Infertility, Part 3

Short recap - we agreed to do IVF with ICSI, went through all the injections, everything was cancelled 2 days prior to ER due to OHSS.

So, picking up where we left off... I finally received a call from the RE advising that the RE's in the office had discussed my case.  Apparently my case was the talk of the table so to speak.  They had made a decision to change my meds protocal to an Antegon cycle.  This works a little differently than a Lupron cycle, in that they are not going to stop my body from ovulating right away.  Instead, they are going to wait until I have so many follies hit a certain size and THEN start the Antegon and therefore stop the impending ovulation.  The point here is to kill off the smaller follies, thereby having less come mature.  It's a great concept, right?

So, we have to wait for my next cycle.  The wait seems endless, but we are renewed with hope.  New Meds, it'll work this time, right?

In so many ways I was secretly hoping AF wouldn't come, hoping that I would be magically pregnant.  That somehow one egg lived through my killing of them by Lupron, and managed to hit that tiny minimal margin of us being able to get pregnant on our own.  Ouch, that's a hard wish in an infertile's shoes.  And one that every infertile knows all too well, one that we all wish month after month after month.  Only to be let down, again, when she rears her ugly head.

And she did.  I was sad, but in other ways glad, because it meant we could get started again!  So, onto the birth control pills I go, started a week before my birthday in April 2008.  (Does anyone else think it's SO funny that when going through infertility treatments you start with BCP's, which are meant to KEEP you from getting pregnant?  Ohhh the irony.)  I hang on the BCP's for a little over a week this time.  Then I start the Repronex (stims) just a few days after my birthday.  This happens after an ultrasound to verify that my ovaries 'cooled off' enough to start again, which they did. 

Ohhh the Repronex.  The food for my little eggies.  The injection that the first time around made me one big welt.  So, they start me right off on a low dose of it.  A dose so low that the RE advises that most people's eggies wouldn't live.  It's all good though, because I'm cautiously optimistic. 

So, an ultrasound on day 5 of the stims.  My eggies seem to like this way so far, yep, they seem to be thriving in this environment.  But not too much!  My numbers are a little high we find, but not too bad.  They say keep doing what you're doing, continue with the Repronex only, and we'll see you back in 2 days.

No Antagon yet?

No, they tell me.  Why not?  Well, my biggest eggies were not quite big enough to start the Antagon.  A couple more days, and those should be good, and we'll start the Antagon.  Two more days should be FINE they say.  No worries about ovulating.

So 2 days pass, and I go back in for more bloodwork and an ultrasound.  I'm getting uncomfortable for sure, but NOTHING like what I was the first time around.  I'm thinking this is good, right?!

Except.

I know, you're thinking 'nothing can go wrong this time, can it?'  I know we were.  The odds had to be in our favor this time, right?  I'm happy, and floating on a cloud of optimism.

But it was not to be.  Again.

They call me with my lab results.  An LH surge they say.  What's that? I ask them.  Well, it means you're ovulating.  Those little eggies, all those immature little eggies, are doing there thing.  What they're supposed to do of course, but they weren't supposed to do it this early.  Now it's too late to do the Antegon.  Now it's another cancelled cycle. 

*sigh*

So many tears.  We still DTD, even though I hurt so bad, just in case.  Maybe one egg was mature enough and it would work.  Maybe.  Maybe.

So, first cycle was cancelled 2/23, second one almost 2 months to the day on 4/24.  My heart breaks a little more, my mind shuts off a little further.  Why, oh why I ask anyone who knows and will listen.  Why is this happening?  We've done things right!  We got married, bought a house, finished school, THEN and only then did we decide to try for a family.  So now, we've been married just shy of 6 years, and a family seems so far off that it is only an unattainable dream.  We've officially been trying to have a baby for 2 years now.  2 long, hard years.

So we take another weekend away.  And AF rears her ugly head again, this month she is really horrendous, like she is laughing at me as she is busy dashing my hopes and dreams for what seems like the millionth time by now.  All I want to do is curl up in a ball and hide away for the rest of forever.  I have to take the time to mourn what could have been, and that is so hard, so very very hard.  I am a miserable human being.  I don't know how to make it through this in one piece.  I envy those with children, and find myself judging people that had an easy time making babies.  Fertiles.  Here I am, part of this club of infertiles, and I don't want to be here.