Conception

Let me just start off by saying that if you have any qualms about hearing the words "menstrual cycle" then you should probably just skip this post in its entirety.

That said, it's like a roller coaster over here.

Somehow in all of my neuroticism and insanity over the last few weeks, I managed to completely loose track of my cycle. Today is Day 23. Holy shit. That means that *if* I get my period this week, I'll start the IVF cycle immediately. Nervous excitement abounds! I'm going to have a blood test tomorrow or the next day to see if I ovulated this month, I just can't wait another five to ten days to see if it's going to happen. I don't have much patience for waiting for these kinds of things. I was the girl in high school that was on the pill, but still took a pregnancy test as soon as my period was a couple days late. I need to know!

I said I was neurotic, right? But we (BF and I) went in and had a consult with the nurse who explained the whole procedure and I'm full of nervous excitement. This is really going to happen!

So if I did ovulate, my next cycle should start between the 25th and 30th and then the two week circus begins. I’ll first start with Gonal-F (follicle stimulating hormone) from Day 1 until egg retrieval, which should be around Day 14. I'll also start with Lovenox on Day 1 to replace my Coumadin so that if we have to do emergency surgery for any reason I'll be okay and so that when they do the egg retrieval I can be taken off of the anticoagulants quickly. BF and I will both have to take a course of antibiotics for the first week just to make sure I don't have any infections and that he doesn't have one that he could pass to me. I'll start Cetrotide midway through the cycle to suppress natural ovulation. Throughout the entire cycle I will be getting regular (read: constant) blood work and transvaginal ultrasounds to monitor my hormone levels and the progression of my follicle growth. Once they have reached the ideal point where they're nearly ready, I'll give myself a shot of Lupron. This will give my eggs the final shot of hormones that they'll need to fully mature. Exactly thirty-five hours after the Lupron shot, I'll have the egg retrieval and whatever eggs they can collect will then be fertilized with BF's sperm. Not exactly the romantic way I'd imagined we'd conceived, but nothing else in this life has gone as expected, so I'm learning to just roll with it.

If I don't get my period this month, they will make me get my period next month with a drug called Prometrium. Once I have that fake period, my hormone levels will be at the right place to start a cycle and it will go along just like if I had menstruated normally.

So I'm very, very excited. I hadn't thought how far I was into this cycle before we went into this visit today and to realize that we're possibly this close is really exciting. Not only because of what we're doing, but because I'm actually doing something. And it was also very nice to find out that the protocol that they have me on consists entirely of drugs that are injected subcutaneously, so I can give myself all of them.

One another subject entirely, LM had his third birthday celebration (dinner and cake at my mom's) tonight and then got to sleep over at his pseudo-grandma's house. I'm glad that they like each other so much. I have a VQ scan scheduled for 8:30 am tomorrow morning and it's hard enough to get myself out of the house without him, so it's nice to be able to just pick him up when I'm done.

Alright, well the day has just caught up with me very suddenly and I've become slow and achy, so I'll sign off for tonight.

I hope the mood swings haven't been too insane and I hope you'll all hang on for the next few months’ worth!