spoke to Dawn, who gave me my results.
FSH: 6.3
E2 (estradiol): 72.9
LH: 5.3

So my fellow infertiles understand these numbers, but family and friends are probably saying, "Gee Tiff, great, but what does all of this mean?"

FSH is basically your Follicle Stimulating Hormone. It should be under 10 to be considered good and it basically measures your ovarian reserve. Women are born with all the eggs they're ever going to have. Think of the FSH as a gas pedal. The harder you push on the gas pedal, the faster the car goes. The higher your FSH level means it's needing more and more "gas" to create follicles and "recruit" your eggs from your reserve. So, you want your FSH to be lower. The closer you get to menopause, more and more "gas" is needed to create follicles and the harder your body has to work, which causes your FSH to get higher and higher. Hope that makes sense to you. So my FSH at 6.3 is really good.

E2 (estradiol): They like to see it between 25-75 on day 3 of your cycle. Mine was a little elevated at 72.9. Sometimes a higher E2 level can lower your FSH level....which masks an egg quality problem. Since my FSH level was so good to start with, they're not overly concerned about it at this point. Dr. Surrey will explain more tomorrow. My E2 level has always been high on CD3 though, so it might just be how my body operates.

LH (luteinizing hormone): Your LH level is the hormone that "surges" when your follicle is mature every month, which sends a signal to your brain to "ovulate." They just like it to be less than your FSH......which mine was, so that looks good too.

My IVF nurse, Dawn, is going to give Dr. Surrey all of my results today and he will decide on our protocol based on everything he's been given so far. He will tell me what my protocol will be tomorrow and we'll go from there.

So that's a lot of "fertility jargon" and probably like a foreign language to the non-infertiles....but that's our life right now......E2, FSH and LH have become common language in our home, sad but it's what we've been dealt and we're going with it.

I'll update some more tomorrow night after we talk to Dr. Surrey!

Biopsy Results are in.......

2009-01-22T17:21:00.002-06:00

I have the sticky protein! Yea! I don't have to repeat the test and my uterus and cervix could not be more thrilled. So once again.....everything looks "great." Whatever......"great" can go suck it.

I'm SO sick of everything always looking "great" and yet, no baby. I'm feeling particulary bitter today. I would like to extend a "shout out" to infertility for making me such a bitter person. I used to be such a happy go lucky person. Now, I'm just bitter.....bitter and babyless.

I went to my new chiropractor last night for the first time. Wouldn't you know it, I walk in to his office to his wife and adorable baby girl at the reception desk. It's just one happy little family with their perfect baby girl and perfect little situation and their perfect little chiropractic practice.....whatever.

I actually really liked them though. He couldn't even adjust me without having the massage therapist work on my muscles first. They were too tense. He asked me what my stress level was and I told him a 7 for work and a 10 for our upcoming cycle. The massage therapy really helped and I'm going to be going there 1-2 times/ week through our cycle.

I really liked the massage therapist, although, there were a few times I would've knocked her out if I wasn't being massaged at the time. She told me she just got married and that she knew she would get pregnant on their first try so they were going to wait a few years. I've been there...never in a MILLION years did I think I would ever have a hard time getting pregnant. My Mom had to look at my Dad and bam.....pregnant. It's okay though, she can have her hope and naiveness. I'm over it. Can you feel the bitterness?

I shipped my frozen bloodwork out to Denver yesterday and called this morning to make sure they got it....which they did. Hopefully we'll have some results in the next few days.

Adam started his vitamins last night. I went to Walgreens yesterday to stock him up. He came home to several bottles of vitamins next to his sink. I asked him if he would like me to buy him one of those pill boxes that keeps everything organized by day...he declined, and told me he wasn't "80." Bitterness all around.

Let's get this baby-making party started

2009-01-20T14:33:00.002-06:00

I never in a million years thought I would be this excited to announce that I got my period yesterday! WOO HOO! The witch showed up pissed off and with a vengeance.....but you know what? It's okay, she's actually welcome this time.

So, I go in tomorrow for my CD3 (cycle day 3) bloodwork and ultrasound, have it frozen and shipped off to Denver for analysis. Once we get the results of the bloodwork and my biopsy....pending everything is normal, we will start 10 days of antibiotics for both Adam and myself. We are still on track for traveling to Denver late February / early March for retrieval. I found a great condo online to rent while we're there for 10 days. It's in downtown Denver and the same price of a hotel room. The great thing is that we can do some grocery shopping and save some $ on food. Plus, I'm realizing how hard it is to stick to "healthy organic eating" when you're at a restaurant. I tentatively booked the place and we should be good to go!

