(*chirp-chirp*)

There isn't much going on these days- drama filled, yes. Anything I can't handle- no. Things have taken a step down, the atmosphere feels clearer. My sleep pattern is all out of whack still, and I'm a little incoherent and forgetful lately.

I finish the Clomid today, and then on with the infinite waiting to see what happens. Again, not holding my breath here- this is sort of a mini-break for us (a chance to Ov, but no monitoring or anything).

Someone asked about injectables last post- well, we use about $2,000 worth of injectables a cycle, because I'm even pretty resistant to them. Coupled with all other out of pocket costs, my high miscarriage rate... we aren't willing to throw that kinda of money down again. Our third injectable cycle resulted in a pregnancy, yes- but, it was the shortest lived one yet. And that was after $6,000 worth of meds on three cycles (not counting cost of blood work, or ultrasounds, trigger shot, progesterone, etc... first cycle the monitoring cost more than the medicine would have, the other two cycles were with another clinic and not as exuberant).

Now, I did get all my meds for free on those 3 cycles (donated, and through a drug company's program) but I can't get them free again. And knowing how I respond, and how many cycles it took... three cycles of injectables could be almost half the cost of adoption... but with adoption, we have more of a guarantee that we'll walk out with a living child. Whereas we paid all this, did all this, and even if pregnancy is achieved... there's no guarantee I would get a take home baby.

My doctor would love for me to do injectables again, she really wants us to consider it- but with my odds? I can't put that kind of money down again without a heavy heart. I'd just rather put the big money towards adoption at this point- I'm tired of waiting to be a mother. And while, yes, if it worked out it would totally be worth it- the other side of the coin is this- if it doesn't, we're out all that money and even further away from being able to afford to adopt.

That's one of the reasons we decided not to try IVF. If I had medical insurance coverage for infertility, I would jump on an injectable cycle or IVF. But since we don't and are saving the money ourselves, and calculating the cost of everything, it comes down to the ratio for potential success versus how much further off that will offset us from our end goals- becoming parents.

I don't know when trying to conceive became such a big math and accounting problem- but it did. Ha, another thing they didn't warn you about in s.ex-ed class- right? If you have $3,000 and it takes $16,000 for infant adoption versus your risk factor of 0/3 pregnancy success rate, coupled with the stubborn ovary factor; which is the better deal?

See, incoherent right here. Not very awake at all...

Given our current options, we have opted to stick with cheaper tries as we save money for adoption. Saving is going slllooowwww. But, after these medical bills are paid off and such, it should go much better. Right now, I have more faith in adoption. I don't have any faith in my reproductive organs- they're evil bitches.

At least, that's the conclusion I've come to.

So, still sticking with the current plans for now.

And for some reason I agreed to keep working the graveyard shift until, like, next year... uh, yeah. I'm very incoherent all the time, and exhausted. But I really can't complain- I check the security cameras, I listen for the crisis line, make sure that the residents in the shelter have what they need... and I spend most of the night doing whatever I want to (usually watching St.ar Tr.ek or other stuff online... like right now). I'm not really willing to give up such a leisurely position as of yet... I'll just keep looking until next year, and see what comes up in the meantime. I figure, I just spent 3 years trying to conceive and failing, the last 5 years pulling myself through college full-time while working 20-40 hours a week... I now only work two days a week, and other than appointments and cleaning the house- I am unencumbered. I deserve this break. I need this break. So while the hours are not ideal, I can not complain. It's what I need right now. And I am soaking it up.

August is almost here again-

Had my baseline the other day. Unfortunately the corpus luteum cyst was still hanging around, boo. However, she ran my estrogen and a beta to check on things- and since the estrogen was low and the beta was negative, we were given the go ahead. We told her what our revised plan was, and she agreed to it.

So I start 200mg Clomid today, and we see what happens. Or what doesn't happen. Next month we go back to Femara.

August is almost here. I should have been due around the first. Ungh.

