NOV/DEC 2009 -- Cycle Group

[turtle0619]

katie my dear, great job on the updates!! it looks great! thank you for taking that on....it looks really hard, but it is sooo helpful. i cant wait to fill it up with BFP!! i cant believe they made you sit through the training again! i think by now you could GIVE the damn class! what a waste of time...well...atleast you are on the the next step now!!

cheeky its so good to see you back also!! yay! this is OUR time sister! i start my stims on NOV.13 which i am taking as a very good sign. so your ER being on firday the 13th is going to make it your lucky day when you get your BFP!!!!!

[/b]tabbdm how did the trigger go last night? did your RE say if there was a chance of doing an ET once they see the quality of the eggs? i'm crossing my fingers for a bunch of great embryos!! please stick around with us. we are here for you. its crazy how quickly things can change during IVF isnt it? whens your ER??

10bear how did the ER go?? i hope you are resting and relaxing! do you know when they will do the ET?? sending you tons of fertilizing dust to you!!

hi lisa! thats so nice of you to offer us your meds. i dont use any of those, but i'm sure someone out there can use them! hows it feel being preggers mama??? i'm guessing TWINS!!

me2009 ive never heard of that happening, but it sounds like your RE doesnt seem too worried about it, so just try to relax. the cramps are probably from both the AF and the MEDS....great huh? its so nice being a woman sometimes isnt it? hang in there sweetie....i'm sure everything is fine!

claud the worrying never stops does it?? did your dr. get back to you? thats nice that you can email her! i call the nurses line all the time and leave them messages....and then when they dont call back in 15 minutes i get all pissed off haha they shouldnt mess with me. i'm sure they think i'm super annoying, but i dont care. 20 units of lupron seems like alot, but i'm sure they learned ALOT from your last cycle and are tweeking this one just for you.

lulu good luck with the U/S this morning. let us know how it goes....i hope you have a ton for follies growing!! grow follies grow!!

olim you are cracking me up try not to over think everything..i know its easier said then done...trust me...i read into EVERYTHING. but i'm sure everything is going great! just blame your craziness on the MEDS and use it to your advantage to scare DH into doing things for you! haha it worked for me!!

lou woooohoooo on having a frostie left over!!! thats GREAT news! i'm so happy for you!

tohavefun how ya doing ivf sis?? i hope everythings going good.,..keep us posted!

if i missed anyone i'm sorry! i'm thinking of you all always!

[katie99]

Hi girls -

How are you all doing today? I just got a call from the pharmacy telling me that my nurse had ordered me way too many bravelle (again) Wasnt I there only yesterday? and I told her I dont want to be stuck w/ extra meds like last month? I ended up with 18 extra vials last time ( at 45 bucks a vial!)
So I guess I have to call her now & ask ( argue) with her on the same topic again I feel like every cycle she over- orders & tells me dont worry about being stuck w/ extras. I would rather make a last minute drive to the pharmacy to pick up a few vials than end up w/ 800 dollars worth of meds I dont need. Why is this so hard for her to understand? Surely I'm not the only out of pocket pt they have. Sorry to rant but its been bugging me.

cheekyone - OMG! thats so quick! I'm so glad that you're back! This WILL be your time! And Yes, please send us some of that lucky Aussie Dust!

10Bear -Hope that your ER went well. Cant wait to hear how many eggies you have! get some rest!

Franny -thats exactly what the nurse said yesterday! " You can give ME this class by now!" he he - How are you doing?

Tabbdm -YAY for trigger! Are they definitely doing a freeze all cycle? Its needed sometimes to let the endometrium calm down first so implantation wont be affected. ER tomorrow? good luck!

Olim78 - All women stim differently. my 1st was 14 days - my 2nd was 10 days. You have time left, try to not worry, they are growing! Your E2 (estrogen) is a marker for OHSS - What was your last E2?

Me2009 - light AF ok during early stims, I freaked the first time that it happened to me too. For me that bloated, crappy, lets move slower feeling starts around day 5 or 6 of stims - You'll know when it sweats or pj pants are the only comfortable clothes! Hang in there!

