Tag Archives: IVF

Yzma! Put your hands in the air!

Pregnancy or Lack Thereof, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Well, I can cross “be an injectable drug user” off my list of things  I’d maybe like to try someday. I’ll stick with pills it it ever comes to that, thank you very much. It might be a bit more expensive that way, but certainly more sanitary and most definitely worth it to avoid becoming the bruised up pin cushion I’ve become. And without the stellar psychotropic effects, even. All the lows, lots of the crazy, none of the highs. This is bull.

to try

But it’s for a maybe baby, I tell myself. And right. That’ssssss good. The thing I’m hoping for. So.

Moving right along. Just keep swimming. Keep on keepin’ on.

The Muppets. Dori. Joe Dirt. The movies are full of such wise people, no?

 

The mood swings really are bizarre. Mostly I’m tired and bloated and blah. Although on Tuesday, after my mom showed up, I was positively buoyant. That’s when we talked about being fat and how it was cool. Except that two days later, on Thursday morning, I put on a dress to wear to work and just about lost it about the way my big-fat-stupid-ugly tummy looked in it. Took it off. (Hypocrite.) Put on some pants instead and went off to work.

Also a shirt. I wore a shirt to work too.

On Wednesday, I got up at 4:00 am and headed to Madison for an ultrasound and blood work. I had 4 large-ish follicles and 3 more on their way — that’s 7 eggs so far, woot woot! When the results of the blood work came back later in the afternoon, Generations called to tell me that my hormones were right on the money and so I was granted not just a two day reprieve (which is really the best you can hope for) but THREE. Three days until I have to return to Madison on Saturday. Oh sweet mother of all that is good. I cannot tell you what a relief that was. So to Madison and back before 10 am on Wednesday and then I headed to work. Where I struggled mightily to keep my eyes open for about 6 hours before I headed home and basically passed out on the bed for another two. Thankfully (also not), my mom woke me up at 7:00 pm to make sure I didn’t miss my evening injections and I grudgingly poked myself three more times before getting back on the up-and-down rollercoaster of emotion that is my mind.

My mom and I went to dinner (yay!) but I was disappointed by what I ordered (boo!) so we went and got ice cream (yessssss!) but the a-holes didn’t have any of the chocolate lactose-free ice cream (rage!) but I did find some chocolate-flavored coconut ice cream (ok…) and a gluten free baking mag that looked kind of awesome (alright, alright…) and we made it home without a meltdown where I had to work some more (ugh ugh ugh) but I did it while watching Frozen and my mom tolerated me singing along the whole time (let it goooooo!) and then back to bed before another day, another round of injections, and another 24 hours of Cray Cray McBray Bray.

Surprise! My belly button is pierced :)
Surprise! My belly button is pierced 🙂

With the exception of Cedar Point’s Iron Dragon, I’ve really never liked roller coasters.

Granted, most roller coasters don’t give every third rider a baby at the end, so…

 

This one might, so as Kronk would say:

Yzma! Put your hands in the air!!

{Source -- and kind of an awesome article about what Disney villains can teach us!}
{Source — and kind of an awesome article about what Disney villains can teach us!}

 

So how’m I doing? Yzma’s face. Hanging on.

Yzma’s face exactly.

Thanks for being my Kronkers, y’all.

A note about the word fat.

Pregnancy or Lack Thereof, , , , , , , , , , ,

I called myself fat yesterday and lots of people were super concerned. Self-deprecating, yes, kind of… but let me assure you, Fat Girl Walking was merely a genius play on Dead Man Walking and, finally, at 31 years old, I’m done being upset about the word fat. Done-zo.

It’s true. I’m bigger than your average bear. Now.

I wasn’t always. In fact, when I look back on photos from when I first started thinking I was fat, I can only groan/shake my head/be pissed off at all those stupid wasted years of fat-shaming, fat concern, fat obsession when I was not, in fact, fat at all.

Except what if I had been? What about the times when I was? Because, let’s be honest, my weight has gone up and down and up and down a lot of times over the course of my life. And I think that’s normal, isn’t it. Puberty’s not exactly fun for anyone and most of us get at least a bit chubby for a minute there.

