Long lost blogger

Yes, I'm still alive.  Barely.  Ha.  Kidding.  I think.

Really, as I sit here to type out a post for the first time in, what, nearly 6 weeks(?), with babygirl sleeping in the sling on my chest and a glass of white wine on the desk, it's with intensely mixed emotions that I begin to write.

Damn, this is hard.  It's been both the most wonderful experience ever and the most maddening.

Bullet points are probably all I have time for before she wakes and wants to eat.  Here are a few of the ill-formed thoughts that, in my blog utopia would be subjects of whole, well-articulated posts, but alas, this is all I have time for:

> breastfeeding sucks (this is a blog post title I've been wanting to write for 6 weeks now):  Pun intended.  And nobody tells you this.  Oh yes, yes, many of the bloggers I read throughout my infertile period and through my pregnancy complained of the pain of breastfeeding, but did I believe them? No.  I self-smugly figured they were just wimps.  Well, count me among the wimps.  Actually, the pain for me isn't physical so much (yes, I had mashed nipples, but never to the point of bleeding, back in days 1-7 or so when I was still trying to nurse babygirl and there was no milk coming out) as mental anguish and pain.  How could I not produce enough milk to feed my child?!?  A hundred years ago she would have died!  Of course, now we have formula and my blame-it-on-something mind decided that that was my downfall.  She had dropped over 10% from birth-weight on her day 4 pediatrician visit and the doctor wanted me to supplement.  My milk didn't come in until maybe day 6 or 7 and by then we were supplementing (with a bottle, horror of the breastfeeding nazis' horror) and it was all downhill from there.

Since then, I've done every regimen known to man to try to increase my supply.  Nurse->bottle-feed supplement->pump every 2 hours (that means I had only about 10 minutes between ending pumping and beginning the next nursing session); power-pumping for an hour every day; a course of Reglan; and currently pumping 8x per day while bottle-feeding whatever breastmilk I get (less than half her intake) and then supplementing with formula.

Why did I think breastfeeding would be easy?  I wish I had been more prepared for how hard and frustrating it would be.  I took a class.  My sister breastfeed both of her boys for 1 year each.  Why was I so unprepared?

Anyhow, nothing has really worked.  I've very slowly and only incrementally increased my daily pumping output from around 10, 12 ounces to around 14 and occasionally 15/16 ounces per day.  Babygirl is a voracious eater though.  She's taken as much as 34 ounces in one day!!

The Reglan did pretty much nothing for me, except make me crazy.  Seriously, a bad drug, at least for me.  I was drowsy to the point of dizziness.  I had this weird mouth thing:  the official side effect is dry-mouth but it felt like I was constantly trying to put something - food, water in my mouth to get rid of the taste and feel of it.  And I wasn't tasting/enjoying any of that food or drink.  And my mouth physically felt drawn downward (weird, I know.)  So, I'm tapering off.  3 more pills; one tonight and then one every other day til they're gone.

And really?  Given my 'poor responder' history with hormone-stimulating IUI and IVF drugs, did I really think taking a drug to stimulate another homone (prolactin) was really going to work?  As we know, my body completely refuses to obey medication rules.

So, I'm going to get off the Reglan.  I'll see where my milk goes with a few more days of pumping 8x per day (plus two or three what I call "social sucks" a day for babygirl) and then probably reduce to 6x per day pumping because I just can't even get out of the house pumping every 2-3 hours it feels like.  

I *think* I'm at peace with myself about only giving babygirl a portion of her nutrition in breastmilk.  It is what it is.  I suppose I could find some hard-core La Leche League person or another lactation consultant (I've consulted 3 already) that would figure some way to get me back to exclusively breastfeeding, but I'm just tired.  And worn out.  And done.  I'll keep doing some pumping as long as my milk lasts probably, but I expect it to fade away over the next couple of weeks.

> Ok, enough with the breastfeeding.  This post is already too long (thanks to babygirl being fast asleep) and too overly downer when what I really want to say is:  I am so blessed.  She is beautiful (everyone says so ;-) but really, she is.  And she's just started smiling at us the last two days!  I get tears in my eyes thinking about how long we waited to have her with us.  It's really quite unbelievable that we've got a nearly 6 week (tomorrow!) old in our house and she's thriving.  Yes, despite the feeding drama, she's over 9 pounds now and growing like a weed!  Her little heart-shape face has gotten chunky cheeks and her little skinny mini legs are starting to get rolls.  So cute!!

> Name:  cgd asked about her name in a comment on my last (epically long-ago) post.  I'm not going to use it regularly, but I do love her name so I'll tell you in this post.  It's Eleanor May.  Eleanor was my maternal grandmother's name (she was my last living grandparent until about 4 years ago).  And May was my husband's maternal grandmother's middle name, although it's the name she went by her entire life.  We wanted something that wasn't trendy, that was classic and it means so much that it honors our grandmothers.  We hope she'll love it as much as we do.  We will be calling her Eleanor and not Ellie or another nickname.  I had toyed with the idea of Ellie as a nickname but a) my parents used to have a dog (a beautiful liver and white Brittany) named Elle which we called Ellie, and b) Mr.Right wanted to call her by her full name.  So, we'll be calling her Eleanor.  Of course, if, when she's in high school, she wants to have her friends call her Ellie, so be it.  I also wanted a nickname and my name just doesn't nickname so I'm happy with giving her the option.

> Life as a post-infertile:  well, what can I say. I think it never leaves you.  Certainly the losses we endured and the pain of multiple failures to conceive with every known medication and medical procedure leaves scars.  But, they fade.  And I honestly have started believing on a regular basis that nothing could go wrong with my babygirl (a weird feeling not to anticipate the worst all the time).  And I know that's not possibly true.  There will be (medical) bumps in the road I'm sure.  But, she's here.  And, she's healthy.  And, she's beautiful.

> I hope for all of my blog friends who are still waiting and/or still worrying before getting to take their baby home for good that you experience success - whatever that ends up meaning for you.  I have a feeling I'm probably going to fade off into that not-so-frequent-blogger contingent who find it both hard to find the time to post and difficult to figure out what to post when we still feel the pain of our friends left behind in infertility.  But, I will try to update from time to time.  Some of my favorite blogs to read - even as I was still struggling to get pregnant - were those that had gone over to the post-baby side.

For now, I leave you with this from Halloween day:

She's here!

Well, she's been here for 5 days now.  Born Saturday, September 24 at 2:57 p.m. via stat c-section (oh yeah, more about that further down) weighing in at 7 lb 3 oz and 20 1/2 inches.

But before we get to the details.  Previously.........

In the last episode, I was scheduled for induction Monday, September 26.  I went in the Friday before for my last OB checkup.  All was well.  The doc I saw was actually going to be at the hospital Monday afternoon so we figured I'd probably end up delivering with her.  Yes, she looks like she's 12 years old, but I really do like her.  She's very straight forward and I get the sense that even though she's the least experienced at the practice, she's actually quite a good doc.

Anyhow, I was driving away (to the Blinds to Go store - don't ask) and I received a call from the surgery scheduler at the practice.  Did I want to go in this evening (Friday, September 23) and get induced tomorrow morning (Saturday) instead of Monday morning?  The doc who was head of the practice (and the doc who had done my D&C at 13 weeks of the Trisomy 18 pregnancy the previous year) was on call all day Saturday and I would deliver with her.  I told her I needed to call Mr.Right.  So I did.  We decided that, despite my desire to let babygirl come to full term (Sunday) and have a chance to come on her own, that this might actually be a good idea.  We like Dr.A and it would actually give Mr.Right a few more days at home with us.  And the fact that I hadn't progressed at all (read, no real dilatation) from the previous week meant it probably didn't matter if I was induced on Saturday or Monday.

So, we decided to go for it. I headed for home thinking about all of the things I'd been procrastinating doing because, gee whiz, this baby wasn't going to come until Monday!

I went in about 8 p.m. on Friday evening to the hospital.  After having to go back down to the lobby to wait for a room to open up, Mr.Right headed for home and left me there.  We figured he'd be more useful if he'd gotten a good night's sleep at home instead of on a recliner in the hospital room. As it was, I was shortly called back up to labor and delivery and put in my room, but with all the things they had to do - put in an IV, do an ultrasound to verify the baby's head was down, put in the cervidil (to soften my cervix), put on the monitors after the cervidil was placed and, finally, removing the monitors, bringing me my last food (jello, natch) - I never really got to sleep until about midnight.  My trusty British Airways eye shades and newly purchased ear plugs let me sleep a bit, but the anticipation had me up looking at the clock every hour or so.  Finally, about 6 a.m. they woke me up to remove the cervidil and break my water.

Mr.Right arrived about 7 a.m. and the pitocin was started.  We chitchatted with the nurses, Dr.A and he did work and I mostly lay there watching the baby's heartbeat on the monitor.

A first indication, although we didn't realize it at the time, that all might not go swimmingly was the baby's heartbeat got kind of erractic and dipped below 80 a few times not too long after they'd broken my water and started the pitocin.  So, they started an amniotic infusion - basically to replace some of the water to make the baby more comfortable.  This proceed to drip out of me for several hours.  At that point, they also decided to place an internal monitor - that monitored the strength of the contractions more accurately.