Lou - Hooray for 1 snowbabie! some girls POAS as early as 9dpt but beware of those things - only do it if you are really brave - i can tell you from past experience that its awful to continue with PIO shots after a neg POAS! Plus you can have a false neg. Too scary!
I'm sure that you'll be our 1st BFP!! Try to hang in there!


babyhopes - we'll be close on schedule together, you start stims the day after me! Its nice to have someone that close through the cycle!

sorry if I missed anyone! hugs & PMA to us all!! xoxo

[olim78]

katie99 -how frustrating about over ordering your meds - you wouldn't think it was that difficult would you? I had to get more today however, I am really lucky in that I get two free cycles of IVF with the NHS over here in the UK, before we have to pay out of our own pockets - this will give us more time to save up if we end up needing 3 or more cycles to get our BFP - one benefit of being in the UK I guess.

However, I don't seem to get told as much as you guys about my treatment, am left in the dark a little bit - I have no idea what my E2 levels are - I never get told - when I go to the clinic I have my bloods done first thing and only if when the results come back in the afternoon and my meds need to be adjusted do I get a call to tell me how much menopur to use. Have written it down as my next Q for when I go for my u/s on Friday!

[to_have_fun08]

Hey Ladies -- Seems like this board has picked up a lot. I have been lurking now and then, it just is hard to actually join in. Seems that being on the board just raises my stress level but it is hard to stay away. The IVF boards have been a staple in my life for so long that I always have to check in to see what is going on.

Katie - As far as being on every cycle group for so many months. Last year I was on each cycle group for a year. Seems like I was always moving from one to another. Hoping this cycle is a better one for you. As far as your meds, can't you just tell the pharmacy that you don't want all of them filled at this time. You can always get the rest filled at a later date and it will still be on file with the pharmacy. I know the nurses want to be helpful, plus it is easier for them to order extra meds so they are not hassled later on to send in a new prescription, but I guess they don't realize the $$ factor. I would also kill my clinic if they made me do a meds class more then once. It isn't like they are really hard to do.

Lou - Congrats on being PUPO.

10bear - Looking for a good ER and fertilization report. Fingers are crossed.

olim78 - slow stimming is good. You don't want to go too fast and seeing that you will have a lot of eggs they also want to monitor you so you don't overstimulate. Sounds like you are off to a good start.

Cheekyone - ER on Friday the 13th. Hope you aren't superstious. I did lasik surgery on Friday the 13th. I didn't think anything about it when they scheduled my appointment. I thought I was lucky to get in so quickly, then I looked at my calender and realized that the 13th was a Friday and kind of laughed. No wonder they had openings.

claud662- A lot of clinics start their patients at 20u of lupron and then drop it down to 10u. I wouldn't worry too much about it especially if you responded really well last time. Maybe they want to slow you down this time.

Hope everyone else is doing well, I know I missed a bunch. Katie thanks for doing the calender. I have done the calender in past boards and know that it is a challenge to keep up with.


AFM - I am on day 9 of stims. Cycle is going a lot better then I expected. (knock on wood) I have 9 or 10 follicles ranging from 19mm to 12mm. This is by far the best cycle that I have had. i go back in today for another U/S the Dr will then decide if I go for ER on Friday or Saturday. I am hoping for Sat so that my 12mm follicles have a chance to catch up, but also tired of feeling so bloated. I can handle the bloating if it means I have a couple more eggs to work with.

Good Luck to all!!

[Riley baby maybe]

Hi Ladies! Hope everyone is having a great day so far...it's only 10:10 am here in TX. Ugh...

babyhopes - Glad you liked the %. I'm slightly obsessive in case you didn't notice.

me2009 - How are your injections coming? Are you sore yet? I hope not!

