Peace

This break has been so nice. I am not worrying about my response or wondering if this cycle will work. I am looking forward to our consult, but for now I feel at peace. I also discovered that my new migraine meds combination helps take the edge off the pain and eliminates the nausea. Yesterday afternoon brought on a sudden migraine with a great deal of nausea, and my new combo helped a lot. So much so that by bedtime, I was able to eat something. Yay.

Our little man has been making us laugh so much lately, it's impossible not to be happy. His vocabulary is exploding and watching his personality emerge has been so much fun.

xoxo,
Megan

Crushed

IUI #4 didn't work. We are crushed. On top of that, I have been suffering with migraines the past four days, plus something messed up my stomach. I couldn't eat, I wasn't sleeping, I've been on pain meds and anti-nausea meds for several days. It's been pure hell. I'm not 100% for my husband or for my son. A failed cycle is so much more than just not being pregnant, for me. It's much more misery than just the heartbreak and some period cramps. Infertility can go f*^k off.

We have a consult with Dr. A on February 27th to discuss what to do next.


IUI #4 details:

January 2014 - IUI #4 + Follistim
CD3 - CD5: 125iu Follistim
CD6 - CD7: 150iu Follistim
CD8 - CD9: 125iu Follistim

CD1 1/16/14
CD3 baseline u/s
CD6 u/s and b/w = all follicles 10mm and under, E2 = 79
CD8 u/s and b/w = nothing on the left / 16 and 17on the right, lining = 7.5, E2 = 232
CD10 u/s = 25, 24, 20, 18 and 17 on the right, lining = 9.2mm. hCG trigger shot. 
CD11 IUI 4.1 = 55 million post wash sperm count
CD12 IUI 4.2 = 35 million post wash sperm count
7dpiui Progesterone b/w = 17

18 Months

Breakfast at Waffleholic Cafe

A year and a half already... cue tears! My little man is so grown up.

Milestones...

• He is SO helpful! He wants to help Daddy and I do everything, and we encourage him to. He takes his diaper trash down the stairs and out to the garbage can on his own. He throws trash away by himself. He puts his toys away when we are done playing. He hands Nick tools when he is working on things. I can tell that keeping him involved with things we are doing makes him very happy.
• Everything in his world is assigned to someone. He points at Nick's car and says Dada. He grabs my shoes, hands them to me and says Mama. He points to Apollo's dog food and makes his dog noise "arf arf". And so on. 

Playing with his sticker books at his table

• He sure loves his Mom and Dad. When Dad is gone, he asks for him constantly. Same thing when I'm gone. He has been extra affectionate lately, wanting to sit in my lap and cuddle, and giving us hugs and kisses all the time. I hope this lasts forever! I just love how sweet my little man is. 
• I rarely use a stroller anymore. I really only bring it when we go to Disneyland or somewhere for the whole day and he needs a place to nap. Otherwise, he is walking wherever we go. He moves non-stop!

A very rare nap on Mom

• He feeds himself with a fork and spoon really well now. He is still a pretty good eater, but he definitely has his favorites. He hums when he eats, which everyone comments on. I think he just thoroughly enjoys his food. His favorites right now are: broccoli, bananas, BBQ chicken, pasta, salmon, and raspberries. He drinks whole milk and water.
• He loves: dancing! {my favorite of his loves}, putting bowls or blankets over his head and walking around, bumping into everything, his etch-a-sketch, his cozy coupe, going on walks on his trike, his sticker books, building blocks, coloring with his crayons, dogs and cats, and really any animal at all, anything outside with dirt, sticks, and rocks, and oh-my-gosh water!!!! Any form, anywhere, he wants to be in it, touch it, put his face in it... so much like his Mama :) 

A quick break on our bike ride

• He can throw a good tantrum now. We definitely pick our battles and that seems to minimize the meltdowns. Just like us, he can have a great day one day and a bad day another. When he is having a bad day, I have found that it helps immensely if I get down to his level. It seems to make all the difference for him. When Nick is out of town for work, I spend all my time with him on the floor. It can make dinner tricky, but we make it work.
• He sleeps really well. He goes to bed at 8pm and we wake him up at 7:15am for school. On the weekends, he will sleep in until 8 or 8:30. He takes one nap from noon to 2pm. We got very lucky with a good sleeper.
• He says: Mama, Dada, Nana, bye, hi, duck, more, ball, bat, banana, milk, light, Norman, Beeg {both the kitty's names}, Matt {our friend's name... he is always at our house}. He uses his sign language too. He signs "more", "all done", "food", "milk", "tired", "thank you", "please", "help me". His language seems to be picking up lately. We watched the State of the Union on Tuesday and I told him we were watching our president Obama. He repeated "Obama" a few times.

Shopping at Home Depot

• He has twelve teeth, and four more molars peeking through. He now brushes his own teeth at the sink with his little toothbrush. It was time to retire the little rubber finger one I was using... those chompers bit down on my finger too many times. Ouch.
• He still loves "school" and is moving to the next classroom {18 months - 30 months} on February 3rd. He has been transitioning over the past three weeks and he loves it! It is definitely bittersweet for me. I will miss his wonderful teacher and his classmates. However, we love his new teacher and he will be with older kids, doing more structured learning, sleeping on a cot, playing outside more... all good things! 

