Moving day

I, too, have reached the end of my tether with Blogger.

You can expect to read more of "What to Expect" at http://whattoexpect.wordpress.com.

Two weeks at a time

Editor's note: This is a freaking long post. Go get yourself a good drink and come back. It's okay. I'll wait. I almost needed alcohol to read through it and I wrote the damn thing.

Let's just start this off by saying that's it's unlikely I am preggers. I peed on a few sticks (which one can afford to do when one's adoptive big sister is a leading importer/exporter of pee sticks) and they all came back as oneliners. Again, not suprised.

And I'm still fighting the cold/flu/dysentary/who the hell knows what it is. I may even drag my sorry arse to a doctor tomorrow (note to self: find doctor in Israel, beyond those that examine my naynay) to see what ails me. I'm hoping to score some codeine cough syrup just in time to start Gonal F.

Or to fix my cough. That's what I mean. I would never, ever use drugs that weren't specifically prescribed for me for a specific cause. Really.

Aunt Flo is due within the week. More updates on "As the period turns."

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There are times that I think I might be losing my mind. I've become startlingly adept at not succeeding at infertility treatment. When I say that, I don't mean getting a BFN over and over. I mean never actually completing a cycle. We are 0-4.

At the doctor's office, melodrama reigned supreme. Upon reading the bad news from the ultrasound, I felt as though I'd been plunged into a bad soap opera.

Nurse: It doesn't look good. I'm so very sorry.
Me: No really, it's okay.
Nurse: (thinking there was something lost in translation and that I'm not grasping that the cycle is canceled): No, really. It's not okay. You ovulated and we can't do the IUI. It's too late.
Me: Right. I know. I could tell. But, mah laasot? (I'm going to botch this, but roughly translated it means, what can you do about it?)
Nurse: Wow. You're taking this really well...

You'd have thought she had just told me a loved one had died. With all due respect, it's not that big of a deal. It sucks. But, when you get down to it, there isn't really much about infertility that doesn't suck, now is there?

I related my story to a friend just before Shabbos last week as we were sitting outside shul (I know: A) of all the depressing things to start shabbat with and b) of all the things you shouldn't discuss outside a synagogue). This particular friend wins the award of "Haven't been there, but do everything in my power to see things from your side of the stirrups." She knows people who fought the good fight and won. She gets it and when she doesn't get it, she isn't annoying. To the best of my knowledge, she has not ever administered assvice.

I told her that I let myself have the afternoon and night of the day we got the bad news to sulk. And then that was it. Saturday morning was a new day and you have to move on.

To paraphrase, she congratulated me on my ability to handle things with some balance. As she put it, and meaning no disrespect, some people practically bury every last follicle. For better or worse, I am not that person.

Before I knew it, it fell out of my mouth. "We've been living the last four years two weeks at a time."

It hung in the air the way a fart echoes when you're speaking in front of 1500 people. My breath caught for a moment, because until I said it, I didn't realize how true it was.

For four years, we've been unwilling to speculate about where we'd be in a month.

In that time, we've moved twice. Once cross country of 2100 miles, another internationally for 7000 miles, give or take. We've adopted two new cats. Several friends have had several children. We haven't traveled, since we were either cycling or too poor as a result of cycling. There has been one surgery, tons of ultrasounds, bloodwork, injections and miles put on the car getting us from one to the other. There have been, at present, three REs, four OBGYNs and one urologist. I've been promoted more times than I can count, the hubby has started graduate school and we've both put a major dent in learning a new language (for the hubby, two). We have fallen in and out of love with new hobbies (triathlon, which I swear I will get back to any year now), songs, foods, books, etc.

When we first started trying to conceive, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix had just been released. The final "Lord of the Rings" movie came out that fall. We were just married, happy campers loving our friends' infant and mesmerized with the prospect of having our own. As you all know, infertility is where dreams go to die.

We haven't tabled plans for the future, but it certainly makes it harder. Five years? Easy peasy! We'd have children. But two weeks? No can do, not sure what the future brings. But we want to buy a something – likely an apartment here in Israel. Two bedrooms or more? Where will five years take us? Can we afford to budget based on our current income or should we plan for a child? Better yet, if I get knocked up and have a baby, will the hubby be able to finish his grad program, or would he need to work to keep us afloat? Right now, I'm the only one making any money and it doesn't look like it will change any time soon.

