PGD/IVF with LuvMyBoys

YAY! I have been waiting to write my blog post and officially announce that we are expecting twins! We are nervous and excited. All of our ultrasounds look great, and the girls are measuring exactly spot on! Just one more week till the magical 12 week marker.

Mostly, I want to say how grateful I am to Dr. Potter, his Nurse Lori and Kelley with Microsort, Thanks for alllllll the help. Poor Lori has to endure my crazy crazy emails all the time, SHE ROCKS!

After our previous failures, we decided to go to HRC and cycle with Dr. Potter. What a crazy busy place that is! We really loved Dr. Potter and especially his nurse Lori. When all was said and done there...we had 4 healthy girl embies 3 or which we transferred.

at 4.5dp5dt - first BFP on HPT (FRER)

Beta #1: 8.5dp5dt - 106

Beta #2: 12dp5dt - 385

Beta #3 20dp5dt - 15,168!!

We feel so incredibly lucky after 8 failed cycles to have finally gotten a BFP that is moving up!!!!

I think I am starting to feel a bit better. I am definately less sad and more accepting as each day passes. Now I am working toward hatching a new plan and moving on. Whatever happens I will need to accept the outcome and appreciate the fact that I have 2 children, and that in itself in no small miracle.

That about sums it up, I am lost. Not sure where to go from here. I have to do another FET because I have 2 last embies on ice. But what then? I have lost all faith in IVF, but getting so close to my dream of a daughter only to have it slip through my hands like sand is just over whelming. Do we do another fresh cycle? Am I crazy to even think of continuing? When do we stop? Should we try IUI??? Jeeze....I feel like I have more questions now then when I started this process but only now, I have touched my dream and am devestated by the loss. I wish I knew the answers, I wish I wasn't so lost.

I live in the land of unfair, it's a crappy place to be. I suffered a chemical pregnancy. That sucks!

As mentioned our Oct, Nov FETs were cancelled due to crappy lining. So was our January try after that. Once again the problem was noooo lining. I can not tell you how much I wanted to just give up. We even looked in surrogacy at our doctors suggestion.

The other suggestion our RE made was to try again. Ugh. Seriously?! This man must be crazy if he thinks I want to fill myself full of crazy hormones again just to be told I got nuthin'! Um...No Thanks. But, we still had 4 frosties to think about so we consulted him for new ideas and went for it. Here's what was different. *1* We used estrace cream, *2* We used Acupunture. These two things together were a little miracle. By my last u/s to see if we could transfer, my lining was looking great! Amazing, that had not happened before! On transfer day, we transferred 2 beautiful embies. One hatching blast and one nearly hatching. For once I did my bedrest as perscribed.

POAS.....

I waited to test until the morning of 5dp5dt. Now my transfer was in the afternoon so this was really 4.5 days but who's counting? (oh wait we all are) anyway, used Equate (walmart brand) test and the faintest of lines showed up. Feeling like I must have finally pushed myself over the edge of sanity I chalked it up to an evap line and posted it for my IG girls. truly I wasn't sure if there was an evap line or no line at all...I decided that POAS had finally pushed me over the edge. So, I did what every insane person does and took another test that afternoon. (dollar tree brand) After several min a faint line showed up, I decided that too was an evap or I was imagining it. My IG girls thought differently. They saw the "line" and thought I may be PG.

6dp5dt. I wake up....I test. 2 tests, both have faint lines....I must be crazy...or....maybe.....I might possibly be seeing real lines?! Nope, I am crazy I decide. That night I decide to take a FRER. I was so afraid of this one. I knew whatever it said, it would be right. The FRER test is mega dependable. So, I hold going to the bathroom off for hours until I think I might burst and I give in and pee on the damn stick. Well, wouldn't you know it 2 lines quickly appear. Holy crap...I am not crazy!! Or, maybe I am but not in that way. I am officially seeing a BFP!!

7dp5dt. Wake up...gather my courage...take a digital. It says "PREGNANT"!!!! I carry it with me everywhere I go and stare at it, I feel sooooo lucky.

At this point of course I continue to test because I am a nut but I finally believe in the BFP!! Now....waiting for BETA!

So the October FET didn't happen. No lining to speak of. Boooooo! So we tried again in November...no go. This time no lining and no estrogen production. Not Cool. So....we did some tests and more blood work and we can't find out why that is. Basically I am inferyile...Ha...the IRONY!!!