In other good news, Adam's Sperm DNA Chromatin Assay test came back close to the excellent range, which is great news. The test basically measured the amount of DNA fragmented sperm he had in his swimmers. They are finding that more and more unexplained cases of infertility and recurrent miscarriage, such as ours, can sometimes be attributed to fragmented DNA in the sperm. It's hard to detect without this specific test though because sperm counts, motility and morphology can all seem good in a standard semen analysis.....so you have to dig deeper to look at DNA fragmentation.
They are putting him on a few extra vitamins though just to get them "geared up" and ready to go. I picture his swimmers in there listening to the "Rocky theme song" and flexing their muscles in the mirror......

So now we wait.......I will keep you posted as more results roll into town.

Love,
T & A

I survived the biopsy!

2009-01-15T19:11:00.002-06:00

My drug of choice today is valium......definitely relaxed me....but didn't do much for the pain though. Oh well....it was better than nothing.

I survived!....not with flying colors....but I survived none the less. First of all, my old RE and FCI have been so wonderful through all of this. I also am so happy with CCRM. Because I have a history of painful procedures due to my cervix being very unwelcoming to catheters etc....they prescribed me a valium to take before the procedure. I wasn't going to ask for some and just suck it up, but FCI encouraged me to at least ask.....they obviously are very familiar with my pain in the ass cervix. I asked, and CCRM came through! FCI called this morning to make sure I had gotten something or they would prescribe me something too. So, I can take this one of two ways......nobody wants to deal with me complaining......or they all really care about me....so I'm going with the latter of the two. :)

I was feeling pretty loopy when we got to the Dr.'s office. Adam, being the gentleman husband he is....tried to take advantage of me in my drug-induced state while we waited for the Dr. to come in. Really? I mean, .....really? When you're about to have a metal wire punctured through your cervix so a sample can be scraped from the inside of your uterus... I can't imagine anything worse, than getting fresh with the hubby. Shot down....poor guy. To be fair, he was trying to make me laugh and keep me relaxed......

That's when the fun began. My Dr. couldn't get the catheter in.....big shocker. (To no fault of her own....it's just my stupid cervix) She had to stop to ask one of the nurses to help her and to bring her the "cervix dilater." Those 2 words haunt me like no other. I've had my cervix dilated way too many times and I was determined not to go through that again. The next time my cervix is dilated, there better be a baby coming through it. At this point, Adam made me laugh by mimicking the Dr. by saying "Um, can you bring in some of that pipe fitting material...you know the giant metal rod." Anyway, I heard those 2 words "cervix dilater", held my breath and told her I was "fine." Since I was clenching my teeth, I'm sure she could tell I was lying. It was pretty obvious. I think she could sense I was starting to lose it, so instead of waiting for the nurse, she went for it, basically puncturing through my cervix....which for the record is definitely not less painful than dilating my cervix....but she got in....she scraped, sucked, punctured, cut...or whatever she did to get the sample. In reality who knows what she ACTUALLY did to my lining....but I'm explaining what it felt like and it was painful..so go with it. Sh was so nice and kept apologizing telling me it was almost over. Once it was over, Adam immediately, TRYING to make me feel better after he had just watched me in his own words "in excruciating pain" quickly reminded me that it was ONLY 30 seconds long once she got in...............and then after he saw the "are you kidding me / death look" I gave him, he quickly added "but I'm sure it seemed much longer to you." Gee, honey, ya think?

The truth is Adam is always there to hold my hand and get me through everything. I don't know what I would do without him. My friend's husband said the hardest part of childbirth is that it's so hard to watch your wife in pain when there is nothing you can do about it. The more I thought about it, the more it made me realize how many times Adam has had to watch me go through physical and emotional pain. 4 years of painful procedures and countless tears....only we don't have a baby to show for it. It also made me realize that he is so used to all of this that when we do go through childbirth....he'll be so immune to all of it, he'll just tell me to "suck it up." To which my reply would be a punch in the face.....ahhh, can you imagine the love in that hospital room that day? Seriously though, I'm a very lucky girl.

So back to the biopsy.....I survived and we should get the results in 1-2 weeks. Please say some prayers that I have the sticky protein, otherwise, I have to go through treatment to try to develop the protein and REPEAT the test in a few months to see if the treatment worked......I really don't want to have to repeat the test......so pray for the protein!

So next steps are....wait for my period to arrive in the next few days, start an antibiotic (both of us), have bloodwork on day 3 of my cycle, frozen and shipped to Denver, have an ultrasound to make sure I don't have any cysts and wait.........

