A tale of Midazolam...and a basket full of eggs

There's something to be said for the memorable side effects of a Midazolam and Demerol cocktail. When I say memorable, I do not mean for the person injected with this concoction. I fully mean this solely for her audience.

On Saturday, my beautiful wife and I went for our aspiration. For the IVF challenged, this is the procedure where we go in and try to retrieve all of the eggs that Heidi has spent the last month trying to make. We are hoping for a good number of eggs so we have lots of opportunities for success! The embryologist is there to find, rate and fertilize the eggs that we find. Also starring in this little event, the good Dr. Welden and his trusty nurse, Pam. It's a full house.

Prior to the actual procedure, she is injected with a little Midazolam and then a dose or two of Demerol. This puts her in a bit of a twilight state where she is able to communicate but has absolutely no recollection of the events that unfold. My friends...I learned something on Saturday about my wife. She's funny as hell. The irony...she doesn't remember how funny she was thanks to her special cocktail.

We went in for our aspiration. As is typical routine, Heidi spent the entire pre-procedure worrying that she might have ovulated and this would be all for naught. She does this all the time because, in reality, it's a huge deal-breaker if she does. She has never ovulated before she's supposed to (except for that one little IUI with RMG) but she worries anyway. At last count, there were about fifteen follicles so we are anxious to see how many eggs we'll fetch during the aspiration. As is standard, the preparations for our aspiration include cranking the AC down to sub-zero temperatures. Heidi was prepared this time! She brought socks to keep her tootsies warm. She also brought her own pillow with her instead of using the standard issue Care Bear. I'm sure this alone is sufficient for ensuring success! Work with me people ~ if baseball players can credit game wins on dirty socks, surely we can credit lesbian pregnancy on socks and special pillows. It would be nice if, for a change, you would just see my vision without me having to elucidate on everything. Digression...

So, all of the cast is present for the making of "Let's Make a Baby". Heidi is naked from the waist down, except for her trusty socks. I offered to also be naked but said offer was graciously declined by the nurse. Just wait until I give feedback on my comment card; this is absolutely going to come up as a "Needs Improvement".



The IV is placed in Heidi's arm and taped to a board. This is good because last time, during her drunkard Demerol state, she was very insistent on removing said IV. Taping it to a board will make it a little more difficult for her to try her own IV removal. We have a new addition to the procedure this time...a video monitor that links up to the embryologist microscope so we can see the eggs as he sees them. Correction...so I can see them. Heidi will be drunk on Demerol. She'll be communicative, but likely not able to remember or see or focus or you get the point. So, yea, a new monitor for me.

As the Demerol starts to flow, Heidi's eyes become heavy. Her words start to slur just a bit and I know...she's heading into the land of narcotic intoxication. The doctor comes in and starts making his preparations. It's a full on procedure so there are a lot of things to do...set up the ultrasound machine, set up the test-tube sucky-thingy, set up all of the test tubes, set up the guide for the ultrasound machine, put the dreaded speculum into Heidi's nether-regions...all types of pre-aspiration fun. As he is preparing his workplace (also known as Heidi's vagina), the Demerol kicks in and the first of Heidi's memorable moments occurs. In her sweetest slurred voice, Heidi says, "Dr. Welden...you're beautiful." Immediate laughter from me and the nurse. I don't mean a giggle, I mean I had tears coming out of my eyes. She's so fricking adorable! Dr. Welden just smiles and nods; I imagine he suspects it's the Demerol talking. LOL

As the procedure starts and the ultrasound wand is inside Dr. Welden's workplace (er, you know, Heidi's vajayjay), Heidi says, "Ow." Pause. "Ow, ow." Dr. Welden looks up from betwixt her thighs and little wifey says, "Just kidding". For real...my drugged up wife is playing a little vaginal practical joke. I thought I was the only Voci who did that?!?

She proceeds to ask Dr. Welden if she can have the rest of the Demerol to take home. Dr. Welden chuckles and says no. Heidi says, "Why not? I paid for it."

Throughout the procedure, Heidi does well but is in a little pain. She's also extremely thirsty. This results in me playing nursemaid to her with a small cup of water and a broken straw, which as we all know, means you suck in a lot of air and a little water. The last time she asked for some water, she said, "It was just right here on the nightstand." LOL My little Demerol darling. LOL

Now, the actual point of this blog isn't only to recap the musings of my intoxicated wife. It is to relay to you, my friends, family and some random strangers (what? It's a public blog!) the progress of our baby making efforts. The procedure lasted for a bit since there were so many follicles. Each follicle was sucked out, sometimes twice because eggs have a tendency to stick to the wall of the smaller, less developed follicles. Dr. Welden would suck the egg into the test tube and Dr. Clarke would look at the messy blob of bloody goo and announce whether or not an egg had been located. I would look at the monitor on the wall to confirm his findings. Really? No, I would look at the monitor on the wall and have absolutely no idea what the hell he was looking at. It was a blob of black and white. I'd like to say I could see it but it was really only when he actually pointed out the exact thing to me. Even then, I wasn't able to pick out the next one. LOL I could, however, identify the follicles on the ultrasound; I'm a frigging expert on that at this point.



The "Unexpected Moment" of the day came in casual conversation with the nurse. The last time we did IVF, we elected to freeze any unused embryos so all of the eggs retrieved were fertilized. Somewhere around sucked out egg #8, the nurse mentioned that only three would be fertilized since that was all we were putting back in. *Screeching brakes* What??? Why were we sucking out all of these eggs if only three were going to be fertilized? What if any of the three fragmented?? It happened the last time but it wasn't a big deal because we started with twelve eggs. What if they were all unsuccessful in dividing? For me, this was a holy shit moment. Heidi was in Lala Land and we hadn't discussed this. I told Pam that I wanted them frozen then because I wanted all of the eggs fertilized. I asked her why they wouldn't fertilize all of them. She responded that Dr. Welden wouldn't discard a healthy embryo. *Screeching brakes again* I hadn't thought of that. I mean, there are plenty of arguments about when life begins but I can tell you that for two lesbians trying to make a baby, for us, it begins the moment those eggs are extracted and they are introduced to a sperm or two. They are, for all intents and purposes, our babies. I couldn't imagine just discarding them either. I talked with the embryologist a little to see what he thought the chances were of successful fertilization with three embryos. He said he thought they were excellent because Heidi had great eggs PLUS there was a back-up plan. Four of the eggs were at the intermediate stage of maturity which meant they weren't able to be fertilized for a day or two. If any of the three that we had fertilized did not thrive or started to fragment, we still had four eggs that we could fertilize. OK. That didn't sound so bad. We didn't want to freeze eggs because, as we already knew, the chance of pregnancy wasn't so great (unless your name is Kyong) and we'd actually have to make contingencies for our frozen embryos. Meaning what would happen to them if we died. Didn't think about that either. So while my wife lay there in her little happy place, I made the executive decision not to freeze any of the embryos and rely on the success of three or the back-up of four. And if all of that failed, I would just tell her that she made the decision and I had to comply. I'd tell her that I thought she was lucid and legally able to make these kinds of decisions. Yea, that's what I'd do...

So, end of the day, we ended up with fifteen eggs. Not half bad for a girl weighing in at 98 lbs. If nothing else, my girl is a helluva egg maker...momma hen, if you will.



Oh, that's not quite the end of the story. What would this blog be without one more example of how darned funny my wife is. So, at the end of the procedure, after vitals are taken and she's stable and all of that good stuff, they slowly start to wake her up. They lift the table she's laying on up a little at a time. They move her legs from a nice comfy position to a sitting position. I rub her hair lovingly in an attempt to rouse her from sleep. I whisper sweet nothings to let her know we are done and to get her to come back to the land of the living. When those things don't work, I reach out, with only love in my heart and ever so gently, grab her boob. To which, she responds, "Thanks Pam." That's my girl. LMAO

We have spoken with the embryologist twice since the aspiration. Both times, he said the embryos are doing fabulously and no fragmentation has occurred. This is great news! His words today, "You're going to get pregnant this time." I hope his prediction is right. I hope this is our time...our turn to be mommies to a baby (or two!).

And now we wait until Thursday when we will hopefully put three healthy embryos back into the baby maker. Hopefully, all of the prayers we have received, good karma and the fact that Heidi made out with a fertility statue will bring us the success we so desperately want. Fingers are crossed!

Doing the math...

Today represents 70, yes, 7-0 shots given to Heidi since the beginning of our "vitamin" endeavor. 70 times she's lifted her shirt, let me rub a cold alcohol swab across her little belly and then stick her on one side or the other and inject her with chemicals designed to make her follicles not grow, then designed to make them multiply and grow. Today, we stop those shots and at midnight, we do one more shot...one to make them mature. Thirty-four hours from that shot will be one of three very major moments we have remaining in this, our last journey. Thirty-four hours from midnight tonight we aspirate.

Over the last seventeen days, we have had a regimen of doctor visits, shots and oh yea, we can't forget, cleaning up puppy poop. Not really a vital component to fertility, but definitely worthy of mention. Why would poop be relevant to this blog? Well, first I will direct you to the last blog wherein I informed you, my dear reader, of our adoption. Second, I will direct you further to the end of said blog to remind you of my intent to effectuate a little duplicity upon the universe. Alas, the universe seems to have uncovered my attempted deception and has paid me back in triplicate by providing me with sleepless nights, countless piles of poop, puddles of pee and a missed opportunity to invest in Bounty and/or Lysol wipes. Checkmate, Universe, checkmate...