The contractions finally got to be fairly intense around 10 a.m. and I asked for the epidural.  It took nearly an hour to get but I made it.  Finally, about noon Dr.A came again and checked me - only 2 centimeters dilated, but she wanted to give it another 2 hours before making a decision.  Somewhere between 1 and 2 my parents and Mr.Right's mother showed up.  We chitchatted (the epidural was heaven!!!) until about 2:30 when while talking with my mother, Mr.Right and I both noticed that the baby's heart-rate was once again bouncing along around and underneath the 90 mark.  Just as Mr.Right was about to walk out to get the nurse, she came in.  They had me roll from one side to the other to see if things changed.  They didn't.  The heart-beat got more erratic and lower.  At about the same time, 4 more nurses came into the room.  It was suggested that the grandparents leave.  At this point, it was probably 2:40 or 2:45.  Things started moving very quickly.  I was given a shot to stop contracts.  I was told to get on my hands and knees (quite a feat with legs that felt like they were both asleep and tons of wires and catheters come out of me and tangling around me).  About this time, Dr.A came huffing and puffing into the room (and she's very fit - so she was out of breath, we later found out, because she'd run up the stairs from the lobby (to the 3rd floor)).

We were going for a c-section, stat.  The anesthesiologist was somehow there and I swear he practically had to hop on the gurney with me as they were rolling down the hall at top speed in order to put the additional medicine in my IV to make the epidural work for the c-section.  We rolled into the OR and mostly I remember talking with the anesthesiologist, asking him what I should and should not be feeling and trying to make sure I was actually feeling the block before they cut in.  At some point as I was still saying this to him, he said, "they've already made the incision."  In 33 seconds after the incision was made, the baby was out.  I heard her cry, but by the time someone pointed out that if I turned my head to the left I could see her at the table where the neonatologist was working on her, someone had stepped in my line of sight.

Next I saw Mr.Right come into the room, crying.  It still makes me tear up to think about how upset he was.  I later learned that they left him outside the OR door, because there were too many people working around me. He headed for the baby on the table.  And then he headed for me.  I tried to tell him it was all right.  And, it was.  The baby was perfectly find.  The neonatologist actually left and they continued on with the usual things - vitamin k shot, ointment in the eyes.  Eventually, Mr.Right was able to bring the baby over and hold her next to my head so I could kiss her.  We got a picture.

Then they left.  And I spent the next - who knows how many minutes - being sewn up.  Dr.A is incredible, really.  She was talking to me through the whole sew up procedure.  She took out my fibroid near the cervix since it was where she'd made the incision anyhow.  She kissed my cheek before she left to let the surg techs finish up the sewing up.

I ended up having to wait around then for the radiologist to come to do an x-ray.  Apparently, when they do a stat surgery and there's no time to count the instruments before the surgery they have to order an x-ray just to make sure nothing has been left inside :-)  Nothing was.  No airport scanner issues here.

Finally, off I went to the recovery room.  Mr.Right was there with the baby in a bassinet.  He'd been holding her for 1.5 hours.(!)  The grandparents and my sister were allowed to come up for a very brief time only.  After some time, we were finally transported to the post-delivery area and our room for the next two days.

Yes, folks, I came home on Monday afternoon after the Saturday afternoon c-section.  I just couldn't stand it in the room in the hospital anymore.  It felt like I was crawling the walls.  And basically my OB and the pediatrician cleared us to go if we wanted.

So, that's the story.  Kind of dramatic, huh?  But all's well that ends well.  Babygirl is absolutely perfect.  Everybody says she's beautiful (of course! ;-) And we think she truly is.  She has so many expressions I want to take a picture of every single one.  And at 5 days old only I'm already realizing this time with her at this stage of her life is going to be soooooo short.

More on the first 5 days in another post.

I leave you with this pic:

She'll be here next Monday at the latest

Well, I took the plunge last Friday when talking to the OB and requested a Monday (Sept. 26) induction date.  I learned Monday afternoon that I'm #2 on the waiting list which, according to the scheduler, means I'm almost definitely going to go that day.  That is, of course, if babygirl doesn't decide to come before Sunday, her due date.   I'll get the final word about the induction schedule (and instructions) on Friday afternoon.

We ultimately decided that we just didn't want to push our luck.  Even though yesterday's NST/AFI says baby and amniotic fluid are perfect and I'm still not feeling that's she 'dropped' (nor have I been really able to identify any contractions - even though I apparently had one while on the monitor yesterday afternoon), we just didn't want to look back in regret (or get into an emergency situation with the placenta starting to give out.)

I realize this means induction most likely and that means longer labor and maybe a c-section but I'm ok with that.  I still hope she decides on her own to start her way out by Sunday, but I'm also kind of happy to know the 'end date' of this pregnancy.

I was only a finger tip dilated last Friday and while 2 weeks ago one of the OB's said I was 50% thinned/effaced, the OB this past Friday said my cervix was fairly long still.  So......we'll see what this Friday's OB appointment holds.  But, regardless, unless I don't make it onto the schedule, I'll be going in Sunday night to the hospital so they can place the prostaglandin near my cervix and then I'll be induced on Monday morning.  Hopefully, I'll be able to get some sleep in the hospital (if I don't start contracting and if it's not too noisy).

Meanwhile, I'm feeling a bit more pressure every time I stand up on the underbelly (the part I can't see anymore!) and the occasional twinge down through my groin so maybe she is starting to move down?

But I've managed to walk the last two afternoons and intend to get out with the dog this morning before it rains this afternoon (again!)

Oh and, can I say this?  I never thought I'd still be enjoying what my RE always called 'marital relations' with the husband this late in pregnancy, but Mr.Right came home early last night and it was marvelous (blush!)  It's supposed to help induce labor, right?!?  :-)

38w5d and counting.....

Counting down, that is!  9 days to go until due date on the 25 of September.  I have my weekly OB appointment this afternoon so we'll see if there's anything to get excited about.  I had my weekly NST/AFI monitoring appointment on Tuesday of this week and babygirl was doing great.  The MFM who saw me afterwards (this is routine - there are about 5 docs and one of them usually quickly reviews the NSF and AFI results afterwards with you) asked what the schedule was for my delivery.  I told him the due date again, but he seemed to think I should have an induction scheduled.  He said if it were up to him, he wouldn't let me go past my due date.  I asked whether this was based on anything he'd seen in the monitoring results and he said, no, just based on my age (41 yrs and 3 months now).

I told him my regular OB (head of the practice) said she wouldn't let me go more than 3 or 4 days past due date for same reason, but he seemed fairly adamant about not going past my due date.  So, I'll ask the OB I see today for her opinion.

I'm a bit of two minds about it.  On one hand, I think the MFM (kind of an odd duck; seems a little old school) underestimates the health of my 41 year old body (!) I mean, I'm still walking 3 miles every morning.  My blood pressure has been consistently low the entire pregnancy.  I've gained only about 21 pounds.  I have no gestational diabetes, etc.  On top of that, last time they measured babygirl she was 40th something percentile I think for size.  She's super-reactive to the NST and the amniotic fluid is perfect.

On the other hand, I don't want to push it.  We waited a long time for this baby.  And, it would be kind of nice to be able to call my parents at a reasonable time of day and say 'hey, I'm scheduled for an induction on x day' instead of calling them at 2 a.m. to tell them we're heading to the hospital.

On the other, other hand, I'd love to see babygirl come before an induction is necessary.  I guess I might end up with a c-section in either case but it does seem like an induction before she's ready my make that risk higher.  But, really, if it takes a c-section, that's the way it is.  I'm not at all going to be worked up about that.  I just want a healthy baby out of it all.

So, there we are.  I really feel like nothing has changed with my body in the last couple of weeks.  I feel no closer to having this baby come out.  I still can't tell if I can really identify even any Braxton Hicks contractions.  (I thought I might have the other night, but it turned out just to be gas.)

In the meantime, trying to tie up all the little loose ends:  getting the rest of my hospital bag(s) packed; off to the cloth diaper store today to buy a few things (my sister has given me all of her diapers); off to meet my friend who's given me her Bugaboo stroller to get the bassinet piece (which she had forgotten the other day) and finally, this afternoon, on to the OB who will undoubtedly do an internal exam this week and I'll at least get some news about whether I'm at all dilated or not.

Just for kicks, here's the (probably) last belly shot:

Vacationing at 34 weeks report - very belated!

Remember when I asked for advice about going to the beach for a week of vacation during my 35th week of pregnancy?  I thought I'd just report in on how it was for anyone else contemplating the same.

It was fabulous!!!  Of course, it was with eyes wide open that we committed the money to a rental on the beach.  The OB had said she didn't have a problem with it as long as there wasn't something going on by then for which they needed me to be kept home/monitored.  So, of course, it was still a risk.

But nothing like that happened.  We drove about 5.5 hours to the beach each way with at least 2-3 stops for potty breaks (we had the dog too so it wasn't just me).

I was a little worried that all I'd want to do was sit in the air-conditioned condo and look out at the beach, but we ended up going down to the beach every afternoon for at least 3-4 hours.  Bikinis were the best.  I did try out my maternity 2-piece, but found it too hot on my belly to sit around in (I swam in the pool a bit with it.)  I'm by no means a stick, but I had 2 bikinis from pre-pregnancy that worked fine.  One other no longer fit my boobs so I didn't wear that one, but the others were a different style/size and worked out just fine.

I was able to keep up my 3 mile walk every morning with the dog (while Mr.Right went for his 5-6 mile run) and every late afternoon around 5:30 as everyone else was clearing out from the beach we'd walk with the the dog off-leash (allowed on our beach anytime but we kept her on-leash during the afternoon when a lot of people were around) down the beach throwing the tennis ball and watching her dodge waves.