Even if I had been fat then, and even now that I am, my body is still kind of rocking it. I can run for-evs (like I said yesterday) and mow my lawn and vacuum my floors and cook and bake and dance and relax and blog and read and write and talk and and and… my body does all those things. It provides my soul with pretty cush digs, to be honest, and right now, especially, it deserves my dang RESPECT.

Because dang, it’s holding up. IVF meds are no joke. NO JOKE. And my body is going through some stuff, but remarkably, my body is handling it like a champ and despite a level of discomfort the likes of which I have never experienced, exactly, I’m doing ok.

Fat or not, I can appreciate that, the champ-i-ness of my bod. So I have to be ok with the word fat — I have to turn it into just another characteristic. I’m blonde-haired and green eyed. I have size 11 feet and curly hair. And I’m fat. It’s just another thing — a size XL, 14/16, bigger than your average bear. It’s not a bad word unless I let it be a bad word. I choose not to let it. (Anymore.)

 

So, pretty please, don’t worry about the word fat. Also, don’t worry about me because my mommy came to Wisconsin today and she’s taking real good care of me. We’re taking a road trip to Madison at 4 am tomorrow — eggs, eggs, baby!!

me and my mumsy

 

 

And PS: If I was worried about being fat, now would be extra, extra rough because ah dang… my abdomen is getting blooooooated. There’s not sucking this beast in. It is what it is and the only level of comfort comes from just letting it be. Oh ovaries, you better be growing me lots and lots of eggs.

Fat Girl Walking

Pregnancy or Lack Thereof, , , , , , ,

Walking is super great exercise. I know that, I’d tell you that, and I’d be the first in line to give kudos to anyone who walks regularly. It’s great!

But I’m not a walker. I’m a runner. Granted, I’m a big girl, a clydesdale, Athena, whatever the term du jour, so I’m not a particularly amazing runner. I’m never going to win a race. I’m just happy to finish. But I always take pride in the fact that no matter how slow I go, I can run and run and run forever. (Not actually forever, but for a long time. Slowly.)

True, once upon a time, I used running as a means to punish myself — I binged and then purged via exercise. I ran to be thin. And then, once I was thin, I ran to be thinner. But that’s not why I run now. Now, I run because I like the way it makes me feel. I like to pound the pavement, to hoof it up big hills and fly down the other side, to feel the sun on my face or the wind at my back, to get the miles under my feet. Yes, I’m fat and I’m slow, but I run. I think that’s kind of awesome and it makes me proud.

Turns out, however, that when you’re in the midst of hormone-induced insanity a la IVF, you cannot run. It can cause ovarian torsion, which in addition to sounding horrifying, actually is an emergent medical situation and basically the last thing you want when you’re trying to get your ovaries to cooperate lots-of-eggs-style.

Yoga can do the same thing. And kick boxing. And basically any other rapid movement type exercise. Or heavy lifting, bending, twisting, etc.

So walking is pretty much it. Which is great, like I said, except… I’m having a hard time with that. Being a fat girl walking.

It was tempting for me to keep run run running (slowly) and then to make the change only when I had to, but recognizing that throwing additional changes on top of the uncertainty of a new (and intense) hormonal milieu was probably a bad idea, I decided to get on top of it… to start walking. To be a walker.

On May 30th, I participated in the 14th Annual Marshfield Dairyfest Cheese Chase. I completed my 5 miles, totally rocked the dang thing (in my slow, but steady way) and called it good. Good until all the IVF mumbo jumbo is over and we either have a baby or we don’t.

cheese chase

And now is the time — baby or not time. As I mentioned. Still scary. Still sad. Waaaay harder than I thought it would be. But also easier.

Sort of like running. A lot like walking.

Either way, you put one foot in front of the other. Either way, you’re moving forward. It’s hard to run, physically, but it feels so good emotionally. It’s hard to walk, emotionally, but it’s pretty dang easy, physically.