So, throughout the injection of closely timed doses of lupron and follistem and ovidrel (oh my!), we have managed to create quite the collection of follicles. There are enough eggs in my little wifey to make the matron of any henhouse proud. Our first "measure" visit netted about twelve follicles progressing quite nicely. This is more than our last try by three...so this is good; more is good! Our schedule for the next couple of weeks will involve various trips across the pond to see Dr. Welden so he can count and measure follicles. Each trip to count and measure will hopefully amount to about 2 mm per day of growth. Doesn't sound like a lot BUT when you have a dozen follicles in there, growing at 2 mm per day in a really small space, well, it can definitely get a little crowded. For those of you gals really attuned to your girly parts...know how some months you can feel what side you ovulate from? Well, that's one egg. One. Let's revisit simple multiplication. What is one times twelve? Come on, seriously? I sense some of you looked up to do the math in your head. LOL It's twelve. So if you can feel one egg move when you ovulate, magnify that by twelve hanging out in your ovary. Get my point? Oh, and you suck at math. :)

This point in our journey is pretty critical. We are doing so many things at the same time, with everything being so calculated. The Lupron is draining Heidi of estrogen. This is the intent, however, it is not exactly fun for Heidi. By a show of hands...who has hit or is hitting menopause? Same effect. The girl who is cold in the dead of summer is now having hot flashes all the time. And, um, well, how do I say this the nice way...low estrogen can also lead to, well, um, a bit of emotional behavior. I'm sure I've mentioned in a past post that Heidi is not prone to emoting uncontrollably. Not so much the case with low estrogen. She sent a text to our nurse asking if it was normal, the nurse said, "yes, it's normal. You're beautiful and everyone loves you." Heidi cried. Add Kleenex to the list of items we should have invested in... After a blood test to measure her estrogen to confirm that they are, in fact, trying to throw her into menopause, we learned her level was 4. For a little estrogenial perspective, when she did her last IVF, her level was over 1300. Just a tiny difference (if you believe that, you really are mathematically inhibited). So our first week of IVF fertility mirrored that of a 54-year-old woman on the cusp of menopause.

Back to measuring...our next visit netted favorable results. The future eggs are maturing at just the right pace. Labor day began the introduction of follistem to our shot regimen. It's as handy-dandy pen used to inject very expensive medicine into Heidi's little bruised belly. We have two vials of follistem to inject through this process, designed to help those little follicles develop and multiply. So, two shots in the morning, one shot in the evening. Oh and prenatal vitamins every day.

With the introduction of the follistem, we had to make more visits to the doctor for more frequent measuring and counting. One of the risks with using meds to stimulate follicle growth is the risk of hyper-stimulation syndrome. I would interject that contrary to what my 17-year-old mind would translate this to, it is not sexual in nature. It has to do with over-stimulating her ovaries. Monitored, it shouldn't happen. Unmonitored, it could actually be very dangerous. So, more trips across the little pond known as Tampa Bay. Each visit nets us the same favorable results...excellent growth and at seemingly each visit, more follicles are located. We went from twelve to fourteen.

In the past week, we have been back to the doctor's office for, you guessed it, measuring and counting, four times. Each time, on track. Today was a great visit...fifteen follicles measured. Yea, measured. There are more follicles growing in my little tiny wife's body, but we only measured fifteen. Most measured around 16 mm. And now the pièce de résistance...drumroll please...Heidi's uterine lining measured in at a little over 14. Dr. Welden's words, and I quote (well, to the extent I can remember), "That is textbook, ideal. It's so ideal I could live in there." Hahaha...he could live in there. I guess you had to be there to appreciate the moment. Good thing you weren't...Heidi doesn't like her friends looking at her vagina. I digress.

So, we are at the beginning of the end of our IVF. Tonight, in less than three hours, I'll be shooting my wife up again, one last time before the aspiration. Then I'll be taking the dog out to poop. I digress again.

Aspiration is scheduled for Saturday at 10:00 a.m. What will you be doing then? Well, you'll be praying for us, of course! I will be doing the same...plus watching the most amazing thing a mother-to-be can watch...a pair of highly trained doctors extracting the eggs of our future child from my wife's ovary. I will be looking through a high-powered microscope to see what will be our son. Or our daughter. Or, both (we are, after all, trying to convince the doctor to put three eggs back in...the chances exist). So, download Brahm's lullaby from iTunes and think of us. And pray. Pray because you love us. Pray because you know how much we want this. Pray because you know God has a lot of people trying to get his attention, it wouldn't hurt if we had a few extra voices putting a bug in his ear for us.

So we are getting ready. We are acclimating to only three solid hours of sleep without a pee or poop interruption. We are acclimating to baby, er, puppy proofing our house. We are acclimating to having our entire lives redefined by an eating schedule, a doo-doo itinerary and cooing and cheering for a successful pee-pee outside. I think we're ready. I've done the math...we're in. We're good. We're going to make a baby...

Our Surprise Adoption

We have a new baby boy. He's a cute one, very small...only three and a half pounds. He has big brown eyes, just the most adorable thing you've ever seen. Ah, I get ahead of myself...let me go back a few days.

My love and I were enjoying the benefits of a loosely planned staycation. We both needed a little va-cay, but with all of the fertility stuff, we decided that instead of missing a cycle or spending money, we would just take some time off of work and do stuff around town. Said staycation was affectionately dubbed "Lawannapalooza" since I like to think of my birthday not just as a day, but a weeklong event. Lawannapalooza did, indeed, include a hang gliding adventure and a trip to visit the fertility statues at Ripleys. We figured we were closer to Heaven than normal so we could throw a few prayers to the wind while hang gliding and if that didn't work, we'd rely on some tribal mumbo-jumbo to knock us up.

For the record, I did not touch the statues. Whilst most of my baby making parts are mostly dysfunctional, I wasn't willing to take any chances. I'm pretty sure that despite the fact that it would be the truth, I would never be able to convince Heidi that I had been chosen as the vessel for the second coming. So, I avoided the statues. Heidi, however, touched and kissed both of them. This is huge, the kissing part, because if you know Heidi, you know she's a huge germophobe. For her to place those precious little lips on statues that had likely been touched by a significant number of hands, lips or God forbid, other weird body parts. But there she was...kissing the statue. That is called commitment, people!

We also had the distinct pleasure of having two doctor appointments this week. The first one was the mock transfer, said details covered in the most recent blog. The second one was the dilation of Heidi's cervix to help minimize any obstruction during the actual transfer. It was, for me, uneventful. For Heidi, the one whose vagina, cervix, and uterus are always at the forefront of attention, it was a different story. I will say this, and I'm sure she'll agree, it sounds a little worse than it was. Not that prefacing it with that statement made it enjoyable. Oh no, my friends, it was not fun, just manageable. Since most of our friends following this journey are of the female persuasion, after reading this, you may all bend slightly at the waist and do an ever so slightly audible groan.

The visit started with having a pain block put on her cervix. This involved four shots, straight up the hoo-ha. Of course, the visual effect was considerably worse than the actual shot. Remember anatomy here...how long does the needle need to be to make its way up the va-jay-jay until it hits the cervix? Exactly...mental image complete. It wasn't all needle, mostly just an extender, but for crying out loud people, it was metal with a needle on the end. Even my private parts cringed. So, after the speculum was in place (all my lady friends, imagine that fabulously cold and metal instrument of discomfort), the block was given. Four shots. Into a very vascular area. That meant blood. Not "girl" blood, but blood. I, the observer of said procedure, was not expecting the vascular result of the shots and did a visible "yit-yit" at the giant Q-tip used to swab up the end result of the shot. Yeee---uck. (Shivers) After that, a magic stick was used, containing some magic chemical, to stop the bleeding. This left a gray residue on her cervix. Dr. Welden advised that there would be an "ashy" discharge to follow. Again, I will reiterate...yit-yit. Now, it took about five minutes for the block to kick in, during which the doctor and nurse left the room. So, I did what any self-respecting lesbian wife would do when her wife is spread-eagle on a gynecological table...I headed down south to take a little peeksy. Oh dear God. Someone could have left a warning label on her knee that said "Danger...there is a speculum and a pair of scissors hanging out of this vagina". I was not expecting that. I was so amazed by the sight that I wanted to share this moment with my wife (I know she was experiencing it, but it was the visual effect I wanted to share). So, I did what any selfless, considerate, giving wife would do. I took a picture on her phone and showed it to her. Not something you see every day. She gazed upon said travesty betwixt her legs, to which she replied, "I did a good job shaving." That, my friends, is why my wife is a frigging superwoman. Does she freak out at the sight of scissors dangling from her most personal spot? No. Did she yell at me for taking a picture of a speculum in her woman-parts? No, you mere mortal, wimpy women. She gave herself GD props for a great shave job. I love my wife. Reason #684.

After the picture was successfully deleted and the block kicked in, Dr. Welden began the process of inserting increasingly larger metal thingamajiggies into her cervix to slowly dilate her. This took about an hour. No big deal, you say? Reealllyyy...well, if you don't think it's a big deal, why don't you just do a pop-in at casa Voci and I will be happy to see if you can take a full fifteen minutes of the speculum, scissors, dilating torture materials, ashy vagina maker, etc. I dare you. Seriously. Next time you see my wife, I might suggest you do a little bow of respect to her.

After the dilation, another mock transfer with the tube. Smooth sailing this time...yea! Then, measuring the cyst again. Same size...bummer but we still had time for it to go down. We would wait it out since the alternative would be the same as having the difficult part of the IVF procedure to drain the cyst. After all that her junk has and will have to go through, we decided to wait it out. So, that's what we are doing...waiting.

Now, let me take you back a week or two. Heidi and I were having an impromptu fertility conversation in the kitchen. It resulted in finding out that someone we knew was pregnant again. We were so excited and happy for her and her partner but we were also a little sad for us. Natural response, I guess, but it was a little bit of a last straw for Heidi. She confessed that she had been so sad for so long and that as hard as she tried, she couldn't make herself happy because she wanted so badly for this to work. She didn't want to tell me how unhappy she was because she didn't want me to be sad too. It was a hard conversation because my job as her wife is to make her happy. I was sad because no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make this happen; I had no control over the end result. That conversation stuck in my head. There was nothing I could do to change this but the sadness stayed with me.