I'll update you in a few days!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Test Results & Health Kick-off

2009-01-10T12:22:00.003-06:00

So our nurse, Dawn, called yesterday and gave us our test results. Sperm analysis was great, other than the morphology being a little on the low end, but it wasn't significant enough to matter. My uterus looked great from my hysteroscopy. It turns out I don't have any anti-bodies built up to Adam's swimmers, which is great. My vision of my anti-bodies and Adam's swimmers gearing up for battle was a funny thought though. My AMH level came back at 8.6 which apparently is excellent. They like it to be above 1, so I'm sittin pretty at 8.6. :) I guess my ovaries and eggs aren't as old and dicrepid as suspected. The communicable diease panel on each of us was negative of course......testing positive for chlamydia would be all we would need right now. ...can you imagine? After all of this blood work we've had over the years, at least we know we're relatively healthy. So we have that going for us....which is nice.

So once again, everything looks great. ....and I say that with as much sarcasm as I can muster. I'm having my biopsy next Thursday and will get the results about a week later. That should be an interesting one. The nurse did mention that Dr. Surrey is putting me on a antagonist cycle. She is putting a "schedule" together for me next week, so I will share that when I receive it.

On another note, I am so happy that other people with their own blogs etc. are reaching out to me and sharing their experiences. Infertility feels SO lonely sometimes and it's so nice to hear from people who truly understand what we're going through. I am also in awe of our friends and family who have reached out to us to help as well. We feel very loved and supported and can't thank everyone enough.

So today, Adam and I are kicking off our "optimal health" program. We had a great discussion this morning about our feelings towards all of this. We have both been in a state of depression the last few years. I feel exhausted all the time, I feel lazy and I feel sad. Infertility has taken over our lives and become a full-time job. We haven't been able to plan anything in advance for years, because we never know where we'll be in a cycle. We're hesitant to buy a bigger house, because every dime we save goes to infertility or maybe even eventually adoption. I feel like I live at the Dr.'s office for blood work, ultrasounds and I feel like a pin cushion. I feel like all of this is so unfair. Why do other people get to make love and create a child, while we have to pay thousands of dollars, go through hell, and more often than not, have nothing to show for all of it. It's exhausting. Adam is tired of watching me cry and go through procedure after procedure when there is nothing he can do to help. I created this blog so I could vent my true feelings and be honest about them. Please don't get me wrong, we know how lucky we are in our lives. We are in a strong and happy marriage, we have a nice home, 2 great jobs, 2 pugs who are the best fur-babies anyone could ask for, the best parents in the world, siblings we call our best friends, families who are so full of love, and friends who support, love and never give up on us. I am also fully aware that there are people fighting everyday for their lives with diseases that aren't fair either or losing family members and friends to a young age, which isn't fair either. Life isn't fair, and I'm aware of that....more now than ever, but I feel like I am pretty strong through all of this and need to vent and ask the question "why me?" every once in awhile. Okay, I'm done....and actually feel a lot better.

So now on to the "health" part of all of this. We have decided to start a new attitude going into this cycle. Niether of us has worked out in months and we have been eating like crap again. Starting today, we are going back to our "pre-holiday" organic healthy eating, regular workouts and we are going to look into supports groups. I need to learn to let go of stupid things that don't matter and to deal with stress. I need to learn how to cope with all of this, instead of just feeling bitter, sad and crying myself to sleep. I'm sure my mental, physical and emotional state right now are definitely not ideal for a pregnancy, and I want to change it. Adam is on board and is going to start taking his vitamins....that I normally have to literally watch him take or he won't take it, and he's going to start jogging again and eating better. Okay, here's the big news....I've decided to start trying a few healthier recipes.....yes, that means cook.....now let's not get crazy or anything....I'm going to start off with a goal of making 2 dinners during the work week and a few on the weekends. I've been looking into some vegetarian recipes that look great and am headed to whole foods this afternoon to stock up. I love that store, and have shopped there semi-organic for a year now, but I am going there with a purpose now and know what I'm specifically looking for. I'll let you know how that goes. :)

So that's it for now.....sorry for kind of a "heavy" post but I really do feel much better. I really want this blog to be light-hearted and sarcastic instead of sad and heavy, but every once in awhile, I have to let it out.

Thanks again for being here!

Love,
T & A (It stands for Tiff and Adam....get your minds out of the gutters!:) )

Biopsy Scheduled

2009-01-08T21:00:00.002-06:00

So the dreaded integrin biopsy of my uterine lining has been scheduled for next Thursday, January 15th at 2:30pm. I am SO excited to get it over with I can't even tell you. I ordered the special kit and it arrived today. We basically had to order the kit, have the biopsy, go to Fedex and pick up a biohazard shipping container and ship our sample off to the company for testing. They will basically scrape some of my uterine lining to check for a "sticky" protein that helps an embryo stick and makes your uterine lining more receptive to your embryos. The only thing I'm allowed to take for pain is ibuprofin........I want to ask for valium since my cervix is such a pain in the butt and I really don't want them to have to dilate it again, but we'll see how far that goes. So Adam is doing some hand exercises to get ready for the squeezing again.....

