The most common phrase I hear from people lately is “It will happen when you stop thinking about it.” I know they mean well and typically I just smile and say, “Yeah, I guess.” What I really want to say is that I have to think about it. I’m not agreeing with my husband that we’ll take the pressure off and just see what/when it happens by going about our normal routines and sex life. I have to make appointments for blood tests and monitoring. I have to remember to take several pills a day. I have to be home between 7-9 PM for about 12 days in order to give myself shots at the exact time. It’s impossible not think about it. I can imagine it’s even impossible for married couples as I can’t expect just turning off the switch in my brain that’s running the loop “I want to get pregnant. I need to get pregnant. Am I ever going to get pregnant?”

Aside from that, I’ll say that I have felt better this week than I have in weeks. I’m exhausted from work, but at least I feel emotionally like my normal self again. Earlier this week as I was getting ready for bed, I all of a sudden had this calming feeling of feeling like me. It’s been over a week since I’ve been off anything messing with my hormones, so that helps.

This coming Wednesday I have the post-IVF consult with my doctor, so we’ll talk about next steps including when I can try again and what we might do differently. Next weekend I’m going away with my mom for a long weekend and I’m really looking forward to it. After it was clear that I had a CP, I decided I just needed to get out of town and try to truly relax before my next try. While I likely will still be thinking about all of this, it will be the closest I’ll get to forgetting about it for awhile and hopefully that will have a positive affect on the next try.

I had another blood test on Tuesday and my beta went down, which was basically the confirmation that it was not a viable pregnancy and was in fact a chemical pregnancy.

It’s been tough. It’s hard to not think about it and it’s difficult to stay hopeful through all of this. On the SMC forum many of us have signatures that show where we are in the process. Things like “IUI #1 – NTT” or “Your name – kids name and year born” or a very long list of all the IUI and IVF tries and then BFP (big fat positive). Next to some there’s a CP for chemical pregnancy. Now my signature carries a CP.

I remember when I first started on this journey, I’d look at the other women’s signatures in awe of how long they had been at TTC and the hope seeing those that eventually did end up with a child. For every heartache that I experience, there’s someone who has experienced more than me. I don’t wish even one NTT on anyone.

As I’ve grieved over the last week or so, I’ve kept thinking about how much I want this and how I hope it does happen for me. It’s a fine line between being optimistic, but also wanting to be realistic. Each try there has been a potential due date starting with January 1st based on my first IUI cycle. As that original due date grows closer and I see others on the forum who are now gearing up for their third trimester, it hurts. I’m happy for them, but it hurts for me. I think I need to stop paying attention to those dates. It makes it worse to see them approaching. I need to somehow get my life back while still continuing on this journey. Living in these 2 week periods and gauging time by doctor’s appointments and ultrasounds and inseminations is making me in a way sleep walk through my life. There’s been no more yoga, very little cooking and isolation.

The last week has been an emotional roller coaster and I still don’t know where I stand. I feel drained and kind of helpless.

A week ago I started feeling similar to how I’ve felt every cycle right before getting my period. On the Crinone (type of progesterone I’m on), I don’t usually get my period until I stop it, but all the same symptoms were there. I had several breakdowns over the weekend trying to remain positive and think that IVF was different than IUI so what I have felt before might not mean anything this time.

Tuesday afternoon I had some light bleeding. Even though my beta (pregnancy blood test) was the next morning, I decided to take a home pregnancy test to just know one way or the other. The test came back negative and I fell into an even deeper funk. Tears continually falling and all the thoughts of where this process has led me. I could never have imagined that it would be this hard and that it would take this long. After months of IUI’s and then now days of shots, a retrieval, and a transfer, I felt defeated. My mind kept running with what else I could be doing to finally get pregnant. When I started this process my sister in law and had just found out she was pregnant. She know had the baby and I’m still not pregnant.

I went into the beta on Wednesday. The nurse seemed so hopeful as she took my blood and I just start bawling. Right there in the doctor’s office! I couldn’t help myself. It just all felt like too much. I drove to work with my eyes welling up with tears every time I thought I had already calmed myself down. At around 2 PM I saw “IVF Florida” flash on my phone and stepped out of the meeting I was in. It was the doctor calling. I already knew it was bad and then now the doctor is calling! He never calls. It’s always a nurse. He said (or at least what I heard was, “So it looks like it’s time to start buckling down.” I totally that he would follow it with something like needing to up the meds next time, but then he told me I had a low positive! My response was “Really?” I couldn’t believe, but I also knew enough not to get too excited yet.

