U/S-BT Follow Up Visit #2

My follicles are developing!  Right now they are at about 10 mm.  No wonder my ovaries feel like they are too big for my belly!  My blood work came back great too.  I will be using 50 units of Follistim for the next two mornings, no Menopur (the diarrhea inducing devil of my fertility cocktail) tonight, and only half a vial tomorrow night.  I will have my third follow up Sunday at 8 am.

Dr. C thinks that I should "go," as in go in for retrieval, no sooner than Wednesday but more likely on Thursday or Friday.  Today I played the scramble game trying to find coverage for Friday, (I'd already covered Wednesday and Thursday per my original schedule.)  Thankfully I found help in the form of a traded shift with my co-worker R.  He's been awesome about being flexible through all of this.  Well actually all of my co-workers are pretty awesome about my ever changing moods and IVF schedule. This day or two later schedule means that my implantation will also probably be later by a few days.  But only time will tell. 

My latest and far from greatest side effect...  I'm breaking out like I'm a sixteen year old teenager again.  It seems like overnight my neck, back, chest, and face are covered with small red bumps that don't exactly look like acne, but really can't be anything else.  Out of all the things I wish I could recapture from my teen years, my troubled complexion is not the one I'd pick.  How about my ability to sleep in any position, no matter how uncomfortable, and not wake up stiff and achy.  Or my super metabolism that let me eat all I wanted without gaining a pound. But no, I get the acne of my teens...

Thanksgiving and needle tracks

The title of this post is slightly misleading.  It should read Thanksgiving and a quick word about injections, but that's so wordy and boring.  Sorry for misleading you :)

I don't think I've mentioned that I had Thanksgiving here at our house.  We had six guests, including my good friend A and my Mom.  I put my Christmas decorations up a few days before.  Its earlier than I normal do, but I love Christmas trees and their twinkling lights!  (Forgive the backlighting, it was very bright outside.)

Our dining room table only seats four, so we had to set up the card table.  It worked out well enough with three at the dining room table, and three at the card table, despite the height difference.

The dinner menu included:  turkey (of course,) cheesy potatoes (a family favorite,) green beans and almonds, brown sugar and honey glazed carrots, orange walnut sweet potato casserole, homemade cranberry sauce, cornbread stuffing, and herb garlic pull-apart bread. 

The spread

It was my first attempt making this particular dish, orange walnut sweet potato casserole.  It was very tasty and different than the usual sweet potatoes and marshmallows.  Here's what you need:
8 sweet potatoes
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
4 teaspoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup orange juice
3 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon grated orange peel
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
honey

I used a bag of pre-peeled, pre-sliced sweet potatoes.  I boiled these for about twenty-five minutes until they became soft.  Then I drained them and placed them in a 1 1/2 quart baking dish.  Then I combined the brown sugar, cornstarch, salt, cinnamon, orange juice, butter, and orange peel in a sauce pan until well blended and boiling.  Mixture should get a little thick.  Pour mixture over potatoes.  Sprinkle walnuts on top and drizzle honey over the whole thing.  Bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, keep an eye on the walnuts so they don't burn!

The other new menu item was herb pull-apart bread.  I don't have a picture of this but it was soooooo good!  Melt 1 stick of butter in sauce pan, stir in two cloves of garlic, chopped,1 tea of dried basil, and 1/2 tea of dried thyme. Take a bag of frozen white dinner rolls and dump half of them into the bottom of a bundt pan.  Brush half of the butter mixture over the top.  Dump the rest of the rolls into the pan and brush the remaining mixture on top.  Cover with dish towel and set in a warm place for 4 hours to rise.  The recipe said it should double in size, that didn't happen for me but it still came out great.  Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.  This was a hit!

For dessert I filled fillo shells with pumpkin mousse, chocolate mousse, and cranberry cherry lemon tarts.  They were light and gave everyone a choice, seeing we have some picky eaters in the group.  And of course, I doctored up a bottle of apple cider.  Cinnamon sticks, allspice, cloves, dried cranberries and apricots, YUM!

I love cider!

I'm trying to figure out what to do for Christmas dinner now.  I'm leaning towards ham but it all depends on what ideas I come across in the next few weeks.


On a side note, I mentioned bruising in my last post.  Check out my colorful abdomen!

I think I might have found a better way to inject the Menopur.  The syringe I'm using is quite vacuum-y and its difficult to depress the plunger, I wind up letting go of the skin I've pinched to inject.  Don't do that.  Ever.  I have managed to find a way to depress without letting go of the skin and the bruising is much more slight.

The difference is clear; the large bruise on the bottom, to the hardly visible one just above the right side of it (in the red circle.)  But my tummy is starting to look like a connect the dots puzzle.

As far as the injection experience.  It's really not so bad.  It's surprisingly difficult to actually stab yourself with the needle.  I had quite a few false starts for the first week, I lacked the conviction to actually stab myself, it's kind of a self-preservation instinct.  You want to insert the needle fairly quickly, in a darting motion, or it will hurt.  If you do it quickly you won't even feel the needle going in.  Pulling the needle out causes me a slight sting, but that only lasts for a second.  Not so bad.  Not so bad at all.  I'm not looking forward to the up-coming butt shots, but hopefully they won't be so bad either.

My follow up is tomorrow morning.  I have the crampy, pressure feeling I had during my Clomid rounds, so I think my ovaries will be in better shape tomorrow, but we shall see...

U/S-BT Follow Up Visit #1

My first follow up didn't go quite as well possible.  Dr. C said that my ovaries aren't showing much development.  Apparently this is pretty common with PCOS and I shouldn't worry, which is easier said than done.  My blood work came out better than my ultrasound.  The conclusion.  I need more medication.  I upped my Menopur inject tonight and my Follistim amounts will go back up to 125 units for the next two days.  I won't have a follow up until Friday due to my slow start.  Sarah told me that this is perfectly normal and shouldn't impact our odds or time line.  Here's hoping.

On a side note, I have been keeping a spreadsheet of the fertility bills.  So far we are at about $1,500.  This includes my surgery and all its related expenses, like the anesthesiologist's bill.  This is more than we were expecting at this point in the process, but we hadn't accounted for all of the lab work.

PS:  Menopur is my least favorite medication.  It leaves me with awful looking bruises and terrible diarrhea.

Racking up the frequent flyer miles

Tuesday was my baseline appointment.  This was a preview of my life for the next two weeks.  The appointment lasted all of fifteen minutes.  Sarah was running the ultrasound machine as Dr. C was out of the office for the holiday.  It took her quite a bit of maneuvering to find both of my ovaries.  Apparently one of them was hiding, hehe.  I then headed down for my blood test. 

Sarah called me about four hours later and told me I was good to start my medications on Saturday.  She also scheduled my next appointment, Tuesday at 7:15am, which is far too early in my opinion.  This will be my life for the then week or so.  Starting Tuesday I will go in every other day.

I started my Follistim and Menopur on Saturday.  So now I get up in the morning and take my Vitamin D and my Levoxyl, then I inject myself with Follistim.  Then at dinner I take my Metformin ER, prenatal vitamin, and my low-dose aspirin.  And before bedtime I inject myself twice, once with Luprion and once with Menopur.  Three shots a day!  My abdomen is starting to look like a connect the dots page.

I will be making a brief post after every follow-up.  These are going to be very short posts just intended to keep you up to date on the latest in the saga of my developing follicles.