Law of Attraction

Had my lining check this morning, and things are looking great. Lining already at 9mm, so we've crossed into the safe zone from my end. Whew, one hurdle down.

And, yes. The nice nurses at my local clinic had an update on the donor when I arrived. She is responding well to stims and as of Stim Day 4, they are tracking 12 leaders (all around the same size of 10/11 for those interested), and a host of smaller ones that might still have time to catch up. Her bloodwork looks great.

Initially, I was kind of bummed to hear only twelve?? (I am a member on a DE board where donors are frequently are pumping out 20-30) but I have to remember that it's quality, not quantity.... right? I keep reminding myself that this a 26 year old with proven fertility.

(just more stuff to obsess about now!)

At this point, it's a safe bet that retrieval won't be over the weekend, but probably early next week. In the meantime, I'll be chewing my fingernails!

And, thinking positive.

I have a new mantra today... This WILL work. I repeated it in my head about a hundred times lying in bed last night. Universe are you listening???

TV Break! Celebs that would make cool BFF's

This blog isn't all infertility, all the time. Well, it has been lately, but I still have other things to share. You see, while I am waiting for the phone to ring (or not), I am watching TV and my computer monitor for Internet live-streaming.

Are you watching The Bachelorette? Because honestly, I am a sucker for these types of reality shows. Sort of like sitting down with a bag of potato chips and a 20oz. Coke. Salty and Sweet. How could you not like Jillian? She's full of spunk and moxie and even reads all the comments to her blog. Something tells me that she is one of the "more real" reality stars. She's probably kicking back right now in her PJ's and fuzzy bunny slippers watching her episodes eating cheese curls and hot dogs.

I approve of Jillian's casting off of Reid last night. Sorry. He might be a nice guy from my hometown in Philly, BUT he's too.... non-committal. Too... dull. You snooze, you lose my friend.

Speaking of moxie, my other addiction is So You Think You Can Dance. Hate the title, but love the host. Cat Deeley should be raking in the $$$, not Ryan Seacrest! Travesty!

One my blogging friends brought up the fact that Cat would probably be a very cool friend in real life. I agree! Cat would be fun to hang out with, and since she's tall she probably has big feet which means I could borrow her shoes! Have you seen her shoes?? In fair trade I could let her borrow my handbags. Wait... who am I kidding? She probably OWNS more than me. Scratch that, she definitely owns more than me.

Last, I totally need to clue you in on my lunchtime obsession. At 12noon, I tune into the Fox News Strategy Room for the Entertainment Hour with Jill Dobson. If you haven't been to the Strategy Room, well, HELLO! You must. It's internet streaming only (not on TV). Relax, my "left-wingers", this is a no-politics chat about everything celebrity. And I bet Jill would make for a cool friend IRL, too. Stick around for the other segments (weekdays, 9-5)... it's good stuff.

Treading water?

Argh. It's hard to focus on writing a blog post today.

The waiting is killing me. I know if my DC was around, she would be calling and keeping me well-informed. The thing that mostly stresses me out is the fact that she noted that they will only call me if something "goes wrong" or the donor is ready to trigger, otherwise I am left to my own devices.

So you know I'm just hanging out here now NOT wanting the phone to ring for once (I won't be on trigger watch until the weekend... she won't stim THAT fast).

My lining check is Wednesday morning, so I am trying to hold off calling and wait for my in-person visit, because I can just ask one of the nurses to physically open the donor's file and tell me how many follies they are tracking, how her estrogen is, etc. The first half of stims is pretty boring anyway.

This is the worst part of knowing too much. I know exactly how things should go, hell, I can practically do the ultrasound measurements myself, and probably would have a good idea when to up the meds, when to coast, even when to cancel (nope, not saying that word).

That's crazy, I know. So I will hold out for my first inquiry until Wednesday.

On a slightly different topic, I am finally starting to pen my "thank you" note to the donor. I figured I would sit down, and the words would flow, but they are not. It's like one giant mental block.

Normally, I am a pretty open person.
Normally, I can always find the right words to say.
But not this time.

I decided to put it away and not devote another thought until the evening before retrieval.

It's so hard to even write that last sentence. To assume that we will get to retrieval. And getting to transfer??? fuggedaboutit!

I'm so afraid of being disappointed. I am fearful of that BAD luck catching up with me again. I know that anything is possible, I am just so used to failing that I have to PUSH myself to think forward. To be a person of optimism.

Damn, that used to come so easy to me- once upon a time...

"just keep swimming..." I see Dory from the movie "Finding Nemo" in my head, and I hear the voice of my BFF, Steph (she loves that line, sorta like her personal motto! but for this week, I am stealing it).

You think I'm crazy now? Wait until I GET to the 2WW.

heh.