It was truly, truly an idyllic week.  And I'm so, so happy we went.

One day I did seem to have the blues (Thursday of our Sunday to Sunday rental) and I'm not sure why. Maybe I hadn't slept too well that night.  I was always famous in our family for being cranky on the last day of vacation --- because I didn't want to go home!  Thursday was a little early though and I got over it and enjoyed Friday and Saturday and even the driving-home day immensely.

I am so eternally grateful for such an easy pregnancy (after the initial weeks of course).  I'm so grateful to my body for being so well-equipped at 41 years old to handle this.  I've just today hit the 20 pound weight gain mark (ok, 25 if you count the 5 pounds I lost in the first month of pregnancy) and people continually tell me I don't look big enough to be less than 3 weeks from my due date.  Not that I was trying to look small, but still being able to walk 3 miles every morning has helped a lot I think and is such a wonderful opportunity to get out of the house (and get the dog exercised!)

Off to the weekly NST/AFI check today.  Last week babygirl had her hand in front of her face (probably sucking her thumb as we could only see the four fingers) so no pics.  Hopefully, she won't be sucking her thumb today and we'll get a 37w2d pic!

In the meantime, I leave you with this pic from our beach vacation:

5 fertilized

Well, 2 'degraded'- whatever that means. And 2 didn't fertilize properly (I guess I got my hopes up that ICSI would take care of that). It's maybe a little disappointing that we didn't get more, but all in all we're pleased. It's 5 more embryos than we've ever had to freeze before (ok, we've never had any to freeze because we've only ever gotten 2 embryos at the most to even transfer in my own 2 retrieval/transfer attempts.)

And I realize that not all will probably survive a thaw. And not all would grow appropriately after thawed. But (and I really hated this when I was told it back when I was doing IVF), it only takes one. It only takes one embryo to implant and become our 2nd child.

And, it's now time to put all of these thoughts about this cycle with my sister away. At least for probably close to a year. I'd like to breastfeed for at least 6 months and although I haven't asked specifically I'm guessing I won't be able to take the drugs required to prep my lining for an FET while I'm still breastfeeding.

We went for a growth-monitoring ultrasound yesterday afternoon and all looks good. Weight estimate is 4lb13oz (based on size of circumference of head, circumference of abdomen and length of femur bones). I'll now go back in 2 weeks to start weekly non-stress tests (at which, apparently, they'll be doing ultrasounds too). That will continue weekly - I guess until I go to the hospital to deliver. I'll also have an OB appointment in 2 weeks at which, apparently, they'll start doing internal exams to determine whether I'm dilated at all.

Oh, and baby girl is now head down!! She's facing my backbone with her legs up in front of her chest (the femur bone length was still only 18-20th percentile (better than 11th percentile last month!) so I guess she likes to touch her toes.

In fact, we saw her trying to put her toes in her mouth! Here's a pic (it's a little hard to make out on the 3d ultrasound pic, but those are apparently toes heading into her mouth):

10 retrieved; 9 mature!

Things went great with my sister this morning. Retrieval was scheduled for 8 a.m.; we had to be there at 6 a.m. so I stayed overnight last night at her house (arriving after the kids had gone to bed) and we got up at 4:30 this morning to make the hour (turned out to be about 45 minutes in minimal traffic) drive to the clinic.

Chit-chatted about everything after we got called back for her to change into gown, etc. Mr.Right even got to pop in to say hello around 7 a.m. after he had dropped off his contribution (and then he ran off to work.)

The doc who did her retrieval had done my first D&C (at that clinic), at least one of my IUIs and I think one of my retrievals as well. I'm not quite sure he remembered who I was at first but then he said he did. He did look a little perplexed about my 33week belly, so I asked him if he'd heard about our wacky story. Not sure if he had or whether he was being polite, but I guess he figured it out!

My sister came through with flying colors. I think she's taken the extra strength tylenol they gave her after she woke up and that's it.

She was dressed by 9 a.m. and we were walking out of the building. Stopped at Panera's for breakfast and then headed home to her house and took the dog for a walk and tennis ball throwing session. Then we went to Target to get goggles for my nephew and had lunch at a diner. About to leave in a minute to pick my younger nephew up from daycare (since she's not supposed to drive and my BIL has picked up older nephew to go to swim class.)

Anyhow, upshot is: 10 eggs retrieved and they called at around 1:30 p.m. to say 9 were mature. They'll be doing ICSI and we'll get a fertilization report tomorrow and then they'll be frozen '2 pn.' I'm not quite sure what that exactly means but basically we'll be freezing on day 1.

We had long-ish discussion with Dr. Dry about this last month and he called this past Saturday to confirm. Apparently there's some debate among embryologists about benefits of letting go til day 5 to freeze. But basically, we went for Day 1 freeze as my understanding was that that might give us some more flexibility out the other end to re-freeze. As I'm carrying this now 33 week old baby around I'm increasingly leery of putting even 2 embryos in whenever we get around to doing an FET. I'm just not sure I want to carry twins. So, we may just end up doing a series of single FETs and this would allow us to thaw a few, see what makes it and potentially re-freeze (one more time) if we get more than 1 that survives the thaw.

The only advantage of day 5 freeze might be to see whether any of the eggs make it that far and I could see why you might want to do that if you were planning to do another cycle, but we're not. This is the only time we're going to ask my sister to do this.

I guess the only risk we run is freezing a bunch of embryos that wouldn't have made it to day 5 and having none of them survive thaw/grow once thawed. But it's not like we're going to use them right away anyhow, so if that happens, we'll just immediately move on to anonymous donor eggs. No time really lost except to thaw the eggs.

Anyhow, we're very pleased! Crossing fingers for good fertilization tomorrow!

33 weeks

Yeah, I'm really bad at consistently doing anything on my blog. So, I think it's been months since I've done a 'weekly' update :-)

But here it is (with belly pic --- which I totally haven't been taking regularly, oh well.)

Total Weight Loss/Gain: 17 pounds (from conception - although I lost 5 pounds in the first 3 weeks of being pregnant so you could say 22).

Maternity Clothes: Pretty much. Except for running shorts - some of which were bought when I was ~5-10 pounds heavier a couple of years ago than my immediate pre-pregnancy weight.

Stretch marks: None that I can see (but I'm starting to lose visual on the underbelly.) Unfortunately, I'm getting 'the itch that rashes' (my mother's terminology) where I just start scratching and then a bunch of little red bumps pop up - especially on my thighs, under my belly and (weirdly) on my left elbow. Lathering up with AmLactin - my go-to moisturizer.

Sleep: Ok. Getting up at least one time in the night to pee. Snoring badly, apparently (horrible nose congestion the entire pregnancy) so Mr.Right kicked me to get me to stop last night and I got mad and went to the guest room. :-/

Movement: Our crazy gymnast/soccer player seems to be constantly active! Movements are getting more pushy than punchy now. Weird 'Alien' like belly movements.

Cravings/Aversions: Not really. Have been indulging in ice cream more than usual, but I'm not sure that's a real craving. Pregnancy is just an excuse to indulge!

Gender: Girl!

Symptoms: The pregnancy-long alternatively stuffy/dried-out nose is really the only major symptom.

What I miss: Running, alcohol.

What I look forward to: Everything! (ok, maybe not the pain of delivery) Holding our baby girl in the first moments she emerges; having Mr.Right at home for that first week of her birth; telling everyone her name!

Moods: Fairly even keel with the occasional weepy moment - like yesterday when I had asked Mr.Right to help bring all the shower loot from the dining room up to the nursery and then weeped at him that I didn't have everything in the nursery ready to store everything! (no dresser yet, no bookshelves yet)

Milestones: Ultrasound this Wednesday. Weekly NSTs starting in 2 weeks(?)

Medical concerns: Nothing more than an 'elderly' pregnant woman can expect. Not even any swelling at this point - still wearing my rings.



Short update on my sister: triggered last night!! Yay! Retrieval scheduled for 8 a.m. Tuesday (tomorrow) morning. That means we have to be there at 6 a.m. But thank God it didn't end up being on Wednesday when my sister has 2 presentations to make for work. She was a total trooper with the IM trigger shot. Her husband gave it to her. She wondered why she hadn't iced shot areas for all the injections before(?) 10 follicles seen yesterday. Crossing our fingers for a good retrieval!

Dragging on.....but an award!

My sister's cycle is draagggging onnnnnnn......... And I feel really badly about it. She's in for monitoring this morning so we'll see what the call this afternoon reveals, but most of her (now) 9 measurable follicles (plus 2 around 10 mm) were in the 12-13mm range on Wednesday morning so trigger might not be til Sunday night or maybe even Monday night. The problem is that we started this cycle when we did (a bit early - she only took 19 bc pills) because she has 2 presentations to make for a work event this next Wednesday. And if trigger night is pushed out to Monday...well.....retrieval will be Wednesday. I just don't want it to be stressful for her. She's, of course, totally like "I'll just call in sick - it happens" but I'm biting my nails here trying to wish trigger for tonight, Sat night or Sunday night. But, I keep reminding myself (and Mr.Right keeps reminding me): this will all be over by early to mid next week. And we'll be done with it. And my sister will be done with it forever. And, even if all goes completely kerflooey with the attempt at doing a donor egg cycle with my sister, it looks like we might actually have a baby around the end of September. And we'll have one child at least.



