Egg Retrevial today!

Today was my egg retreival for IVF #2 it went very smooth and I have almost no pain afterwards. I came home and slept for several hours and feel pretty good right now (about 6 hours post retreival) they got 10 eggs, 9 of which were mature. It's a good number, our doctor was expecting 13- but obviously 3 follicles did not contain an egg. We are still waiting to see if that final egg was mature or not- so we may have 10 out of 10. I am happy with 9 mature eggs though- hopefully they will be better quality then last time. I am counting the hours down to our first fert report to hear how things look this time. We had a horrible fertilization rate last time so I will be interested to hear this time. I pray things are different. This IVF has gone so fast, I feel like I have not had any time to think about it, which I think is a good thing, I almost feel numb, like I am just going through the motions. Maybe that's my way of dealing with things so I don't get hurt anymore.

Tonight I start my PIO shots- I am scared- that needle is so big!!!

Our new doctor!

Well after our failed first IVF, I decided that I was going to go see another doctor at another fertility clinic here in Las Vegas. After meeting with Dr. Fisch at SHER Institute I convinced John to switch doctors. As much as I love our old doctor, I just feel that we need a change. I felt like out IVF was rushed and I was put on to much of a common protocol and there was not enough thought that went into our cycle.

I think its human nature when something goes wrong to change something. After talking to the new doctor- he ordered some tests that I have never had. He also feels that I had a egg quality issue- so he is going to work to improve the quality of my eggs this go around. He is very confident that I can get pregnant with my own eggs, which is a relief to me, my biggest fear is donor eggs, just because its so freaking expensive. He said that my protocol with my old doctor was not all that bad, but there would be things that he would change. That made me happy, because my old doctor was not going to to change my stim protocol at all.

While I was talking to the doctor I was going through my last IVF cycle, and I really started to get mad, there was a lot that was done that I feel our old doctor dropped the ball. Our new doctor didn't understand why she didn't let our embryos grow out to day 5, just to see what would happen. He felt transferring all 6 was irresponsible, and I have to agree. I would not have been upset if we did not make it to transfer- I feel we would have had more info on the embryos if we had let them grow another two days, especially because they looked so bad on day 3.
He also feels that John should have been called in to do another semen sample when his sperm was dying. I also felt like why did they leave the sperm so long- if it was dying after an hour- why was it left for an hour?!

So we are cycling again! SCARY!! Not until the end of July- I am currently back on birth control pills- and I will start stims after the 4th of July. I have my appt with the IVF coordinator tomorrow- so hopefully I will get my protocol- I am interested to see what he changes with my protocol.
To read more about our new doctor visit www.haveababy.com.

Well IVF #1 offically failed!

As I type those words I still cannot beleive it, I never thought it would turn out like this. Granted, there were other things that were found out during our IVF cycle that we never would have known without doing IVF, so in that way I am grateful.
Today was one of the worst days of my life, I made arragements to work only a half day- thank god I did that- I could not have stayed at work with the way I was feeling today. I felt like someone ripped my heart out and stomped on it. I do not wish these feelings or this infertility journey on anyone.

Poor John, he is taking this so hard- I at least had a clue that things were not going to work out- I know what good embryos look like and what creates a baby and I knew on transfer day that our embryos were not looking good. Part of me feels like my babies died- I had 6 of our embryos in me and none of them made it, that makes me sad.

On a positive note I was able to speak with my doctor today and she said my eggs looked perfect so we will keep the protocol the same for our next cycle, which will be towards the end of July- I will start birth control pills arouund the 4th of July. We will be using half donor sperm and half of John's sperm this time, due to the severity of our sperm issues. I know this is tough for John, but he will always be the daddy, no matter where the sperm comes from. We are creating our baby together. My doctor said she really thinks this will be out ticket to parenthood- great eggs, and great sperm (we will be using a donor who has proven pregnancies).

I had the opportunity to start another IVF cycle right away, but I think for our sanity we need a break, I need to accept this and move on with things. My heart is really broken right now- yes it will heal, but I really think that my heart will ever be the same. Infertility is something that stays with you forever, even once you have kids.

This Sperm Will Self Destruct In One Hour

Well, we've taking the next big step and pulled out the big guns and have done our first IVF. After years of being unable to conceive naturally and a few IUI's with no results, our first IVF may have finally revealed our problem.

Sperm normally can live up to a week once implanted into the female. Giving it ample time to find where it needs to go. Mine on the other hand only has about an hour. Of course when trying naturally there was no way of knowing this and since the IUI's injected the little guys fairly quickly we had no idea they were dying. This is why nothing has been working. They never have a chance.

My sperm always seemed perfectly normal. Once the initial analysis was over there was no further checking for any other problems and this was never caught until now.

This has been very disheartening as we thought this was going to be the fix all. To be so excited thinking this was the one to feeling doubt just sucks. We did implant 6 eggs. One at least looked pretty good and one is all it takes. See Shannon's post for more of what happened.