Back to present week. Every now and again, Heidi makes me take her to a puppy store so she can hold and cuddle random puppies. She has forever wanted a King Charles Cavalier puppy but because of the cost and competing fertility treatments, it was always a "someday we'll get one" conversation. Well, this particular week during our random visit to the puppy store, lo and behold, there in the back of the store, off the market for sale, sat a King Charles Cavalier puppy. He wasn't with the general population of confined or jailed puppies; he was in isolation, so to speak. He was sporting a slight cold and until the vet cleared him, he wasn't allowed to go home with anyone. The lady at the shop must have seen the longing in Heidi's eyes and she let her hold the puppy. He was, to say the least, a handful; adorable, energetic, kissy faced. But more than that, he made her smile. A deep smile...one that went all the way to her heart. We left, smiling for our time spent with the puppy. That night, he kept popping into my head. He made her smile. He lightened her heart. The next day of our staycation, we were trying to figure out what to do. I suggested we take another trip to the puppy store to gauge her reaction. She looked a little incredulous, like why would we do that? So, I told her that I thought we should maybe think about getting him. I told her my reasons. Usually, my frugal wife would have immediately said no. But I think she knew she needed this. She needed something to make her happy, to help soften some of the disappointment of the past two years. So, we did what any heterosexual couple unsuccessfully trying to have a baby does...we adopted. We just adopted an eleven-week-old puppy instead of a child. Meet Ty...our newest addition.

Now, while you are oohhing and aaahhing about how cute he is, know this. There is a method to my madness, oh yes there is. Not only is my goal to make my wife happy, but I am also here to trick the universe. (Insert Dr. Evil laugh here)

What happens to every straight couple who finally decide to give up on having a baby and adopt? They "accidentally" get pregnant. Well, that won't work for lesbians. If she ends up pregnant without a doctor's assistance, we'll be headed for divorce court. BUT...if we "adopt", then go to seemingly unimportant doctor visits, focusing only on our new addition, just staying for the visit because we have to, like a physical or pap smear or something mundane like that, we will be so focused on our new baby boy that we might "accidentally" get pregnant. I'll pause while you revel in my brilliance...I know it's a lot to take in. Take your time...

So, there it is and here we are. We have our new baby boy, who is ridiculously adorable. We also got our period, which means nothing because we're not doing any of that fertility stuff, we've adopted (wink, wink, nudge, nudge). Our next step is to work on housetraining our new addition and maybe we'll do a pop in at our doctor's office just to see if that pesky cyst has shrunk. No reason, just to know. And maybe Heidi will take some kind of vitamin shots to give her energy to take care of our new addition. Maybe they'll be a lot like the old IVF shots she took, but these are different; we aren't trying to get pregnant. Duh. So, between our flight to heaven, our fertility statue, and our "accidental" opportunity for pregnancy, this could be looking good. I'm optimistic. I mean, chaos has entered our lives in the form of four very small legs. It only makes sense that the universe pile on some more midnight feedings...

Today's Episode..."The Mock Transfer"

Today was doctor's appointment #1 in our last little endeavor to have a baby. It came during my birthday week so I'm hoping that is a good sign...like, a belated birthday gift kind of thing.


We went in for a mock transfer. It's like a fake IVF where the doctor routes out his cervical path. Heidi tends to have "difficulties", meaning whenever she has the chance to make something difficult, she does. With respect to IVF, or even IUI, her cervix sometimes gets a little pushy. What does that mean? Well, it means that when the doctor is trying to feed the small tube into her cervix to spit the embryos into her uterus, sometimes her cervix likes to push back. To prepare for that, the doc did a faker-baker transfer, shooting some water into the ole' uttie and checking for path problems (like rocks or sticks on a walkway) and other obstructions.

We found a couple little things...one, the obstruction isn't something we can move or reduce the size of, it just is. So, instead of risking any damage to the embryos when we put them back in by having them bang against this little push-back, we are going to dilate her cervix a little and hope that the transfer goes more smoothly. Lucky Heidi gets to go back to the doctor's on Friday to have a needle plunged into her cervix to numb the little barrier between va-jay-jay to uterus, wait a few minutes and then place a pipe-like instrument into her cervix until it gets larger and larger and larger. She'll then wander around for the next few weeks with a slightly dilated cervix.

Big fat aside here: When (not if, but when) we have a kid, if said kid is ever in a verbal disagreement with his other mother and during said heated discussion, if said child ever says to said other mother "you don't love me", I am going to beat said child with a print-out of this blog. The things that she is going through to create said child are nothing short of amazing. She is nothing short of amazing. Said child better never, ever say that. I think I can, without reservation, say I have never met another woman who had to work so hard to have a baby to love, to cherish. So, yea, child-to-be, make note.

Anywho...back to the uterus. During the ultrasound, we also found a rather large cyst. Nothing too alarming, there's actually a technical name for it but um, well, I don't remember it. In short, it's a leftover from ovulation where the follicle didn't "explode" but the egg left the container. So, the shot Heidi is currently taking twice a day (Lupron) should effectively reduce the size of said cyst. If it doesn't go away within ten days of starting the Lupron (we've been on it about six days now), we'll just keep shooting Heidi up until it does diminish. It won't make us have to wait a whole other cycle to do the IVF, it'll just delay her current cycle. We don't want to move forward with the cyst because it can adversely impact that ovary from making enough follicles. We want as many follicles as we can get.

We did have a question for Dr. Welden today...how many embryos would he be willing to put in this IVF since this is our last try? Last time, we did two embryos and got pregnant. But it didn't stick. We had been tossing around the idea of having three or four placed back into the oven but we weren't sure what Dr. Welden would think about this. After a little smile and a slight twinkle in his eye, he agreed to three. Four was pushing it a bit, I suppose.

So that's where we are, my peeps. Step one. Now we are waiting for Heidi's monthly visitor to visit (I have it on good authority that it may be knock, knock, knockin' on Heidi's door as I type). Then...the rest of the meds. We picked up the big expensive drug, Follistem, today. It's chillin' in the fridge. That means, if you happen to hang out at our house, watch what you grab from the fridge. You may end up amazingly hormonal and not have a clue why. LOL

Oh, and for good measure, we are going hang gliding tomorrow. The ranch where we are doing this is not too far from the Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum. Guess who they have as visitors at said museum? Fertility statues. I'm thinking after we take the hang gliding plunge from the sky, we'll stop by Ripley's and maybe let Heidi brush against the fertility statues a little. We'll go from close to Heaven to fertility statue...cover our bases. It can't hurt, can it?

Fertility Rule #437: Fertility is dynamic, never static.

It's been awhile since I've posted. No particular reason, laziness; nothing relevant to share. I'm touched by the people who have reached out to see what's been going on since I've taken a sabbatical from blogging. Not much and a lot, all at the same time, I suppose.

Our last blog left us preparing to do the big egg count for our first IUI with RMG. Since we were on a new protocol and new meds, we had no idea of how little V's egg makers would react. Would they create even one follicle? Would they create too many follicles? We didn't know. Thank goodness for ultrasounds that give us the ability to actually count them before we inseminate. That way, we would know how many potential kiddies there are in there. I mean, that's the idea. The only thing that would throw a wrench into the works would be if Heidi ovulated early. But that's never happened before so nothing to worry about this time either. I mean, she's nothing if not consistent. . Day 12. Ovulation. Let me clarify: ovulation is not supposed to happen until day 14 or 15. Our ultrasound wasn't scheduled until day 13. Ovulation. How? What? How? Wrench thrown.

Day 12 started with Heidi thinking she was ovulating. Because we've been trying to get pregnant for, oh, I don't know, about two years, we happen to have quite the stash of ovulation predictor kits, pregnancy kits, pregnancy meds, etc., etc., etc. Short story...we had an ovulation test so we decided to take it to see if she was ovulating. Why is this important, you ask? Well, first of all, if you're asking you need to take yourself back to health class and learn how this works. Geez. If you're just being fertility lazy, here's why...if she's ovulating BEFORE we do the ultrasound, we can't count her follicles. Why does this matter? Because we haven't ever used the regimen of meds we are on now so we don't know how they work on her. Remember full strength Clomid put her in egg-making overdrive? We had no idea if these would create one or ten. We do not want ten. Why else would this matter? Well, if she ovulates now and our IUI is scheduled too late, we miss this cycle. There is only a 24-36 hour window to knock her up. Worse, we inseminate and there's no eggie there for the spermie to try to find. So, yea, ovulation a few days early can be a bit of a problem. Good thing we have a doctor's office we can call and get guidance from, huh?

Yea, about that...so Heidi calls the doctor's office that morning because she is in fact ovulating. The nurse or sonographer gal, whoever, whatever she was, is giving Heidi a little attitude about taking an ovulation test because Heidi was specifically instructed not to LH track. Heidi informs her was wasn't tracking; she advises that she felt like she was ovulating, didn't want to miss our window and so she took the test. She says this several times because the sonographer is apparently upset that we were tracking. We were not tracking. Heidi kind of knows what it feels like to ovulate. She's been slightly attuned to her cycle for, oh, about two frigging years now. So, yea, she's pretty attuned. The appointment for the ultrasound was cancelled and the appointment for the IUI was scheduled for the next day...day 13. Well, hells bells, that was a whole unexpected, chaotic mess. Geez oh pete! Thank goodness that's over. Huh?

