Friday, June 11, 2004

I'm feeling pretty good so far. My PMS is enough to contend with and this seems a lot easier to deal with -- just feeling a little queasy (almost barely) and then there are I guess some light cramps. My breasts are a little fuller but you would have to be intimate with them to notice, they actually hurt less than they did last week when I was PMS-ing.

Honestly for those of you who haven't been pg before it isn't earth shattering necessarily (which in my head it always seemed like it was). It is like a natural progression of the menstrual cycle which I usually describe as being a test cycle each month to help things tuned up and ready to go.
I often felt desperate as medical practitioners offered up:

"Have you considered adoption?"
"I'm sure he has antibodies; it is very common post-vasectomy reversal. You won't be able to conceive without IVF/ICSI"
"We won't treat you unless you have your fibroid removed"

I was a wreck from the time I found out about my fibroid until 18 months later when I changed gears completely by:

Trying another RE who it turns out I love
Started going to acupuncture weekly
Started going to counseling several times a month
Got us on more vitamins and supplements
Reduced my stress level
Went for chiropractic (which helped with an old back injury)
and then we tried, and tried, and tried, and tried, and tried, and tried every cycle as much as we were able to fit in prior to ovulation

I'm amazed that we did it but here I am 6 days late and the tests say it is a done deal. Don't give up hope and if you want to stay natural just know that it is a game of odds and that it just might take time.
I'm off to get my next blood sample. The nurses were total flakes yesterday. My doc said on Wed to call on Thursday to find out if I should do supplemental progesterone. I had to call twice and I didn't hear back until 5pm yesterday that I should but by then they couldn't call the order in until today. I've been using my natural progesterone cream in the meantime. My mother had low progesterone when she was pregnant with her first baby so I think it might be a genetic thing that we aren't such great producers of progesterone.

Thursday, June 10, 2004

We'll tell one grandma over Father's Day weekend since she'll be in town (she will be so excited since my partner is her favorite and she's been wanting lots of grandkids to spoil). My parents I think I'll wait until the end of the month when I'm in New York for a family wedding.

I got my blood work back and my HCG (beta?) is 435 and my progesterone was 18.4. I'm waiting to hear if they want me to supplement progesterone but I can feel the extra hormones -- especially in my bbs which are feeling a little fuller and less sore than what I experience normally with PMS. I told you all back
when my CD21 test came back low in November that my suspicion was
that low progesterone was part of my issue. The elevated progesterone so far actually makes this pregnant part easier than my PMS -- my breasts are full but less sore and my mood is better. Normally I go from grouchy and sore to feeling hot in my lower abdomen and weak when I get my period. Are you sure my period isn't going to show up on my unexpectedly? Should I keep running around with sanitary products in my handbag?

I saw my acupuncturist this morning as well and told him that my
fibroid was smaller. I didn't tell him about the pg and asked him to
check my pulses (this is something that you have to find a good
acupuncturist to do but it is amazing what he can sense from both
wrists). He checked first on the left, then on the right and then he
looked at me and asked "are you pregnant?" I've been going for
treatment since January and it has really helped calm my system down. I tend to be a bit frenetic and very sensitive -- work and emotional stress knock me down quickly and I get sick a lot because of it. With acupuncture I feel a lot more even. We're going to give treatment a break for a few weeks while my body adjusts to the pregnancy.

Because of my fibroid and TTC I've gotten quite attuned to the
different pains and sensations in my lower pelvis. I would have
fibroid related pain on the right side, a couple inches to the right
of my belly button in a vertical channel. Last night and today I feel a sensation more in the center but just to the left of my belly
button. Not pain but something is going on in there and it feels like the front, side and back of my uterus that are involved. In
acupuncture they say that things are being reorganized.

Wednesday, June 09, 2004

I'm just back from the RE. He said it was too early to see a gestational sac and it is really early still. I told him that we were pleased just to see that our equipment works!!!

My fibroid was a bit smaller too no 9cm measurements this time. It was only 6x7cm.

They did a blood draw to check my progesterone and HCG. I'll have the latter in an hour or so. Progesterone will have to wait until tomorrow.

I told them that I wasn't sure if they would show me the door since we got a positive pg on our own and they said no, that's not how they work. The doc was pleased about the positive pregnancy test just by itself. I thanked him for making me feel like my fibroid wasn't a life sentence and that in that he helped alleviate my stress and that surely that influence helped out as well. He said he would happily take credit. I also asked him to please tell the UR in the same clinic (the one who did the reversal) that he had another success story.

My partner is so excited he's already telling me what to eat and not eat. Let's hope it is a keeper because we are so ready for this change in our life.

I just wanted to add that I too used every last positive posting about MFI successes to have hope even though doctors sometimes made it feel like there wasn't any reason for any. If there is anything I can do for any of you to help make you feel better supported please let me know.
I tell you I don't really feel that different. My breasts are a touch fuller and less sore than normal, I'm late, I had a touch more of acne on my chin (but I get a little of that during PMS usually), slight crampy feelings and feeling full like just before my period. I kept asking my partner "what if we are?" and he would say "do you think you are" and I would say "I don't feel like it but I've never been before".