IVF is hard both emotionally and physically.

I keep crying.

My face is breaking out. Like crazy, pizza face breaking out.

My tummy is so crazy tender.

File that under things you can't un-see. Sorry. I'm a pin cushion.
File that under things you can’t un-see. Sorry. I’m a pin cushion.

I’m bloated to the nth degree.

And it’s all only supposed to get worse. For a while.

 

Amongst it all, I’m a fat girl walking.

Fat Girl Walking
Fat Girl Walking

 

Hard as it all is (see above), there’s some things that make it ok too. Mostly it’s YOU guys. You’re freaking amazing. The support, the love, the encouragement and best wishes. Dang.

 

My mom’s coming tomorrow to hang with me as I drive to and from Madison over and over again until surgery.

 

Seth is sending me lots and lots of pics of my baby girl:

baby girl

 

And the Lemas got me everything I needed for a relaxing daily massage in the comfort of my own living room!

massage

Daily, in theory, except I worked up a little bruise on my right shoulder trying to get a knot out. He he. This thing is soooo nice.

 

But even better, was the note that came with it:

fat girl getting a massage

Fat Girl Walking.

 

With this much support… I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.

Moo: July is for IVF

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Remember the show Malcolm in the Middle? You know, before Brian Cranston was a psychotic meth head and back when he was just a suburban dad trying to make ends meet while honing his speed walking career…

{Source}
{Source}

Regardless of whether you remember it, there’s this excellent line that Reese, older of the middle two brothers, had in one episode that my friend and former roommate Steph and I (Steph-and-I… Steph-an-ie… Stephanie…) just adored that went a little something like this:

“My God. Women are the cows of people.”

As I chatted with my cousins-in-law this afternoon (because Seth’s cousin Meg says she and I are cousins-in-law, and Gary and Holly are Seth’s cousin and Seth’s cousin’s wife, respectively, so by extension, also cousins-in-law to me…), I realized how very true that is. Gary, the Gary of Gary’s Dairy in Halder, WI, was super inquisitive about my IVF drugs, you see… because it’s the same stuff he gives his ladies. And all of his ladies (with the exception of the lovely Holly and their crazy baby girl Ella) are cows.

My God. Women are the cows of people.

I mean, of course they are on account of bull : cow : : man : woman (thank the good lord I never have to take the SAT again), but the fact that me and the cows are kinda doing the same dang thing? Well. That was something.

Perhaps if I mosey my way into a stanchion, Gary can give me a hand with some of the injections…

 

So, yeah, all that to say… July has begun, and so has IVF. It’s been super stressful and emotional and crazy already. I won’t bore you with the details, which have been stressful and emotional and crazy really only to me (what do you mean you’re not shipping one of my drugs, pharmacy?! also… I got super defensive during a mandated appointment with a clinical psychologist and made Seth very uncomfortable), but no matter, it has started.

On Sunday, I took my last birth control pill. On Tuesday morning, I got up at 4:00 am and drove to Madison for my baseline ultrasound and blood work. Tomorrow morning, I start injecting myself with some stuff. And on Saturday evening, I add more stuff. Four injections a day plus lots and lots of ultrasounds until they tell me to use what I can only describe as “the big needle” to deliver a trigger shot (go eggs go!!) and then surgery. They say I can expect headaches first, then bloating, then hot flashes and tiredness and moodiness and breakouts (and probably freakouts) and so on until the week of the 19th when I have surgery to retrieve the eggs my body is supposed to be cooking up. Followed by fertilization, implantation, and the dreaded two-week-wait.

That stanchion, a nice pile of hay and oats right in my face, access to water ad libitum… it’s all looking pretty good right now. Better than living real life around all of the above, don’t you think? I wonder if Gary has some space… moo?

cow

But, I guess, in that respect at least, I’m not a cow. And I have a lot more control, a lot more space to emote, and significantly more complex responsibilities (p < 0.05).

Dang.