Also, my niece was stillborn at the end of August. My niece should have been turning twelve next month. That's so surreal. She was so beautiful; her skin was so dark, with black curly hair, and pudgy little cheeks. I still wonder who she would have looked more like, her mom or her dad. My sister's oldest son takes after her, her youngest after his father. I think Amariah would have taken after her grandmother though, like my other niece. I would love to have seen her grow though, I wonder which traits she would have gotten. She was multi-racial, African American-Native American- Caucasian. I think she had her grandmother's cheek structure, my sister and her husband both had black hair so that was from anyone and everyone. The curls were from her father though, because my sister's hair was straight as can be. Would she have been tall, or short like all of us? My sister is only 5' 1", my mother 5', grandma was only 4' 11". We used to joke that we were "breeding our line up taller" since each generation married a taller man, and each new generation got a few inches taller. No one's laughing now. Would she have had my sister's smile? I wonder what her eyes would have looked like- they're closed in the only existing photograph of her. She was born sleeping, time frozen in place. She never changes, she never grows up, she never opens her eyes. I bet they would have been beautiful- beautiful eyes for the beautiful baby girl.

Plans-

After a long talk last night we made some new plans. Still saving money for adoption (not making much progress right now due to some medical bills, but once those are paid off we should be making more progress). But instead of doing the monitored Femara next cycle we are going to ask for an unmonitored Clomid cycle.

We decided we do not want to take a break just yet, mostly because I just had that ovarian drilling done. Any benefits from that only last 6 months to a year, with it getting less effective the further out you get from it. That surgery is not meant to be redone, and it was a lot for me to go through. I don't want to waste any of it's effects, and we're almost 5 months out from it now. Also, I do not ovulate on my own. Which means no chance of having a baby at all on my own... I'm pretty much my own birth control. So while I'm not getting pregnant on treatments right now, at least I have a chance. We don't want to give that chance up just yet.

My husband really wants to keep doing the Femara because I'm responding to it so well- he wants to make the most of whatever cycles we can get now, because we're both so used to me not responding at all. This is something new for us. We've had four tries to get pregnant this year. To put this in perspective... our first year trying to conceive we didn't have any tries, at all, because I didn't ovulate once. We then sought fertility treatments. Our second year I ovulated three times. Third year, I ovulated twice. Four months into our new year of trying to conceive, and I've ovulated four times. Four times in four months! That is a record my friends. Even when I was younger and cycling on my own, I only got my period every 2-3 months. For once, I'm actually responding to treatments and ovulating. No wonder he's getting his hopes up too.

I talked him into the unmonitored Clomid. It'll be a nice reprieve. If the doctor will let us do this, anyway. We know this has worked in the past, because my second pregnancy was from an unmonitored Clomid cycle. We won't have as much pressure because of no monitoring, I can chart ovulation by basal body temperature to see if I respond (which, there's no guarantee that I will), and it will also save us some money. That's my logic at least.

After that we will do 2-3 Femara cycles. And after that, we decided to take a break from November until March. A break would be nice; it would give me time to focus solely on my weight loss and not trying to conceive, time to just recharge, and we don't really want to drive an hour through the snow and ice for monitoring another winter. After the break we will re-evaluate, and most likely try Femara and/or Clomid again.

Plans may change again, but that's where things stand right now. New cycle should be starting tonight or tomorrow, I had a major temperature drop in my basal body temperature today. We'll see what my doctor says about our plans. And I guess we'll go from there.

Blllaaaahhhh-

Still negative. No surprise there.

Blogger messed up and I went to publish some comments and it deleted them... grrrrr. So if your comment isn't on the last post, I didn't mean to delete it. Blogger is being a jerk.

I've been having a pretty bad weekend. Personal crapfest that I won't go into.

But the cold front finally hit, so that's good at least. Up until a few hours ago my husband, my little brother, and I were kinda just sitting around looking like we were going to melt. My cats were all laying around like deflated balloons, the poor babies. Of course, the heat is better than a blizzard... I hate snow.

I'm in a kind of crappy place at the moment because of the crappy weekend. I sort of feel like just yelling, "Fuck it all." to life right now. I'm just really angry about something, and it happening on top of my negative and my back pain and the amazingly high heat index for the past few days... yeah. Angry, upset, annoyed, sad, depleted, numb, blah.

I have some decisions to make about what we're going to do after this next Femara cycle. It's either keep going, switch back to Clomid for a cycle or two, take a break until spring, or go ahead and quit like we keep saying we're going to. Obviously we're not totally ready to quit, since we're still doing treatments- mostly because it's going to take us a long time to get to where we can afford the adoption fees. Partly because, apparently, a small part of hope is still alive. Not much, but it's there. I think the fact that I've been responding to treatments has contributed to the latter... I've never ovulated this much in a year. It's really weird.