Anyhow, on to lighter topics.....I got an award! And I'm usually very, very bad at responding to awards, but I'm going to make a real effort to do this one! It comes from one of my hero bloggers, Eb at Twins40+ (http://ivf40pathtoparents.blogspot.com/) When I first realized that we might actually be heading to DE and I was definitely going to be well over 40 years old by the time I was carrying a baby, she gave me inspiration that I could do it (she had twins and turned 42 just a little time later.)

So, I've got to share 7 random things about me and also nominate 7 bloggers of substance. Here they are:

1. I once treated Harry Belafonte to a fish sandwich at McDonald's. Seriously. I was driving him around before and after a concert he did at my university (I was on the committee that selected and hosted entertainers for big concerts) and he wanted to go to McDonald's after the concert.

2. I've run 5 marathons and I've done a half Ironman. Not fast, mind you, but I got them done. I hope to do a marathon again, someday, after baby making is done (not sure about the half Ironman - another Oly-length triathlon, yes, but 6 hours is a long time to be competing in a race).

3. I used to speak German - pretty fluently. I lived in Germany for a year in college and a did a stint working for a member of the Bundestag during graduate school. Now? I can still carry on a basic conversation, but not very well.

4. I've travelled to 51 countries (mind you, this number includes Vatican City). I've been to 6 continents (no Antarctica yet). I used to travel internationally for work a lot, plus toured around Europe in college and travelled with my sister in Africa when she was in the Peace Corps.

5. I just learned to play chess this year (I got Mr.Right and myself a chess table for our anniversary so he could teach me.)

6. My first job was working at a steak house when I was 16. I came home every night that summer with my clothes smelling like A1 sauce.

7. I had 2 slices of pizza and a Dairy Queen vanilla cone today for lunch. What a nutritious lunch for babygirl! :-) Ok, I don't do that every day (by any means). It was balanced with a bowl of kashi Go Lean crunch w/organic skim milk and a peach and blueberries + a clementine for breakfast this morning and grilled wild sockeye salmon, corn on the cob and grilled eggplant for dinner last night. Chicken breasts with leeks and rice tonight for dinner.

And for my seven bloggers of substance (and I know some of you are so good you get awards all the time, so I'll totally understand if you don't take this up):

1. cgd at Adventures in Infertility Land (http://adventuresininfertilityland.blogspot.com)
2. Alex at Alex's Adventures (http://manyadventuresofalex.blogspot.com)
3. kc at You Wouldn't even make an omelette with stale eggs! (http://kcoryfertility.blogspot.com)
4. Roccie at Roccie Road (http://roccieroad.blogspot.com)
5. Fran at Everyone else but Me (http://everyoneelsebutme.blogspot.com)
6. R at One Egg Please (http://1eggplease.blogspot.com)
7. ks at Inconceivable !?!?!? (http://inconceivable-pofjourneytomotherhood.blogspot.com)

Of course there are many, many more of you ladies out there who write blogs of great substance. And although I'm not sure I really qualify I'm glad to be among this community!!

Sister Donor Update

Since last post, my sister has been in for monitoring on Saturday, Monday and this morning. Things are looking good. They changed stim levels to 150 Gonal-f and 150 Menopur on Monday night and added the Cetrotide. This morning she had 4 measurable on one side and 5 measurable on the other (so I guess that cyst on one side really didn't have much of an effect after all). Most are in the 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 cm range so I think we've got a couple of days to go. We'll see what they say this afternoon. I'm suspecting she'll go in for monitoring again on Friday and maybe on Saturday morning. We had been hoping to trigger Friday night so retrieval would be on Sunday, but unless things really take off, I doubt that. I guess she'll have to call in sick to work on Monday if she triggers on Saturday night. I *hope* it doesn't go later than that.

She seems to be doing great with the shots. I actually came over to her house last night to bring some Menopur that I got delivered yesterday and helped mix up the shots last night. We managed to get the 150 Gonal-f and 150 Menopur into one syringe so only one shot (which her husband gave her) and then the Cetrotide shot this morning. I'm actually still hanging out here this morning waiting for another delivery of Menopur (long story, but there was a mixup at Freedom Fertility thinking we needed another Rx order from my doctor).

Anyhow, we're trying not to over-buy drugs since we're paying for them all this time so I'm finding myself tied to the 8 a.m. - 3p.m. FedEx delivery window most every day. But that's ok. This will be over, by the latest, this weekend (at least the drug delivery part).

I'm still amazed at my sister's willingness and ability to do this. My only duty this morning was to play with my younger nephew until my BIL could get my older nephew up, through breakfast and dressed for daycare. Then I walked my older nephew over to daycare. Meanwhile, my sister had gotten up at 5:45, made lunches for the boys and headed out to her monitoring appointment at 7:15. And, I'll be forever grateful - no matter how it all turns out eventually.

In the meantime, I think babygirl has switched positions. I seem better able to fill my stomach without getting incredibly uncomfortably full afterwards. This might mean the weight gain picks back up. I've been plateaued at 15-16 pounds weight gain for the last ~3 weeks. Can't wait til we get to see her again next Wednesday!

Eight is great

My sister went for her first monitoring b/w and u/s appointment since starting stims this past Monday evening and she's got 8 follicles - 6 on one side and 2 on the other. Not super fantastic, but it is what it is. The donor coordinator nurse (who's also been calling me directly with info) said the 2 were on the side where the cyst had been - "I think we told you about the cyst at her initial b/w and u/w appointment, right?" Well, no, you didn't. Apparently they did tell my sister but my sister didn't know it could potentially be a problem (and they didn't tell her it would be.) So, anyhow, Mr.Right and I talked it over last night and decided we would have in all likelihood gone forward with this cycle anyhow, even if we had known about the cyst (which was not producing estrogen). First, we've delayed and delayed (first because of my pregnancy, then because of my sister's breast biopsy) and we are just ready to get this thing done - both for our sakes (since putting it off runs us close to babygirl's arrival date) and for my sister's and BIL's sake (we feel we only want to drag out their offer/commitment to this just so long); and secondly while communication from our clinic is not always perfect we have come to trust the judgement of Dr.Dry and feel like if he thought there would have been a better chance in another cycle he would have let us know that.

And, really? Eight is great. It's more than I ever had on day 4 of stims and something must be going right because they decreased my sister's Gonal-f from 150iu to 112 iu per day. She's actually responding to the stims well. And I *never* did that. I mean, I was incredulous when they told me she'd only have to take injections once per day. And we've combined the Gonal-f and Menopur into one shot, so until she adds the Ganirelix/Cetrotide she's only had to have one injection per day! I was always on injections morning and night and was taking max dosage of everything - resulting in, at the most, 4 eggs retrieved.

So, we're hopeful those 8 follicles with have some nicely developed, not overly-drugged eggs at retrieval sometime the end of next week. Meantime, my sister and BIL are doing great with the shots themselves. They're both biologists so they at least have some familiarity with lab-type stuff - measures in iu's, even syringes and stuff. I'm just the drug-runner right now, getting Freedom Fertility deliveries to my house and running them over to theirs (an hour's drive) so they don't have to sit around and wait for the FedEx man to come.

Meanwhile, babygirl continues her gymnastics/soccer goal-kicking routine on a regular basis which makes me nothing but extremely happy. I have been worrying just a tad about my weight - in that I'm not gaining much. But Mr.Right tells me my belly looks bigger and bigger to him and despite the occasional (ok, becoming more frequent) soft-serve ice cream cone habit in the afternoon, I feel like I'm eating well (healthily) and I am walking 3 miles a day. And I have gained 15.5 pounds (or maybe 20.5 if you start from week 4 or so of my pregnancy since I lost 5 pounds from conception to then). And my OB said she's happy with more than 10 lbs and less than 100. :-) And I still have 8.5 weeks to go.

Luckily, we'll be getting a look-see at babygirl again on August 10 which, for some reason, seems like an exceedingly long way off.

Meanwhile, I continue to remind myself (despite my minor day-to-day silly worries) that we are extremely lucky to have this miraculous last-good-needle-in-a-haystack-egg-of-mine pregnancy as well as the possibility of a backup/2nd pregnancy opportunity with an egg of my sister's.

One year to the day

We have a lot to be grateful for 365 days after utter devastation. I'm 30w4d pregnant with a genetically normal baby girl who is measuring right on track for growth. I appear to be a long way from seeing this kid as my cervix is long and very closed and I've not had a whiff of contractions. Plus, my sister is, as of this morning, launched on a stim/retrieval cycle from which she will donate her eggs to us for our future use. How blessed we are.

I teared up a few days ago thinking about where we were last year on this date - having my NT scan which led to having a D&C a year ago tomorrow.

Interestingly, it was just as annoyingly hot last year these days too. How do I remember this? Because 2 days after my D&C we hosted a bbq for my sister and family (including my 2 nephews), Mr.Right's sister and her boys, Mr.Right's best man and family (including two of our flower girls) and one of my bridesmaids and her family (including our 3rd flower girl). Yes, 7 kids running around my house (ok, 2 weren't walking yet) and it was 104 degrees outside. And, the only people who knew about our news was my sister and BIL. It was so hot, we grilled the hot dogs and sausages outside and spent the rest of the afternoon/evening inside.

It was the best of times (our 4 nephews getting to play altogether and our favorite little girls too!) and the worst of times (trying to hold all the hurt and anger and disappointment in about our lost baby.)