Lou - It's a BFP, we will all keep telling ourselves that. Now you are halfway through your 2ww, beta next week! I'm glad your lone embie made it, but I don't think you'll need it...PMA. It's funny when you talk about defense mechanisms. No one knows we are doing IVF except for my parents and I tell everyone I know that I don't like kids and don't want one because they poo in their pants. How ridiculous, I know.

justwanna, 2010, LuLu, babyhopes, olim - Thank you all for the info on your DH counts. It's comforting to know we aren't the only ones in this boat and that there is a way around this issue. It is so nice to have friends to talk about all of this with.

supergenius - I'm glad you're ok!

justwanna - let us know how your appointment goes today. I'll be thinking of you!

katie99 - The tracker looks great - thank you for taking the time to create it! Since I have my consult tomorrow, I'll send you the update and hopefully get my name on the list! I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that yesterday...what a mess! But hey, at least you got some time off work!

olim - Slow and steady wins the race...PMA!

cheeky - I've always heard 3rd times a charm. This is it for you & DH!

Franny - Hope all is going well with you. It's almost time for you to start stimming YAY!

AFM - So ready to get this first appointment out of the way tomorrow and figure out where we go from here. My younger sister who is set to give birth to her second child (by a second man within 18 months of the first baby and she has no job) found out she may have the new baby a week early and I know it's horrible, but I do not want to go to the hospital. It's almost more than I can stomach. Sorry...that was immature and mean. Just had to get it out!

Ladies, I hope you all have a wonderful day...I can't wait for tomorrow!

[turtle0619]

katie i totally feel you on the meds...i just spent my whole day yesterday back and forth on the phone with my clinic and the pharmacy...my clinic called my meds into the wrong pharmacy...a pharmacy my insurance doesnt cover. why? i have no idea...you would think they would look in my file and see where i got my meds last time and order them from the same place...but nooooo....so i got a call from the pharmacy that i'm not covered under saying my meds were ready for delivery and how did i want to pay for them.....i said...ummmm i'm NOT paying for them! so i had to call my clinic and tell them to fax over my perscriptions to the RIGHT pharmacy and to call me back and let me know this was done so i could set up delivery with the right pharmacy. (are you following all of this? haha it makes my head want to explode) well....they never called so i called the pharmacy and they said they never got the rx. from my clinic. so i called my actual doctors office...(they usually make me call a generic nurse line where i leave a message and pray they do what i ask) so the girl who answered the phone who i know said that i would have to call the pharmacy that i wasnt covered under and have them send it to the right pharmacy...huh?? oooooookkkkk so i called back the wrong pharmacy and they said they couldnt do that without dr.s approval!!! arrrrhhhh. so i called back my clinic and it went to voicemail....soo i left another message. finally at 230pm i got a call back from my clinic saying that they faxed over my rx to the right pharmacy at 1030am and i was all set!!!! WTF??? so i called my right pharmacy back and they said it JUST came through and that they had to fax a form to my clinic because the new mircodose lupron i'm going to be on needs to be pre approved by my insurance and my clinic had to get the approval before they could send it out!! sooo i'm going to take today off from calling them to make sure they sent out the pre approval form, and i will check up on it tomorrow. luckily i decided to do this now and not wait until next week! i'm not totally freaking out yet because i dont need my meds until next friday, but my stess level was through the roof! i really dont know why they make everything so hard.
haha ok i'm done venting!! that was an ear full. i just thought we could have our "we hate dealing with nurses and meds" party together!
i also agree with tohavefun...my last cycle my RE called in all my meds at once and added refills to them all incase i ran out. i only paid for the first week or so worth of meds at a time...which ended up working out because i was canceled and with my new protocol all my old meds are useless this cycle. so even though i do have leftovers i dont have TONS. there's got to be a way to have it on file, but not have them filled all at once..look into it! good luck sweetie!