The craziest part of it all is the uncertainty. I don’t know how I’m going to feel or how I’m going to react and I’m not super great at dealing with uncertainty or with feelings. So. There’s that. Also, I tend to be very black and white with myself — I’m either doing awesome or suck, suck, suck at everything, which leaves very little room for grace.

So what to do about all of that? I don’t really know. I can’t run (original title of this post: Fat Girl Walking, but I’m gonna go ahead and save that for another day) or do yoga. I have been spending a lot of time eating lactose and being sorry for it later, but I suspect that’s also a bad plan and maybe even some sort of subconscious punishment for not doing as well as I want to be doing. But I am trying (trying) to do some productive and healthy things — I read Brene Brown, I subscribed to Headspace and practice mindfulness, I listen to Dean Koontz books while taking long long walks around town, I keep a gratitude journal, I read Shauna Niequist’s Savor over breakfast every morning, and perhaps most importantly, I sometimes find the strength to say these words:

I’m scared. I’m sad. This is hard.

And Tom replied, “here’s a picture of our niece’s disturbingly realistic horse:”

Tom's Text

And I smiled even though I was scared and sad and this is hard. Where “this” refers to IVF, not the horse’s genitalia. Obviously.

 

This afternoon, I had a meeting with a child and adolescent psychologist. It was a legit work meeting, not actually a therapy session (as I’m neither child nor adolescent), but the psychologist I was talking to went through IVF herself and knows about my deal so we spent the first couple minutes talking about that. Free therapy — woot woot! Seriously though, my favorite thing she always says is that despite all she went through (and it was a lot), if she could go back, she wouldn’t change a thing. Not a single thing. Not the procedures, the dollars, the injections, the travel, the stress… nothing. She says that every step was necessary for the next step and that she learned something every day and that it was all worth it.

Come to think of it, even though I don’t have what I so desperately want, the thing that’s supposed to make it all worth it, (yet), I already kind of agree. Every day I am better at handling the unexpected. At appreciating my strength. At giving myself grace, patience, respect. At giving my body grace, patience, respect. I appreciate better the complexity of fertility and family and adulthood. I am more empathetic and sympathetic. In spite of it all, I am growing and learning and playing the hand I have been dealt. July is for IVF. It’s a chapter, a lesson, a small piece of what will ultimately be my narrative. It’s a scary, sad, hard piece. It’s a piece a cow wouldn’t have to deal with. But I am only like a cow, not an actual cow.

Moo, anyway… and hand me that syringe, I’ve got some injections to do.

The Barren-ess

Pregnancy or Lack Thereof, Seriously, , , , ,

Well, well, well…

Did you know that this was a thing?!

National Infertility Awareness Week
National Infertility Awareness Week

I had no idea… and I am. So… awareness!

And one in EIGHT couples? Wowza. Friends, I hope that for many of you I’m swaying the odds in your favor. Goodness knows I know many more than 8 other couples though. Dang.

Recently, I passed what I’ve long considered “the point of no return” — I started taking birth control.

Seems counter-intuitive , doesn’t it? But apparently, birth control is a necessary step in the IVF process. No more wishing, hoping, praying, imagining that this month will be the month that a spontaneous pregnancy catches us by surprise. We’re committed. Past the point of no return, if you will, on the way to IVF.

Early, early last Monday morning we headed down to Madison for the uterine mapping process. I’ll spare you the details, but it was not exactly a fun time. One step closer. Now that I’m on the pill though, I’m happy to just check, check, check these things off my list and get to the real business at hand. Egg collection, fertilization, implantation, and then, God-willing, a legit pregnancy. Cross my fingers, hold my breath, say my prayers, beg all the powers that be…

Honestly though, stumbling across this infertility awareness business, recognizing that I’m just another 1 in 8, makes me feel a whole lot less bad for myself. It’s a lot easier to be over-dramatic and woe-is-me-ish when I’m preoccupied with the utter uniqueness of my situation, which is really not all that unique at all. Tough, yes, but not unique. Barren, but not a barren-ess… nor the barren-est.