Anyhow, I'm so glad to be in a *very* different place this year. It's such a cliche to look at all we went through to get here and say, 'well, it's made us appreciate it more' but, I think it has - at least in some ways. I wouldn't wish on us to have had to go through all that, but it is what it is and I have a different appreciation for being this pregnant than I think I might have had had it been easy. I'm not sure what that gets us - hopefully not becoming helicopter parents because of the preciousness of this baby - but it's worth observing.

I wish the blessing of better days on anyone out there who's still in a similar place to where we were at this time last year.

The Elderly Gravida advantage

Oh yeah, this is my new favorite phrase, "elderly gravida." So much more pleasing to the ear than advanced maternal age, don't you think?!? :-) (I only just realized that the ICD-9 code that gets checked on my monthly growth monitoring ultrasounds at the MFM is labeled 'elderly gravida.')

But seriously, it is an advantage. Monthly ultrasounds (henceforth minus the transvaginal for cervix check since they say it's not worth checking the cervix after 34 weeks) are great! We saw babygirl again this past Wednesday. She's now frank breech (last month she was head down) but there's still plenty of time for her to turn. In fact, given the movement in the last few days, I'm not so sure she hasn't already. We also saw her taking a sip of amniotic fluid.

Next ultrasound in another 4 weeks. And, as mentioned, they'll just be checking growth. Apparently, what they're worried about is that in the latter part of the pregnancy for the elderly gravida (yep, that's me), there can be a tendency for the placenta to start to not function quite as well, leading to a slow-down in growth (nourishment) of the baby. So, far, though, she's right on target. Her head is still measuring a little on the relatively larger side at 30w1d (I was 29w3 days on the day of the scan) although her femur was measuring only 28w4d (we're both short so no real surprises there.) 17 on the amniotic fluid index (which should be between something and 20 apparently) so this is good. Cervix is even longer than past measurements at 4.6

The MFM also recommended that I start weekly non-stress tests at 34weeks. Am going to check with my regular OB whether they do this in their office or whether I need to go the antenatal center (where I see the MFM docs and get my ultrasounds since my OB doesn't have an ultrasound machine.)

We've been fine-tuning my sister's schedule. It looks like she'll be finishing up bc pills the end of this next week and have bloodwork/ultrasound evaluation done next Thursday morning. We've jiggered things enough, we think, that her first stim med injections will be the following Monday evening. (My sister and her family are going to my parents' lake cottage Saturday and driving home Monday afternoon) That way I'll be able to go over and help her with her first injections. Retrieval should be around August 4 or 5. That will wrap things up nicely for us to go on our beach week vacation on the 14th. Of course, as you all well know, count on *nothing* when doing any infertility treatments, so I'm prepared (I think) for this all to go kerflooey. But, I am hoping that my sister's body is much better behaved than mine (at least in terms of IVF med response.)

Still on track with everything

Yikes! It's been almost 2 weeks since I've posted anything. I've been catching up on my reading today, having been without much internet access at my parents' lake cottage all last week. It was a wonderful week, though! Mr.Right was there for the long 4th weekend and then the pup (she's 11 months old now!) stayed with me for the rest of the week (along with my parents). Babygirl was kicking up a storm all week! I wasn't sure if it was because I noticed it more - sitting around more than when I'm home - or because she's just more active now. Maybe a little bit of both.

We had the talk with my sister and BIL last night. They were at the lake cottage over the 4th too, but obviously with my parents there and their two little boys running around we didn't get a chance to talk there. So, last night we were going to drive over to their house, but Mr.Right had a cold and our oldest nephew was going to be getting home later than usual (and therefore getting into bed later than usual) and we just decided it would make for a late night to start out the work week. So, we skyped. Yes, we live about an hour's drive from each other on either side of the city, but we skyped nevertheless. Actually, it worked just fine.

So, the upshot of the conversation seemed mostly to be a concern by my sister and BIL that *we* might feel obligated to go through with paying for an IVF cycle with my sister just because she continues to be willing to do so. What with my being pregnant (29 weeks, 1 day!) and it looking like we actually might have a baby at the end of September, they just wanted to make sure we were still really wanting to do this.

With anybody other than my sister, I might be inclined to take this as a polite, but backhanded way of saying that *she* really didn't want to do this anymore. But I know my sister: if she didn't want to do this anymore, I think she'd feel comfortable in just saying that. And my BIL too. And, as Mr.Right pointed out, my sister has been more than willing to do the follow-up consult with Dr.Dry, is already on birth control pills and is making plans for the last little things she needs to wrap up (getting her latest pap smear results faxed over to the clinic; having a phone consult with a lawyer about the draft donor contract we sent them for their review and input). And, presumably, she would be not going forward with these things - or, at least, dragging her feet on them - if it was really the case that she decided she didn't want to move forward.

So, as Mr.Right said, "leave it to your sister to be concerned that *we* might feel obligated to move forward." That's pretty much just who she is.

They also wanted to talk about a bunch of things that really weren't in our scenario set when we last talked all 4 of us together (when I wasn't pregnant yet - although, as Mr.Right pointed out - we probably conceived the next morning after we all sat together on the evening of January 31 deciding to go forward with this.) Like, we'll probably now have a baby genetically linked to both me and Mr.Right and how is a potential younger sibling going to feel when they find out they were conceived differently? I pretty much have decided that given the number of blogs I follow that have siblings from different avenues of conception and/or adoption, somebody out there will probably have some advice to share with us when/if we get there.

And, frankly, there's *always* something that siblings are aware of that they have/don't have compared to the other(s). For me, it was "why did my sister get pretty red hair (and curls too!) and I got this brown hair that nobody oohs and aahs over?" Or, "why did my sister turn out skinny and me fat?" and I know my sister wanted my straight hair. Ok, maybe these are not as big of an issue as, "why did my older sister get mommy's eggs and I got Auntie's eggs?" but I think they're concerns that are at least along the same lines. And who knows, at certain ages, the hair color thing (or the fat/thin thing) might actually feel more important to our child than where the eggs that made them came from.

I was actually more concerned in the discussion with my sister and BIL about whether my sister will feel like all her efforts will have been wasted *if* we somehow miraculously get pregnant with my own eggs again. Or - although this is really inconceivable (ha ha!) at this point - we decide not to have a second child after having a first (or if, god forbid, something happens to me that makes me unable to carry a second baby.) My sister didn't feel like her eggs would be 'losing out' :-) and really didn't think the imposition of injections/retrieval over ~ 14 days of her life was big enough to warrant feeling regret for having gone through this and then having us not use her eggs.

So, it looks like we're still on track. We're tying up some lose ends (that contract; fine-tuning the stim schedule) but we may be at retrieval as early as August 4.

I remarked to Mr.Right later last night that while I think we were both a little nervous and worried about the conversation last night I just marvel at how much less stressful the whole thing is given the fact that I'm pregnant already. I can just imagine how much more desperate I would have felt having this conversation looming if we weren't pregnant.

Anyhow, regarding that pregnancy: BORING! And I love it that way :-)

Went to the OB today and really didn't have much to talk about. We asked a question about tetanus and pertussis vaccinations and the answer was that I'd get a Tdap at the hospital after delivery. We said we might have more questions after our tour of the hospital tomorrow night and childbirth class (the express version) on July 30. Babygirl's heartbeat was 142 and I'm measuring (fundal height) spot on at 29weeks and a couple of days.

We have our monthly growth scan/cervix check ultrasound this coming Wednesday so we'll get to see Babygirl then. I can't wait!!!

Moving forward on 2 fronts

I feel like we're fighting a war (on infertility) on two fronts, although the one front (this pregnancy) doesn't really feel like a war so that's not a very good analogy. It feels, mostly, like a really boring, but pleasant walk (at least it does now, several months past the CVS procedure and the 'great toxo scare' of March). For that, I'm HUGELY grateful! :-) I managed to pass the glucose screening test with a score of 131 (135 is the number at which they'd make me do the 3 hour test) so, somehow, this is just starting to feel easy (please, karma, do not kick me in the ass now for just having said that.) I've gained 14 pounds and I'm tracking along the "what to expect" weight-tracker line for a total gain of 25 lbs. I'm out walking 3 miles a day, which is helping a lot I think. So, fingers-still-crossed, this is going pretty well.

The second front is with my sister as egg donor. It's looking less and less like we're doing this as a backup plan for child #1 and more to tackle (presumed) secondary infertility (ok, it's really a backup plan now for #2). That seems to be going ok. She'll start bc pills this Sunday. We had a follow-up consult with Dr.Dry yesterday afternoon (with my sister on the phone). He reviewed everything and still hopes we'll get 6-10 eggs from my sister (although she'll be turning 37 probably the week she starts stims). We discussed freezing embryos (our decision, over freezing eggs) and on what day (we'll freeze on day 1 after retrieval). We even discussed how we might eventually defrost and how many we might transfer (maybe just one at a time to avoid twins).

The only minor wrinkle is that later in the day I called my sister to thank her for interrupting her vacation with her family to take the call yesterday afternoon and she said she and my BIL wanted to sit down and talk with Mr.Right and me again. I don't *think* she's backing out, but apparently they've been discussing some of the implications of my pregnancy - with it looking like I might actually have this baby - and what that might mean for a future child created with her eggs. Of course, immediately alarms go off in my head that they're going to back out. But I think they're just being reasonable: the last time we all 4 sat down to talk about this we didn't know I was pregnant. And the only other time the 4 of us have even touched on that situation together was so early on in February when we met with the social worker that, of course, we were all still very much discounting that this pregnancy would make it. So, I think it's a good idea.

