Almost halfway there!

Sometimes, it feels like I've been pregnant forever. And then alternately, time is flying by! Very strange. It's also weird how sometimes I feel very pregnant and other times totally normal. I think my belly is bigger some days than others, too. It felt really big when I took the picture above, though!

I can also say I am 100% sure I am feeling the baby! In hindsight, now that it happens pretty consistently I suppose I have been feeling it here and there for maybe two weeks. It's a nice little feeling and it makes me smile! It's also tremendously reassuring to know the little one is in there and dancing around.

So the baby is a mango this week. I was not amused when What to Expect When You're Expecting described it as a "mango dipped in greasy cheese" due to the vernix caseosa. Despite not having had more than a whiff of nausea during this pregnancy, that really crossed a line. Not cool, WTEWYE!

So that's really all that's going on right now! The baby is moving and I'm growing. My back is getting a bit sore. As I mentioned in the last post, according to my general practioner, I've gained 6 pounds since I got pregnant...but she has a fat scale and I'm waiting until I see the OB tomorrow to get the real measurement. :)

Anatomy Scan

We saw the baby again! And look, s/he is waving to you again! The position was so funny to see, with the legs way up to almost the head. Although it feels like this baby is taking up a ton of room, apparently it is folded in half. Heaven help me when it decides to stretch out!

Again, so amazing. Even more this time when the baby doesn't look like Alien. It looks like a real person!! The purpose of the ultrasound is to check on organs and such, so it was totally cool to see the four chambers of the heart. AND the technician didn't slip and tell us or show us the sex, so it was a win!

And since he'll probably never read the blog, Rob is almost as much fun to watch as the baby during these things. He has such a grin and gets all teary. :) Also, aren't those feet the cutest picture ever?

Besides the appointment, not much else is new! I'm feeling good but getting big. I'm up 6 pounds since getting pregnant...which I think is borderline too much, so I should reign it in! Some days, though, I am just a remorseless eating machine - I can't stop!

I had an appointment with my general practitioner yesterday and she literally squealed when I told her I was pregnant. My last appointment was right around my first IVF cycle and I was definitely at a different place in my body and mind.

I hope everyone who actually reads what I have to say had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I am thankful for all my family and friends. :)

Infertility - Getting here

So now that I'm "out" on Facebook and have shared my blog, I thought I should finally update with the last piece of our story on getting pregnant. I've really been avoiding it, honestly. I'm not sure I've really recovered from some of the emotions, but I am hoping my sharing I'll seem (a little) less neurotic. Maybe people can understand some of my hesitation to just enjoy and relax.

The picture up top is not the first time I've posted embryo photos. But these two are no more - they're the ones transferred during my "fresh" (vs frozen) cycle. They didn't make it. I'm not trying to get into a philosophical place here with when life begins, etc. Despite my liberal views on these issues, there are emotions that linger from these two beautiful little potential babies not making it. I think I mourn them (as well as the potential twin to the child I'm carrying now), and I also feel varying degrees of sadness, remorse, guilt, and shame. I'm still rocked by the idea that my first cycle didn't work despite our success with the second.

So an IVF cycle. How to sum it up without getting too bogged down in the details? It's intense. It's a very strange thing to put your body through. It's all-consuming when you're going through it. I've been pretty laid-back through treatments and got pretty good at distancing myself mentally from the physical procedures, but IVF is just so in your face. Let me explain what my cycle consisted of here. "CD#" refers to the cycle day, or days after my period. Also, you start with a month of birth control pills (a heavenly tease for someone with PCOS).

CD3 - 13: Injection of 150 iu of Gonal-F (FSH, or follicle stimulating hormone)

CD8, 10, 12, and 14: Monitoring appointments (bloodwork and internal ultrasound)

CD14, 15, and 16: Injection of Ganirelix (a drug that stops the follicles that you'd normally ovulate from releasing, allowing the smaller ones to catch up)

CD16: Injection of Novarel (a "trigger" shot to stimulate release of all mature follicles)

The process is strict about exactly what times drugs are injected, so I had a few times where I sat with an ice pack on my belly in a parking lot to prepare for the Ganirelix injection (that one is particularly painful for some reason). For the most part, Rob did my injections. Not because I couldn't (I could and I did!), but so he could see what I was going through and feel more involved. Share the pain, you know. :)

Then on CD18 was the egg retrieval. They put you under (thank goodness) to remove the follicles using a vacuum needle guided by ultrasound. Not as painful as it sounds! Then three days later, they put the best embryos back, also ultrasound-guided. This was on Memorial Day to give you some reference. The embryos that aren't transferred are then frozen if they're high enough quality. You start a progesterone injection nightly until your pregnancy bloodtest. It's weird stuff, though - suspended in an oil, so it leaves weird butt bumps.