For those of you who follow us please pray for us. I feel just horrible that we may not be parents once again. I know Shannon will be devastated. I can't bare to see her disappointed again.

I don't understand why this has happened to the people who are known as "the couple who have everything". This may be the one thing we can't have. We are loving, have a nice home, are able to support ourselves and a child or children, and we would love our child as much as we love each other. I have heard the theory that we pick our parents, but does no one want to pick us? I don't know why that would be.

There are so many people who obviously don't want children. They have abortions, chloroform their kids and leave in car trunks for dead, smother them and bury them in the park, try to sell them on Craigslist, and through them in trash cans. Why do they get to conceive and we do not?

I have to think God wants us to tell our story and help others. But right now I feel we need the help. God please Bring Us A Baby.

Well maybe the 300th post will be lucky!

Today marks my 300th post- I cannot believe it- I have actually written that much about this journey that is my life. Well lets recap that last 2 days. Yesterday I called my IVF nurse because I was feeling really horrible and thought that I have having symptoms of OHSS (ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome) which is where your follicles fill up with fluid. It can be very serious if left untreated. My nurse said to rest, and drink lots of fluids and come in on Sunday to see the doctor.

So I went the my RE's office this morning, thinking that I am there to see her regarding my possible OHSS- so John stayed at home. I was feeling much better this morning so I figured everything would be fine. My RE comes out into the waiting room and tells me that my transfer is today and she will talk to me in a minute, but that I should call John and Dr. Roth (my acupuncturist) and to prepare for the transfer.

I call John and tell him to get his butt down to the doctors office, then I call Dr. Roth, who bless her heart drops everything and rushes down to the office to see me.
I then burst into tears, because I know nothing at this point, but I can deduce that the embryos are not doing well, otherwise they would push for a 5 day transfer, not a 3 day transfer. I am pretty much hysterical by the time the embryologist comes to talk to me.

She tells me that due to the issue with the sperm the embryos are not growing properly and we are going to transfer all 6- one was a decent looking 6 cell embryo ( they should be 8 cells by day 3, but it had not been exactly 3 days yet- so that one could still catch up) and then the other 5 were not looking good. My RE suggested that if this doesn't work we should look into donor sperm because there is obviously more of an issue with the sperm then we thought.

I am in shock right now, I never thought in a million years that this would happen. My eggs looked perfect, all 14 were mature- so we don't think its an egg issue.
So pretty much at this time we need a miracle- I know that lots of perfect cycles don't end in pregnancy and lots of bad cycles end in pregnancy-but still.

It's in Gods hands now- please God bring us a miracle!

I am on bed rest for 3 days- and already going crazy! How am I going to make it 2 more days!

Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick to have twins!

So this was the news headline on People.com tonight and I have to admit I am super exicted for them. I absolutely LOVE Sarah Jessica Parker- partly because I am a huge Sex and the City fan, but becasue they seem like they are such real people and real parents. I also love that they came out and admitted that they are using a surrogate.

My personal favorite was the comments that people were making on people.com, stuff like "why don't they just adopt" or "why did she use a surrogate?" "is she too vain to get pregnant?" And my personal favorite, "I hope its their egg and sperm, otherwise it's not fair to the kid".
I seriously wanted to kill those people. First off, freaking be happy for them, they admitted that they have had trouble concieving since the birth of thier son, James Wilkie 6 years ago. Hello people she is 44 and he 47- getting pregnant at 44 is not an easy task! It has nothing to do with being too vain to carry her own child. GET REAL!!
I would be interested to know if they were SJP's eggs, just the fact that she is 44 her eggs cannot be in the best shape, if they are donor eggs, good for them, and if they are not good for them as well.

People have no idea what it takes to form a family, and they need to learn to keep their comments to themselves. These twin girls were concieved out of love, and lots of blood, sweat, and tears. Good for them! I just hope they use this as an opportunity to tell their story and encourage and inspire others!

I would be interested to know

Trying to keep it all together!

Well, we are in the home stretch, in about a week and a half we will have our insurnace, which means that we can start our IVF cycle. I will start birth control pills when I start my period the first week of April, so its BCP's for about 3 weeks, about mid way through April I will start Lupron, to surpress my ovaries. Then after I am fully suppressed (checked almost daily with bloodwork) then I can start stims (which in my case is Follistim) daily injections to stimulate my ovaries to produce lots of eggs.
Then after about 12-14 days of Follistim and lots of ultrasounds to check follicle growth they will schedule me for the egg retreival. That is when they stick a big ass needle through my uterine wall and they asperiate each individual follicle to get the egg out. Then the eggs will be fertilitzed with John's sperm and will be put in the incubator to grown. In then in either 3 or 5 days they best embroyos will be put back into my uterus and will hopefully implant and I will finally be pregnant.
So I am going nuts waiting to get going! I feel like this entire process is waiting waiting and more waiting.

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