#ivfround1

[0nein8]

And so it begins...

CD #1 was on Friday, 04/10. Birth control was called in for me to start on CD #3 for 10 days. Today I received the tentative IVF calendar. 📅

More meds will be shipped on Wednesday... I know it’s here but it still feels far from Egg 🥚 Retrieval. Also confused about getting another period after 10 days of birth control. Is it a real period? Is it to keep the follicles I have from this cycle? 🤔

[makingbabyglowworm]

6 March 2016

Stims day 5 ✔️💉 Got a bit ahead of myself yesterday and titled my last post day 5 (which has now been fixed). Maybe it was a combination of wishful thinking and being half asleep, but today is definitely day 5!

We cracked open a new vial of Puregon today. Each vial has enough units for 4 days. I’ve been given enough for 12 days worth of stims so fingers crossed I don’t need to go and collect some more later on.

Today’s Injection site was back below the belly button and I did notice that area is probably the more painful of all the options to inject so will be trying a new plan of attack to go on the outer areas of my tummy.

Last night I felt pretty good and it made me a bit worried. I was concerned the meds weren’t working anymore, but maybe my body is getting used to them? Fingers crossed they do still work. I’d hate to find out I had ovulated before egg collection and the meds were all wasted! I don’t go back in to the clinic for monitoring until Thursday which seems like a really long time to leave me injecting without checking my follies. Maybe I’m just being impatient!

Time to be real here: anyone who thinks that IVF is the easy option is sorely mistaken. It’s not just the money, or the meds, or the needles, or the time you invest. It’s the psychological impact. Daily I find myself flipping between being positive and telling myself it will work, to trying to keep realistic that my chances are only slightly more than a natural conception. I desperately want this to work, but I have to keep my hopes in check with the fact that there is a 60% chance it won’t. Add to that the self guilt and worry of administering meds wrong and looking for even the slightest side effects to make sure the meds are working and it’s no wonder it can be so taxing on a person's relationships during the cycle.

[makingbabyglowworm]

5 March 2016

Stims day 4 ✔️💉 Getting up early on a Saturday to start my day with body shots is not nearly as awesome as it sounds. Think about it: I do a body shot before I do anything else. Ha.

We went back to the diagonal right of my belly button today (as below it is still bruised) and it was easy! Shame we can’t just inject in that general vicinity all the time. We were told by the nurse to mix up the injection sites so I don’t end up with a mega bruise.

Playing the long game here, but hopefully at my scan next Saturday the clinic will tell me to use the trigger shot to “release the eggs”. It’s kind of like “releasing the hounds” but on a microscopic level. After that the shots for IVF round 1 are alllllll done. Then it’s just putting progesterone gel up my hooha on the daily and that’s way better. I hope. 🙂

I’m starting to feel a little bloated, which I think at this stage is only noticeable by me. I can feel my ovaries pinching and I’ll be really interested to see what kind of great work they have been doing in there. I feel like a roosting hen 🐔 or maybe I’m just ovary-acting. (See what I did there?! Everybody loves some infertility humour).

[makingbabyglowworm]

2 March 2016

Stims day 1 ✔️ This is hubs doing the “stab & run” manoeuvre - where he gives me my shot and then leaves for work. 😂 You can see the look of sheer enjoyment in his face.

The shot was actually fine! I hardly felt the needle go in, then there was a bit of pressure when injecting the hormone and it was all done in seconds. The injection site is a bit achey right now but that is nothing!

Can’t wait for the next 8+ days of injections. Said no one ever.

[makingbabyglowworm]

I told my boss

26 February 2016

I grew some balls and finally told my boss about hubs and I undergoing IVF treatment over the next month or so.

I was absolutely terrified. I was shaking, my voice was unsteady and I’m pretty sure I looked as scared as I sounded… But she was great about it and was really excited for us (hubs works at the same place) which was so nice compared to the way it played out in my head!

I said that no one really knew and it was important for it to stay private, which she said she completely understood and she thanked me for trusting her to share such a personal thing. I told her that I wanted to be open and honest with her so that if I was out of sorts or a bit vague or needed time off she would know what was going on.

She’s ok with me needing to have some time off for procedures etc and I said I was pretty sure I could have blood tests and scans around work with the clinic opening at 7:30.

It’s such a relief that my boss knows now. I was dreading telling her and as usual, I built up all this stress in my head about having to tell her. It never ends up being as bad as the 59 different scenarios I think up.

Thank goodness.

Still doesn’t mean I’m telling my family yet though.

[makingbabyglowworm]

19 February 2016

Goodbye my lover. Goodbye my friend… This is my last glass of wine for what I hope is a very long time. It’s a bitter sweet moment for me because it has been there for me through good and bad times. I’ll be steering clear of alcohol for *at least* all of IVF round one.