Physically, the act of producing that many follicles is painful. We retrieved 20 eggs, 14 of which were "mature." I gained several pounds in bloat over the process. And it got to the point where I swore I could feel my ovaries bounce when I walked. Ironically, I looked pregnant with the bloat. Mentally, it becomes completely impossible to see how this could fail. Until it does.

Oh my gosh, that telephone call. After sweating every little symptom for two weeks, you go in for a pregnancy bloodtest. And then wait. When my phone rang that afternoon, I can't explain how excited I was. But then I heard the doctor's voice and just knew it had failed. I had failed.

I think one of the biggest issues I had with it was feeling like I was depriving my husband of the chance to have children. Watching him with kids is magical and I felt for a while he would be better off without me. Also, there was such a profound feeling of being broken, that they actually put these beautiful, handpicked embryos in me and my body killed them. I don't think the broken feeling goes away. I still don't understand how anything worked after that cycle didn't.

This is all very heavy, I apologize. There was a bright side - the doctor really thought it would work in the future and thought my ovaries had been hyperstimulated, preventing implantation. And I had nine high-quality embryos frozen and waiting for me to be ready to try again. The frozen cycle worked and was so much easier on me, mentally and physically.

But I'm still sorry for those first two, and I'm still hurt in places I'm not sure will scar over until I can actually hold my baby.

Checking in!

Surprisingly, I have less to say than I would've imagined. Hard to believe if you know me, right? Ha. But being pregnant is not the action-packed adventure I might have expected. I just took this picture so you can all marvel at how much I've grown in 3 weeks!

Nothing is really new! I'm 16 weeks tomorrow. It definitely feels different in the past few weeks. I actually feel not pregnant at all! Pretty much since hitting the second trimester I feel more like myself. Not that the first trimester was miserable at all, I know how lucky I was! But I was definitely exhausted. That has passed for the most part, thankfully!

I had an obstetrician appointment this week, so that's new. It was the first time I actually heard the heartbeat with the Doppler (basically, a belly microphone). Super cool! I think the heartbeat was at 151 beats per minute. It was also neat to hear the baby moving around, it sounded like static. Rob was upset he missed it, but he's been working crazy hours. Thankfully, I have a friend who is letting me borrow her Doppler - isn't that the sweetest thing? I am so grateful. Rob is dying to hear it, and I think it will be nice to check in on the babe when the mood strikes.

And call me crazy, but I think I may have felt some movement! It was kind of like little bubbles near my belly button. Of course, it could have been gas... :)

We also scheduled my big anatomy scan, the next ultrasound. For 12/1. I'm looking forward to seeing the baby again! But I'm definitely disproportionally worried about them slipping and telling us the sex. Fingers crossed no one breaks the news!

You've gotta see the baby!

He's breathtaking! (one of my favorite Seinfeld episodes ever!) And totally waving at you, can you see it??

Anyway, it's not a boy or a girl yet, so don't get all excited! The ultrasound tech explained that there is a genital tuber (awesome), that will either get bigger or smaller in a few weeks, depending on the sex. Hee hee. So it's both.

But everything looks good with the baby! Who is the size of a peach this week, by the way. Because I AM THIRTEEN WEEKS PREGNANT. Holy crap. This scan was done to measure the NT fold for potential cardiac defects, including Down's, but things appear to be within the normal range! (Knock on wood)

It was truly amazing, though, especially remembering the last time we saw the baby - a cashew at 7 weeks! Which really looked like a blob with a little bright spot (the heart). This looked like a baby! Well, it kinda looked like Alien. Something about the jaw, I think. But way more human in just 5 weeks. Can you imagine if we all grew and changed that much, that quickly?! It blows my mind.

