Mortified

I had my uterine lining biopsy today and it was awful.  Just plain awful!  Let's start at the beginning, shall we.

Like an idiot, I didn't take any tylenol or anything before my appointment.  This shall now be known as "mistake #1".  Drew and I were called back into the exam and I undressed.  The RE came in and began the procedure.  First, he swabbed my cervix with some iodine stuff.  Not bad, I just felt a little poking around, nothing bad at all.  Then, he used a tool that sort of resembled what he uses to do the IUIs.  He inserted it and I felt a little cramping.  I was just trying to breathe through the whole thing.  Then, the RE mumbles something to the nurse, who was holding my hand, and she lets go and grabs something out of the cabinet.  It's a package and it sure looked like some long bladed scissors.  Drew later confirmed this.  RE then inserts the new tool and HOLY HELL THAT FREAKING HURTS!!!!!  And cramps!!!!  Nurse tells me that it's almost over and so I lay there and wait.

And wait.

And wait.

Lying liar!  It was at least another 30 seconds or so before it was over, and when you're in pain, 30 seconds is a long time.  The RE put the specimen in a container that the nurse was holding and I can see a few small flecks in there.  I then heard him say that it was probably enough.  Good thing, doc, because you certainly weren't going to go back in for Round 2!!

The RE removed all of his fun tools and the nurse told me to just lay there for a minute until the pain goes away.  As I laid there, she told me that my results would be back on Tuesday or Wednesday.  I asked her what I do if my period shows up before then and she said that it shouldn't, but to call her if it does.  I was still pretty crampy at this point, but I really wanted to go home and take some tylenol and lay on the couch.  So, I start to get up and get dressed.  This shall now be known as "mistake #2".  Once dressed, the nurse walked us out to the area of the office where you make your next appointment.  I started to feel very warm and very light-headed, so I told Drew that I needed to sit down.  Everybody starts to go into panic mode and the nurse gets me some water.  Then, I said that I felt like I was going to throw up.  I really didn't want to throw up.  I willed myself not to throw up.  It didn't matter.  I threw up.  In the middle of the office, I threw up.

I. was. mortified.

I felt a lot better after that.  After laying there for a few minutes, I put my jacket on and Drew helped me to the car.  The entire time I'm walking out of that office, I'm just apologizing profusely.  I was so embarrassed, but the nurse just kept reassuring me that it was okay.

We came home, I took some Aleve, ate some banana bread, and promptly fell asleep.

At this point, all I can say, is that those darn results better come back okay.  I'm certainly not going through that again!

If You Have Hope

Tonight, Drew and I were out running errands and I was starving.  We stopped into Panda Express to grab a quick dinner.  The fortune cookie is my favorite part of the meal.  I don't usually put a lot of faith in what they say, but this one caught my eye.

L-O-V-E!!!!

I love when I get a fortune that I can actually apply to my life.  I have hope that I WILL get pregnant, and that I WILL be a mother, and that it WILL be soon.

It is so easy to get down during this process.  Every month, when that stupid pee stick only has one line, a little bit of hope goes out the window.  After months and months of that, it's hard to have hope at all.  This message is exactly what I needed to keep my hope alive.

We're Moving On

Today, Drew and I met with the RE.  The good news?

We're moving on and doing In-Vitro Fertilization or IVF.

We sat with Dr. H and he told us that it was time to move on.  I figured that it was coming.  So, we discussed a lot of things that are going to be answered in the coming weeks. 

At this point, after doing the IUI's, we know that the issue more than likely lies with me.  Drew produces excellent numbers.  Since I have primary infertility, some concerns that we will be taking a look at are my eggs, including maturity, number, and quality, whether my eggs have a hatching problem, and whether I have an implantation problem. 

The first thing that we are going to test is my uterine lining to make sure that it's sticky for implantation to occur.  A fertilized egg can't attach to my uterus if my lining is ideal.  Here's the analogy that he used:

In your lawn, you want a nice, thick, green grass.  You don't want any crabgrass.  In order to get that nice lawn, you have to do fertilizer and proper maintenance.  So, he says that my endo is crabgrass, and that I could possibly have some crabgrass in my uterus, meaning it's not sticky. 

