Almost Blastoff...

We are officially at CD 12. Another 8 shots of Follistim, one trigger shot, lots of herbs and acu, plus a ton of hope. I still have five follicles in the race. On Saturday, the ultrasound showed 2 still on the left at 16.5, 13. For the right, there were 14.5, 14 and 11.

We are trying to take some of the morning procedure stress away, so we are staying up in Palo Alto tonight. Plus, it makes it easy to celebrate my father-in-law's birthday up there. We'll have a more leisure morning, maybe breakfast at Il Fornaio, and by 11am, we will hopefully be on our way to a BFP. And thankfully, Auntie J is going to watch the four-legged kid tonight.

There won't be much more to report in the 2WW [except for the POAS obsession]...my beta is scheduled for Bastille Day [July 14 for the non-francophiles].

My acu reports that my stress levels and pulse are night and day from when I was working, so I can only hope this new lifestyle brings some luck my way. Let's face it...science can only do so much.

The Numbers for Day 7 U/S

We are on track so far this month. It looks to be three follies on the right and two follies on the left. The good news is that they are all currently between 9-12, so it is a nice even crop. For those who aren't familiar with growing follicles, you hope that they are all around the same size so when you feed them the drugs, they all stay together in an even pack that is ready and available when the "boys" are released to find them.

The stims this time, however, seem to be instantly causing weight gain and I feel bloated. But, I did make it to a fertility hiking group last night and that was good. It always helps to feel like you are not alone.

Deja Vu: The Same But Different

I went back and looked at my post for my Day 3 ultrasound in April. I literally could cut and paste it. I have a very happy right ovary that has 3-4 good sized follicles, but my left was only hosting one at the moment. I didn't get the sizes because I had a resident instead of my normal doctor who was out of the office. And, it was too early in the morning for me to think clearly and get the sizes from her. I think she'll ultimately be a good doctor. She seemed to have an honestly eager spirit about her. And, let's face it, we really need good "eggs" [forgive the pun] for this type of work.

Tonight we'll start up on Follistim 300 again. Though, we have directions to try and milk as much out of it as possible. Last time we got close to 400mg each time.

Right after the ultrasound, I whizzed down to Santa Clara for reproductive massage and acupuncture. I will repeat both next Tuesday, prior to the next ultrasound. The acu believes that the mere fact that I quit my job and I honestly look happy, instead of simply friendly and stressed, bodes well in my favor.

I spent a lot of time today trying to understand from all the professionals, what type of exercise could I continue to do. It seems that Pilates is less than ideal, so I am going to have to shelve that right now. Lots of yoga, walking, some weights and swimming. I am also thinking about joining a support group at Stanford that goes for a weekly hike. I think I have more issues around this whole thing than I have been willing to acknowledge.

Officiallly CD1

We're off and running again. The clock has started. Our first ultrasound appointment will be Saturday morning. That ultrasound will tell us whether or not this is a good month for a stimulated cycle.

Meanwhile, I am busy starting yoga and Pilates--working on the mind/body principles as well as the artificial means to achieving success. I am also trying to schedule an acu appointment, but Nurture Acu is starting to get busy and harder to schedule at last minute.

Going Off the Track

This is day two of my official hiatus on the career track. After working intensely for the last twenty years in high tech, I finally had to make the decision to put my health and well-being before my career success. Now I inherently know that life is more important than work, but for someone who has defined a large part of herself on career achievement, this was a tough choice.

I had to wrangle through the feelings of thinking that I have failed. I have failed as a woman because I can't do it all, which is the bill of goods I have been sold since the early commercials that sang "I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan and never let you forget your a man." Yet, what we as a society fail to do is encourage people to take time to pursue their dreams. And, unfortunately, most corporations are not set-up to enable folks restorative periods or the flexibility to do both. I have often heard people brag that they never took a two-week vacation---I just think that is sad. There are a few progressive corporations who offer sabbaticals. If I ever own a company, we will have sabbaticals.

Almost everyone at the office wished me well, and often, there was a slight expression of envy. When I went to the doctor today and my blood pressure was the lowest it has been in years [100/70], it was another confirmation that I had made the right decision. This break won't be forever, and I definitely plan to work again but right now I am really focusing on everything I can do to get my health and wellness back into balance. I ate more fruits and vegetables this morning than I had in a week. But, I had time to shop. I had time to prepare them. I had time to sit down and eat them. I did the happy dance.

When I knew that I was going on leave and would some day be looking for a job again, I debated on whether or not to go public with my fertility challenge. Obviously, I decided to go forward, but here were my reasons: 1) If someone wouldn't hire because of all this, then it wouldn't be a supportive environment going forward--not a place I would want to work. 2) As someone with a career in marketing, my ability to embrace new forms of marketing [social media] should be lauded. and 3) If they worried that I would get pregnant and leave them, then they didn't get to know me at all. Someone who is willing to go through all the pain and challenges to pursue a single goal is someone you want on your team.

Enough time on the computer, I am going out to smell the sunshine.


PS It is CD 30 and am waiting for AF.

To Hope or not to Hope

Even though this technically is a month where I haven't focused on getting pregnant, we still tried. So I find myself on Day 23 still being optimistic that maybe we got lucky this month.

There were some very pointed discussions on one of my chat boards this week. Cruelty being the other face of hope. It doesn't matter how little you have invested in a particular month, there is always the looming disappointment ahead. I don't know how to cushion the blow. I can only take care of myself when the time comes.

Until that time, I will continue to check daily for symptoms and hope.

And, for this week's audio blog http://www.lexy.com/feed/?id=388

Getting Back in the Space

As you can tell from my lack of writing, I took a couple of weeks off from infertility. Though, my lack of diligence on my health in the last two weeks has resulted in my first cold in over a year. I attribute my good health to better eating, more sleep and acupuncture. None of which I did at the end of May.

Now that we are back from our mini vacations, I am ready to do something about my BMI, which seems to be slightly overweight these days. I start with a personal trainer tomorrow night, along with Pilates. Plus, all the Smores are out of my reach now. Between camping and my sister-in-law's house, the graham cracker/Hershey bar combo has added at least a pound or two to my waistline in the last week.

What's next? Basically we hope like crazy that maybe Clay and I got lucky this month. We certainly gave it our best shot without doing any monitoring. I just have my doubts that we are going to get there without medical intervention. If that doesn't work, we will do another injectables cycle with Stanford. That is scheduled to start roughly around June 18th.

My basic plan this summer is do one month on and one month off the drugs--enabling me to still do many of the things I enjoy doing in the off months.