Day 13, inspermination day. We are required to arrive an hour and a half early so our spermcicle has time to defrost. We check in and hang out at the office waiting for Heidi's turn to get knocked up. Thank goodness for smart phones...waiting rooms are much less frustrating when you have the power of the world wide web at your fingertips! Finally our turn! Our inspermination technician (the title I officially bestow upon her) arrives in the room. Her name? Good question. We don't actually know. Pause here...does it make Heidi slightly slutty if she gets knocked up by a person whose name she doesn't even know? Kind of makes Teen Mom look chaste, huh? I digress...

Before we do the deed, we bring up the LH surge and communicate to unknown knocker-upper that we were actually a little offended at the tone taken by the unnamed sonogram tech about tracking. I told unknown baby-maker that this wasn't our first rodeo, we had been through this for two years so we know how it works. She apologizes and we let it go. Why? Because that's how we roll. We got some baby making to focus on, not being pissy about the lecture we got about tracking our surge. Much like the first time with a high school jock, the "injection" only took about five minutes. Very fast. Mostly painless except the unexpected jolt at the top of Heidi's uterus when the catheter made its way a little too far up. Yowza! A little jump on the table, the more G-force to suck the sperm into the uterus and knock her up. Maybe this was their secret recipe for success!!! Tricky, ingenious even! The whole experience was exhausting so, well, we went home to take a nap. Sidebar: Heidi and I have found that most of life's really ponderable challenges are made less intriguing with a little nap. We have solved most of the mysteries of the world, simply by napping. So, yes, this little pregnancy challenge was going to be overtaken and defeated with a nap.

Day 15 welcomes a new player into the fertility game: progesterone suppositories. What are these, you query? Well, shaped much like a bullet and a larger than a 9mm bullet (that's my only frame of reference...I'm not a huge gun expert. Pft.), the progesterone suppository is designed for vaginal insertion and absorption in the body part located most convenient to the uterus. The vagina. Hence "vaginal" progesterone suppository. Let me take some creative, descriptive liberties here and paint a clear picture for you...I'd hate for any of you to not benefit from every detail available in our fertility journey. The vagina bullet must be inserted twice a day for seventeen days. They must also be refrigerated. Therefore, the COLD vagina bullet is inserted twice a day. In her vagina. Digitally (meaning, no instrument to help...just the little pointer finger). So, the cold vaginal bullet is refrigerated for a reason. They melt with heat. Take a moment to think about where in this scenario heat might come into play...think about it, think about it. Ding, ding, ding. So, think a little deeper (no pun intended, dirty minded freaks!) about what happens when something meant to be kept cold so it doesn't melt is inserted into a warm body cavity where science, or common sense, would dictate that it might melt. What impact does that have? I'll give you a multiple choice guess:

A. The vaginal bullet melts, drains from its "cavity" and leaves an oily mess in ones panties.

B. A sudden "flow" happens upon standing, wherein an immediate appearance of a urinal accident appears to have happened, usually at work and other inconvenient locations.

C. Several pairs of panties and work pants have more oil slicks than the Gulf of Mexico after BP uprooted and left.

D. All of the above.

To say the least, Heidi hated the vaginal bullet. However, the doctor told her she preferred these to the shot because they were closer to the intended target. Heidi would prefer the shot.

I considered drawing out this results of all of this new effort, but, well, it's been awhile since I have blogged and I have a good feeling that this is already going to be a little novella so I'll just blurt it out. Negative pregnancy test. There. I said it. All this and a big fat negative. I have to say that I am usually prepared for dealing with these tests and the potential for a negative result. I have to be honest, for whatever reason, this one was devastating to me. I don't know why this one hit me so hard. I cried. A lot. I couldn't talk to Heidi, not because I held her accountable for this, not at all. I couldn't talk to her because for the first time, I couldn't find anything positive to say. I have no glass-half-full mumbo jumbo to throw out there to deflect the sting of this pain. I had nothing. I felt emotionally and physically spent. I stayed in bed the whole evening and when Heidi finally came to bed, I still had nothing. I held her and cried but I had nothing to say except that I didn't think I could do this anymore. Not exactly the fairy tale ending we were hoping for.

So, fast forward a couple of days. After accepting what was our fifth sucky reality with IUI, we had a talk. It was a hard talk but we did it anyway. We talked about how far we would travel down this path. We talked about what it would take to make us call it quits. Despite thinking this would work two years ago with the first IUI and spending, oh my gosh, like $2500 (so much money!), here we were. Five IUI's, one IVF and one FET later. And $2500? Puh-leaze. Such a small amount compared to what we've spent on this endeavor. I would love to say that money is no object in our quest to make a baby, but unfortunately that whole lottery thing hasn't panned out for us and our jobs won't give us a "fertility cost of living" salary increase. We have limited means. So we had "the talk". I won't bore you with all of the sordid details of a somber and difficult conversation, but I will share with you the ultimate resolution we made. We would try one more IUI and one more IVF. If we didn't get pregnant with either of these, our journey would end. That was it. Two more tries. If the powers that be...call it God, Jehovah, whatever deity name you care to bestow, if that power decided we should be mommies together, this would have to be the time.

This brings us to cycle #2 of IUI with the Reproductive Medical Group. So much of our hopes sit with what is literally one-half of our remaining tries to make a baby. Last IUI.

Heidi's cycle starts. Here goes...we start the same protocol again. This time, we are scheduled to do our egg-counting ultrasound on day 11. Don't want to miss our window, now do we?

Day 10 brings an unexpected phone call from our new friends at the Reproductive Medical Group. We were advised that the blood tests Heidi had to do for the first IVF would expire soon. Apparently, they are only good for one year. Nothing for us to worry about right now because we aren't doing IVF this cycle. Well, actually, wrong. RMG has a policy...they want those blood tests done every year for IUI. They require them twice per year if we are doing IVF. And at their lab. Huh. Need I remind you, dear friends, that our insurance covers nada with this group? Not even blood tests? Need I also show you my bank statement demonstrating that these tests run around twelve hundred pesos? Huh. Oh yea, forgot to tell you one more thing. I'm also going to need to do all of these tests. At their lab. No insurance coverage. And if you are just tuning into this blog, let me remind my dear audience that I am not a boy. I am not donating sperm to this endeavor. I am not donating eggs to this endeavor. I am donating cold, hard cash...said cash was not being blood tested. Why would I need to take the same blood tests (at their lab) that Heidi had to take, even though I wasn't a physical participant in this process? Response: It's their policy. Huh. I wonder, as a layman, how testing for communicable blood issues impacts fertility more than twice the rate that the FDA requires? I wonder about this little policy, I wonder. You don't think it's a policy created merely to generate revenue, do you? Nah...I'm getting paranoid. Pft.

Day 11, back at RMG, follicle counting day. Woot-woot! We are hoping for 3 or 4 follicles. This is our day. Yea baby...glass half full is back! Can't wait...gettin' ready to knock up my wife again. Again we have a different sonographer, no-name #3. Heidi's uterine lining looks good (so she says). I have to say I've always admired the measurements associated with her uterine lining. She makes a wife proud. Now to the big moment...please don't let there be too many follicles! Remember, this is our first ultrasound with this medicine. Please, please don't make it, like 8. That would be so many. We can't inseminate with eight follicles, no way, no day (although at this point, we may actually have been willing to risk it). Big moment...wait for it, drum roll...1 follicle. Yep 1. Let me spell that out for you in case you fear you must have misread it. One. ONE. No-name #3 says, Great! We will inseminate in two days." With one? Huh. Before leaving the room she, once AGAIN, brings up LH tracking from last cycle. She proceeds to say well maybe if you were not tracking last month it would have worked. Can you say beating a dead f**king horse? I again consult my layman's medical reference guide to try to independently determine how pissing on a stick will create a negative response to IUI. Are you f**king serious? (Excuse my French, but seriously no-name...how dare you. You don’t even know us. You don't know Heidi. We aren't new to this game. Your redundancy is insulting and quite frankly, I'd like to take that GD ultrasound wand and slap you upside your GD head with it. Yea. That's what I'd like to do.

After our appointment, we converse and both agree that we are extremely disappointed with the Reproductive Medical Group and their stream of no-name, uninvested techs and sonographers, spewing their ridiculous "no tracking" lectures. We seriously consider Dr. Welden again. At a frigging minimum, Dr. Welden actually knows who we are. He cared if we got pregnant. He cared about whether we would inseminate with one follicle. He wasn't just trying to make a buck off of us.

Aside here: Outside of our regularly scheduled program, we previously communicated with Pam, our nurse at Dr. Welden's, about our frustration with her lack of response. It was worked out. Over, done with, gone. We would have considered going back to them, except we had already committed to ourselves that we would give RMG an honest-to-goodness try.

We place a call to Dr. Welden's office to seek his advice on whether or not we should to do this insemination. We want to increase our chance…that’s definitely not going to happen with 1 follicle. Dr. Welden's office advice was that with only one insemination per cycle, it wasn't really worth it to try. Of course, there was a chance, just not the statistical chance we wanted to take, especially not with one-half of our remaining tries.

Heidi and I talk some more. Do we want to keep going back to RMG? We have an IUI appointment on Thursday for our sixth inspermination try. Do we want to continue with one follicle? What happens after that? If it doesn't work, we would have to spend a couple thousand dollars on blood tests to do an IVF through their office. They've already left such a bad taste in our mouth that we both feel like we just don't want to go back. What does that mean?

Welcome back Dr. Weldon. We let their office know that we are done with the RMG and want to come back. We ask the nurse to ask Dr. Welden what he thinks we should do: another IUI after 5 failed ones or IVF. Dr. Welden's opinion: IVF. Huh. A slight change of plans.

So this is it, my friends. Our final attempt. We had to get a loan to pay for this cycle (thank goodness we don't pay Jessica's rent anymore!) This is it. All cards are on the table. We have and are putting everything we have on the table - all emotion, all hopes, all finances. Here we go. Powers that be...this is your chance. Bless us, my friend, bless us this time.