For some exciting news, my best friend Kristi and her husband Jeff, welcomed their first baby into the world on Tuesday. They named her Addison and she is beautiful. We went to see her in the hospital last night. I would be lying if I said it wasn't hard. Not hard because I'm not happy for them, because they are going to be such great parents and are 2 of my favorite people in the world, but hard because it's sinking in that that experience may never happen for us. We may never get to give birth and see our baby and immediately try to figure out who she/he looks like, did she/he have my eyes or Adam's nose? We may never get to have friends come visit us in the hospital. I may never get to fill my friends in on my delivery experience.....and well, frankly, it just sucks.....

So I ovulated a few days ago, and it was one of the first times I didn't jump Adam's bones. I just kept thinking that with my luck, I would get pregnant and the biopsy would cause me to miscarry again.....Adam laughed at me when I told him, because it is pretty funny to think that the thought of conceiving naturally actually crossed my mind. We need to accept that all the romance of making a baby has been removed and we now require 8 doctors, nurses, a lab and an embryologist to get knocked up. So romantic.

So the next steps are to have the biopsy, wait for my period to start, have day 3 bloodwork frozen and shipped off to Denver and wait to see if everything looks good to start suppression.

I'll update more when our test results roll in from our one-day work-up. I'm just dying to see if I have the anti-body to Adam's sperm.....you know, the one that gears up for battle and attacks Adam's swimmers the second they enter my body? The thought still makes me crack up. :)

CCRM One Day Work-up

2008-12-30T18:25:00.002-06:00

So we arrived at CCRM at 7:15am to start our "spa treatments."
We started with our Dr. consult. We met with Dr. Gustofson because Dr. Surrey is on vacation this week. He was great. Very nice and very easy to talk to. We went over our history....and how much fun the last 3 1/2 years have been and he answered any questions we had.

Adam was very excited to find out that the occasional beer will not affect his swimmers quality and that I have been wrong all along.........which he proceeded to tell me in front of Dr. Gustofson. It's okay, he very rarely gets to be right, so I let him have his moment.

So next, we met our nurse, Dawn. We originally were supposed to have Rachel however we were assigned to Dawn and she's very nice. We really liked her a lot.

After we met with Dawn, we went for my "wanding." I had an ultrasound to measure my antral follicle count and doppler to measure the blood flow to my uterus....everything apparently looked "great." So that was good news.

After the wanding, Adam went to make his "deposit." Since we're sitting in the airport waiting to come home right now, he would like to write about his experience himself so I am now passing the computer over to him.......I repeat, Adam now has control of the keyboard....here he is......

Ok, this is Adam. I thought our readers might be asking themselves, "Gee, I wonder what happens in the deposit process?" Well, I won't go into the gory details, but it's pretty much what you would expect. A small, bland room with a chair, a sink, and a few amenities for assistance. It's like a prison cell, but with some excitement.

So, I only wanted to add a little info on this particular experience. Normally, it's a routine in-and-out, but this one was a little unique. First before I could provide my sample, I had to give them my credit card information. I know what you're thinking, but it was all legit. Second, without going into details, this place puts an emphasis on being cleanly. The other interesting item (and probably the best part) was CCRM provides a flat screen tv in the room for optimal viewing "pleasure" - awesome!

Back to Tiff....

Okay, I'm back. It's Tiff again.

So after Adam supplied his sample.....we went to the business office. Contrary to popular belief, Adam did not go into shock and need a paper bag when we were told how much this is going to cost us. He handled the news pretty well.....I think he was still happy about the "optimal viewing pleasure." I think they plan the day that way so the husbands are as happy as they possibly can be. We signed our consent forms and moved onto the lab to have some bloodwork done.

When we got back from lunch, I had to give a tour of my uterus via hysteroscopy. This did not go very well. My cervix is very difficult to insert a catheter into, so the Dr. ended up having to dialate my cervix......this was awful. Adam switched hands at one point because I think I squeezed his hand too hard from the pain. It was over in 10 minutes though so I survived. Everything looked great inside my uterus and the Dr. couldn't see any reason that a baby would not want to get cozy in there for 9 months.......they made me lie on the table for a few minutes afterwards to keep an eye on me and once we got the okay to leave, we were off to our nurse consult and genetic counseling session. Let's just say that my uterus will not be accepting any more tours for a while.....