The first thing that he will do in this IVF process is a biopsy of my uterine lining.  He will send that off to a lab to test the stickiness of it.  If it is not sticky, he will do something, which could be equated to using a dethatcher on your lawn, in order to help my lining.  I actually didn't go into too many details about this with him, because I'm going to stay positive that my lining is not the issue.  We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

So, assuming that the biopsy comes back good, as soon as I get my period, we can start the stimming process.  Basically, I'll just be bombarded with hormones to stimulate my ovaries, then the doctor will do an egg retrieval, the ICSI to fertilize the mature eggs, then an embryo transfer.

We have a mountain of paperwork to go through.  I'm excited, anxious, nervous, scared, hopeful, there are a million emotions running through me.  I do plan on blogging about this.  While this struggle has not been a pleasant one, I don't want to forget it.

Lent List Project: Organize Entryway Closet

I completed the first project on my Lent List tonight.  Since winter is almost over and we won't be going in the closet nearly as much, I figured that I would start there.  Plus, it was the one that was annoying me the most.

Before

Before

Ewww, right!  Just piles of crap everywhere.

So, I bought some baskets and did a quick clean up and I am very happy with the results!

After

After

Much better, right?

On to the next project!

Blessings

When we bought our new car back in July, one of the features was that it came with XM radio.  I have been spending a lot of time listening to the The Message, which is one of the Christian music stations.  I heard this song a couple of weeks ago and I just love it.

It amazes me how God sends me a message exactly when I need to hear.

Lent List

Lent starts tomorrow.  Lent is the 40 days leading up to Easter, starting at Ash Wednesday.  This time marks a time of sacrifice in order to honor the time that Jesus spent in the desert.

Usually, people will give something up as a sacrifice.  Since I know that giving something up at this point in my life is really going to do nothing more than piss me off, I have decided to do something a little different.  I have decided to add something in.

I have decided that I am going to focus on being a better wife for Drew.  I don't feel like our home is as clean as it should, considering the fact that I do not work outside of the house.  Our home is clean, but not nearly as spotless as should be expected.  I am going to focus on that.  I am going to work on planning and making good dinners for Drew to eat while he's working.  (This may be really tough because I strongly dislike cooking.)  I am also going to work on bringing more organization to our home.

Here's my Lent List of things to accomplish in the next 40 days:

• Organize entryway closet
• Get basket for winter accessories
• Organize shoes
• Clean out dresser
• Organize guest bedroom closet
• Organize office closet
• Organize office
• Clean and organize desk
• Get new desk?
• Clean and organize bookshelf
• Purge wall hangings
• Clean out my closet
• Newlywed map
• Clean out pantry

I definitely have my work cut out for me, but I think that it should be a good challenge.  On top of all of these tasks that I want to complete, I also will be focusing on cleaning my house more thoroughly.  Bathrooms will be cleaned completely once a week, as opposed to me just cleaning them when they got dirty.  Carpet will be vacuumed at least once, if not twice, a week.  Floors will be mopped once a week.  I will dust once a week.  I will clean off the tables every night, as they have a tendency to be a clutter spot for stuff that Drew drops.  Usually, I'll just clean an area as it gets dirty.  These next 40 days will force me to stay on top of things.

Moving On?

I had my beta appointment today.  It was negative.  But we already knew that, right?  Especially after the devastation of two weeks ago.

When the nurse called me to give me the results, she told me that the RE wants to meet with us to decide where to go from here.  I figured we were going to be taking a break this cycle anyways.  We have an appointment to meet with him on March 24th.

I'm wishing and hoping and praying that he is going to let us move on to IVF.  I really felt defeated after our 2nd IUI failed despite amazing numbers.  I feel like IVF is our only chance of conceiving and bringing home a healthy baby. 

I hope that the next three weeks go by quickly!

Catching Up

I've been quite the blog slacker lately, but for very good reason.  I have finally decided to take the plunge and open my own photography business.  I have been hard at work researching so many different things, setting up the blog that I'm going to launch, working on pricing details, and did I mention researching?

Drew has been hard at work on the basement.  I promise that I will take some pictures tomorrow or the next day and post some progress.  It's grown bigger than we originally planned.  Don't projects always work that way?  The other Drew is coming into town mid April, so Drew is shooting to have it done by then.

I'm planning on going tomorrow to get my business license.  I'm so excited!  I've really been trying hard to get all of my ducks in a row before opening things up to clients.  I'm just about ready and I'm so nervous and anxious and excited about it.