Sort of like the first steep drop on a rollercoaster...

And so we begin...

Donor starts stims tomorrow. Her baseline appointment went great, and dare I say close to perfect.

The only downside? My DC is out on vacation all next week, so I will have to hunt down one of the IVF nurses for any updates while she's stimming. My DC knows I am a numbers obsessive gal, so she's already told the staff to expect my pestering calls. ...Who me? A pain in the @ss?

If things keep moving as they have been, donor will be triggering for retrieval next weekend (7/18-19ish).

Please cross your fingers and toes for me. I need the collective good thoughts/prayers from all of my friends.

Hands in the air!

Here we go.

She works hard for the money!

Where have I been? Well, not too far- honestly.

Been trying to do anything to keep my mind off of being worried. The good news is I don't have to travel far- my work laptop is right beside my home computer and while you were perhaps having a restful long holiday weekend, I was busy working! A half-day of catch-up on Saturday, and one day of rest (Sunday). I figured Monday would be a slow day, but NOT... I felt like I was trapped in a whirlwind of deadlines and issues.

You see, my job security hinges on my ability to suck up extra work therefore making myself critical to the business. Hence, a chance of not getting laid off.

I know what you are thinking- I am clearly delusional. And in this corporate world crammed into a bad economy everyone is expendable. I get, I get it. I am merely racking up some good credits for later this month when I will take 3 sick days.

After all, I may be a workaholic, but I am not insane.

Yesterday (Tuesday) I did take a day off and went to see my stylist for a haircut and touchup. I love my stylist. I don't even have to tell him what to do with my hair, he always has the best ideas. Yesterday's idea... CUT IT OFF!! and so we did. Three inches in fact.

I feel lighter and quite happy. Not to mention I love being closer to my real strawberry-blonde hair color.

Then I went to Trader Joe's and bought myself some flowers and a mint green tea to drink.


By the time I got home, I was peaceful.

Not a bad day!

Sparkly

Thanks guys for hanging with me on that last post. I think the appropriate word someone used in the comments was "panic", and yes that pretty much hits the nail on the head. As much as I am excited to finally get here, the anticipation of finally being here just reminds me how close I am to the end of it all.

I've been stewing on these emotions for the last two weeks, but this week it just reared it's ugly head to the forefront.

So what's new? Well, I started the estrogen (in pill AND patch form), and just counting down the days for the donor to start stimming on the 10th.

Man, was I EVER glad to knock down the Lupron injection... the headaches were a royal PITA. Made me grumpy too.

Or, perhaps the grumpy part came from running into two Moms from David's old school (gloriously pregnant with #2 and #4 respectively). They were talking about being sick and tired during their pregnancies, and all I could think was how I wanted to be in their shoes. I wished they knew how lucky they were. I put on my happy face and let them rattle on until I couldn't take it anymore, and excused myself to my car. Driving home, the whole way... all I felt was a large lump in my throat. I will not cry. I am so damn sick of crying.

Looking forward to the holiday weekend, although not a long or restful one for either of us.

S. has to work for some of it. I'm not off any extra days. I want to check out fireworks somewhere (last year if I remember correctly, I think it rained a bit and we missed them).

Fireworks make me happy. I think I even have a few boxes of sparklers somewhere that I picked up out of state (NJ says NO! to fireworks... freaking buzzkillers). Yes, I know they are dangerous... (funny how when I was a kid no one thought they were dangerous at all) but again, they make me happy.

I have such fond memories of running around the backyard with two sparklers in each hand... wishing they could stay lit forever.

So what are you doing this weekend?

The Monster in the closet

This post has been brewing for awhile now- the draft locked in my head wanting to finally be documented to make room for other thoughts.
...
I had a dream, not long after the drama in March after Donor#1 failed. I thought it was just the stress talking, a way for my mind to reset...

In my dream I was putting together a scrapbook, all lovely pictures of me, S., and David. As I turned the page there was a blank page just begging for photos. I reached into the pile of photos that remained on my desk.

The first thing that was seemed off was that each picture was black and white. I remember thinking "how odd" but when I looked closer to visually inspect them I noticed there were no people in any of the pictures. They were scenes familiar to me... our backyard, the beach, my family room.

But no people. I became frantic looking for pictures that had anyone I knew in them. But the pile seemed endless, and one after another, each picture was curiously absent of living things. Not even the cats.

I remember having the worst feeling in the pit of my stomach, so in my dream I ran to the two people closest to me looking for an answer. I glided into my kitchen, and S. and David were eating eggs. The table was set for six. But they seemed sad, and again I found that the color in my dream had vanished to a dark grey.

And then the dream ended.