Should we, dare I even think it, postpone having children until our current situation resolves itself?

To some degree, living life normally would be to admit that you can live life normally when things aren't normal. It is not normal for two people, who so desperately want to be parents, to wait so long.

But what really scares the hell out of me is that I've become fixated on the treatment itself. To some extent, it is no longer about having a family. It's about winning. Beating this ... disease? I no longer see IUI/IVF as a way to have a family. It's just another competition I want to do well in. I don't choose to cycle, it's just a part of my life. I take injections for 10 days, like a treatment for any other medical condition, and then I fail to get pregnant. It's just what I do.

When I play with my friends' amazing, beautiful children, I hear a lot of "You, of all people, have to have a large family. You're too good with kids not to." And I'm honored, flattered and all the rest. But there is a significant portion of me that has placed "large family" in a basket on a shelf that also holds "vacation home," "luxury cars" and "expensive vacations." All things that I'm not quite sure I want, but I'm almost certain I can't have.

Assuming you've made it this far into my navel gazing (it's lovely and warm in this navel, no?), have you ever been where I am? It's not a hard spot to be in so much as a place where I don't know what to feel.

Back to the world of the living

First of all, thanks for all your kind words and thoughts after our latest cycle got canceled. It was a bit of a nasty surprise, but sadly wasn't entirely unexpected.

I got quite a few e-mails from folks who had suggestions about how to overcome or improve our chances on the next go around. Lest you think I don't read or appreciate the advice, here are a couple responses.

Take Lupron next time so you don't ovulate too early. Everyone knows you can't ovulate on Lupron.

The hubby and I sometimes joke that you can't control me, you can only hope to contain me. This is a brilliant suggestion that would likely work for almost everyone. Amazingly, when our IVF cycle was canceled, I did ovulate on lupron. 24 follicles, 18 mature eggs by our RE's estimate. Sadly, lupron can't hold back my stunningly ill-behaved ovaries. Is there a corollary to Lupron that might work better for me?

You should skip IUI and just go straight to IVF.

And I totally agree. I want this IUI to work, really I do, as it involves less risk and surgery and generally complicated facets than IVF. Really, I wish it would work. But when I heard (for the fourth time) that our cycle had been canceled, I couldn't help but think "Man, I'm sick of this shit." Yes, we had an IVF cycle canceled too, but this is three IUIs canceled either because I did or did not ovulate early enough or I ovulated too early. And let's not forget the Clomid cycle where pretty much the same thing happened.

That said, we live in Israel now. Most (not all, but really most) of our infertility treatment is covered by state healthcare, but that means you have to play by the doctor's rules. And if the doctor says IUI, then you're doing an IUI. When we were in the U.S. and had coverage for IVF, I demanded that we not waste our time trying to do another IUI. Our doc listened and agreed we should just go on to the big stuff. I'm going to try and discuss it with my doc here too, but I'm not sure where it will get me. And I'd really really like for IUI to work. The whole cycle can be done locally this way and it's so much easier on so many levels.

Demand monitoring everyday when your follicles get bigger. Ask your doctor to trigger earlier so you don't miss ovulation. And stand up for yourself since you seem pretty good at predicting ovulation.

This, I think, is probably the best advice I've received.

When the hubby and I were walking home from the doctor's office on Friday morning, bummed at the bad news, I tried to explain to him why I wasn't angry (because, well, he certainly was). I've kind of accepted that every RE and infertility staff that treats me will completely blow a cycle in learning about my incorrigible ovaries. They cannot be taught; they will not listen. It doesn't matter if I have all the protocols of my effed IVF cycle; they refuse to listen to me when I say that I'm about to ovulate and that it really would be better if we triggered now.

With two IUIs canceled in Israel so far (one due to bad holiday scheduling, one to early ovulation), it's my hope that my warnings will count for more the next go around. And if they refuse to trigger when I think I'm about to ovulate, then the hubby and I will give it the old college try. And if they won't trigger a bit earlier, then maybe I can convince them to do bloodwork and ultrasound every day, instead of every other.

In any event, I'm not going to give up. And I'm going to try and advocate for my own needs better than I have for the last few months. I've used my lack of Hebrew skills as a cop out to keep my mouth shut, but I really need to stand up for myself again.