And, really, all along I've told my sister that she can back out of this at any time. Even up until right before the retrieval (although it would be nicer if we don't have to spend the money on the drugs and the global fee, but if we do, we do). And we'll figure out what to do about conceiving child #2 if/when we get there. Maybe lightening will strike us twice and we'll get pregnant on our own again (not holding out too much hope for that at age 42) and we've always said that if this didn't work with my sister we'd cheerfully (ok, that may be stretching it a bit) move on to anonymous donor eggs.

Anyhow, it looks like we won't get a chance to get together and talk face to face until July 10, but that will still be before we have to pay the global fee to my clinic and before we have to order drugs. So, we'll figure it all out then.

I really suspect this is more about how this 2nd donor egg child might feel when they find out they were conceived with an egg from their Aunt, but that their older sister was conceived 'the old-fashioned' way. Honestly, I've not thought too deeply about that myself and my guess is that my (little) sister may have a little bit more perspective on that than I might have. I think it might have already been hard to be the younger sibling and I imagine she's worrying a bit in advance about how this child might feel about all of this. So, I'm trying not to speculate too much about what they're thinking or what they want to talk about and just let it be what it's going to be. In the meantime, like I said, she's starting bc pills on Sunday at any rate.

Off to walk with the dog on a glorious, sunny, humidity-free day here! Feeling hugely blessed that we might actually have a baby at the end of September and blessed that we may still have this opportunity with my sister to help us with #2.

Moving forward

Thanks to everyone who commented on my last post. I really appreciate the support and unconditional acceptance of this community. I think TeeJay hit the nail on the head: for some reason, I continue to feel this need to justify myself regarding going forward with a stim/retrieval cycle with my sister. I think I feel like somebody is going think I'm 'greedy' for asking my sister to do this when I've got a perfectly good pregnancy going already. Of course no one (besides you guys) is really going to know right now that we're doing this - outside of Mr.Right, me, my sister and my BIL (we're not going to tell our parents at this point, unless it becomes necessary) and, of course, the people at our clinic. And, besides, who cares what this imaginary person thinks!?! They don't necessarily know what we've been through or what the situation is.

Still trying to get a phone consult scheduled with Dr.Dry for next week but have been trading messages/voicemail with him. It was kind of touching that he called and left a voicemail (after I called his office to try and arrange a consult time) and wanted to know how my pregnancy was going.

How is it going? It's going well. Really well. Well, despite a little down moment the other evening. I guess it had just opened up old feelings calling the fertility clinic that day. And then there was this 'tempting fate' kind of feeling I had about this pregnancy and moving forward with my sister as a donor. You know: now that we're moving forward again with my sister the fates will decide to make this pregnancy difficult or even make it end.

But, of course, that's irrational thinking and ridiculous. Nevertheless, it coincided with a time over dinner when I wasn't feeling babygirl move and started worrying that I hadn't felt her move in a while. There were a few tears, but Mr.Right and I talked ourselves out of getting worked up about it. Or so I thought. When Mr.Right joined me in bed he was very quiet. I had actually felt the baby move (I often do once I'm lying down in bed) and I turned to tell him. He told me he'd just been rehearsing in his head the speech he would have to give to his colleagues/employees in the office about losing the baby. Sigh.

Of course, that night, I swear babygirl woke me up in the middle of the night with her kicking. I couldn't fall back asleep so I read for an hour or so. I guess I deserved that! :-)

Anyhow, we're all fine now. Back to our 'boring pregnancy' status. (Please, let it stay that way!) Out for a 3 mile walk (sadly, I quit running a few weeks ago) with the puppy this morning (she's not much of a puppy anymore at 10.5 months old!). I was getting lonely walking this last week since she'd not been able to go with me as she was recovery from her spaying surgery. But she's off the pain meds now and raring to go! The people (mostly women) that I meet walking dogs are now routinely asking me when I'm due. I guess it's a pretty safe bet to ask now that the belly is pretty obvious. And I find I don't mind at all. :-)

All clear for my sister!

My sister called yesterday and the results of her breast biopsy are all clear! She has to go for a post-op appointment this Friday and they apparently want to do another mammogram at some point soon-ish because the surgeon wasn't able to get as many calcifications as they thought they saw on the initial images so I guess they just want to see if they still show up. Hopefully, none of this means further biopsies.

Along with telling me the news about the results, my sister wanted to let me know she'd be free this Friday for the follow-up consult Dr.Dry wants us to do before moving forward. I'm going to push for a phone consult since it's a long-ish drive for her over to our clinic (an hour+) and, honestly, I'm not thrilled about walking into my clinic with my 25-week belly. I know if I were sitting there waiting for my appointment I wouldn't really want to see a pregnant woman walking in. Anyhow, he's seen both of our faces before (and mine, way too many times) so I think a phone consult will suffice.

I still feel a little weird about doing this cycle while we have a (currently, and hopefully continuing) successful pregnancy of our own going on. But for most of the reasons we initially started down this path, I know it makes sense to continue: 1) get a first take-home baby (ok, it's looking more and more likely that we may accomplish this without my sister, but that wasn't the case in January or even April when we decided to start/continue on this path), 2) have a shot at a 2nd child (this is still highly unlikely with my own eggs since if I have this first baby, I'll be closing in on 42 by the time my body is ready to have a 2nd), 3) my sister is turning 37 this July so we don't have time to wait and see if we need her eggs a year or so from now, 4) given all this and the likelihood that we'll need donor eggs (if not now for #1, almost definitely for #2) this will give us a chance of using genetically-related eggs.

Ok, I know I've gone over and over this in previous postings, but I guess I just need to keep convincing myself that it's worth putting my sister through this. I know she's completely on board with it, but I really don't think she knows yet what it will really be like taking 4-6 injections everyday. Of course, maybe the emotional toll will be somewhat less for her because, despite the hormones, it won't be like she's desperately trying to get pregnant herself (which was always the state I was in) and she knows we're only asking her to do this once (where, at least until our last declared cycle, I never knew when it was going to end.)

I'm am exceedingly grateful that my sister is still willing to do this and also so grateful that her biopsy results were negative.

Otherwise, continuing to wade through the completely overwhelming task of registering for baby stuff. Trying to figure out how the heck to order the Dutailier glider I want with the finish and fabric I want. (I get a little obsessed with the details sometimes.....)

Random updates, cont'd

Oh boy. I'm turning into one of "those" bloggers - totally random, inconsistent posts that don't have any real through thread (although, honestly, I don't run into too many bloggers like that). I'd like to think that this is because of the 'busy-ness' of being pregnant. But really? Not all that busy. At least, with being pregnant. Or at least it feels that way now. I am under the gun a bit to get a proper registry done since invitations have now gone out for the first (of 3, sigh) showers which will take place on July 9.

But, I was busy being on vacation and having a birthday last week! More on that:

> Yep, I turned 41 last week (and Mr.Right turned 42 the day before me - we have back-to-back birthdays). So, I'll be 41 and 3+ months old when babygirl arrives (hopefully). Old, old, old. Of course, I don't feel 41. I feel somewhere around, oh, maybe, 35 or so. Weird. Would I want to be 35 again? No way! No Mr.Right at age 35. (There was a Mr. Rebound who broke my heart that year though). Anyhow, more importantly, birthday dinner was at a wonderful Italian place in Boston's North End. And I had saved up all my alcohol chits for a couple of weeks so I could have a glass of Prosecco!

> Long(ish), rambling, driving vacation last week. Started off at Mr.Right's 20th college Reunion the weekend of Memorial Day and then drove northwards for 3 days at a gorgeous inn on Cape Cod. The weather was absolutely perfect! Took the ferry out to Nantucket one day (had never been there before). From there, we hit a few historical sites (Plimoth Plantation; John Adams houses) south of Boston and shot on through to New Hampshire to spend one night in the town where Mr.Right went to boarding school. I had never been there and he had such fun showing me around his dorm and the classrooms and everything (it was the last day of classes). Then back to Boston for 4 nights' stay catching up with friends for dinner Friday night; dinner Saturday night; breakfast on Sunday and dinner on Sunday night! Phew!! A lot of catching up (mostly with Mr.Right's university and boarding school friends, but also one of my high school friends). And in the midst of that my birthday dinner as noted above. Lots of historical site-seeing. We're all boned up on our Revolutionary War history (oh yeah, and btw, Sarah Palin, Paul Revere road to Lexington after crossing the Charles River into Charlestown and getting a horse there -- he didn't ride around Boston ringing bells and warning the British. I don't care how you try to spin it....sigh.)

On the pregnancy front:

We had both another cervix/growth ultrasound today at the hospital's antenatal center and a regular monthly appointment with my OB's office. Cervix is as perfect as perfect gets (4.3 cm). Babygirl is measuring right on target - head a little large (yikes!). But she wasn't very cooperative this time in getting her picture taken. She was head down and turned toward the back and so no really good pictures of her were forthcoming. Fundal height measured 25 weeks at the OB's office. I'm up 11.5 pounds total and had gained 3 pounds since the last OB visit so they're predicting a 25-30 pound weight gain total (personally, I'm trying to stay on the 25 pound trend line if I can).