He told me that it is low, but it’s a positive and that I needed to go back on Friday for another beta. The goal is to see the result doubling. I was at 27 and so they’d be looking for a result closer to 60. It seemed surreal to me and I tried to keep a mix of positivity and realism, but it was hard not to get excited.

*Warning – this might be TMI* Thursday evening as I went to the bathroom, I noticed something that looked like wet white tissue in the toilet. It totally freaked me out. I was convinced it was tissue from inside my uterus and that this was it. By Friday morning I had bleeding similar to a light flow. I went in for the beta and held it together this time. I just wanted to get in and out of there without shedding any tears. As the day went on my bleeding got heavier and I started getting pretty bad cramps.

The nurse called this time and I could tell from her voice it wasn’t good. In my mind, I had already diagnosed myself with having an early miscarriage. She told me that the beta went up to 37. It’s not the doubling that they like to see, but it hasn’t gone down, so the doctor wants me to come back on Tuesday for another beta. I told her all of the things I was experiencing and she said it doesn’t necessarily mean a miscarriage (she didn’t sound too convincing) and that I should continue taking my meds and come back Tuesday.

I know I was wrong earlier in the week thinking that it was definitely a negative, but at the same time I know how my body is feeling right now. The heavy bleeding and cramps have to mean something. This is heart breaking enough that I’d rather grieve and move on to the next instead of staying in this limbo I’m currently in.

I really do not need to hear from people to stay positive. You try doing that in my shoes. I do need time to grieve or to deal with whatever it is that is happening inside my body. Allow me to feel my feelings without needing to put up a front that it’s all going to turn out OK. None of us know that.

I typically don’t tell anyone when I’m going on a first date. It’s not that I’m hiding anything. It’s just that I’d rather not have the added pressure of all the questions or checking in with me before and after the date.

In the beginning, I used to tell at least one person, but soon I realized that it ended up making my expectations even higher than they were before. When it didn’t go well, it felt like I was letting down my friends or family. It wasn’t enough that I was disappointed, but now I had disappointed someone else. It felt better to just go on the date and tell them later with much less fan fare and when I was ready to talk about it.

This is why me being so open about trying to conceive is against my character. It’s the same kind of feeling in terms of pressure and expectations. Every time I have a failed cycle, I feel the dread of having to spread the news. Each month during the TWW, I get comments and questions ranging from “How are you feeling?” to “Soon we will have another baby in the family!” Each stings me in different ways. Sometimes I wonder if it makes this process harder than it needs to be. I’m happy that my family and close friends are so supportive of me. Some women doing this aren’t so lucky. It’s only that I hate feeling like I’m letting everyone down when I don’t get pregnant. I’m already devastated enough each time and at times it makes me feel that I have to be strong for them instead of letting myself feel the emotions I’m feeling.

I’m not saying that I’m going to stop sharing. I still feel strongly about doing that for those other women who are thinking about this or going through the same process. I appreciate the support I’ve gotten…I don’t want everyone to think that I don’t.

I have 2 tiny embryos sitting in my uterus right now! It seems crazy that they are so small that they put them in through a catheter in the same way they do the inseminations.

They brought my mom and I in to the same pre-op area where I waited for my retrieval. I put on the gown and socks and waited for the nurse. She handed me pictures of the two embryos they were recommending that I transfer. One was good condition and the other fair. They both were already divided into 6 cells. She walked me through what was going to happen. One of the other eggs that fertilized didn’t make it and the 4th is continuing to develop and will hopefully be frozen in the next couple of days.

Once she had walked me through everything, she had me take a Valium. This is to relax the uterus. Then we had to wait about an hour. My mom got into her scrubs and then they brought me in. The whole transfer took about 5 minutes. While the doctor did the transfer, there nurse had the ultrasound going so I actually also have an image of the ultrasound once they were in the uterus, not that you can really see anything.

Now it’s on to the 2 week wait just like with the IUI’s. I’m on progesterone again and also on estrace. Hopefully the 2 weeks go by quickly. I’m a little nervous about the potential of twins, but with the way things have gone so far, I think I’ll be lucky to have my singleton 🙂

Today was a good day welcoming in new life! My sister in law gave birth to a beautiful baby girl! It is always a good day when the family is expanding.