So despite being late to the appointment thanks to people who don't know how to drive and I'm sure having a blood pressure much higher than normal, the baby was sleeping when we got in! The tech was funny, poking me and shaking me to get it to move certain ways. But it was sweet to see it all curled up. Literally the "fetal position," which I guess makes sense. :)

Rob's face when we were watching the screen was so sweet I couldn't help but tear up. The whole experience is just so unbelievable. I can't believe there's really a baby in there.

Happy Birthday to Meeeee!

I am writing now as a woman in her 30's. No more straight-up 30 for me. THIRTY ONE. I would totally be dead if I were a dog. (This dog looks just like my beagle Layla, by the way!) My birthday was actually Saturday the 16th but I've been in a deep depression.

Ha, ha - that's not true! It's not really a big deal. It was a super wonderful birthday and I am so appreciative of my family and friends making it so special. But as an aside, and I hope this doesn't make me sound like an alcoholic, but jeez it's weird not to drink on my birthday!

I'm going to write about it briefly because I want to remember it! And also because I owe you a big post since I had my NT Scan yesterday, but I need to scan the pictures so I am holding off. Teaser! I need a scanner at home. I hate having to remember to scan ultrasound pictures before anyone comes into the office in the morning.

I woke up not-too-late on Saturday, after Rob got up to feed the dogs at 7, and took them for a nice walk in the park. When I got home, Rob got up to give me my presents! A really sweet teddy bear (the baby's first!) and a beautiful necklace. It's a heart with little diamonds and in the middle is a mother and baby. Awwww! So sweet. I teared up. It's absolutely beautiful and Rob is the best.

After that, we went apple picking! It was such a gorgeous fall day! I'm so happy we enjoyed it that way. We went with Rob's brother Ian, his girlfriend Brittany, and one of the autistic kids from their school. It was great fun! I learned lots about apples from Ian, who apparently went to "apple college" while working at a cider mill. Ha.

We went to one of our favorite restaurants, a little Mexican place, for dinner with my parents, sister, and sister's boyfriend. Great times! And everyone went in on a sweet flatscreen for Rob and me. I am very lucky and spoiled. :)

Then we went bowling with friends! I thought it would be a good way to do something where people could drink but I didn't feel like a tool for not! It was great and some of my favorite people. :) I love that one of my friends kept buying me Shirley Temples.

All in all, a great day. Also, I had broken down and gotten some maternity pants earlier in the week - I totally popped! I'm 12 weeks and I really look pregnant. Crazy!

I'm happy, lucky, and loved. And thrilled to be adding a baby to this life, family, and group of fabulous people!

Oops!

Ha, I really stink at updating. :) There really hasn't been much going on, though! Here is a random picture of one of my dogs in a laundry basket to apologize.

I had my first obstetrical appointment last week! I was so excited and was really hoping for some kind of proof I was still pregnant...an ultrasound, hearing the hearbeat, something! But nope. I was so disappointed after the appointment. When I was telling my mom about it, I kind of realized what the issue was. For most other pregnant woman, and for the nurses/midwives/doctors that see them, it's really no big deal. I would venture that most women don't spend the time thinking about what could go wrong that those of us with infertility do. I feel like I'm constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. What can I say, I'm a delicate flower! ;) It makes me realize how deep infertility reaches. And how differently you're treated at a fertility clinic than at an OB office!

I had my first gestational diabetes test, since I'm at a high risk due to my pal PCOS (and the extra pounds, of course). I didn't get the results, so I am hoping things are so far, so good in that way. I still feel like my blood sugar gets low if I don't eat often enough. And the office should be calling me this week in order to schedule my NT bloodwork and ultrasound. Probably sometime next week. I am so excited to see the baby again! It's the size of a lime this week, by the way. I'm 11 weeks and 2 days pregnant today. :)

So this week I am feeling a little different, though! I feel like the fog of exhaustion has lifted! I'm still not quite normal but I'm getting there! My nausea, which was already minor, has continued to decrease. I do know how lucky I've been in that area! And also, I think I can feel my uterus. Which is super weird. :) It's really hard and feels like a little muscle knot just above my pubic bone. I can see it below my normal gut. Hee hee. And Rob felt it, too!

He is so cute, by the way. I love how excited he gets when we talk about the baby, or I tell him a new feeling I have, or read the week's entry in "What to Expect." :)

Anyway, I swear I'll try to post more often. Scout's honor. Also, I'll be officially "In my Thirties" in a few days...my 31st birthday is this weekend. Eek.