I woke up in tears, and my first instinct was to reach over to S. to ensure he was there, and then I walked off to David's room to check on him. He was sleeping of course. But I sat down in the rocking chair next to his bed and replayed that dream in my head... looking for meaning.

And so began those terrible thoughts in my head after that night.

What is to become of me if this cycle doesn't work???

This is it. This is the last stop in my journey. There is no more after this. No more injections, no more tests, no more doctors visits. No more loans on top of loans. No more planning around a 28 day calendar.

How will I ever become whole again when I've been carrying around years of disappointment and loss like a monkey on my back?

I've been trying to shove these thoughts from my head. "Worry about that when the time comes.." I say to myself.

But each morning it is the first thing on my mind when I awake.

...and it is the last thing I think about when I lie down to sleep.

It's the monster in the closet, behind the door I don't dare open. What is to become of me when I have to turn that doorknob? It's almost like being told you are going to die, but instead of not knowing when.. you have a date.

Because very soon ...I will know.

Heady Thoughts

It's Friday, I am up to my ears in work, and the same headache I went to bed with? Yep, it's still hanging around. I'd love to blame it entirely on the medication, but it's also the witching hour before AF is due (migrane city).

Double trouble as far as I am concerned.

The good news today? The donor got her meds. Case closed on that drama.

Hmmmmm.... this cycle is really going to happen I think.

Rock with me

Truth be told, I haven't thought about Michael Jackson much in the last 10-15 years. With all his oddities and dicey situations, he faded into obscurity for me (well, as much as the King of Pop can).

So the news of his death was sort of a shocking/not shocking thing. Do all musical icons die young? Because it does seem that way.

Anyway, when I went upstairs to remove my makeup and get into my comfy jammies, I turned on the radio.. and of course, playing on every station... an MJ marathon.

I was instantly catapulted back to my youth. Each song held a vivid memory.

Listening to "Rock With You" in the car on our first family trip to Hollywood, CA in, was it '79-'80? We were looking for the stars houses (and the stars... AS IF they just HANG OUT at the end of their gated driveway on Mulholland Drive), but the soundtrack to our trip was Michael Jackson... "Off the Wall." While we were scoping out the Farmers Market and Hamburger Hamlet for Johnny Carson we heard nothing but MJ as our background music.

My brother singing "Beat It" while sporting a red leather zippered jacket with a white glove. The same brother watching a VCR copy (DVD's not invented yet) of "Thriller" over and over and over again. So much so that my parents could do the zombie dance themselves. "Shake you head to the RIGHT! Mom!"

My school dance, dancing to "PYT" with my BFF, Nancy. She had a massive crush on MJ in high school. If she's reading this, I know she's laughing.

Spring Break trip to Bahamas my sophomore year of college... and that wacky little sports bar that had the only 52" widescreen TV on the whole island (hey, it was 1988, come on!). They also only had one music video playing on it.. "Man in the Mirror".

Yep, if we are being truthful, I was never a huge fan of Michael Jackson. If anything, I am mostly conflicted.

But looking back, his music was the soundtrack of my childhood and early adulthood.

So today, I am wistfully thinking that even though I had nearly forgotten about Michael Jackson lately, I am reminded that his music will be something I talk about until I am old and grey.

Love him or hate him, his impact will remain.

The fall of civilization

Well, I took my last BCP yesterday. Just waiting for AF to show. I'll be happy to back off the Lupron a little bit. I've been having hot flashes at night. The headaches, not so bad as long as I keep hydrated.

The donor meds saga was resolved, but not without a minor freakout yesterday that all my work to date was for nothing when ONCE AGAIN a customer service person thought I was paying cash. Thank goodness for my new friend at the other specialty pharmacy who reminded me to remain calm, and then called the OTHER pharmacy to remind them of my insurance details. Ugh, such horrible communication between these insurance agencies.

Anyway, when it rains it pours. Husband and I recently changed over our phone service to the MASTER MONOPOLY CABLE PROVIDER in PA/NJ (we already had internet and digital cable with them), and man, they screwed us big time with our bill. In addition, our phones still aren't working correctly since the initial install. S. has been in charge of that big 'ole mess, and last night just went ballistic on the customer service folks. We call with a service problem that's been ongoing for two weeks AND a bill issue... and what do they do?? They try to freaking up sell us on another one of their worthless features!! Arghhhh! Are you kidding me??

All of my complaints this week are directly related to the US Economy, I suppose. Is is me, or are all of you feeling like you have to fight with service providers more than you used to? I have to be honest, I feel like I have another full-time job just dealing with money-obsessed companies.

What's next? Will my favorite donut shop start not filling my coffee cup to the top to save a penny?

Oh, nevermind. I don't want to go there. That's too traumatic to think about.