rileybaby haha you are cracking me up about telling people baby poo makes you sick! i used to get sooo upset when people would ask me why i didnt have kids (i still think that the "when are you gonna have a baby? and the "are you pregnant yet?" questions are the rudest questions ever) but its everywhere, and i stopped crying everytime someone would ask me because of one thing one of my best friends said to me one time. i was really upset because it seemed everytime i turned around another one of my friends were pregnant and i was crying on the phone to my friend katie. she's 38 and isnt married or have any children (she's one of my last friends like that) and i told her how mean it was for people to ask me if i was pregnant yet and why were me and DH waiting so long to have a baby....well katie gave me the best advice EVER. she said...ya know what you say when people ask you that franny? you tell them to go F themselves!! hahahaha it was sooo blunt and unapologetic it just made me laugh. she said its nobody's business and they have no right to ask me about such personal things....sooo although ive never actually told anyone to go "F" themselves, anytime i get asked the questions i think it in my head and it makes me laugh instead of cry...i usually end up just shrugging my shoulders at the questions and walking away...then i go home and tell DH "i got asked about having a baby again today" and we both look at each other and scream at the top of our lungs "GO F YOURSELF" haha. try it...its fun!
try it in the hospital next week!!
its ok to feel bad about your sister. my SIL is the most fertile woman ive ever met....she used to tell me before she knew about me and DH's struggle that all my brother had to do was look at her and...bam...shes preggers! she's had 2 beautiful DD's in the same time me and DH have been TTC #1 soooo its been really hard. i love her and my nieces like crazy, but i still cry sometimes and think how unfair it is. hang in there sweetie....this is YOUR time! you are going to be able to say you are BFP in no time and then it will be great to have cousins so close in age to grow up with!

[olim78]

Turtle0619, katie99, tohavefun, Riley baby maybe – thank you all for the rational thought! You are all right of course. I am trying not to get ahead of myself and convince myself that slow and steady is good – just not a very patient or calm person I am beginning to realise!

Riley baby maybe –you are hilarious – it’s funny the things we come out with isn’t it? I’m sure people just think I’m a career girl and that I’m focussing on my work so I don’t say otherwise – it’s just easier than getting embroiled in a conversation about it isn’t it?! It’s completely normal to feel the way you do. My younger sister had a baby this year and it’s not that I’m not happy for her, it’s just not the way round I imagined things going in my life an that’s very hard to get your head around. I had to fight back the tears when I first heard the news and I still cry about it now. It’s totally normal but it doesn’t stop you being wracked with guilt afterwards does it?

Turtle – I am laughing out loud at your email (good job I’m working from home!) I love your friends idea about how to respond. It still amazes me the number of people that come out with that question – it is literally gutting – am going to think of your story the next time it happens !
It’s also amazing how easy it is for some people to get pregnant – I know people with 4 kids who said they literally only had to try 4 times –knowing what we all know now having gone through this process – I wonder how anyone manages to get a BFP!

Lou – I was so busy scribbling down the measurements of my follies at the clinic today I forgot to ask about assisted hatching – probably getting ahead of myself again there any way! Will see if there’s anything to hatch first.

Funny conversation at clinic today – my DH made me ask when he should and shouldn’t be ‘abstaining’ prior to E/C day – I’m sure you can imagine the look I got when I suggested he call the unit himself to ask!! Needless to say I ended up asking...

[sarah_ruth79]

Sorry I don't have time to write to all of you individually, but I am following your progress and wishing you the best. We just had our class and although most of it i knew already, the injections seem a little intimidating. You really have to get that trigger shot right, huh? I am thinking I will do all of the shots myself...not have DH do them. Is that a bad idea? I start Lupron on the 11th and then go in for u/s and bloodwork on the 20th. I think I will be on Gonal F the 20th or shortly thereafter. We have to do the 5day transfer because of PGD, but they scared us at the class saying that only 50% of embs make it to day 5. ugh...overwhelming.

[katie99]

HEY! HUH? WTF? What happened to the list? The list ate 2 of the category headers! I dont get it. It was fine this morning. I thought that was too easy! ARRRGGHHH!!!
OK bear with me ladies, I'll re do it now...