On a semi-related infertility front:

My sister went in for her breast biospy this morning. Remember her? We were all set to do donor eggs with my sister when I turned up pregnant (the old fashioned way). We were on a path to continuing on with retrieving eggs out of one cycle with my sister when she turned up with a calcification (hopefully, that's all it is) in one breast. Keeping all fingers crossed that there is no sign of any malignancy (she should hopefully have the pathology report back by next week some time). She still wants to do a cycle and so we're currently planning for July - if all is negative next week. I haven't heard from her this afternoon but I'm hoping everything went ok.

I went last night and stayed at their house so I could watch my younger nephew this morning while my BIL took my sister to the surgery this morning. My nephew had hand, foot and mouth virus this past weekend and they weren't sure if he'd be feeling well enough (mostly just sores in his mouth/throat at this point) to go to daycare this morning so I offered to go and stay with him at home. He seemed very lively, though, and we played all morning until I had to leave for my appointments this afternoon (and my BIL was able to come home while my sister was in surgery to get him and then go back and pick her up.)

If all looks ok, we'll schedule a consult with Dr.Dry and get underway with a cycle for her. It seems a little weird to be doing this with our baby seemingly, finger-crossing-ly, healthy at 24w3d but we know lightening doesn't strike the same place twice and there more than likely won't be a 'miracle' second baby with my eggs so we're taking my sister up on her continued generosity.

Anyhow, I hope to get back to more consistent reading, comment and posting now that I'm home for a while. Hope you are all well!

Random Updates

I've been terrible at posting lately. I'm feeling a mixture of "nothing going on here to post about" and "I'm done with that infertility thing, right?" But, of course, I've so enjoyed posts from those of you who kept going through your pregnancies. And my little ego is saying to me, "maybe they want to know what's up with you too!"

Anyhow, a few random things from me at 22 weeks, 1 day:

> This was from a few weeks back at my 20 week ultrasound. Right at the end, they turned the 3d on and, of course, babygirl had her hands in front of her face. It looks like she's hiding :-)



> Yay for secondhand stores! I hit the jackpot today in maternity clothes. A local consignment store had a small stash of maternity clothes, but magically everything I need right now: a second pair of shorts (broke down and bought a nice pair at the Gap maternity store last week), a pair of jeans, a pair of navy blue khakis and a swimsuit. My sister gave me two garbage bags full of maternity clothes she still had (and had been given) the other week and I've managed to fit into a few things (my sister is probably 4 sizes smaller than me, but some of the stuff she had been given was big on her) including a nice pair of gap khakis and a bunch of t-shirts and tops. I had told myself I could get away with just buying some shorts and summer dresses, but we're headed to New England next week and I think I'll be needed some long trousers still.

> Lavender it is. Going to register for lavender-themed crib skirt, crib sheet, curtains, etc. at Pottery Barn I decided. The "taupe" color I was going for on the walls of the nursery came out pretty light, but that's probably a good thing. I still think it will look nice with the lavender accents.



> First registry (well, besides the online Pottery Barn registry I've created) done! Drove to my MIL's house last Thursday to register at a baby boutique in her city. The shower being held there (1st of 3 it appears) will be all her friends - the Country Club set :-) It was a really cute store and actually had quite a few things (I thought it might just be clothing). I didn't ask the price of anything and just let the salesperson walk me through the store and suggest things I might want to put on registry. I did register for a few things I knew I wanted: an Ergo baby carrier, a diaper bag (super cute....god only knows how expensive), a super cute playmat, a Moby wrap and some clothes and toys just to give an idea of what I like. Next up: Babies 'R Us or Buy Buy Baby....haven't quite decided yet. Need to get registered before the first shower (July 9), second shower (July 23 in my hometown and mostly my aunts and cousins' wives, etc.) and third shower (August 27 in my area which will be mostly my friends from here). Crazy. But, it will be nice to enjoy and share this pregnancy with all of these people.

> Name: well, we're making progress. I have a name in mind and had told Mr.Right this a while ago He wanted to do the "list" thing. My "list" is a list of one. I finally just told him the name I was thinking of and he's considering it. I like some of the names on his list. I only vetoed one. Not quite sure where we go from here. If he decides against my name I'll be willing to pick one of the ones on his list, but mine's a family name (my maternal Grandmother's) and I really want it. Ok, there, I've said it. I really want it. I'm trying not to get myself into a situation where I'll be really disappointed if he doesn't agree. This is all about compromise, right? Oh well, we still have 18 weeks left :-)

Vacation decision

Thanks to everyone who weighed in on the big vacation decision! Despite advice seeming to trend to not going, we decided to pull the trigger last night and book the place. As recommended by several of you, I did ask the doc I saw for my OB appointment yesterday afternoon (how convenient). She thought we'd be ok, of course, caveat something coming up like high blood pressure or something, before then. She thought the 5 hour car trip would be fine and that we'd naturally be wanting to stop anyhow (It's Mr.Right who is the absolutely nazi about making me get out every 2 hours and walk around. He's worried about a DVT. I figure I'll be wanting to pee that often anyhow.) It turns out the particular doc we saw yesterday did her residency in Norfolk (we're headed to the Outer Banks) so, completely unprompted, she gave me the name of the head of the MFM department there who was her mentor and several other docs in the department as well as the names of docs in a practice in Chesapeake where she worked for 2 years. She thought we'd be very well taken care of if something happened while we are there.

We thought about it a little more again last night. We are pushing into the 3rd week in August because of the possibility of the stim/retrieval part of a donor cycle with my sister falling on the last week in July/first week in August (according to our current best guess and assuming she gets an 'all clear' from the biospy in early June). We were originally thinking the first week in August (which would have been 32 weeks for me), but wanted to give ourselves the best chance of avoiding my sister's cycle and having our vacation cancelled because of that. (I know, you're saying, but why do *you*, HopeB, have to be there? I promised my sister I'd be there to stay overnight if needed at her house every day during stims to help with my nephews/help her with injections. And, since we're hoping to freeze embryos, Mr.Right has to be there on retrieval day. And, I want to get my sister to/from retrieval so her husband doesn't have to take a day off work if it falls during the week.)

And, of course, if things go kerflooey with my pregnancy they could very well have gone kerflooey for the 1st week in August too. And we're prepared to eat the cost of the rental if they tell me ahead of time I can't go. I mean, what's $2,000? It's a complete and utter drop in the bucket compared to the multiple 10s of thousands of dollars we've spent on IUIs, IVFs, surgeries, etc. to get here.

As it is, I'm now having an incredibly boring pregnancy. And, without sticking my head in the sand, I've just got to start accepting that my body is (at least currently) pretty adept at handling this. Besides having old, most genetically abnormal eggs and ovaries that decided to do exactly the opposite of whatever the fertility drugs I was taking asked them to do, I've been super healthy (despite being overweight for most of my 20s and half of my 30s) for all of my life. And despite feeling tired, I'm still getting out for 3 miles a day (ok, sometimes just walking). This pregnancy has been marked by absolutely no sickness, great blood pressure and I'm measuring right on track (19" fundal height yesterday which is exactly right for 19 weeks and we'll see for sure on Monday at the anatomy scan). Of course, there are hurdles yet to jump. I know that.

And all of your comments - especially those who have lived through the 35th week! - are great because I feel like I'll be going into this prepared and with eyes wide open. I told Mr.Right last night, if I end up lounging on the couch in the air-conditioned condo most of the vacation, I'll at least have an ocean view and he and the dog can go on adventures. It will just be the 3 of us. No pressure to do anything with relatives or friends. No need to go out to eat (we'll have a kitchen). No need to do anything but waddle out the front door of the condo down to the beach in the mornings and the evenings.

We actually have another driving vacation scheduled for Memorial Day weekend and the following week. We're going to Mr.Right's 20th college reunion and then onwards to New England where we'll have 3 days on Cape Cod at a super cute inn near the beach. We'll spend one day touring another alma mater of Mr.Right's and then spend 4 nights in Boston where we'll be doing the historical sites and seeing a bunch of friends (in several groupings since they're from different parts of our lives) for brunches, dinners, etc. Oh, and we'll celebrate Mr.Right's 42nd birthday and my 41st birthday along the way! So, even if our Outer Banks beach vacation bites the dust because of something pregnancy-related, we will at least have had some vacation in early June - which may even include a little beach time.

All in all, I'm really starting to look forward to this summer! Despite the probability of being hugely pregnant in the hottest time of the year, I think it will be great!

Off to write the check and send it off for the first part of our rental payment........

Thanks again for all the great comments and advice!! What a great resource this community is.

Vacation at 34 weeks?

A quick question for those of you who have some experience in this, are we crazy for booking a beach vacation in August when I'll be 34 weeks? (i.e. in my 35th week)

I realize I'll be hot and huge, but the condo has AC and there's a pool and, of course, the ocean. It's about a 5 hour drive from our house.

And, we're prepared to just eat the cost if for some reason babygirl comes early. (We're getting travel insurance for the hurricane possibility but there are exclusions for pregnancy (except for a few 'complications of pregnancy' situations)).

All that having been said, are we crazy? Will I just be miserable? Of course, my thought is, would I rather be miserable sitting around my AC'd house without a pool and without the ocean or miserable sitting around the AC'd condo looking at the ocean and occasionally waddling down to the pool?

Oh, and we're very excited that we found a pet friendly place. A belated 1st birthday present for the pup! I'm sure she's going to *love* the beach.