****

Lest you think I've been wallowing in self pity for the last few days, I assure you it's been better than that. I've been wallowing in a pool of phlegm instead. Tasty! Goes well with latkes! Just in time for Hanukkah.

I've been told that when you make an international move (or is this just a move to Israel?) that you're highly likely to come down with more illnesses for the first year or so. Indeed, when I talk to some of my coworkers, they tell tales of recurrent strep throat and bronchitis, flu bugs that wouldn't go away and stomach viruses aplenty. I can't say I've been that sick, but I have been a lot sicker than I ever was in the U.S. What's more, the hubby who does not ever get sick, has actually had a couple rough days since we moved. He may have actually sneezed once too.

In any event, I've gone from discomfort from the Gonal F (headaches and bloating) which leveled me over shabbos to a nasty head cold that came in Sunday night. I've been subsisting on some delicious bagels which were delivered by our adoptive family (thanks again guys!) and ramen noodles. Which are kosher here. Under the rabbinate of Singapore. I can honestly say I would not have thought that Singapore would have a rabbi, let alone a rabbinate.

That said, we managed to get some stuff done around the house these last couple days. Our Internet issues are finally solved (new WiFi router is in place and the Vonage box should be fixed shortly) and we went on a tour of Jerusalem on Sunday before I got sick.

Or East Jerusalem actually. As in Arab Jerusalem. I was kind of suprised they would trot our tour buses through there. But it was a nice trip and I got to see more of Wadi Joz (up close and personal) and Ramallah (from the highway) than I ever really wanted. It was a nice tour over all though and a good time was had by most. Even if I did want to bury the kid sitting behind me at the archaeological dig on Mount Scopus.

I'm still getting caught up on reading other blogs, but I hope to start commenting again soon.

Kirby 2, Medical science 0

Cycle canceled. I guess I wasn't so impatient after all.

From the looks of things, I ovulated on Wednesday. Which means that if we had triggered Tuesday like I planned, we would have been right on target. By Thursday, my estrogen had dropped and my progesterone had skyrocketed.

Which means I'm right – again –but it's not much of a consolation.

As it it, I'm shit out of luck again. Has anyone else ever heard of this being a problem during infertility treatment? Cause this is four cycles canceled because I ovulated "too early" and I'm getting a little sick of it.

I am still optimistic that, when we actually receive treatment, it will work. I'm just not too optimistic that that will ever actually happen.

There is still the hope that we might conceive on this cycle on our own. It appears as though I ovulated nine eggs, four of which were expected to be mature. Only time will tell.

Stolen, lock stock and barrel

I stole the book meme. It was not passed to me. But I thought it would be fun.

The general idea is you mark whether you've read, not read, loved or hated a book from the list. For my list, read is bold, not read is plain and the comments are marked in parentheses.

Here goes:

1984
The Aeneid
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
American Gods
Anansi Boys
Angela’s Ashes : A Memoir (loved it and loved Tis)
Angels & Demons (best of his books)
Anna Karenina
Atlas Shrugged
Beloved
The Blind Assassin
Brave New World
The Brothers Karamazov
The Canterbury Tales
Catch-22
The Catcher in the Rye
A Clockwork Orange
Cloud Atlas
Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
A Confederacy of Dunces
The Confusion
The Corrections
The Count of Monte Cristo
Crime and Punishment
Cryptonomicon
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time (loved it)
David Copperfield
Don Quixote
Dracula
Dubliners (a significant portion of my life I will never get back)
Dune
Eats, Shoots & Leaves (loved it, and its sequel)
Emma
Foucault’s Pendulum
The Fountainhead
Frankenstein
Freakonomics : A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
The God of Small Things
The Grapes of Wrath
Gravity’s Rainbow
Great Expectations
Gulliver’s Travels
Guns, Germs and Steel: The fates of human societies
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (loved it)
The Historian: A Novel
The Hobbit
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
The Iliad
In Cold Blood : A True Account of a Multiple Murder and its Consequences
The Inferno
Jane Eyre
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (on my list, somewhere)
The Kite Runner (am trying to get my hands on a copy in English)
Les Misérables
Life of Pi : A Novel
Lolita (read this when I was way too young in my opinion)
Love in the Time of Cholera
Madame Bovary
Mansfield Park
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlemarch
Middlesex
The Mists of Avalon
Moby Dick
Mrs. Dalloway
The Name of the Rose
Neverwhere
Northanger Abbey
The Odyssey
Oliver Twist
On the Road
The Once and Future King
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (saw the movie, surely that counts)
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Oryx and Crake : A Novel
A People’s History of the United States : 1492-present
Persuasion
The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Poisonwood Bible : A Novel
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Pride and Prejudice
The Prince (as in Machiavelli, right?)
Quicksilver
Reading Lolita in Tehran : A Memoir in Books
The Satanic Verses
The Scarlet Letter
Sense and Sensibility
A Short History of Nearly Everything
The Silmarillion
Slaughterhouse-five
The Sound and the Fury
The Tale of Two Cities
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
The Three Musketeers
The Time Traveler’s Wife (loved it, but cried my eyes out)
To the Lighthouse
Treasure Island
Ulysses (again with the James Joyce)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Vanity Fair
War and Peace
Watership Down
White Teeth
Wicked : The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
Wuthering Heights
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance : An Inquiry Into Values