And for those of you that believe in the power of prayer or positive thinking or both, we need you something fierce. You've always been in our corner and have helped us through this journey. One last favor we have to ask...on your knees. Give it all you got...we need your prayers.

We are at the beginning of the end.

Last time...come on, Heidi. Let's go make a baby.

Wanna make a baby?

We were mowing the lawn tonight and after an extended reprieve, Heidi was wearing her handy-dandy tank top she picked up at a gay days booth that contained a sexy, yet very significant slogan "Wanna make a baby?". It's a non-descript tank top from a lesbian reproductive company in California but yet it held obvious significance. She said that she hadn't worn it since one of her IUI's because it had been unlucky the last time she wore it. It was nice to see it on her. Maybe her wearing it today indicated she had let go of the bumps we have had in our journey, wrought with moments of excitement, followed by disappointment and frustration. Maybe her reunion with this relevant piece of clothing represented a renewed faith in the possibility of our success. We were, after all, venturing into the unknown with a new doctor and potential insemination this week. Maybe the simple gesture of putting on that tank top holds extraordinary optimism.

Heidi got her period (FINALLY!!!!) ten days ago. It was not a pleasant arrival. It had apparently decided that after 45 days, the long awaited menstrual cycle would come with a vengeance. It was a mix of emotion for us...relief that it had finally come and cramping like a beotch for Heidi. I believe it may have taken her two days to be able to actually stand upright after the arrival of our long-awaited visitor.

She started a new regimen of follicle creators: Letrizol. It's a milder version of Clomid. It's also item 1 of the new protocol. Five little pills: Completed. The good news is that if it's working, it's not working on overload. There were periods of time when she was on Clomid that she felt like her little abdomen may explode. As of yet, this hasn't happened on the Letrizol (generic for Femera). (I have to write this crap down so I remember all of it; I thought I would never forget the names of her meds but as soon as her regimen changed, I somehow managed to lose everything in this little, frazzled brain of mine).

Wednesday is our bean counting day. We go back to the doc to see how many follicles Heidi's little ovaries have created. I'm optimistic it isn't too many, despite the fact that she is typically an over-achiever in this area. Incidentally, we were having a discussion the other day about her follicles (yes, her uterus, her follicles, her period, etc., these are things we talk about all the time. ALL THE TIME.) Anyway, we were talking about the very first cycle we did with Dr. Welden when she created a whopping nine follicles. We joked that we should have just inseminated then; our chances would have been amazing. That then led us to how many we would stop at for our next insemination. It's a bit of a scary thought, really. Once you've failed so many times, nine follicles doesn't seem like so many. I mean, if there's about a ten percent chance of success with IUI (which for you mathematically challenged is a ninety percent chance of failure), then logically speaking (I'm channeling Leonard Nimoy as Spock here), if we insperminated with nine follicles, would that translate into a potential ninety percent chance of success? Food for thought, people, food for thought. Worse case scenario, we have nine kids, a potential reality show on TLC and the need for all of our family members to move in with us to help us take care of nine babies. I mean, at this point, nine sounds better than none. So close...exchanging an "o" for an "i".

Sometime after Wednesday, we take a trigger shot of Ovidrel in Heidi's little tummy area. We're used to three shots to her arse so Heidi's hiney should be thankful. This one also cost about three times more than the three shots we used to take so it better be three times as good. For sure!

After the inspermination, which will hopefully be this Saturday or Sunday, Heidi begins, um, hehehe, well, she begins progesterone vaginal suppositories. She is less than excited about this and would, quite frankly, prefer the shots. However, the doc said she likes the suppositories more because they are closer to the intended "target", unlike the shot which has to go through her blood stream. Now, we've never done progesterone with IUI so this is new too...we've only done it with IVF and FET. We couldn't get these at Costco at a reduced rate, oh, no. We had to go to a compounding pharmacy and get them prepared for us. They look like huge bullets, waiting to be "shot". LOL My poor Heidi and her poor little vajayjay. So much going on there that she better get a good return on. LOL

So, to recap:

Letrizol ($9)
Ovidrel ($95)
Suppositories ($104)
Prenatals ($25)
Making a baby: Priceless (Oh come on...you knew that was coming!)

So, that's where we are. Hopefully we inseminate within the week. Hopefully ten days after that we find out we've made a baby.

Back to that tank top. Perhaps this was a sign; a positive augury. Or maybe she just grabbed a random tank top from the closet. I suppose we'll find out soon enough.

On this week's episode of "Let's Make a Baby"...

Welcome back to our program. On last weeks episode, our heroines were in search of a fertility savior to assist them in their reproductive aspirations by way of seeking a second opinion on the pros and cons of a protocol requiring the execution of a consent form. Bummm-ba-bummm. And so, the saga continues with our herioines entering a new fertility office.

Scene: New doctor's office, bigger waiting room, more staff. Slightly intimidated, our heroines wonder what they will lose in service by moving to a bigger group. They know this group has had at least one success...a handsome boy named Liam (who has the great distinction of being our godson). There are more doctors, different specialities. Surely, we can find solace in our decision to get a second opinion here. Remind me again why we feel a little guilty about there mere thought of changing doctor's? Why does it feel like we are cheating? After all, it's been two or three weeks since we've spoken with our old doctor's office. Still no call back with an answer on what Dr. Welden's opinion is on this protocol. We've texted. We've left messages. Goose eggs. This was the doctor we had been with for almost two years. We were friends with the staff. Why is it that we feel like we are cheating when they are the ones that seem like they have checked out on us?

Sidebar: We believe in the universe interceding when it deems appropriate. If the universe wants a path to be changed, it will make that change, with or without your consent. When we were contemplating making the consultation appointment, we talked about the universe interceding. We accepted that the universe decided it was time we moved on from Dr. Welden. We didn't want to. The universe decided to intercede. Apparently, it did that by breaking the dial-out feature of our fertility doctor's phone. So be it. The universe has spoken.

So, here we are back at the new place. The Reproductive Medical Group. In a waiting room. Waiting.

Now, our goal is to get a second opinion, maybe even find out what the RMG would recommend for a protocol. Standard stuff first, weight, height, vitals, yadayada. Then to the good doctor's office.

We start our conversation by talking about the protocol recommended by Dr. Braverman. My dear wife has done a wonderful job at putting together a very detailed timeline for the good doctor, letting her know what we've done up to this point, including dates, doses, and procedures. My girl, she's very articulate and detail-oriented. The doctor, who has spent some time at a little place called "Harvard" actually worked on a research protocol involving the impact of auto-immune disorders on fertility. Wait a minute...that's what we have. What? WHAT??? This is unexpected...sneaky universe, sending us to a doctor who has actually studied this stuff. Sneaky, sneaky universe. So, the good doctor, appropriately named Dr. Goodman, advises that her experience has been that ANA hasn't proved to be much of an inhibitor in fertility. Wait a minute, good doctor...that's not what we read on the internet, provider of vast amounts of information to the common medical practictioner...or us. In her words, you can find anything on the internet to match your situation and a diagnosis to match. If you get pregnant looking out the window, you can find something that says that's what causes it. Huh. What about that...huh. She says that while she thinks we put ourselves on a path exploring something that likely didn't need exploring, she would be happy to look at additional research if Dr. Braverman would provide it on any trials he's done. In her opinion, however, without additional research, she wasn't comfortable with a protocol using an off-label drug for the entire duration of the pregnancy, particularly without research that shows the impact the drug may have on a baby. Unfortunately, she wasn't able to find anything published about it. She also didn't agree with keeping Heidi on Lovenux the entire pregnancy.

That led us to asking her opinion for a protocol for Heidi...what would she do different? Remember, we love Dr. Welden. If the same protocol is recommended, we hadn't fully committed to leaving their office. We just wanted someone to to help us with the decision about Dr. Braverman's recommendation. We wanted that to be Dr. Welden, we just never heard a word back...refer to that whole universe thing. So, we're paying for a consult, let's just see what the good doctor at RMG has to say.

First, she asked about the prednisone Heidi has been on since the third IUI. Flashback scene: Dr. Welden, in conjunction with the rheumatologist, prescribed prednisone as a possible solution for the pain Heidi experienced after the first two inseminations. We did a combination prevention effort: prednisone and changing sperm banks to see if the wash affected her. We don't actually know which of those worked; just that something worked because she didn't have the same pain with subsequent IUI's. Back to present day: Dr. Goodman said she would remove the prednisone from the protocol because it was a drug that was hard on the body and even in cases where an auto-immune issue impacted fertility, they didn't always recommend prednisone as a solution. She would also change from Clomid to another drug, Femara. Per the good doctor, it was less potent than Clomid and we all know how Heidi reacts to too much Clomid...she's a fricking hen with all the eggs she creates. She would recommend progesterone shots with the IUI, which we usually only did with IVF. Finally, she would only be doing one insemination instead of two. Some food for thought.

After the consult, Heidi had to do a little cervical scrape for some type of culture. Haha...poor Heidi. It seems like every few months, there's a new stranger looking at her hoo-ha. The doctor also calculated Heidi's BMI. In the memorable and deep words of Scooby Doo, "Ruh-roh". Heidi is below her BMI. Shocker. The doctor said that while Heidi wasn't sick or mal-nutritioned because of her weight, it was a statistical fact that having a low BMI impacts fertility. She recommended that Heidi gain ten pounds. Ha! Fat chance (no pun intended). When we explained that Heidi has tried to weight for several years, she said to at least try to five pounds...eat lots of protein and drink lots of milk.

Since she was a new patient, the doctor also wanted to have Heidi tested for chicken pox. Heidi had them when she was like 7 or 8. Why did she need to be tested? I don't know. Maybe I'll use the power of the internet to find out. Maybe I shouldn't... Then, the most amusing part of the visit, we were informed that I would also have to have a blood test. For STD's. LOL I find this incredibly comical. Um, we've been having S-E-X for almost twelve years. If I had a little hoo-ha bug, she would have said bug. And, just by the mechanics, well, it just seemed unlikely. Maybe the next test will be to measure my sperm count. Funny, funny...