[to_have_fun08]

Turtle - I feel your pain about trying to get your meds. I went though all that a couple of weeks ago. With my insurance, the women's group has to approve the meds before the pharmacy can dispense them. Which means my dr office has to fax a med request to the pharmacy and the womens group and also the dr.s office has to fax my last cycle sheet to the women's group. Well, the nurse at the Dr. office has no clue what they are talking about a "cycle" sheet. I explain this to her but still nothing gets faxed correctly. I messed with this for days. Finally my meds get approved but not all my meds. Seems that they forgot to add the first page of the cycle sheet which was the days I was on used the highest amount of meds so my insurance was saying I used 1500u of follistim on my previous cycle which really I used 2900u. So then I had to fight to get more Follistim approved. Thought I was done after that, then I get a call from my pharmacy saying that the famera had to be pre-approved and needed more info from the dr. office and it could take 2 weeks for them to decide if they want to approve it. Needles to say, I got really rude and told them I would pay out of pocket for the famera, $130 for 10 pills. Then the pharmacy typed in my credit card # wrong so my bank declined it and put a hold on my credit card. I had to then call the credit card company to have them take the hold off, which took forever because the credit card company wanted to sell my there alert status crap, then had to call back the pharmacy. Thought OK now this is done and I defiantly need some acupuncture. Still wasn't done, the pharmacy didn't have the 125ug Ganirelix they only had the 250ug Ganirelix so Dr. office then had to fax in another prescription for the 250ug so I could get that shipped. I was so ready to kill someone after dealing with them. I was so happy to see all the meds finally arrive.

All in all though, I am so happy that I have insurance to cover all my drugs. I only have a co-pay so if I have to deal with 10 hrs on hold with the pharmacy and the dr.'s office, it is well worth it.


sarah_ruth79 - don't let the injections intimidate you. It does seem really hard at first but once you get a couple shots down, they are no big deal. for my first cycle, I found organizing all my meds and getting familiar of what each med did helped out. The sub q shots are the easiest, a little prick and sometimes a little burning but no big deal. The IM are the worst but they are doable. I have always done all my shots. I would have been too much hassle to make sure DH was around all the time to give them to me. Plus, I am a control freak and have to have control over the pain I am putting myself through.



Chris

[lou71]

OK, I did it. This morning. I POAS. I shouldn't have. It's too soon for a positive. It was negative, of course. I knew it would be... but I read that some ladies get positive HPT's after 5 days... others get negatives the morning of their beta and get a positive beta after they're convinced it'll be a BFN. I wanted it to be positive so bad that I did it. I know the negative isn't indicative of anything but it sure bummed me out. Don't do it ladies... they don't call them evil sticks for nothin'!

claud662 Thanks for your encouragement. I'm doing my best to stay strong!

me2009 I took 450 u Follistim and 10 u lupron while stimming. I didn't have any bleeding. I would call the clinic to report it for sure. It's probably nothing to worry about, but not enough can be said for peace of mind! I started to feel cramping/bloating around 4-5 days of stimming. I stimmed for 8 days total before ER.

tabbdm So Sorry to hear you will have to freeze your embies this cycle. But I'm wishing you lots of them! I don't know why they want the progesterone suppressed at that stage, but that's what they told me.

kerribell I didn't have any follies to see right before stim, and RE told me that was GOOD. I stimmed OK. It's way to soon for you to worry about that.

Riley baby maybe Haha... you made me laugh with telling people you don't want kids because they poo in their pants! I'm very similar in the privacy area as that. Most people I know believe we never wanted kids. We did that mostly to stop them from asking!!!

Thanks to all of you who congratulated me on my one lone snowbaby. It gives me another chance if this cycle is BFN.

Good luck and baby dust to you all.

[katie99]

Julia78 - 1st u/s 12/15 FET 12/21
justwannabeamom - start stims 11/25 ER week of 12/7
SarahRuth - lupron 11/11 start stims 11/20
Jenice - ?
Sharishu - 1st RE appt 11/7
Hopefulcycleone - FET Nov
Katie99 - start estrace 11/9 stims 12/3 ER week of 12/14
Riley baby maybe - ?




Claud - BCP lupron 11/12 stims 11/18 possible ER 11/29
Miyaya - BCP
Miner79 - BCP
Starwishes - BCP
TC4474 - BCP



Babyhopes - meds start 11/5 stims 12/4
Turtle (Franny) - on lupron start stims 11/13
motherhoodhopes - on lupron FET 12/11
2010 - baseline 10/28



Me2009 - stims 11/2 ER?
Jandm - stims 11/4 ER?
Olim78 - on stims next u/s 11/6 ER 11/11 or 11/13
To_Have_Fun - on stims ER 11/6 or 11/7 Whoo -Hoo!
Marya - stims 10/28 ER?
Lulu - stims 10/31 u/s 11/4 ER week of 11/9
Supergenius - stims 11/5 ER?
Cheekyone - on stims u/s 11/7 ER 11/13
Kerribell - on stims ER?