The nurse consult was pretty standard and we went over our injections and everything. The genetics counseling was the most informative of the day. She basically explained the testing we are doing on our emrbyos in greater detail....and Adam and I both walked away feeling more knowledgable on the testing.

Overall, the day went well. We left CCRM with feelings of hope and excitement. Turns out this process will go on for the next 5 months. By the time I have my biopsy and get the results etc....we'll be back to Denver in late February / early March. Estimated retrieval will be on March 5th. Then by the time 6 weeks passes from testing our embryos etc. and we build up my lining over about 4-6 weeks....we're looking at the transfer being in early June. So hopefully in mid-June, we'll find out we're expecting our miracle...... or miracles!

The posts in the future will not be this long....promise. :)

Love you all!

Travel Day to Denver

2008-12-30T17:33:00.004-06:00

I am breaking my posts up into 2 separate posts for each day we were in Denver. I HAVE to talk about Monday, December 29th first.....our "travel day." The trip honestly could not have started better....seriously.

So we were originally supposed to take a 10:15am flight, however the flight was overbooked. Since we weren't in any real hurry, we decided to volunteer to give up our seats. In return, we each received a $400 voucher for another flight! So basically our flights are pretty much paid for when we have to return in late February / early March for the retrieval. Cha ching! $800 saved! We also got a voucher for free lunch. :)

We figured we should take advantage of the opportunity while we're not the frazzled parents we saw trying to comfort their restless and bored children at the airport. You could not give us a big enough voucher to stay at the airport any longer than necessary once we are those parents. Of course, OUR children will never act out, scream, cry or have any tantrums.........and for all of you parents out there reading this and shaking your heads....let me have this hope, I'm infertile myrtle for crying out loud!

So, we get on the plane on a flight a few hours later and we find out we're on some sort of list which has been chosen to get a free upgrade for TV on our flight. So Adam and I got to enjoy some tv on our flight. So a little Judge Judy, People's Court and a nap later, and we arrived.

So I have to go back for a minute to when we were still waiting for our flight. Since we spent about 7 hours in the airport, we had a lot of time on our hands. I am currently reading the book "The Case for Christ" and you know how your mind wanders sometimes, so you have to re-read the page? So, that happened. I had just finished staring...not in a creepy way....totally a loving way....and maybe in a little "I want to steal your baby" way, at an adorable baby who looked like she could be ours. So I was thinking about how much I wanted a baby and had to re-read the page I was reading....anyway, I glanced down and read the first line referring to Jesus......"But who was he really? Who did he claim to be? And is there any credible evidence to back up his assertions? That's what we'll seek to determine as we board a flight to DENVER to conduct our first interview." How CRAZY is that? I am a HUGE believer in signs. Also, I was using this Pug bookmark that I LOVE to mark my pages. When I stood up to board, I left it on the seat and realized it once we were on the plane. I was so bummed because I frantically searched my pockets and purse to see if I had put in there and just didn't remember....but couldn't find it anywhere....and I searched everywhere. So we arrive in Denver, I put my hand in my pocket.....and there's my bookmark! I checked that same pocket on the airplane at least 3 times before. I think it was another sign that Adam and I have an angel watching over us......more to come on that, it will give you the chills.

Okay, so while we were on the plane, our flight attendant was seriously a wacko. She literally told the man behind us that he needed to put his bag all the way under his seat because she wouldn't want him to feel guilty if the man sitting next to him by the window "died trying to get off the plane in an emergency because his bag was blocking his forward progress." What is this football? We were a little slap happy at this point so we were cracking up. Oh and did I mention that there were about 5 babies on the plane and they basically surrounded us the entire flight? SURROUNDED...literally. Everywhere we turned there was a smiling or screaming baby staring at us.......mocking us.

Okay, so we get to Denver and get our rental car....a PT Cruiser....which we got 1/2 off! It was supposed to be $75 and they only charged us $38! So we were off cruisin in our PT Cruiser......here's the BEST part of the day....as if the day could get any better. We were pulling out of the Thrifty rental car lot and had to stop to turn in our form to the guy who checks for dents etc. He seemed like a nice enough guy, but not really the type who would just start talking to you. Well, he did....and the conversation went like this:

Angel Man to Adam & I: "So how long have you two been married?"

Adam: "Too long....ha ha" "We actually just celebrated our 5 year anniversary."

Angel: "You two have that look of love, the ones newlyweds have."

Adam and I: "Yes, we're very lucky."

Angel: "I don't know why, but I feel like 2009 is going to be a good year for you two. You're heading in a new direction and good things are going to happen for you. Happy New Year."

Adam and I: (I now have tears in my eyes) "Thank you SO much. You have no idea how much we needed to hear that. Happy New Year."