After our visit, we discussed next steps. We both liked the good doctor. We felt like the universe was pushing us in a new direction. We liked her feedback on Heidi's ANA. We decided we'd give her a try.

Flash forward two weeks: Heidi has been eating like a teen-age boy. She has breakfast (pancakes, cereal, or muffin), mid-morning yogurt, late morning peanut butter sandwich, lunch, mid-afternoon peanut butter sandwich, dinner and if there is even one inch of space left in her tiny tummy, dessert. Needless to say, she is always full. All of this food, for about two weeks, have netted her 3.6 lbs. Now, despite the fact that I can gain that in an afternoon after a Twix bar and 12 oz. Sprite, that's a huge accomplishment for Heidi. She has a ridiculous metabolism. If I could bottle it, we would make Bill Gates look like a pauper. I digress. In addition to all of this eating, Heidi also had to have a pap smear. Despite the fact that all of these medical professionals have been treating her vagina like the water cooler, hanging out there all the time, no one had done a pap on her. She went to a new doctor...yep, one more stranger in the ol' hoo-ha. Poor Heidi's vagina...

And so as this episode comes to an end, we preview what is next for our heroines. Pan to Heidi eating. A lot. Add dramatic music as we wait for mother nature to bring Heidi's monthly friend. Unfortunately, for two years Heidi's cycle was more regular than an Exlax salesman...guaranteed every 28-30 days. Last month, 16 days. This month...still counting. We are on day 37. We had a blood test today to see what gives. There was also a pregnancy test thrown in there. If it doesn't come soon, oddly enough, she goes back on birth control. De ja vu...birth control to get pregnant. The universe has brought us full circle.

So like any dramatic comedy, I leave you with...

To be continued...bumm-ba-bummm!

New beginnings

It's been quite the week for us. So many changes, so many difficult choices to make, so many ups and downs in our optimism. I don't suppose I ever anticipated getting a hot chick knocked up would be so hard and take so much out of us! Where to begin, where to begin...

I suppose the most logical place to begin is at the beginning...

So, last Wednesday, we had our follow-up Skype appointment with Dr. Braverman. We were anxious to talk to him because we really wanted to know what his protocol would entail. Mind you, neither Heidi or myself are doctors. We are not immunologists. However, we have fully established what her issue is and how it is going to be corrected. Granted, it's in simple black and white, not in technical terms, but we have the general idea of how we are going to rectify this challenge. See, it's simple enough...if Heidi's immune system is on overdrive, then we introduce something into her system to reduce this effect. Simple enough. Again, we are not doctors so of course we figure this out in our layman's terms, hardly using big doctor vernacular. Concept is the same though. How hard can this be? Seriously. They can put a frigging man on the moon, most certainly they can get my wife pregnant.

Now, aside from the fact that the doctor was fifty minutes late for our Skype appointment and despite the fact that we watched him sit and review our blood tests while we waited another ten minutes, because, well, Heaven forbid you do that ahead of time, and despite the fact that he talks well above our head, because, well, that's how we know he's smart...big words. Well, despite that here's what we walked away with...

1. Based on the blood test, it appears to be an immune issue. (I'm going to go ahead and throw in a "No Shit" here...)
2. Despite the exorbitant number of vials of blood Heidi donated for his blood test, he advises that he really would like to see our first rheumatologists blood test and the results of those tests. Huh...
3. Something about inflammation and interfering gamma something...I know. I should have asked for elaboration but let me lay it out on the line here...I'm a little more than annoyed and frustrated right now and I'm pretty sure anything I ask may come out sounding like I have a raging bitch disorder. I don't want that. I just don't. This could be the guy that helps us have a baby so instead, I take notes while he talks above my head and I let Heidi do the talking. Yes, shocker, I know.
4. Finally, it was confirmed that Heidi is a true, full-on bad ass. Actually, I believe what he said was that she has elevated natural killer cells. I construed that to mean that she's a bad ass. Uh, does your wife have something that contains the words "natural killer"? No. Point proven. Oh, and she can break boards with her bare hands. Exhibit B. I digress.

So, this leads to proposed protocols. First is IVIG (Intravenous immune globulin). Not really an option for us. Heidi looked up some stuff on it prior to this meeting while scouring the internet so she was already familiar with it and not interested in participating in it. In short, it entails having one or several transfusions using donor plasma to help negate the immune responses that seem to attack a fetus. Well, it involves several risks, including several transfusions that last two to twelve weeks (at approximately $4000 a pop, mind you) and take several hours per transfusion. Side effects, aside from the potential infection from donor plasma, it can cause damage to internal organs. It just wasn't something we were interested in trying because of the associated risks. We're trying to make a baby, not risk Heidi or her health.

Second suggestion - leukocyte therapy with the donor. Um, well, that won't work. We don't actually know our donor. He's a number from a sperm bank. I'm almost positive he's not going to also agree to continually send us some of his blood so we can acclimate Heidi to his, um, fluids, in the hopes that she will not send her Natural Killer Cells out to kick the ass of his sperm. Pretty sure that'll be a big fat negative from the donor.

Third option is a drug called Neupogen and Lovenox. Lovenox we knew about from our last meeting. It's actually what we were anticipating while practicing our doctoring skills referenced above. The other one was new on us. It would be administered in a daily shot from ovulation through baby delivery. It is not actually a drug created for fertility. It's actually created for cancer patients going through chemotherapy to help build their white blood cells. Fertility is an off-label use for this drug. Oh, and it's about $4000 for the full cycle. The Lovenox would also continue throughout the entire pregnancy. Per the real doctor, this protocol will increase her chance of pregnancy. We just have to sign a consent form to use it. A consent form? Whhhyyyy? . He advises he'll fax us the consent form and we can sign it and send it back. We ask a little more about him working with our fertility doctor and sending him the recommended protocol for review. Dr. Braverman says if we have our doctor email him and request the protocol, he'll send it to him. Now, mind you, each meeting with Dr. New York runs about $350 and lasts, on average, 15 minutes. I'm no math whiz, but my PC calculator estimates that to be about $23.33 per minute, I thought that maybe he could take one more fricking $23 minute and send the f**king email to our doctor. I know my wife hates this word, but SERIOUSLY??? So, yea...OK, we can go ahead and do that. I mean, we kind of have to. Why? Because we aren't actually doctors. We can't seem to do this alone.

Well, now we need to check with our fertility doctor. We've been with him for almost two years and we really need his feedback on what he thinks of this protocol. We knew from our last meeting with him that he had to be agreeable to the protocol and it couldn't be unethical or dangerous. Good...those were kind of our benchmarks as well. Alignment of thought. Excellent. So, we call the doctor's office, give a little info about our conversation with Dr. New York and ask the nurse to find out from the good doctor what his thought is on this suggested protocol.

I'm going to take a sidebar here. We love our doctor. We have friends who have told us to go to their fertility doctor (said doctor who successfully gave us our Godson). We've always declined because we love our doctor. We love their staff. We love the welcome feeling we get when we go in. We love that they cry with us when we're sad and they laugh with us when we're happy. We are friends with the nurses. We love them. Sidebar over. I just wanted to put that out there.

Back to the regularly scheduled program. So, we put out the protocol to our doctor and we wait to hear back. A day goes by, two, three...nothing back. I text. I call. I leave messages, no returned call. Over a week has passed, no response. I'm not going to elucidate here the frustration and disappointment we feel but it's overwhelming. We feel like we have such short windows between cycles and adding over a week to our not knowing is nerve wracking to us. Not responding to us, a little heart breaking.

So, it is with a sad heart that we reached out to our friends and got their doctor's name. Our next appointment is June 5th. A new beginning we supposed. Maybe this was how it was supposed to happen. We loved our doctor and his staff, but we're trying to make a baby. Almost two years later and we still haven't been successful. Maybe this was God's way of making us move on.

Incidentally, we sent a question to the new doctor about our situation and suggested protocol. They were back to us, with detailed information on their opinion about this protocol. It wasn't favorable. That's all we wanted. Feedback. Someone to help us understand the risks. Someone to guide us. I mean, I know we're doctors and all, but still...we need to just be patients.

New beginnings are on the horizon, my friends. New beginnings are on the horizon...

A (Brave)rman New World

per·sist·ence/pərˈsistəns/
Noun:
1. Firm or obstinate continuance in a course of action in spite of difficulty or opposition.
2. The continued or prolonged existence of something.

If my wife is nothing else, she is persistent. I think this journey is proof of that. Despite the burdens she has faced - emotionally, financially, and physically, she has remained persistent in her journey to attain this goal. And despite the heartbreak of the last failed attempt, her persistence continued to reign supreme. Give a persistent girl all of the resources of the world wide web and she will find something, anything, to answer her questions. That persistence has led to a discovery...something potentially big. Maybe an answer. An answer to an all-consuming question...why isn't this working?

Let me back up a little and take you back to the most recent saddest day. We hadn't decided yet what our next step would be but we were at a crossroads, to say the least. Do we keep trying? There isn't a manual on when to say when. For all intents and purposes, Heidi is perfectly fertile, perfectly reproductive. Every procedure has been met with accolades at how perfect things were...her follicles, her embryos, her lining, everything. Despite this, we continue to be met with disappointment. So, was this the point where we say "I give" and stop? What about adoption? We could try that avenue. What about becoming foster parents? Another option, for sure. What do we do? Where was the "Fertility for Dummies" guide when you needed it? What? What? What do we do?

