Psychics – was she right?

If you recall, back in September I contacted a psychic. She told me that I would either get pregnant in September or October of 2011, or give birth in September or October of 2012. I did get pregnant in September of 2011, and found out in October of 2011; but we lost the baby. I am praying that she gave both dates because it is possible that I am going to get pregnant this cycle, and have the baby(ies) in September or October of this year.

Only time will tell.

I've been shot

We began treatment this cycle (including injections). Last May my doctor at the time, prescribed 50mg of Clomid, and I overstimulated.  Therefore, I began 25mg of Clomid on CD3; half the lowest normal dose.

I began to have pretty significant cramping on CD5-8, and ended up going in for my CD10 ultrasound (u/s) on day 9. On day 9, I had one mature follicle, and two nearly mature follies (measurements: one 17 and two 15s). The doctor gave me the choice of taking my Ovidrel trigger injection on Friday evening, and only having the one mature follicle, or waiting until Saturday morning and potentially having three.

Although the thought of triplets is a bit overwhelming, we opted to wait until Saturday morning. Our thought was, with our history the chances of having all three follicles release eggs, have all eggs mature and fertilize, have all three implant and survive were extremely unlikely. However by waiting, we figured that it would give us three chances for success this cycle and also the possibility of multiples which we would welcome with open arms.  

We woke up Saturday morning and I got the shot out of the refrigerator. The needle wasn’t that big, but it was still scary. Mr.A ended up giving me the shot about 2-3 inches below my bellybutton. In case you aren’t familiar with trigger injections, they have HCG in the injection which gives your body a signal much like that when your LH is surging, causing you to ovulate. HCG is also what increases in your body when you are pregnant. Therefore, after taking the injection, you will test positive on pregnancy tests for 5-6 days. I promised Mr.A I wouldn’t test, although seeing those two lines would be really nice, obviously it isn’t real. A lot of women will “test out their trigger”, meaning they will test daily until negative, knowing that the result on day 10-11-12-13 are true positives, and not remaining HCG from the injection.   

Per my doctor’s orders, I will be beginning my 200mg three times daily of progesterone tomorrow evening, as well as beginning my regime of 80mg of baby aspirin; these are in addition to the 4mg of folic acid and prenatal vitamins that I am already taking daily. We will wait to test until 2/10. February 10^th will either be a very depressing day, or bittersweet; it will be exactly one year since my surgery.  

If by some miracle I do get pregnant this cycle, I will begin injections to better control my bodies clotting tendencies immediately following the +test, and will be very closely monitored throughout the first trimester.

I am both terrified and excited; praying for a miracle. 

Bad Blogger – can I make it up to you?

Wow, I’ve been a very bad blogger this last month. I am sorry for the lack of updates.

It was such a relief leaving 2011 behind, but the end was very busy. I (of course) was traveling for work, wrapping up my projects and delegating tasks, preparing for my New Year’s visitors and anxiously awaiting the beginning of my new career.

2012 began:  My closest family was here, I bid adieu to my traveling career and began my new career with the promise of change and challenge. I’ve just completed my third week at the new company. Thus far, I love it. The company is focused on positive change within their company, their employees and the world. They have an entire department focused solely on charitable giving and they match employees’ donations to charity (to a specified amount per employee). They have counselors within HR that help you determine your career path, and help you to achieve your goals.

Although there are a few things that may need to change to make the company leaner, they seem to do a pretty phenomenal job right now on most everything else.

In addition to my professional life, my personal life has had some pretty significant changes. Cycle 28 was a bust; no surprise there. I was out of town during the key points of the cycle, and didn’t expect a miracle or immaculate conception.  However, after that, we decided to move forward with treatment; something we’ve put off time and time again.

We met with the RE on the second day of my cycle, went over test results, her concerns, opinions, and then set a path forward. The results were all great. All of my tests, aside from the MTHFR, came back negative, and Mr.As swimmers are of excellent quantity and quality. She said that since we have been able to conceive naturally twice in two years, she isn’t overly concerned with getting me pregnant, just keeping me pregnant. She has a suspicion that my losses are related to my blood clotting when the baby attached to my blood supply, cutting off its life source. 

After our discussions, we decided on a path forward and are moving forward with treatement.

2011 - A Recap

The holidays are hitting me hard this year. We have so much to be thankful for, yet I find myself envious of nearly everyone around me.  Many of the women who I began this journey with 2.5 years ago are pregnant with their second child. But, the world moves on, with or without me, so I suck it up. It is all I can do. I try to keep my mind occupied with decorating, renovating and most recently planning our New Years Eve Party. However, I seem to forget that we are hours and hours away from our families and friends, and they've got their own commitments.