I mean who says that? When we pulled away, we could NOT believe that the guy at the Thrifty Rental Car Lot had said all of that to us. I repeat, the random guy working at Thrifty....who knew nothing about us, gave us something to talk about the whole way to our hotel. What an angel.

So we were driving to our hotel, Adam sobbing with emotion......okay, maybe it was me that was sobbing......Adam was just crying....okay, he had tears in his eyes....okay, neither of us were sobbing.......but we were definitely emotional. Anyway, in the 30 miles between the airport and the hotel, we passed through "Aurora, Colorado." We live in Aurora, IL! Weird!

Our hotel was in an awesome area. Imagine a dream shopping area and any restaurant you can imagine. That's where we were. Nordstrom, White Chocolate Grille, Pottery Barn, .....the list goes on and on. It was basically "upscale suburban heaven."

We had some dinner and saw "Yes Man" which was pretty good, but to be honest we were so tired, we really just wanted to crawl in bed and go to sleep.

We came back to the hotel and went to sleep....and I dreamt of the thrifty guy while Adam joyfully cried in his sleep remembering how much money he saved that day.....it was a magical day in every sense.

Leaving for Denver!

2008-12-28T20:45:00.002-06:00

We're leaving for Denver in the morning and we are so excited! I mean, as excited as you can be to get poked, prodded and give tours of your uterus all day anyway. My parents are wonderful and are taking us to the airport in the morning for our 10:15am flight. By the time we get there, pick up our rental car and drive to our hotel, we'll probably get there around 1:00pm mountain time. We've decided to make it a low key night with some dinner and a movie. We'll have plenty of time for sight seeing when we go back in late January / early February for a week. We're coming back Tuesday night so we can be back here for New Year's....not that we have any exciting plans. We'll see where the night takes us as far as excitement. Maybe a little guitar hero and Olive Garden. :) We had a few options for plans with friends, but decided not to plan anything since the 29th and 30th are going to be such exhausting days.

Christmas is really hard every year because for the last 3 years, we've been saying "maybe next year we'll have a baby for Christmas" and it obviously hasn't happened yet. We had a great time with both of our families together for the "Griswold" family Christmas though. Lots of Wii, dominos and of course, booze.

Anyway, we have our camera packed and ready to go to document the day....don't worry, we'll keep it clean. I'll post some pictures when I update the blog on Wednesday when we're officially back home.

Happy New Year to everyone!

Love,
Tiff & Adam

Colorado here we come

2008-12-19T13:47:00.003-06:00

Adam and I officially booked our flight and hotel room for Denver!

We're leaving on Monday, December 29th on a 10:15am flight and will be flying home on the night of Tuesday, December 30th. I know what you're all thinking.....that's a LONG day on the 30th. A spa day (it's what I'm calling it....so go with it) and then traveling home in the same day and getting home around midnight.

We decided to make this a quick trip. We will save $ on hotel and food etc. this way. We have to go back in late January / early February for the retrieval etc. and will be there for 7-10 days, so we can have fun and do some sight-seeing then.

So, okay, you've all been warned that there will be some venting on this blog. It's time for a vent.

I was at work the other day and one of my staff came up to chit chat. This is a staff person I rarely see because she's in a different staffing region, so she wanted to catch up. Big mistake. This was our conversation:

Idiot: "So how long have you been married now?"

Me: "A little over 5 years"

Idiot: "Really? Why don't you have kids yet?"

Me: "Trust me, we've been working on it."

Idiot: "Well, how old are you?"

Me: "31"

Idiot: "You really need to get a move on with having kids, you're not getting any younger and it's only going to get harder and harder to have a baby."

Me: "We've actually been trying for over 3 years. It's been a really rough road with procedures and miscarriages etc. so we're actually looking into adoption."
(I didn't feel like our IVF was any of her business, and didn't feel like explaining it to her. What I really wanted to say to her is inappropriate for this blog....but you can pretty much guess)

IDIOT: "Why would you ever want to adopt? You shouldn't adopt, because there's nothing like feeling your own baby kick and carrying it for 9 months and then bringing it into this world."

Me: complete silence........just staring at her in disbelief that a person could actually be THIS dumb. I literally got up from the table and just walked away.

I mean, are you kidding me? This was one of those times that my morals and manners were truly put to the test.....you know the ones that say it's not polite to murder someone? ...or the ones where you shouldn't berate someone in a public place? Yeah, those manners. Does she think I wouldn't give anything to experience that? I've only gone through all of the injections, surgeries and procedures over the years because I think they're fun and I know how much Adam enjoys being and seeing me in pain....physically and emotionally. Everything we've been through had nothing to do with wanting to give birth to our own child though. Not at all. What an IDIOT!