We threw out those questions...stop, continue, adopt, foster, stop, try...Despite the pros and cons of each, there was something that wouldn't let us throw in the towel just yet. Heidi wants more than anything to have a baby. She also wants to be pregnant. Not just to have a baby, but to be pregnant, to have a baby. She said to me that most little girls dream of their wedding day when they grow up. Not her; she dreamed of being a mom (a little punch to my self-esteem since I thought I was all that she dreamed about, but apparently, no...there was this too). So, we managed to decide on that much, but we still had to figure out how we would try to accomplish that. There was IUI but we hadn't ever even gotten pregnant on the four we had tried. We could try IVF again, but the medicines were so hard on her little body and so expensive. If we decided on IVF, we wouldn't be able to try again right away; we'd have to take some time to save more money (we did briefly consider a "knock up my wife" fundraiser...feel free to send your payment now!).

While we hadn't yet decided on what to do, Heidi took to the internet to see what she could find. Remember when I said she just "knew" things? Her intuition is good, I mean, really good. She can't always pinpoint why she feels something, but she's usually pretty spot on when she feels it. So, this voice known as Little Heidi (my new nickname for her intuition) kept nagging at her, bringing her back to her positive ANA blood test. That's the ONLY thing that wasn't perfect. We started prednisone after the second IUI to stop the pain, but maybe that was just masking something. Maybe there was something else that a positive ANA might affect.

Sitting in my office one day, Heidi walks in and puts a piece of paper on my desk and said "Read this.". I read it (she's very authoritarian, if she says read something, I'm reading it). Yep...I'm pretty familiar with this...it was all that Heidi had gone through from IUI, to IVF, to miscarriage, to positive ANA. I said "Yea? This is about you. So?" Her response "It's not about me. It's about someone else. And she got pregnant." What the what??? My persistent wife had searched the internet and found a testimonial about a woman just like her, who had the same history as her, who had the same auto-immune issue as her, who got pregnant. Heidi told me that she had found a website for a specialist in New York...a reproductive immunologist. He had a lot of information on his website about the affects of ANA on failed pregnancy. Again, I say what the what??? I think that night we looked through every page on his website. We watched every video he had posted. We thought...maybe this could be our answer. What if? So, Heidi filled out the sixteen page questionnaire and sent it in to the specialists office. And we waited. While we were waiting, Heidi happened to shut off her phone because it was acting possessed. During that 2.67 minutes that her phone was off, the doctor called and left a message. Really? That was the window you called in? Really, really? Anyhow, he left an encouraging message, saying to call the office to schedule an appointment and "do not despair". Our new mantra...

We decided to talk to our fertility doctor to see what he thought. We scheduled an appointment for April 10th (or somewhere around there). We also scheduled an appointment with the reproductive immunologist for April 20th. Since our private jet is in the shop, we scheduled a Skype appointment (God love technology!).

Our visit with our fertility doctor goes...well...oddly. We presumed he would immediately be on-board with our discovery and excitement about meeting with a specialist. We were a little shocked to find out that he knew about various reproductive immunologists in other states and had never mentioned any of that to us. We were a little disappointed that he seemed to be resistant to our discussing this with this new doctor. He kept saying that we hadn't tried that many times, not enough times to count as multiple failures (I disagree. I would say six tries sufficiently demonstrated multiple failures). He cited statistics that eventually, with enough tries, Heidi would get pregnant...there was nothing wrong with her. It was...odd. Heidi cried and began to put the information she found on the specialist away. To her, the conversation was over. I pulled the information from Heidi's hand and gave it to Dr. Welden. We talked a little more, about how if everything was perfect, why wasn't she pregnant? What about the pain of the first two IUI's? What about the fact that the only thing not perfect was the ANA? Dr. Welden started to warm up a little to the idea of a specialist. He admitted that he wasn't the expert in ANA and that he would, in fact, be willing to work with the specialist as long as everything he recommended was ethical and wouldn't put Heidi in danger. Incidentally, these are also my criteria so I think it's safe to say we were finally on the same page.

On April 21st, we meet, face-to-face, well, via Skype, Dr. Jeffrey Braverman, reproductive immunologist. We had prepared a list of questions to ask, everything we could think of. Before we could ask our questions, he asked his. There were many. One of those questions to Heidi was "Why are you trying IVF?" Her response: "Because I'm married to a woman and want to have a baby." His response: "That's great, but why IVF?" LOL Outage from the closet unnecessary...it wasn't the intent of the question. LOL...my wife. Then he began talking about what he thought about our situation. It became pretty technical...talk of natural killer cells. Talk of Interleukin 10 from endometriosis. Tumor necrosis factor created by a reactive oxygen species. Activation of her compliment system and the resulting attack on the embryo. It was a little like speaking to someone who spoke a different language. Here's what we did understand...there's hope. It would seem that it is likely that the ANA is creating a sci-fi like attack on anything we stick into Heidi...sperm, embryo's, you name it. Her over-achieving immune system attacks it like it's a flu virus, leaving it incapable of surviving. If this is in fact what is happening, there is a protocol that she can be on that will prevent this reaction. The down side is that they are daily injections and would likely need to be continued throughout her entire pregnancy. Well, speaking for Heidi's backside, it's a small price to pay.

What now? We have to do some blood tests and it'll take about three weeks to get the results. We received the "kits" in the mail today to take to a lab. Heidi will generously donate about six vials of blood, or pretty much all of her supply. In three weeks, we have another appointment with the doctor and find out what our protocol is. That's that. Fingers crossed. Optimism is back. Positivity is back. I'll leave you with Dr. Braverman's words to us during our consultation..."You will have a baby at the end of this."

That's all we ever wanted.

Big Fat Negative

After yet another ten days of waiting, we found ourselves in very familiar territory. The home pregnancy test we took at home before the blood test was a big fat negative. We tried to talk ourselves into feeling like it was just too early for an EPT to pick up something as important as this, but, well, we knew. Heidi knew, to be exact. She has always been very intuitive. She knew she was going to miscarry. How? I don't know. She just knew. So, while I tried to reassure her that there was still hope this time, she already knew.

I sent a text to our nurse, asking that she tell me when the blood test results came in. I wanted to be able to prepare Heidi for whatever the result would be. I don't know why. She knew. She just knew.

When the call came in, prepare I did. I think I didn't want to hear from Pam because it would finalize what we already felt. If she didn't call, it meant there was still hope. When the call came, the hope was gone. Again. Much like waiting, you'd think we would be better at preparing ourselves. You'd think we would be better at hearing the final words..."I'm sorry. I just heard from the lab. The test came back negative." Oh the cursed words that we have come to hate and dread. And now, I had to tell Heidi, for the sixth time, that all that she wanted was not to be. How was it that the most amazing, kindest person I know can't get just this one thing? While I would never wish this on anyone, I pondered the fairness in unwanted pregnancies. I pondered the fairness of parents who didn't want their babies. Parents who killed their children instead of treasuring them. And here we were, wishing for nothing more that just to have that simple, natural event take place.

I called Heidi into my office. Adding a little insult to injury was the fact that I had to tell her while we were at work. She came in. She knew. But knowing still didn't stop the tears from coming. Even with only the tiniest shred of hope, there was still a shred. And I was the person who took that away from her. Sitting in my office, she cried. My heart broke. It broke for her and her immeasurable sadness. It broke for us and one more failure in our endeavor. It broke with the feeling of helplessness I felt in that moment. I'd always been the strongest proponent of positive thinking and here I was, feeling defeated. Feeling like I had nothing more to offer. No more words of hope.

And so our day continued. Much like any other day, back to work, but with broken hearts.

Tales from the Ice Age (Or...Defrosting Frozen Embryos)

So, when we last left off, we were impatiently awaiting the arrival of a little thing called ovulation. On top of the big ovulation moment, we were also anxiously awaiting the transfer and more importantly, to learn how many embryos would survive the thaw. To save you the trouble of surfing back through previous posts, we had five frozen embryos waiting to be transferred into the warm innards of Ms. Heidi's uterus. Five...not bad numbers except that it was highly unlikely they would all survive the thaw. So, here we were, once again in the throes of antici...pation (said with the same articulation as Dr. Frank-n-Furter from Rocky Horror). We wouldn't know how many would survive until right before the anticipated transfer. Just to throw some irrelevant statistics out there, we have spent a total of sixty days throughout this process waiting for pregnancy test results. From time of insemination or IVF to blood test...a total of sixty days, that's nine plus weeks, two whole months. Just waiting. And here we were again...waiting. One would think that we would have become professional at it. But no. We are horrible at waiting.

As we wait, we continue our experimentation with eastern medicine. Our second acupuncture on March 6th had more needles added in addition to those previously added to the tummy. Somehow, eastern medicine says that adding hollow needles to Heidi's ears, that tiny spot between her eyes, along her hairline, and a few in the leg will help the fertility gods bless her baby making parts. This episode of sci-fi acupuncture finds Heidi wrapped in a silver mylar blanket for warmth. We were also introduced to a special Chinese herb cocktail via some kind of charcoal looking thing that was lit on fire and blown out and circled around the needles in her belly. We are told it is, in fact, not voo-doo. We are not so sure but hey, at this point, we're willing to do whatever it takes, even if it means summoning some unknown voodoo god. The acupunturist assures us that instead of voodoo, the ancient Chinese believed that this particular concoction would be absorbed through the acupuncture needles to increase circulation in the reproductive parts. The Chinese referred to it as getting the cold out of the belly. Yep. That's what we did. We got the cold out of the belly.

On March 9th, we go back to Dr. Weldon's office. We are so excited to be back! Heidi bakes brownies for the girls (because we all know fertilization and implantation is more successful with chocolate!). We are welcomed with big hugs from Pam and Tana (our favorite nurses...ever!). Then we head back to the exam room. Now, it takes a moment for us to realize that the last time we were in this room, we got pregnant. It takes my breath away, even now, thinking about it. The last time...pregnant. The only thing that could pull us back from this reverie of sadness was, of course, Pam and Tana, entering the room as my wife sat half-naked on the exam table because they missed us so much. They wanted to come visit while we waited on Dr. Weldon. Did I mention Heidi was half naked? Bottom half? I did...