Breakfast time

His stats:

• He is wearing 2T. 
• He is wearing size 5 diapers.
• He weighed in at 27 lbs {85% percentile}, measured 32.5 inches tall {55% percentile} and his head circumference was 48.5cm {75% percentile}
• His doctor was so happy with how he is developing. He had a perfect appointment and we were very proud parents :) He had just one last vaccine and won't need any others until he is 4 years old! Woot!

18 month appointment

Nick and I are just smitten with our little man. We couldn't be happier. He is our everything.

xoxo,

Megan

A quick update

IUI #4 is done. Dr. A upped my Follistim dose pretty high so I had a good response. Not as crazy as Grayson's cycle, but good. I am still going to acupuncture, which I am loving, but now it's just a waiting game. How do I feel? Eh. Not very hopeful. I am trying hard to be more hopeful, but it's tough.

The last few days I have done a lot of thinking {what's new, right?} It's crazy to look back at all we have done. Giving myself shots month after month, spending WAY too much time at my RE's office and being poked and prodded more than I would like. All the medications and hormones give me mood swings, they give me aches and pains and nausea, and some of them are just icky. It's intense and, at times, overwhelming. I go about my day-to-day like I always do, but every once in a while I stop and think about all of it. Even with all that's involved, I have never given a second thought to what we are doing. I just do it. I am determined to have children, at least two of them, and I will do whatever I have to to have a chance at that. But dang, what a process. Long gone are the days of "let's have sex and get pregnant!" The good thing is that I have mourned the loss of that chance and moved on. This is our normal now.

My little man turned 18 months yesterday! Crazy how time flies. I'll have his 18 month post up this weekend. I am waiting for his doctor appointment on Friday to get his official stats.

xoxo,

Megan

Neurologist Appointment

I had a neurologist appointment yesterday for my migraines. I know they are caused by my hormones, but I wanted to see a doctor for new ideas on pain management, especially after ending up in the ER again back in early December. They definitely seem worse when coming off a failed cycle and I stop medications, like the progesterone. Which makes total sense because hormonal levels are dropping or spiking and that's the cause of my migraines. It also means that this break cycle turned out to be a wonderful break from those awful headaches. I didn't have a single one! Woohoo!

We discussed trying some supplements; magnesium, riboflavin and the herb Butterbur, have shown some relief to migraine patients, when taken daily. I have to check with Dr. A before taking these while cycling, but it's definitely something I will try once I am done having kids. I would much rather take daily supplements than take pain medications and/or go to the ER. For now, I have Toradol for the pain and Reglan for both migraine relief and nausea/gastric upset relief. The Toradol doesn't always work, but it seems to help. However, I haven't tried the two meds combined before, so hopefully they do the trick the next time I need it. They are both safe to take while trying to get pregnant too.

Fingers crossed for no migraines this next cycle!  CD1 is today, so off we go with IUI #4.

p.s. I had to laugh... I talked to my neurologist about our Infertility during my visit. You know what he tells me? "I bet you will get pregnant if you just relax." Really?! The old cliche, from a doctor, of all people. Thanks bud. I hadn't thought of that. ::roll eyes::

xoxo,
Megan

Just Waiting

Waiting. Infertility involves lots of it. I think I've become more patient these past four years, and I am the complete opposite of patient. I think a lot of that stems from my control freak personality. I have a hard time when I can't do anything about it. And in the case of Infertility, I have absolutely no control. If this journey has taught me anything, it's taught me that sometimes you have to let go and just let things happen as they will.

I am excited to start acupuncture again. We are still on our treatment break, but I should be starting a new cycle next week. I am terrified of the migraines that will likely accompany the new cycle. I am also terrified about this being our last chance to get pregnant with an IUI. This is our 4th one, and while we could choose to do more IUI's, it's probably not the best choice for us. I haven't been responding as well either, and it's scary to think about my response continually getting worse as time goes on. After three tries, it's advised to move on to something else, and because we are doing the strongest stimming meds with IUI, that next step would be IVF. Or nothing. Or adoption. Really the next step is what we choose for it to be. So yeah. I am really scared. In the meantime, I am reading The Pursuit of Family. I am enjoying it so far. I love to read so I don't know why it's taken me so long to read a book about Infertility.

It feels like G learns something new every day. He is a lot of fun at 17 months old. He also never stops moving so life is go, go, go right now. My job is keeping me busy and I am working with management on a new bonus structure, so that is exciting. Nick and I have been working on some new house projects. We are putting in new ceiling fans, we are doing a new vanity with double sinks and new mirrors in our master bathroom, Nick is building a BBQ island in the backyard, and we are finishing the exterior work with new paint for the house. We love to stay busy :) We are looking forward to a family vacation with my parents, my sister and her boyfriend, and my aunt and two cousins in April. We are staying in a beach front house on the Big Island in Hawaii.

Things have been good, and I've been especially appreciative of that lately. I have taken time each day to look around and be thankful for the things I have. Life is too short to wish the days away.

xoxo,
Megan

Happy 2014

A new year! It's crazy how time seems to move faster and faster as I age. We had a wonderful Christmas and New Years. We went to our usual spot for Christmas Eve dinner. Grayson got lots of gifts. We traveled to my family's ranch in Ojai. We spent lots of time together. It was perfect... and it was so hard to go back to work after 12 days off.