Mind you, I went to a very snobby boarding school that prided itself on kids reading crap to improve their SAT scores.

That said, the hubby and I sat down a few years ago and agreed we'd love to read the whole Western Canon over the period of a lifetime, so we're plowing through it bit by bit.

Feel free to tag yourself for the meme. It's kind of fun. What would you add to the list? I'd think Harry Potter would merit a spot. And that Shakespeare guy. He wrote some stuff.

What's the best book you've read recently?

Talk about folly...

Impatient, party of one, your table is ready.

So I'm a bit gun shy about missing ovulation. Cause you know, I went down that road once and it sucked a bit.

Anyhoo. Back in for bloodwork and ultrasound on Thursday morning. I know my ovaries can't (won't) hold out until Sunday morning and we don't do stuff on Saturday mornings in Israel (do we? maybe we do). So that means I'll kinda hafta trigger Thursday night and have the IUI Friday morning. Right?

****

I have a degree in journalism, which is a nice way of saying I am mathematically challenged. Which is why it took me this long to realize 18 mm = 1.8 cm. Which is really big, in the microscopic realm of things. Especially since I had 24 follicles measuring 14 mm larger during our canceled IVF cycle. No wonder I felt like arse. That's like shoving a bunch of grapes up into either side of your nay nay.

I feel a bit like crap now too. The headaches continue and I'm waffling between bitchy and klempy. And I've put on six pounds in a week, which I know is bloating from the meds, but I still don't like it when I did such a nice job of losing weight recently.

*****

On a not completely unrelated note, I'm building in a backup plan in case of another failed/canceled cycle. If things go badly, I'm going to get a gym membership here in Modiin and try and jumpstart the weight loss again. I have lost 26 pounds since we moved to Israel (more than 10% of my body weight!), but I've totally plateaued and need to expand my efforts to outright aerobic exercise.

****

It's Hanukkah here in Israel (okay, duh, it is everywhere else too, but) and we're hoping a great miracle can happen here for us, too. Keep your ovaries crossed for me.

My follies: with update

I tried to come up with a pithy title, but I need a nap.

Just back from the doc's office. They didn't tell me this yet (still need to see bloodwork) but I think tonight will likely be the trigger shot. They gave me the uhh, collection cup, for the hubby's contribution to the IUI effort.

I have two dominant follies, one on each ovary, that are measuring 18 mm each. The rest are unlikely to mature, so the risk of dodecatuplets is pretty low. Today is CD12 and I think if we wait my longer, we'll probably miss ovulation.

Meanwhile, I feel a bit like crap. I think the stomach flu is gone, but the headaches from the Gonal F are still here.

For the record, I get to do the IUI right in my doc's office here in Modiin. I am hoping we do it tomorrow since the hubby's university is on strike (okay, his program is generally not affected and he usually has class, long story) and the campus is closed completely tomorrow. Which means we could both just lay around hoping for greatness to occur in my naughty bits.

I am planning on my own bed rest for the day of the IUI. Any other tips?

I am still having a hard time believing this might actually happen. It would be the first time I had completed a full cycle of treatment. I'm 0-5.

___

Just kidding. Two more days of Gonal F. IUI set for Friday morning.