So, after some half-naked chitchat, Dr. Weldon came in to do his doctorly business. He measured Heidi's uterine lining, which was right where she was supposed to be on a natural cycle. He made sure she had a dominant follicle…she did. Heidi, if you fail to remember, is an over-achiever. She wouldn't dare have a less than dominant follicle! That's just how she rolls. As an aside, not in a creepy way, but in a grandfatherly way, Dr. Weldon said Heidi had a cute little uterus while pointing to it on the screen. How many of you can say that? That's right. My wife has dominant follicles and a cute uterus. Booyah!

Off we go back home to wait for Heidi's LH surge (fancy talk for starting her ovulation). We invested in some home ovulation predictor tests (which, by the way, we totally should have bought stock in...those and preggar tests). Heidi starts her regiment of pre-natal vitamins, baby aspirin, and prednisone. Her much anticipated progesterone injections will begin after ovulation starts.

We work on positivity. We know that this time it will work...if we could just get to the transfer!

Well, Heidi's ovulatory cycle decided to be a little stubborn. It may be that she wasn't jacked up on a bunch of drugs before this...we relied on good, old-fashioned ovulation (the only thing missing was an icky boy!!!). Since we did not get a positive LH surge over the weekend, Dr. Weldon wanted us to come back in on Monday to take another look and make sure Heidi didn't sneak in ovulation without being predicted. She did not. Instead, she got a little gift from the nurse...a HCG trigger shot that will make her ovulate. We schedule "The Transfer" for Monday the 19th. She starts her progesterone injections on Thursday. Ah...I have missed these special moments with Heidi, injecting stuff into her tiny-hiney. We still had special Disney bandaids for the occassion. We go back to Dr. Weldons on Saturday for a blood test to measure the progesterone in case it needs to be adjusted...she's good to go. Why? Uh, because I'm the injector and I don't mess up! Intended in the most appropriate way possible, I can stick an ass better than most. :P

On March 14th, Heidi goes back, again, for a little eastern medicine. We are planning on having this session, then one immediately before and immediately after the transfer. Transfer day will be a busy day for Heidi...acupuncture, transfer, acupuncture, and hopefully a nap!

March 19th arrives. Transfer Day. The big day. The day starts. Early. Our transfer is scheduled for 9:30. That means we have to be in Tampa for acupuncture in time to do that and get to Lutz. We get the first round of sticky stuff (Heidi even took one in the ear with her...good luck, you know!). Then we head to Dr. Welden's office. Sitting in the waiting room is long. Remember, we don't even know yet if we can do the transfer because we don't know if the embryo's are going to survive the thaw. They don't do the thaw until close to the time of the transfer. So, to be a little punny, Heidi was on pins and needles for the second time that day. (Ha...PUN-ny. Get it? Moving on...)

So, Dr. Bill, our embryologist comes into the waiting room. Now, you have to know that Dr. Bill is pretty straight-laced. Very solemn and doctorly like. He comes into the waiting room looking somber and prepared to deliver bad news. Yep. That's when my heart dropped. Pretty sure Heidi's did to. Damn Dr. Bill and his somber persona. He came out to advise that three embryos survived. That is not the look of surviving embryo's! Damn you Dr. Bill! In typical Dr. Bill fashion, his somber look was not indicative of doom. Instead, he wanted to know if we wanted to see the embryo's before the transfer. He said that we could, but he preferred to not expose them to light too much. We were fine with just a picture of the kiddies. We weren't interested in overexposure here! He also informed us of the great quality of the embryo's...two were AAA rated (I think that's the right rating) and the third was even starting to hatch! . So...we were golden (eggs)! We could do the transfer. We went back and much like the previous IUI's, Heidi stripped down and Dr. Welden got his insemination on. Dr. Bill was there holding our embryo's in the tube (kind of makes you think of a test tube baby, doesn't it?). Once Dr. Welden found his way in, the embryo's were set free in Heidi's uterus.

Afterward, back to the acupuncturist. Second time in one day. At this point, Heidi just shoots water out of various holes in her body because of all of the needle marks. I was only slightly envious as she also received a massage. I mean, this is all about her, but there was some tension kicking in my shoulders that could have stood to be rubbed out!

And so we wait. Again. Ten days until the blood test. I think we finally move from amatuer waiting to professional waiting.

On pins and needles...

Ah...we are back. After a much needed reprieve from baby making and a couple of snowboard trips to soothe the mind, body and soul, here we are. Back and ready to make 2012 the year of the baby (we have our own Chinese calendar...year of the snowboard, year of the baby, you get it). It's been a few months and Heidi's uterus has enjoyed some well deserved break time. Since August, we have not taken any blood from her little body. We have not injected any hormones or spermies into her little body. We have not done any of the lesbian make-a-baby rituals. We are starting fresh and with a new mission. Well, same mission, but with renewed spirit.

When I was a younger lad, I had in my mind the idea that all lesbians were earthy and one with nature. I assumed they all wore Birkenstocks and had cats. They were all recyclers and aligned with Mother earth. We are not that kind of lesbian. Well, we have one cat but we don't really like him so I don't think that counts. However, desperate times call for desperate measures and so we find ourselves exploring more holistic opportunities. Ancient opportunities. Eastern opportunities. I speak of the ancient mystery known as fertility acupuncture. Yes, once again I am subjecting my self-respecting wife to the proverbial prick. Or ten. In the form of small acupuncture needles.

How, you ask, did it occur to us to explore the option of fertility acupuncture? Well, it was quite accidentally, actually. My beloved was perusing the pages of People magazine when she happened upon an article about Celine Dion (near, far, wherever you are...have fun getting that out of your head). In the article, Celine discussed the trials and tribulations of getting pregnant via IVF. I believe she tried somewhere along the lines of seven times unsuccessfully. In that article, she said she had fertility acupuncture and that was the time it worked. Coincidence? I don't know but we did a little research (thank goodness for the Internet and friends who enjoy the occasional "prick") and decided, eh, it can't hurt (of course, we confirmed that with our nurse and the acupuncturist and additional research). So, we made an appointment with an acupuncturist who worked under a MD (a little more reassuring for us, that whole medical license component) and opened our minds to learn about eastern medicine.

Not a bad appointment. The acupuncturist was very informative and very knowledgeable. She discussed the particular protocol tested several times across the pond in England and advised their office followed that same protocol. She discussed the differences in pregnancy rates between a test group of IVF participants with and without the fertility acupuncture. She gave us some handouts to read whilst we relaxed in a bubble bath...really, the best time to learn about eastern medicine. She was a super fast talker so I spent most of the consultation leaning forward, listening hard. Apparently, however, it was no effort for Heidi to understand her because as she advised me "I'm used to listening to you". LOL (Note to self: work on pacing the speed at which I talk.) The acupuncturist gave us the basic 411 on acupuncture and how it worked...think meridians, think blocked rivers with a "dam" problem with flows, think the five elements...really, it narrowed down to ancient eastern medicine in practice for about 3000 years and no one really "knows" how it works. Fantastic...sign us up.

And so, on our first date with the acupuncturist, we went all the way. An interesting experience but surprisingly pain-free. At least for me. :) Actually, for little Heidi as well. There were about thirteen needles in her baby making region (specifically, between her ribs and pelvic bone) and two needles in each ankle. Four of the needles on her uterus (uty, for short) had positive and negative proby-things.




And the best part for Heidi (or at least it would have been for me), were the little electrodes placed ever so gently on Heidi's ears that gave her the same head effect as a glass or two of wine, meant to relax her. And relax her it did.




And if that weren't enough, the whale song music in the background finished her off. She sat there for about twenty-five minutes, practicing her visualization. And laying on a table with a bunch of needles sticking out of her. Let me just say again, for the record, that while she said it didn't hurt, I continue to be amazed by the lengths my amazing wife will go through to make this happen. She didn't hesitate to explore and try this option. She laid there, listening to whales sing, visualizing, and hoping. This is one of the many, many, many reasons I am hopelessly in love with her. She amazes me.

Back to the pins and needles...so, after her first acupuncture experience, she is feeling pretty relaxed and a little tired...good stuff! That's what the acupuncturist said would happen. And we made an appointment for this Tuesday and plan to get the deed done the day of the embryo transfer, both before and after the transfer, in hopes of increasing our odds a little more.

What? What's that, you say? Transfer? What the hell else is going on? Well, we came back from vacation ready to go. Anxious and ready to make a baby. So, we aren't wasting any time. The first day of acupuncture was also the first day of Heidi's cycle. Day One. This Friday is Day Ten. So, we have an appointment with the fertility doctor for an ultrasound to measure the thickness of Heidi's uty and see where she is in the ovulation cycle. If she's ripe, we get a trigger shot and in a week, we go in for the transfer. If you remember, we have five frozen embryos. We're going to try to use those, all five if they survive the thaw, and see if that makes a baby.

What are our challenges between now and then? Well, not too much...this particular cycle won't have near the meds the full IVF had. We have a couple of acupuncture appointments (maybe I can try to sneak one in for myself...see if I can't cure this back pain) and then after the ultrasound, a few hcg shots and maybe some progesterone. Our big concern, aside from the obvious "Will we get pregnant?" comes with the thaw. We won't know if the embryos will survive the thaw until the day of the transfer. So, my dearest friends (and strangers alike), keep your fingers crossed and send positive vibes to our little spermsicles that they may defrost and anxiously implant into a warm, prepared, happy and healthy uty.

Here we go again. Eastern medicine meets western medicine. We will go to the ends of the earth to make this happen. Hopefully, this will be our time...the year of the baby.