Bitter-

I tested earlier today than I intended, mostly because my back really fucking hurts. And I really wanted to take something stronger than acetaminophen. It was negative, and I took some Naproxen Sodium. It probably won't help, I'm pretty sure I know what I did to my back (or rather my spine) again. Spinal inflammation sucks. It sucks bad. Sitting hurts, standing hurts, walking can hurt, and even laying the fuck down hurts. Getting up hurts. Everything I do hurts. I had spinal inflammation before, for a very long time until I got a proper diagnosis, and it felt just like this. Not cool.

I am pissy about the negative test, because honestly- I had no problem getting pregnant before, it was ovulating that was the issue. Now? What the hell?! I've ovulated 4 times in a row with intercourse timing (an IUI this time) and NADA. Nothing. Not even the hint of a fucking line. I know, I know, other women go much longer... but I managed to get pregnant on every other ovulation before. Now, nothing. It just makes me worry that something else is broke now. Even though all testing, surgeries, etc... showed nothing else being wrong.

Deep breaths. Whhheewww.

I'm in pain. I'm pissy. I'm most likely not pregnant. Again. And the heat index for today is 105... and I'm in a Northern state of the USA... so that's HOT for us... especially since we don't have air conditioning at my stupid house. I'm sad, angry, and melting... ungh.

The countdown-

I am holding out to test tomorrow at 11dpo (days past ovulation). I know, it's early- but I got my positives at 11dpo for the first two pregnancies, and 10dpo with the last one. My body seems to like that time line. If it's negative, I'll retest at 13dpo to confirm the negative. Then I will stop my progesterone supplements. But if it's negative tomorrow, I will feel confident that it is an accurate result.

But the waiting is hard, not just because I want to know (but also don't want to)- but also, my back hurts, and I would really like to take something stronger than acetaminophen. But I'm being a good girl and toughing it out. That's one thing I won't miss about trying to conceive- living your life like your pregnant, even though you aren't. If I was pregnant, I'd be fine and happy to do that. But I'm not... so it just pisses me off. I know, wah wah wah.

I really hate being in the homestretch for testing, I get antsy. I feel like I'm chanting to myself, "I will not test today. I will not test today. I will not test today."

If I click my heels while I say that, do you think that will help me make it come true?

Feeling blah-

I am halfway through the two-week-wait. Whew. Time has sure slowed down though.

I've been utterly exhausted lately, and sleeping is not helping. I think it's because I'm working graveyard shift two days a week, and the nights I get regular sleep... well, I don't. I keep waking up during my R.E.M. sleep every single freakin' night... for like two to three weeks now. It's bad. I wake up still exhausted and sore- as if I'd only slept a few hours.

I worked myself even more sore Friday doing home repairs, which is rewarding but painful. I installed a few screens for some of the windows that needed them. I replaced our broken ceiling fan, which would have been such a simple task, if our ceiling wasn't so damn high. I guess we need a taller ladder, but I barely reached the wires, and one of us had to hold the fan while the other one spliced the wires together... so, uuunnnggghhh. But I got it all hooked up, and it works lovely! I am proud of my handiwork. Of course, the light on it is different. At the store I thought it looked nice and fit the woodwork and decor of the living room better... but when I got it up, my husband had to point out that I had bought a boob light. You know the ones I'm talking about, they are round with a metal piece in the middle. Yeah. Oops. Oh well. If your mind isn't in the gutter, it's elegant. If it is... it at least provides you with a good laugh, right?

Did I mention time seems like it's slowed down? Yeah... only halfway there. But still.. halfway there! I may start testing on Friday. I don't know. I'm pretty indecisive, and in the end I have to fight myself from testing early. I'm bad. I usually cave in.

Did I mention how much I hate waiting? I've had to wait so much for so many different things over the past 3 years... it's tiring.

I'm not really feeling it- but then again I never am. I'm just so jaded by everything. Not getting pregnant. Having miscarriage after miscarriage. I expect the worst at every turn now. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised one day. I'm not going to hold my breath on it, but it'd be nice.