Misery really does love company, I suppose. But misery loves joy too. And support and friendship and happy news. Misery can even not be so miserable all the time because the notion of whether or not I’m going to have a family this way or that one is really only one small part of the life that I am living… which also happens to include blogging and smiles and products for curly hair and a floppy-pawed pup and buzz-cutted man, etc, etc, etc (please don’t tell Grammarist i just listed et ceteras, it’s so super wrong). Yes, sometimes procedures and tests and waits, anxiety and pain and grief, but even lives not marked by infertility include all those very same things. I’m just one of the eight in which infertility happens to be a major source.

Ain’t no thing. Except sometimes when it’s a thing. And in this week, I guess we should maybe chat about that thing on account of it being a week dedicated to the awareness of infertility.

So: some people are infertile. Some people like me.

Some people also have cancer or webbed toes or choose to adopt despite not being infertile at all. You never know. Different strokes. I guess the best way to go about it all is to remember what my fortune cookie said that one time: Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting their battle too.

Fortune Cookie

Regardless of the appropriate etiquette and practiced responses we’re supposed to be referring to (those links are specific to infertility, of course, not webbed toes)– I think with a little kindness about it all, remembering that there is a battle going on, one we might know nothing about, we can’t really go wrong.

Even my own attitude seems to swing somewhat wildly… some days, like today, I feel relatively non-nonchalant, infertility is just another thing. Other days, infertility feels like The Only Thing. With respect to etiquette and responses and such, I certainly can’t expect you, my husband, my dog, my mom, or anybody else to try to gauge that. It’s simply not fair. I can hope for kindness, though, and so can you. And while you obviously don’t need one more thing to be aware of (infertility! autism! breast cancer! colony collapse, drought, pandas, and webbed toes! so many Things!) it can’t hurt to remember that the radar of others’ isn’t necessarily tuned to the same channel as our own and, as such, discrepancies regarding awareness do exist. Because our radar spheres have overlapped in this moment (and I know that all of these metaphors are super non-coherent, scientifically speaking, so yeah) here I am, bringing infertility onto your screen.

Blip! You’re welcome.

Not really though. More like I’m welcome. Because it’s my self-serving blog, not yours.

Wiiiiink.

Anyway, I’m really going to go write that book review of I, Lucifer now. I keep thinking about it, obviously my mind wants to talk talk talk about it. See you then!

I had a temper tantrum. More to come, I’m sure.

Lent Conversations, , , , , , , , , , ,

My poor husband. Truly. Sometimes I do not know how he even deals, but he always does and thank goodness for that.

This Sunday, like many other Sundays in the past (but not every Sunday, because I like to keep things spontaneous), I had a little “episode.” I can’t really put my finger on what it was that triggered it or why I got all ridiculous, but I did. I was basically, in a word, disgruntled. And I’m no fun to be around when I’m like that.

Even though most of our lives are spent doing the ordinary, the mundane, things that aren’t fun, exactly, but necessary to get to the fun bits, even though all of that is true, every once in a while, I freak out about all of that.

I throw a little temper tantrum.

I get mad about something completely stupid.

Yesterday, it was because I always having to choose what to make for dinner and then grocery shop for the ingredients and then make the dinner and then clean up from the dinner. (In reality, I do like to cook. Just not that I always have to cook.) And also laundry. And sweeping and mopping and vacuuming. And every other mundane thing I do on the regular makes it’s way onto the list and I get all snappy, “I’m fine. It’s fine. Whatever. [Silence]”

It’s so stupid really. And it’s cyclical, yet unpredictable. I do it all the time, freak out about the mundane. Get super grumpy about the must-dos and have-tos. I take it out on Seth (pretty much always because, where else, I guess? seriously love that man) and then I get over it and (thankfully, oh so very thankfully, so does he… I think) and we move on to another day.

This Sunday, as I said, was one of those days. Maybe it was just because it was Palm Sunday and the passion is so… dang… long… Who knows though. It happened, regardless of the cause. I was a brat. Seth was patient. Thank goodness for all of that.