Anyway, I still have two healthy boys so I am not going to jump off a cliff or anything. So, where to from here? Well we throw out the plan to do this unmedicated and go back to the medicated route with a few extra things. Crossing my fingers!

My final FET is officially underway. It is a natural cycle...no meds or needles. I am looking forward to it and hoping hoping hoping it is my turn!! My day 3 u/s shows my lining at a 6 and I am desperately hoping it goes way up from there. So far I am only required to take baby asprin and prenatals. YAY. the coaster is going up again.

Our June FET was not a success...ahhh crap! I was bummed out for sure, but not as much as I had been the FET before thank goodness. We transferred 3 embies under almost ideal conditions and we were left with nothing to show for it. But as the coaster goes.....there are ups and downs. This is definitely a down.

But like all good roller coaster enthusiasts....we are back in line to take another ride. After our failed cycle we sat down for a chat with our RE and decided to take a different approach.

The plan is to do one last FET using all 4 remaining embies but this time try a natural cycle with no meds. We have not tried this before and past experience would suggest that my body is not all together fond of fertility drugs. The plan was to wait 2 full AF cycles, to allow my body to purge the drugs and get back to normal. this idea was a tiny bit of nirvana to be as my body has spent an entire year on some sort of fertility drugs, I was ready for a break.

Where are we now?

I am currently just waiting for my September/October AF, and then we will start the monitoring up again. I anticipate we will likely have a mid October natural transfer. I am definitely looking forward to it. I would love to be blessed with a special pumpkin this Halloween season.

As I take time to really think about my next FET, I find myself trying to figure out what really works. I have tried to figure out if there is anything that I can do differently. According to my RE....not really. I accept that the odds for getting PG with an FET are 40/60 but none the less I am always interested in increasing those odds. I am thinking of trying acupuncture for me and assisted hatching for the embies. My RE and I have an appointment to discuss just that later this week. I am not sure if there is anything I can change but I am always game for a little research.

I have been so down in the dumps since my last cycle and have really struggled to get myself together. Today, my dear in-gender friend, "Pink Please" got a BFP and I was there to see it!!! It was not until that moment that I was studying her stick and seeing a pink line that I finally felt like myself again. Her success is just what I needed. I am elated for her!!! Now, I think I can really get it together. :) 

This BFN was a tough one. Case and point....it has taken me this long to officially report it on my blog. :) So a few weeks later I am am still trying to get it together. I took some time to mourn and worked hard to get over it. So far no-go with the get over it part, but I do think it is getting better. We will try again with a few of our remaing seven when I can feel like I can get back on the roller coaster and once I have lost all of the stinkin' wait from last cycle. That seems to be the toughest part for me...I gained a bunch of weight and didn't even get PG. Grrrrr.....

Oh well, what can you do??

We did our FET with absolutely ideal conditions. We thawed 3 embryos and all 3 survived with very little cell loss. We transferred all 3. Thanks to the IM PIO shots I was experiencing so many PG symptoms even before the transfer. UGH...I hate that!! I experienced cramping on day 3 but other than that not many interesting symptoms to report. I started testing on 5dpt. Today is 9dpt and the internet cheapies still say BFN. I am absolutely devastated. I am really starting to wonder if this will ever work. I have always kind of known that this process will eventually work for me but now as I sit here...I wonder if it ever will. My beta is scheduled for tomorrow so I will know 100% by then, but I am not holding out much hope.

   These days I am sitting around awaiting the much anticipated frozen egg transfer. I am on Lupron daily and a twice weekly IM shot of Estradial. I constantly probe my RE for more info on thawing success rates, which I am sure must be driving them batty. There quoted thaw success is about 50% but I have gotten them to fess up that they generally have more success than that. I am hoping I'll be one of the lucky ones to have an over 50% rate of success! Less than 2 weeks and I'll find out.

OHSS...now that is really something. Luckily I feel so much better. It has taken me a very long time to feel normal again but I am so happy to be there. When my period returned most of my major symptoms including the crazy bloating/swelling went away but the lack of energy and run down ickly feeling stuck around for about another 3 weeks.

**** My Frozen Transfer is April 18****

I started Lupron earlier this week and have been on BCPs for a while now. Tomorrow I will take my last BCP. So far so good with the Lupron. My only complaint is that the needles aren't as sharp as they could be which means I have to press harder that I would like to get them into my abdomen. It's hard to believe that my FET is just 3 weeks from now, I am really looking forward to it.