Now that I’m back to normal today, I’ll let give you a little more details on the egg retrieval. My mom and I arrived a little bit before 8:30 to the clinic and they brought us in to the pre-op room right away. I changed into the gown and they got the IV started. I had to fill out some final forms related to embryo storage and then it was about an hour wait before they brought me in for the procedure.

As I lay in the operating room waiting for the anesthesia, I had a minor freak out. I mean the only “surgery” that I’ve ever had is getting my wisdom teeth out and a colonoscopy, so it is not common for me to be in this situation. I was laying there almost in disbelief that this is how far I’d go to have a baby. My mom says that within 10 minutes they had wheeled me back out, but it was still scary for a minute.

Once I woke up, I was under observation for a little while. They hadn’t yet come to tell me how many eggs were retrieved, when I heard the nurse tell the woman next to me that she got 15 eggs. I started panicking as to why I hadn’t been told anything yet. I sensed it wasn’t great news. When the nurse came over to bring me water, I asked her and she said she had to go check. She then came back with the news that they retrieved 5. This felt pretty devastating. With 16 follicles, I had been hoping for almost that many eggs to be retrieved and had been hoping for 8 minimum to make it through fertilization. Starting off with 5 felt depressing.

I spent the rest of yesterday in bed resting. I had some pretty bad cramping especially in the evening, but survived on just tylenol. This morning they called me to say that 4 out of the 5 fertilized. That made me feel better. They still need to survive until transfer day and then freezing for those left over, but at least I have 4 right now. The transfer is tentatively scheduled for Friday. I’m a little nervous because the nurse this morning said that there would be a message for me on phone tree this afternoon with more information on my Friday appointment, but there was no message. I’m going to have to call in the morning to get an update.

Everyone keeps asking how many I’m going to transfer. The doctor is going to give a recommendation based on the embryo quality and then I need to decide. If they are good quality, I’m likely going to go with 1. While it would be nice to get pregnant faster and up my chances with more than 1, the high risk of twins worries me. We’ll see. I don’t know for sure what I will decide until I’m in that moment.

I finally had my retrieval today. I’ll write more about it when I’m feeling more up to it, but wanted to update everyone. They retrieved 5 eggs, which feels disappointing since I had 16 follicles. It didn’t help that the woman next to me in recovery got 15. I’ll know tomorrow how many of those 5 fertilized.

For now, I’m in some pain and tired, but overall OK. Once I’m feeling a little more back to normal, I’ll write a little more about the actual experience.

I’m not ready for the retrieval yet. Day 12 of stimulation meds and still waiting to get the go ahead to move forward with the egg retrieval. My follicles have been growing, but they haven’t yet gotten to the optimal size. I’ve been going in for monitoring almost every morning. The nurse I spoke to a few days ago said it’s normal and that we all just have different rates of response to the meds.

I have a total of 16 follicles. I’ve read enough to know that this doesn’t mean that I’ll get 16 eggs out of the retrieval. Some follicles may be empty and some eggs might not be mature enough. There will also be eggs that don’t make it through fertilization. I’ll be lucky if half fertilize, so we’ll see. First I just need to get to the retrieval. I just got home from another monitoring, so will know more this afternoon once my blood test results are in.

I am uncomfortable at this point. I am bloated. I’m not sleeping well. And I just feel blah…don’t know how else to describe it. I’m not irritable, just kind of down and ready to be done with all the shots. I know once the retrieval is done, I’ll be obsessed with when the transfer will happen and then after that of whether I’m pregnant. It’s not like the anxiousness will subside with this next step.

On another note, last night I ended up watching La Bamba which I found while flipping through random channels on TV. This was the first movie I ever remember that truly affected me. I remember being devastated at the end when Ritchie dies in that plane crash. I remember coming home and wanting to be in my room alone and I was only 7. All of that came back to me as I watched his brother running into his mother’s back yard where she was doing laundry and had just heard the news that her son had died via a radio report.

The weird thing is that this morning as I drove to my monitoring appointment, the song La Bamba came on the radio. It was such a strange coincidence that it felt worth mentioning. I have no idea what it could mean and it probably means nothing.

Day 7 of shots and I’ve gotten the hang of it. It’s crazy how something can be so daunting and now seems like habit. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want this to be permanent habit, I just no longer sweat when mixing everything together afraid that I’m doing it incorrectly.