(Oh, and don't think that it didn't go through my mind before, during and after writing this that I'm *actually* planning to still be pregnant at 34 weeks. Crazy.)

19weeks report

So, I finally took a belly pic. I do wish I would have done this many weeks ago to have something to compare to. But it just seemed like I'd be taking a picture of nothing! (of course, that being the point, sigh)

Anyhow, I guess I'm truly transitioning into the "pregnancy blog" category so just a bit of forewarning. (Although I expect to occasionally continue reporting on our sister donor egg endeavor (that is now postponed until probably at least July)).

So, my first ever-posted belly pic at exactly 19 weeks (yesterday, Sunday):




And, having cadged this from Hope at Leave it to the Beavers (who is currently at the hospital waiting to meet her baby girl!), my first attempt at the weekly pregnancy report:

How far along: I’m 19 weeks 1 day.

Baby’s Size: Well, depending on what newsletter/book I read, either the size of a small cantaloupe or of an heirloom tomato (I thought that was a funny one! Somebody writing those things visits farmer's markets apparently!)

Weight Gain/Loss: up 6.5 lbs. (Well, that's a little bit of fudging. I was, indeed, just 6.5 pounds lighter on the day(s) of conception, but subsequently lost 5 pounds (since I didn't know I was pregnant and was still training for a marathon, running 13 miles the day before took the HPT!) So, maybe that's really an 11.5 pounds gain, but I'm going to stick with 6.5 :-)

Maternity Clothes: Bella Band (only used with one pair of jeans right now), one long tank and cardigan I bought for work meetings the other week.

Symptoms: Ongoing stuffy/dried-out nose. I don't have allergies and it's not a cold and it's been going on for at least 2 months now so I do think it might be the mucus membrane issue supposedly brought on by pregnancy hormones.

Foods I’m Loving: Ummm....everything. Like usual :-) Seriously, I've not yet encountered a single aversion (and oh do I wish I would since it's increasingly hard to stop eating!)

Foods I’m Hating: Nothing, unfortunately.

Sleep: Super solid. I didn't even wake up last night to pee.

Gender: It’s a GIRL!!! (Which we've known since the CVS FISH test results at 12 weeks)

What I Miss: Long runs. Keeping it to 3 miles (and a verrrry slow 3 miles that is). Wine and occasionally a beer (although I'm not completely teetotal. I've allowed myself a celebratory champagne the other week when we had a good friend and her fiance for dinner and the occasional (like, every 2 weeks) sip of Mr.Right's wine.)

What I’m Looking Forward To: A more noticeable bump. I know, I know, I'm going to regret this in August when it's a bazillion degrees and I'm a whale, but I just kind of wish there were more there to convince me that I'm really pregnant. And, I'm looking forward to more definitive movement/kicks. I'm pretty consistently feeling the twinges, but they're still suspect.

Milestones: This coming Sunday will be the halfway mark! 20 weeks!

Emotions: Mostly even-keeled. I get a little cranky towards 8 p.m. when I start really, really wanting to be in bed. I know, crazy early.

Movement? Really?

I think I'm feeling babygirl move. It feels a little bit like muscle twitches (I hate those - I have a recurrent one in my right eyelid that acts up when I'm overtired). So I wasn't really sure. Of course, Mr.Right pointed out that those might not be *my* muscles twitching :-) I don't think it's gas bubbles. It's low down on my belly and, sort of, in front. Could it be? Or is it wishful thinking? I'm 18w3d and they say that you might start to feel some movement now, but maybe it's all in my head (planted there by the books).

Anyhow, in other news (since I've been a terrible blogger. I've been commenting, but not writing much.)

- my sister won't have her breast biopsy done until June 8. Apparently there's no urgency and the first the breast center could get her in was May 25 anyhow. Since her husband will be gone for work then, she's decided to wait til he's back in June. We've let our clinic know that we're pushing off her stim cycle until we get an 'all clear' on the biopsy (probably June 15). It's likely the stim cycle will be in July since my sister and family have some vacation planned in late June.

I had a little bit of a breakdown on Monday when she told me the news about the biopsy schedule. It just felt like yet another f'd up infertility mess. But then I had to stop and remind myself: I'm pregnant. And maybe even viably so. And it doesn't matter when we get these eggs from my sister because we hopefully won't be using them for a while. And, this is about my sister's health. That's our first priority. And even if it never works out to do a stim cycle/retrieval with my sister we've got other options (anonymous donor eggs) if we lose this baby or for a 2nd child. My sister continuing to want to donate for us is really a "bonus gift" and if it never happens, that's ok too.

- I need to take a belly picture. I still haven't because I'm still having a hard time thinking about the bit of belly down there being anything more than fat. But, it is kind of centered and almost a little pointy so I guess it doesn't quite have your usual rolls of belly fat kind of look. I can't *wait* until it really looks like I'm pregnant. Somehow, despite all the people who have been pregnant around me, I didn't really understand that you can make it to nearly halfway through the pregnancy and still not really *look* pregnant. Weird.

- Next babygirl sighting: Monday, May 9 for my 20 week ultrasound. I do have an OB appointment next Tuesday, but there will be no ultrasound there (although a doppler).

- I really want to start embracing this pregnancy. I think I'll steal one of those lists of weekly pregnancy updates to try to get myself a little bit more excited about all of this. I'm also trying to get excited about baby stuff. I'm trying to pick out a color scheme for the nursery since my Dad has just about fairly insisted on coming and helping me paint in May. I'm thinking taupe colored walls with lavender accents/crib bedding/curtains? I'm *so* trying to stay away from pink.

And here I'll stop and recognize that I can't really believe after all this time of TTC and our losses that I still can't quite get myself as excited about this pregnancy and buying baby stuff, etc. as I think I should be. Maybe that will come after the 20 week ultrasound? I don't know. On the other hand, we are now very much planning/scheduling around the assumption that this baby will come around the end of September. But there are still moments of real fear that it's all going to come crashing down - even though we've gotten over so many hurdles at this point.

Ah well, I'm not going to "should" all over myself. Should I be feeling more excitement? Maybe, but I'm feeling what I'm feeling and that's the way it is. Maybe it will change tomorrow.

And because I just reread this post and just can't leave the end here on such a "blah" note: sunny and 70 degrees finally. Yay to the end of winter!!

Good news and bad news, all in the same day

I had my first ultrasound to check my cervix on Friday afternoon. All is well. My cervix is measuring a little over 4 cm and is tightly closed. Of course this was a transvaginal ultrasound and I guess, at this point, the uterus has moved up so much that it didn't show the baby. So, when the ultrasound tech finished, I said something like, "I guess we don't get to see the baby with this kind of scan, huh?" But the tech was so cute (with her Chinese accent) and said, "oh yes, we always check baby." And proceeded to do an abdominal scan. Yay! She was in breech position, sitting upright. She checked a few things, pointing out kidneys, stomach, etc. The cutest picture was one of the bottom of her foot - where you could clearly count all 5 toes! We came home with a picture of that and a profile pic.

As soon as I got home, however, my sister called. This is donor sister. And she told me that they had found a 'calcification' at her first mammogram and because she doesn't have enough breast tissue to do a needle biopsy, they're going to have to schedule an excision biopsy (surgery, basically) to get to it and diagnose it. Ugh. Her first concern, of course, was to tell me that this might delay her stimulation cycle. She is currently on b.c. pills and schedule for her 'Lupron evaluation' (even though she's not going to be taking Lupron) on May 2 with stims predicted to start May 4. But as of Friday afternoon her consultation appointment with the surgeon was scheduled Monday, April 25 and who knows when they'll get her in for the procedure.

Of course, of course, of course, I want all of this taken care of before we even think of proceeding with the stim cycle and egg retrieval. I even suggested to my sister that I'd call Dr.Dry and inform him and she could stop the bc pills right now. But she wants to keep on them. Just in case she can get this thing excised before May 4 and can keep on schedule.

Mr.Right and I talked about it Friday night on the drive back to his mother's (I had been with her all last week for her foot surgery last Tuesday morning and had driven home Friday morning for the ultrasound appointment and to drive back up to her house with him on Friday night.) He offered to call in some chits with surgeons he knows in his area and even a breast surgeon in the city with whom his sister worked and for whom the wife of a very good friend (from residency) works as a surgeon. We called my sister just to offer to see if Mr.Right could get her an earlier consultation and perhaps, therefore, an earlier date for the procedure. We didn't want to make her feel like we were doing this to pressure her and keep the stim cycle on schedule --- I really don't care about this at this point. But the other factor is that my BIL is actually supposed to leave that first week in May for a month. Every year he goes to Canada for the month of May to do surveying for wildlife. And I just can't imagine that they want him to be gone before she has the procedure/gets the path results. I would be a wreck if that were me.

I had a little cry as soon as we got in the car on Friday night on the way to my MIL's. I know this is probably nothing. My mom also had calcifications that they watched for years until they finally did (when she was 48) do a lumpectomy and then radiation. But there's some question now whether they would even do that now for the kind of intraductal 'tumor' that she had. This is why my sister and I both have started with annual mammograms before age 40 (I was 38, my sister is just going to turn 37 this July). I know it's going to be ok. I just don't want to see her having to go through all this stress.

Anyhow, in the meantime, I'm seemingly becoming a normal pregnant person. My first shower was even scheduled yesterday (for July 9). More on all of that later.