To be honest, if Adam and I are told that having a biological child isn't going to happen for us......I'm okay with having a child who doesn't look this us or come from our genes. It's the experience of being pregnant (longer than 7 weeks) that I want the most. I actually want to throw up every day and have stretch marks! (I kind of have some anyway, but whatever....I guess it's what happens when you're 31 and your ovaries are already shriveling up, according to idiot anyway) Never in a million years did I ever imagine I would WANT those things....but I do!

Anyway, thanks for letting me vent.

The moral of the story is, please, never ever ask someone who has been married for awhile why they don't have kids yet.

We have our big family Christmas Party tomorrow at my Mom and Dad's so I'm mentally preparing myself for the "poor you" face that I'm sure I'll get at least 5,000 times from relatives. The one that makes me tear up. I'll definitely be drinking heavily.

Merry Christmas!!!!!

Love,
Tiff :)

Overwhelming Support

2008-12-17T22:24:00.003-06:00

I want to thank everyone for their tremendous support since starting this blog. Your support means the world! Feel free to post comments on the blog if you want to!

Well, my af (aunt flow.....you can figure out what it means) hasn't started yet, which is what we were hoping for. It could not start before tomorrow or our plans for December 30th would be ruined. Everything has to happen a certain way and on certain dates for the tests to work out. So we're already off to a good start with af being a little late....hmmm, my period is late? Maybe I'm pregnant! HA HA.....that's probably the funniest thing I've said all year! If I were pregnant right now.....then move over Jesus.....there's a new X-mas miracle in town! (Sorry God, please don't be mad....it's really the LAST thing we need right now)

So we will officially be booking our flights and hotel tomorrow for Denver. We had to wait until my af DIDN'T arrive today before we could book anything....because our appoointment wouldn't fall in that cycle day 5-13 window. Now we're good to go!

We've had a special request for "real-time" updates while we're in Denver on the 30th. Be careful what you ask for.... :)

Merry Christmas everyone!

Love,
T & A

One Day Work-up Schedule

2008-12-10T18:15:00.002-06:00

Adam and I received our official schedule for our appointment on December 30th. It goes a little something like this:

7:30am - New Patient Consult with RE

8:00am - Nurse IVF Consultation - We will meet our nurse who is assigned to us. We know her name is Rachel and she will probably become our new best friend over the next 4 months.

9:00am - Baseline U/S and Doppler Blood Flow U/S: These will measure my antral follicle count (basically how many eggs I will produce on any given cycle with medication) They will also look for any cysts. The doppler will measure the blood flow to my uterus to make sure it's strong and healthy.

9:30am - Semen analysis: Adam will do his "thing" and I get to have blood drawn. Hmmm...seems a little unfair. Anyway, they are checking for abnormalities in his swimmers and checking my blood for an antibody that would be attacking his swimmers. This cracks me up....I can just see my antibody and his swimmers in "battle."

10:00am - Meet with the business office so they can bleed us dry and Adam can breathe in and out of a brown paper bag when they tell us how much this is costing us out of pocket. It's not pretty.

10:30am - Consent form signing. We basically sign everything from my anethesia consent for my retrieval ....to what happens to any frozen embryos we have left if one of us dies etc....really fun and enlightening stuff.

11:00am - Blood work in the lab. I believe 9 tubes from me and 3 from Adam. They are testing for communicable diseases and genetic screening. We've had these tests done numerous times before, but what's another blood test at this point...seriously.

11:30am - Break - We get to have lunch and take a break from the poking and prodding!

12:45pm - Hysteroscopy for me - This is where they basically put a camera inside my uterus to have a look around. I've had this before and everything looked "perfect." That damn "P" word. If everything is always so perfect than why hasn't a baby made it their home for 9 months?...whatever. Anyway, it's not a fun test because it causes major cramps, but I survived it before and will survive again.

1:00pm - Nurse consultation - She will go over our medications and review injection mixing and administering instructions. To be honest, I have this mastered, but it's apparently "required" so we'll go with it.

That's it! Sounds like a real "day at the spa" doesn't it? The funny thing is I can't wait! It will mean we are that much closer to trying again and if it works, our dream will come true and if it doesn't, we will have some answers and closure and will start our family through adoption.

When we get back, I'll have to have the dreaded integrin biopsy......which can apparently be pretty painful....but just like everything else, I'll get through it and hopefully be closer to making my dream of becoming a mother come true!

Thanks again for your support. It means the world.