10Bear - ER 11/3 - 1 strong embie - ET fri 11/6
Tabbdm - trigger 11/3 freeze all cycle FET in Jan



Lou - ET 10/30 6 eggies! Hooray PUPO! beta #1- 11/10

[10bear]

Hi Lou, LuLu and Olim

Sorry to get back to you all so late.

I was on ER yesterday, the whole procedure run pretty smooth, just oneone ahead of me get delay in the operation, may be too many eggs to retrieve so that my schedule was pushed out for another 30 min.

Anyways, they retreived total of 12 eggs, 6 of them are grade 3 and 6 are grade 2. My clinic rank them in grade 1-5, 3 is the best, 4 will be a little too matured, and 5 is over matured, and grade 2 is a little under matured. So I was congrat by my doctor and most of nurse saying that I was doing great for my age.
I did not feel too much pain/sore when I was home. pretty much by night time I already recovered. Thank God. And today, I pretty much want to go to office and work since it is a little bored for me stay at home already.

However, we received a pretty bad news this morning. Among my 12 eggs, only 1 fertilized.
How can it be???, my DH does not have any sperm issue and my eggs quality were considered good, so.....I just call the clinic and ask if I can do ICSI at this stage and see if anymore can be fertilized later this afternoon. Need all your prayer in this............... Does anyone have any experience in this kind of situation?? Only think I can think about went wrong was my DH had some kind of flu two weeks before the ER, will that affect his sperm quality? or it is always my eggs problem

For the ER, my clinic told me to put hot pad on the tummy and it will help to relieve any pain/sore, I did try and I think it works. I did not take any Tyleno or Tyleno extra strengh. They also said I need to cut down on my regular plain water intake, as overy can absorb water faster than other fliud, that will prevent it from healing to it's normal size. So most of the fliud I took was juice and soup. Any sport drink is prohibit as well.


Hi Katie

My scheduled ET is on 11/6 ( Friday), now I am not sure if the only fertilized egg I have can survied on that date or not.....just keep our figure cross for some miracle will happened.

Hi all ladies
Best wishes to you all and hope everything went well.

[olim78]

Katie99 – thank you for the updated list- must be a complete pain in the backside but it’s much appreciated!

10bear – I’m sorry that you only got one embie when you had 6 grade 3 eggs but please just try to remember that it only takes one and that could be the one. Fingers crossed about the ICSI too. Me and my DH are borderline IVF/ICSI but to be honest I would rather have ICSI to give us the nest chance. Your DH’s flu might have been the reason but it might not, it could just be that those ones just weren’t meant to be – which is just plain unfair isn’t it. Hang on in there – I’m praying for your one embie

Lou71 – Don’t dwell on your negative POAS – just think to yourself, it’s too soon and think no more of it. I can’t imagine how long the 2WW feels, I am driving myself crazy waiting for an u/s and I’m having them every other day!

Sarah_ruth79 – I am the same as tohavefun, I do my own injections, in fact DH refused to do them and I’m glad, as we’ve both been working completely different hours and been out and about and I couldn’t be doing with waiting for him to come home to do them – something else to stress about in case he isn’t back on time! Also – I too am a complete control freak with a little bit of OCD thrown in for good measure so wanted to be able to do them. I don’t use an autoinjector pen – I figured it was one extra thing to faff about with – not sure if you are using one?

[Mommieof2]

Hey there lady's I can't remember if I've been on here before or not but I'm chiming in as I am doing the dec cycle also I should start lupron around dec 12th stims the 23rd projected ER 12/5 and ET 12/10 praying for a BFP for Christmas I so badly want this to work it's killing me that my brother, my cousins and alot of friends are all pregnant right now it's only making me more impatient but I'm looking forward to follow u guys and all the BFP's to come.