I’ve been going in for monitoring every other day since Saturday and am still on the same initial protocol and apparently on the right track. I go in for another monitoring appointment tomorrow morning and I’m guessing that tomorrow night might be when I introduce the next med (cetrotide). I’ve heard this one stings or burns, so not looking forward to that.

It’s a little unsettling not knowing exactly when I’ll be going in for the retrieval, but so far it looks on track for Sunday. If there’s one thing I’ll learn from all of this is patience as everything is a waiting period for something else. After retrieval it’s a wait each day to get status of the embryos and then to see when the transfer will be. Then it will be the TWW.

My stomach area is looking a little bruised, but other than that I’ve been holding up well. I haven’t had any drastic mood swings, which I am sure is appreciated, but it’s still early on in the week!

Last week I was thinking about how nice it would be to go away for the long weekend; to be somewhere with a beach and a spa where I could feel really far away even if it was only a couple of hours from home. Unfortunately, going away wasn’t doable for a number of reasons. I knew I’d have at least 1 monitoring appointment this weekend. I also can’t be in the sun too long or get overheated per the nurse’s instructions. And lastly, my sister in law is due in the next couple of weeks, so I didn’t want to risk being away.

That all led me to try and figure out what I could do this weekend to help me relax without leaving home. Having been in Arizona a couple of weeks ago for work reminded me of the reiki treatment I had a few years ago. I went into it completely skeptical, but left feeling more relaxed than I ever have from a massage.

I started trying to find somewhere local that has reiki services and called a an Ayurvedic spa that had reiki as an option on their website. When I called, they told me they currently don’t offer reiki, but they have chakra balancing and I figured why not.

I went in yesterday for my balancing and I was pretty skeptical when she started off by having me hold 2 crystals. At the end I was relaxed. It might not have been as amazing as my reiki experience, but I definitely almost fell asleep and truly did feel the energy flowing through my body. Plus last night I slept 10 hours!

It was relaxing, but also moving and somewhat emotional. I had told her before starting that I was trying to get pregnant and had just started IVF. When she was done, she let me know that my 2nd chakra that stands for fertility and creativity is wide open. She felt a lot of energy moving in that chakra. The chakras that she felt were blocked were the 3rd and the 5th.

The 3rd one represents your drive and your confidence to go after what you want. This took me aback at first because ever since I decided to move forward with becoming an SMC, I have never questioned that choice. I might be nervous that I won’t get pregnant, but I don’t think twice about wanting to get pregnant and about being able to raise a child. Then, I realized that it might not necessarily have to do with trying to get pregnant. It could be blocked because of other areas of my life. This drive to be an SMC is probably the most drive that I’ve ever had for anything…the most committed I’ve been to anything and maybe, I just need to apply that same drive to other areas of my life.

The 5th chakra is in your throat and represents communication and expressing yourself. I know that I am pretty open on this blog, so this point might seem like a false reading, but it’s accurate. Writing this blog is vulnerable, but it’s hidden behind a computer screen and it’s probably the extent of me getting vulnerable with anyone. I have never been good about expressing how I’m feeling vocally. Even back in high school, it was easier for me to let a friend know how I was feeling by writing her a letter instead of saying anything to her. That’s just how I’ve always been. It’s almost like it’s safer to keep it myself because I don’t want to say the wrong thing. I know that’s not right and I went through years of therapy to be told that, but it’s still hard for me to express how I feel. It just is.

This whole trying to get pregnant process has been the hardest thing I’ve had to go through. I know that I have everyone’s support and logically I know that I don’t need to act strong when I’m not, but I just can’t help myself. I cringe even thinking about posting this and then having people calling or texting me to ask if I’m OK or that they are there for me. I don’t want that kind of attention. I don’t want to talk about it. I want people to just do fun stuff with me and take my mind off things. When I have a failed try, I want someone to just take me out for sushi and wine (and ice cream) instead of asking me if I want to talk. When I’m nervous about an appointment or a step in the process, I want to watch a movie from my adolescence or spend time playing on the floor with the little kids that are part of my life. I don’t want to be asked a bunch of questions that I don’t know the answers too or have to answer the generic question of how I am feeling (does anyone really need to ask this).

Maybe that is running away from talking about how I feel, but if that’s what helps me through the process, then that should be enough for everyone. I do know that for my own well being I have to work on opening up that chakra, but maybe that will come with taking some of that pressure off of feeling like I have to talk about it.