Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Ahhh.... Sweet vino

Yup, that is right. I have a large glass of red wine in my hand. On this brisk chilly winter day, nothing warms you up like a nice glass full of tannins. WHat?! You can't drink when you are pregnant. Exactly.
I had a blood test this morning, and my numbers dropped to 216, which is a lot in just a couple days. This is good, it means the pregnancy hormones should leave my body quickly. We will get back on track after I have 2 negative pregnancy tests one week apart apiece, and a "natural" period. (Which I don't typically have so we will see how that plays out).
In the meantime, I can get serious about losing those 10 pounds I wanted to lose before I got pregnant. And I am due for another laser hair removal treatment, which also can't happen if I am knocked up. My list of things to do is quickly filling up before the next round. Nothing but time on my hands.
I am quite relieved that the situation is ending this way. I would much rather a miscarriage happen naturally, and organically than have to terminate another pregnancy with months of chemicals (I do enough of that trying to get pregnant). To me, this is the way to go. I will be all the wiser to more potential road blocks in the next round. I also think there was also another great lesson that may have finally sunk in (after years of receiving this lesson), and that is how to keep my mouth shut. I will let you all know in the future once I have had an ultrasound and have a solid confirmation that things look positive. I realize that until a baby is born, and healthy, there is no right time, or safe time to announce anything. But in the future, I may wait until at least 8 weeks to say anything. It won't be anything personal. I just get tired of repeating myself.
So there you go. I gotta run, my glass is empty! :)

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

More baby blues

Sorry, this is a long one. Bear with me.
So I might as well just say it. I am pregnant. And like the times before, there always seems to be some sort of complication that makes this difficult. When we started this round, it seemed so smooth. I was only going to have to take 1 day off because all of the appointments fell on days I already had off. I didn’t have to ingest many medications, and we had frozen embryos just waiting for us. I started on the pill, and 3 weeks later, stopped. My period didn’t start, and my transfer date almost had to be re-scheduled. But after blood work and an ultrasound, all indicated that I had not ovulated (which was the main concern) so they decided to go ahead.
The day off of my transfer was pretty low key. Jon took me out to breakfast, and I laid down like I was supposed to. Then goes the waiting game.
My first blood test was the day before Thanksgiving. The test came back positive, but the hormone levels that they count in the blood stream were really, really, low (a count of 5 is positive, they like to see somewhere around 100. I was a 6). I had a major meltdown that night an negativity finally hit me. I finally began to wonder if this was ever going to happen. I was not looking forward to being social at Thanksgiving, and i wanted to stay in my black hole and feel bad for myself. I deserved it. Forty Eight hours later I had another test. While still low (11), the numbers had doubled, which is what they were looking for. I told myself not to get excited, wait until the ultrasound to make sure everything was ok. The following Saturday I had another blood test to check that my levels were rising. The nurse called that afternoon with the count - 629. I was officially preggos, and my ultrasound was scheduled for Tuesday. I got excited. This is where I may have gone wrong. I called to tell the family, and basically, felt it could be public knowledge. The question remained, “How many are in there?”
Monday afternoon, during my lunch break from jury duty, the doctor called to discuss the ultrasound that would have to be rescheduled because of my jury duty. But that wasn’t all she called about. She said the doctor was concerned with my jump in numbers and was afraid it could be another ectopic pregnancy. She wanted me to see the fetal radiologist in the morning instead of going in to see them. Crap. Not again. What are the chances? It isn’t so much losing a pregnancy, it is the threat of 3 more months of chemo that freaks me out.
I made the call to Jon, and could hear the disappointment in his voice. We talked a little, I kept my cool. No need to completely freak out yet. And then I called my mom, and was hysterical. Then I had to tell the judge, on record, in front of both councils what was happening and let them know that I may not be there tomorrow. Crying, like an idiot. The judge told me to come sit in the witness chair, there were Kleenex there. Weird perspective.
Anyway, all I could think of was how to patent some sort of super glue for the uterus. I dashed off after court to a holiday party for the Knitting Guild and was trying to enjoy myself (under normal circumstances, I would say it was quite the shin dig, but you can understand that in my distracted state, I will probably not look back fondly). I ran to the bathroom to discover that I was lightly bleeding. I grabbed my stuff in a frantic flurry and rushed out the door before the party was over. Damn.
Restless sleep ensued with dreams of miscarriage. My cat slept beside me all night, aware of some sort of distress. He has been stuck to me like glue since the embryo transfer. I should clue in more to his intuition.
The fetal radiologist was a cool experience last time, regardless of the outcome. Jon drove separately so that if nothing was wrong, I could jet off downtown to court. It wasn’t nearly as neat this time. Gray blobs with no conclusive information. Basically, she said that it was too early to see anything and that there were no signs of an ectopic gestational sac, but she couldn’t find one in the uterus either, so we would have to wait. They suggested that we get another blood test to see if my numbers were still rising, and if so then to come back in a week when they could see more. If the numbers are dropping, then I am miscarrying.
Tomorrow morning I will go in for a blood test and should have results tomorrow afternoon. I will re-post tomorrow when I find out more. This is the easiest way to let everyone know what is going on.