Offical Travel Date to CCRM - Denver

2008-12-08T12:36:00.002-06:00

I just got off the phone with CCRM and according to my cycle, we are scheduled for our one day work-up on Tuesday, December 30th. I was miscalculating earlier, thank goodness. So we will be flying to Denver on December 29th and either staying through New Year's or flying back on New Year's Eve. It's all going to depend on prices of flights. We are both on vacation during that time anyway so at least we don't have to take any time off work. The good news is that we'll be starting 2009 off with new hope and excitement. 2009 will be the year we become parents, through birth or adoption...it will be a good year.

Why CCRM?

2008-12-07T23:32:00.002-06:00

I should have mentioned in my previous post that we chose CCRM because they are the leading IVF center in the country. They are very cutting edge and perform several tests that most fertility centers do not perform yet. They have some of the highest success rates in the country, which is why if this doesn't work, we will know we explored every option and were definitely meant to adopt. :) We may even finally get an answer as to why we're not pregnant yet. Sometimes not knowing is the hardest part. We're very excited to see what CCRM has in store for us.

Phone Consultation with CCRM

2008-12-07T22:13:00.005-06:00

Our phone consultation with Dr. Surrey at CCRM went great. Adam and I have been to several "consultations" with doctors over the years and this one was by far the most informative. He was so easy to talk to. He looked over our history and since all of our tests always come out "perfect" he is chalking our problems up to a chromosome problem with our embryos. He also wants to do a biopsy of my uterine lining to see if I am missing the "sticky" protein needed for an emrbyo to stick. He also wants to run a whole battery of other tests as well. So, Adam and I will be flying to Denver in the next couple of weeks. Here is the breakdown:

Fly out to Denver for a full work-up....including the following:

A Hysteroscopy which is basically looking inside my uterus...again...and I'm sure everything will be "perfect" as usual. I should probably warn him that if the word "perfect" is used to describe any of our test results, I'm allowed to punch him in the face.
Adam gets to supply a "sample" which he has become an expert at...I'm so proud...and they will do a test to see how many "abnormal" swimmers he has...basically the ones with 2 heads, 3 tails, swimming around like they're drunk......his tests have always been great in the past so this will be an interesting one. I guess they have a way of getting rid of the abnormal ones when it comes time to fertilize my eggs after the egg retrieval. This test will give them an idea of what to look for.
We both will have bloodwork done....big surprise. My veins are actually going through needle withdrawal since we've been on a break for a few months.
They want to test my ovarian age.
We will also meet with the financial office to discuss payment....I'll be sure to pack a brown paper bag for Adam since we will be paying out of pocket for several thousand dollars plus traveling to Denver 3 times.
I also have to have a biopsy of my uterine lining which Dr. Surrey described as a "30 second ouch." He also said I could have that done here in Chicago so I can't hold him accountable for the pain and can't yell at him. Gee, can't wait for that!
We fly home.
This visit has to take place sometime between days 5-13 of my cycle which will basically be between December 18th through December 26th. My body hates me....seriously, I don't think the timing could be worse. We'll figure something out.....

Once the test results all come back, we start my stims. I have no idea what my protocol will be yet though. If my biopsy shows I am missing the protein, I will be on lupron injections to develop it for up to 2 months. Lupron makes me crazy....seriously, crazy. Please pray I have the "sticky" protein....for everyone's sake, but especially Adam's. ...poor guy. I will be monitored here with the regular ultrasounds and daily bloodwork until it's getting close to trigger. We will fly out to Denver for the last few monitoring appointments and the egg retrieval. They will grow our embryos to day 5 and freeze all of them. They will be sent off to be genetically tested. This testing is different from PGD, as it tests all 23 chromosomes. Since PGD only tests 9 of the 23, this test is much more accurate in choosing healthy embryos that have the best chance to implant. Chromosome abnormalities are the leading cause of miscarriage and failure to implant. I should be the poster child for this test.

It will take 4 weeks to get the results back. While we are waiting for the test results, I will start my PIO injections and endometrin to build up my lining for the transfer. We will fly out to Denver again for the transfer....have 2 days of bedrest and fly home.

That's when the hardest part of the whole process begins, not the tests, not the injections and bloodwork, not the retrieval...it's the "two week wait" until the pregnancy test that's the hardest part everytime. We are always SO hopeful during all of this, but when you get a BFN (big fat negative) you feel more crushed than you could ever have imagined you could. The thing that's different about this time is it's our last try. We are to the point where we just want to be parents......if this doesn't work, we will be very excited to start the adoption process and we will know in our hearts, it's what we were meant to do.

So that's where we're at in a nutshell.....I will be updating my blog with more updates as we progress. This will be a 4 month process with all the test results we have to wait for. For those of you who have gone through this or who are going through this......you understand that we do a lot of waiting...waiting and more waiting. So that's where we are....we wait for my period to start and we fly to Denver. Thanks for joining us on this journey! Stay tuned!