By Sunday afternoon, I had planned out some meals for the week (really outdoing myself in the fruit-flavored water department for Seth’s sake– a meager apology, I admit) and by dinner time, I had white chicken chili simmering on the stove, bread baking in the bread machine, and a walnut pie (gluten free!) toasting up to perfection in the oven. My house smelled gooooood and I was basically over it. (Basically.)

So what did Joan have for me to reflect on on Monday?

“When the mundane things that occupy our time threaten to dull our view of the universe, it is time to slow down.” –Madeline McClenney-Sadler

Oh, for pete’s sake.

“The ‘mundane’ is certainly dull, I agree, and may even limit us — not only our perceptions but even the breadth of our questions. At the same time, there is something very freeing, very humanizing about the mundane. Doing dishes and buying vegetables get us back in touch with ourselves, give us time to smell the earth of our lives, give us time just to be. We will go on long after the big ideas fade and the profession ends. The question is, Will there be anything in me then? Will there be a me in me? It all depends on how I deal with the mundane.” –Joan Chittister

It’s true. By Sunday night, when I walked back in the house from taking my Curly girl outside for a stroll around the yard (potty break) and smelled the good smells and then ate the good food and finished chopping the veggies for what would become good food the rest of the week (and the fruit for what would become Seth’s fancy water) I did feel freed up, humanized. I don’t have to deal with any of those things the rest of the week, we’re crock pot or microwave ready. We’re eating healthfully and deliciously and as mundane as it is, that is so super worth it. Right?

Riiiiiiight?

Except maybe the problem is that lately, all of it, so much of every… single… day… is part of the mundane. And the mundane isn’t part of the life I imagined. So the banality of the day after day… what is there to revel in? Turns out, Joan had something to say about that too. Because I didn’t quite get this out on Monday and now it’s become a twosie.

“God makes me to lie down in green pastures and leads me beside still waters.” –Psalm 23:2

My green pastures, still waters? A family… it all sounds great, doesn’t it? The kind of stillness, a sense of the mundane, that one could really be satisfied with.

“I have to believe this scripture fiercely right now because life does not feel like ‘green pastures’ or ‘still water.’ It feels like a living death. Everyone around me is still producing, still building, still going on. But I am cut off at the root with nothing to show for it. I am empty, useless, doing nothing, going nowhere. The speeches and the books flash and fade and I am embarrassed by my existence. So where is God in all of this? What is life without life? I feel like I am on the other side of a window pane looking in and no one sees me. No one is unkind; they are simply uncaring. It is ‘make your own way time’… and I don’t know how.” –Joan Chittister

And wow. While I sincerely doubt that my current struggle is of the same nature as Joan’s, I am seriously impressed with her ability to describe what it feels like.

Exactly what it feels like.

To live in the age of Facebook and Twitter and the blog-o-sphere and the decade of my 30s in general without the stupid pink or blue lines, the sonogram photos of little chicken embryos, the kiddie quotes and rosy cheeked pictures? It’s tough. Really tough. And after nearly four years of trying, trying, trying and tests and pills and sticks to pee on and hormones to inject, still nothing but negative, negative, negative month after month. It’s exhausting. How do you embrace this level of mundane? Where’s the green pasture and the still water in relation to me?

This sense has been particularly poignant of late as we embark on IVF. Testing, testing, testing. Counseling and drugs and prescriptions and $$$$$. The very real chance that it still won’t result in what we want. Very real chance. That even with all of the hormones and the money and the trying and the prayers it still won’t work. What if it still doesn’t work? Then what? Then how will I deal with my mundane? How will I embrace what life is to be?

Simultaneously bored of what’s current and terrified of what’s next. Or rather, what might not be next, maybe.

Oh, Joan! How do you know?!

I suppose if nothing else, the constant intake of random hormones over the next few months is bound to make life feel anything but mundane, at least for a while, eh?

Oh guys. Buckle up. I can only imagine that I’m due for temper tantrum city coming up. And without Joan to keep me company, who knows how I’ll deal. Better find something else just as constantly-insightful-and-relevant-to-my-own-life-every-single-day. Right!