The expected due date falls right around my sister's birthday in February and she's in training to become a doula. When I told her she said that she'd have to come back from France (she's going to be teaching there next year) to help attend the birth.

Things that may have helped (other than luck, God and timing):

Iron supplements
Acupuncture
Happier about work, more fulfilled
Meditation
Giving up hope
Chiropractic adjustments (to help heal my back from falling down the stairs 2 months ago and also problems from a car accident 4 years ago)
Lots of prayers from family, and friends

With my fibroid my uterus was already estimated to be comparable to a 4 month pregnancy (crazy I know) but I'm thin and it is amazing how much extra stuff you can fit in the abdomen without it showing. If this holds then I imagine I'll start showing sooner rather than later. Risks with the fibroid are:

Blood supply to the embryo/fetus/placenta can be compromised since fibroids are so demanding. This can happen even if the placenta isn't placed over the fibroid and can result in miscarriage.

The fibroid can go through rapid growth because of the pregnancy hormones. This can cause the fibroid to outgrow its blood supply and some of the fibroid tissue starts to die and this is supposed to be quite painful. I've heard of women having to be on bed rest and narcotics for 1-3 weeks because of this. Still, some fibroids don't grow during pregnancy, and some even shrink.

The fibroid can cause premature labor which can result in a preemie or in a pregnancy loss. There are no guarantees.

I'm feeling lucky though somehow. Let's just keep praying that it’s all good.
So today is full of all kinds of good news for me and my partner. We
just got our first pregnancy test positive, confirmed by the doctor's office just a little while ago (my pregnancy hormone level is very good). We've been trying, actively trying, for over 2 years. My partner had a vasectomy reversal in 1998 and we had a sperm morphology issue as well. This happened though completely naturally, the old fashioned way.

I already had an appointment scheduled with the RE (reproductive
endocrinologist) today to check on the size of my fibroid since I've
been going for acupuncture treatment since January. I was worried
because the ultrasound wouldn't be accurate since my period hadn't
arrived yet (with its corresponding drop in the estrogen level). The
fibroid in February measured 6 x 6.5 x 9 cm, today it measured about
6x7. Who knows what's up with it but at least it didn't get larger!!

We are really excited that the "equipment" works and have our fingers crossed.

I don't feel pregnant at all and honestly, I even told the doctor,
when you have a heavy period and it doesn't arrive when you expect it you feel like you are walking on eggshells until it does. I guess the biggest thing is that my PMS symptoms are backing off and I don't feel hormonal or yucky. So far my impression is that this is all a good thing hormonally.
It is 6:00AM and my partner pushes me to move over and mumbles that I'm too hot. Too hot I think, that's kinda odd if I'm just about to get my period. So I take my temp and it is 98.6 - really high for being woken up an hour and a half early. So, I figure 34 day cycle, temp a little warm, still no sign of my period, I guess that warrants a pregnancy test. So I go down the hall to the bathroom and do. And I watch the paper fibers being saturated and it looks oddly bluish and it settles into two very clear blue lines. That's right, my first positive.

I have no idea what we are up against at this point because of my fibroid but I wanted to share. We have been trying for over 2 years, unprotected sex since February 2000 as well. This seems amazing and I don't really feel different. Not really. I guess that visit to the doctor will be for something else this afternoon.

Tuesday, June 08, 2004

Our UR didn't check for antibodies until we asked. That was frustrating to say the least since one RE (the male head of a university fertility center in our area -- who fired me as a patient b/c I didn't want to have abdominal surgery) I was talking with assumed we had an anti-body issue without any tests being done.

My partner likes to think that the doctor's know it all and I was raised to question doctor diagnoses (my dad went to medical school and was in practice as a dentist so we had a different perspective on the medical system). He's open to my research but one RE (a woman) told him a year ago in Feb that he probably always had a morphology issue and that it was genetic and there was nothing to be done about it -- yet the UR works in the same clinic and he is optimistic for us in spite of the bad morph numbers. (We don't have antibodies thank goodness -- we've got enough working against us).

Here's the fact sheet from the ASRM site about Diagnostic Testing for Male Factor Infertility
Still waiting. I did ovulate a little late this month on CD 17 instead of 15 like usual. Work stress or the stress of my mother visiting I'll never know. I don't think I'm pg though but I'll keep a candle lit just in case I'm one of those people who can't tell their pg. I'm so sensitive to my hormones that seems unlikely. I do feel wacky moody today, holding it together as a professional at the office but feeling weepy and the like -- signs that aunt flo approaches.

I do have this ultrasound scheduled tomorrow and it won't be accurate at all unless I get my period. When the hormones drop at the beginning of the cycle my fibroid shrinks and that's what we use as baseline. It takes a couple days for the effect though. I think it is still growing although I don't want it to. I'm fighting messed-up DNA at this point in time though; that just keeps replicating itself. Blah! I'm still shooting for trying the IUI with the fibroid in place. Don't want to go through major abdominal surgery if I can help it.

Monday, June 07, 2004

My cycle average length is 30 days but the longest one since I've been charting was 33 days. I could be hours or minutes away from it starting though. Here's to cycles longer than 30 days though.