This just reminds me that every now and again, I need to make a list of everything we have to be thankful for to remind myself that life really is good.


This year, we may have even more to be thankful for. Of course our love for one another, health, our jobs, our families and friends.  I am beginning a new job that I think will be amazing, a short commute and has stupendous benefits including IF coverage. Mr. A landed his dream of all dream jobs. We were able to sell our first house when we moved and purchased a beautiful home and have been able to customize it to our liking. My brother getting married. Mr.As tests all coming back normal.


However, there are the no-so-positives of 2011 to also remember. The loss of two pregnancies. Bearing the load of selling our house and condo, while buying our new house, packing to move all while traveling at nearly 100% for work while Mr.A was away. Moving, again. Not being able to sell the condo then having to replace the water heater, flooring damaged when the water heater went out, and drop the list price to where we will take a considerable loss if we can sell. Knowing that since Mr.A's tests were normal that all the issues with IF lie with me....


All in all, it was most certainly a challenging year. In addition to the normal ups and downs everyone deals with, we've also had to learn to live and deal with IF and pregnancy loss. This is officially our third Christmas since beginning our TTC journey and yet we are still without children that we can hold in our arms. It is troubling. I never thought it would take this long. I never thought it would be this hard. So many people take parenthood for granted, yet to me I fear that I will only ever know my children in my heart.

Staying Strong

I cannot believe the measures my current company was willing to go to in an attempt to keep me. In the past week, I underwent negotiations between current and future employers. In an attempt to keep everyone happy, I gave 6 weeks notice to my current employer and plan to finalize all projects I am currently working and coordinate our upcoming activities. They desperately wanted me to stay a week longer, but through talking with Mr.A, I realized that there has to be a point where I am willing to switch allegiances. I decided a cut is a cleaner wound than a tear, and put my foot down.

When I gave my official notice to my employer, they offered me a bonus equivalent to nearly 15% of my current salary to stay until April. I declined. They then offered to also increase my salary by 30% (!!!!!).  Again, I declined. You may think I am crazy. I might be, however, to me, my life is priceless and this new job will enable me to have it back.  

::Cheers:: to moving forward with my career and life without sacrificing my family.

I got the job!!!

This news couldn't have come at better time yesterday! I had been sitting in an airport delayed from 12 noon until 7 pm. I had been traveling since 5 yesterday morning and wouldn't arrive into my destination until nearly midnight. I received the call from my new boss and gave my verbal notice to my current employer. Sadly, we will have to postpone further treatment cycles until March/April to qualify for their incredibly generous maternity leave package, but I think in the end it will be well worth the wait.

Nona Lisa

Emotions ran high this weekend. On Friday, Mr.A and I drove the 7 hours to our friends' wedding. Originally, the wedding was to take place in a church with the reception immediately following. The groom called as we were about an hour away to let us know that there had been a major change in plans. The bride's mother was very ill and doing very poorly. They changed the wedding location to the hospital chapel to ensure her mom would be able to be a part of their special day. The wedding was so bittersweet. It was such an incredible gesture for them; they had to cut the list from 200 to 25, but it goes to show how important their families are to them.

After the wedding, we picked up our nephew and drove another 3.5 hours to my mother-in-law's home. We adore our nephew and don't have many chances to see him. He is always such a good kid and is as genuinely excited to see us as we are him.

My MIL recently moved to a farm near her parents. Their barn cat just recently had kittens and all 6 were such sweeties. In addition, her mother does foster care for the local humane societies and had one puppy who's mother died shortly after birth and was being bottle fed, and 12 other puppies younger than 7 weeks.

I fell in love with a 9 month old lab named Nona (they call her Nona Lisa). She and her mother were hit by a car when she was 12weeks old. Sadly her mom died and Nona had to have major surgery to reconstruct her hips. She still limps, but she is a normal puppy. She is so sweet and affectionate. I want so badly for her to find a wonderful home, and that home may just be mine.

We brought her back to my mother-in-law's house just to see how our dog would do with her. Our dog was upset, jealous; furious really, she wouldn't even look at me. Eventually we decided that it probably would be best to leave Nona with her rescuers when we left for home.

Today, I cannot stop thinking about her. She needs a permanent home, and our dog could use a companion. I've just about decided that if I get the non-traveling job, I am going to adopt Nona too.