Waiting and meditating

Thank you again to everyone for your support. It is amazing how much a little comment can help.

Per Leah's request, I am posting an update on how I am doing. I have been thinking about what to post for a couple of days. I would like to chronicle how my feelings (hopefully) continue to change to more acceptance regarding using donor eggs. The problem is that my emotions have been all over the place and I am not even sure where they come from.

I haven't been feeling particularly pregnant. I do have tender breasts and have had some cramping, but neither of these are definitely due to the pregnancy instead of the progesterone. They are also much milder symptoms than I had with Ernest - my only non-medicated pregnancy. Even though it is early, the lack of symptoms leads me to panic that this pregnancy is already over and I just don't know it yet.

I have also been crying a lot - not for extended periods, but for short periods several times throughout the day. At different times, I have different reasons for this. All or none of them may be true, but here is the short list:

• I am afraid this pregnancy won't last.
• I feel like this might actually work and that letting down my guard a bit allows the grief of the last 5 years to come pouring out.
• I am sad that the first time we receive good, doubling betas is only after we have given up on my eggs.
• It is just the hormones making me cry easily and all the reasons are just manifestations of a mind trying to make an illogical reaction logical.
  

In order to stay sane - or at least somewhat calm - I have been practicing my meditation per Mel's second happiness challenge. I either try to just notice my breath, the sensations around me or I create a happy place in my mind to visit. I have had varying degrees of success. I was surprised - when I finally set a timer - that I am coming nowhere near the 10 minutes. The time I did set a timer, I was amazed at how many different thoughts can pass through a mind in only 10 minutes. Especially when I'm trying to keep all those thoughts out.

I think it has helped. I especially find it useful to "go to my happy place" at night. Otherwise I would be too terrified to sleep. Don't get me wrong, I am hopeful. At least I think I am. At the very least I try to stay neutral and not think about it too much. The down side of knowing so many infertiles is you always know someone who was in a similar position and lost the pregnancy. In this case, I know someone who had high, doubling betas (they were thinking it was twins) and found no gestational sacs at the first ultrasound - the same timing as my upcoming ultrasound. Later the blood work revealed her beta levels were going down and she was diagnosed with a chemical pregnancy.

Did I say I am trying not to think about it too much? I guess "trying" is the key word. I keep reminding myself that it is either going to work or it isn't and there is extremely little I can do to influence the outcome. I don't want to spend the next eight months (if I am so lucky) worried or filled with anxiety either. I figure this is good practice.

Some happenings around IVF #5

Thanks again to everyone for your thoughts and well wishes. It helps so much. It has been a nice weekend. I am still not sleeping well at all which has made me a bit of a basket case, but I am surviving and Brad hasn't tried to kill me yet so we are doing ok.

Yesterday Belinda had her appointment. I didn't go with her because I was away on a camping trip. We actually slept in a hotel Friday night. Saturday morning, before heading out for what turned out to be some beautiful day hiking, I called Belinda to see how she was doing and how the appointment went. Our wonderful egg donor is pretty uncomfortable. She is tired and is cramping a lot. I feel so bad for her. I hope it doesn't get much worse. Her appointment went well, however. Dr. R. was unusually chatty, asking her how old she was, how many kids, how old were the kids. Like me, Belinda wasn't sure if he was just making conversation or probing about her fertility. She didn't know how to answer the question about the number of kids she has. Yes, seems easy, but is he asking about her fertility - in which case she has given birth to two - or is he asking about how many kids she has - which is three (she is currently trying to adopt a daughter she has raised since 18 months). She answered two, but then felt guilty about lying.

After getting off the phone with Belinda, the worst case scenarios starting going through my mind. Are her E2 levels dropping? Are her follicles not growing? Is he concerned she that she doesn't have very many? I got myself all worked up to the point that I called my nurse and asked her to check it out for me. Thankfully, she was checking her voice mail so I was able to find out pretty quickly that Dr. R. was just making conversation. I don't exactly feel silly asking - I am very thankful to have the reassurance, but they must think I am crazy. My RE probably believes (correctly) that I am watching and interpreting everything he says like some early Junior High romance. "What do you think Tommy meant when he asked if I liked Algebra?" would be the equivalent.

I am so shameless, I asked him again in person today. Over the last 24 hours, I imagined that he is a bit concerned, but knowing there is nothing to be done about it, he is not letting me know. I figured in person I could read his body language. My conclusion is that he is being honest and he really does believe everything is going fine. Yep, I feel better. For now.

Everything else went pretty well at my appointment too. He said that my lining was good (7.9, I think and he showed me the triple stripe). Then he checked out my ovaries. Since I am not taking Lupron, I do have a beautiful follicle growing at 19 mm. I joked that we should just aspirate it and see what happens. Dr. R. pointed out that there is only one, to which I replied, "But it might be the lucky one!" He laughed and asked if we bought lottery tickets. My husband quipped, "Why? Do you think that will help?" Sadly, no, he didn't think aspirating one follicle nor buying lottery tickets would help. I start genirelix (to keep from ovulating) tonight.

One other nice event. Today I ran into a couple whom I recognized from our previous cycle. I said hello, gave my condolences and wished them luck this cycle. They did the same and then they were gone. Why do I let these chances to get to know more IRL infertiles just dissolve? I decided that the next time I made a connection with someone I would get a phone number. Brad and I sat in a fairly full waiting room for about 30 minutes while no one spoke. I looked around the room and tried to figure out with whom I could start a conversation. Gosh, this part is so hard. "So, what brings you here?" "Do you have any kids yet?" "Is this your first time or are you a 4 time loser like me?" Nothing comes to mind even though I know that once a conversation starts it usually flows easily until one of us gets called in. I notice a lady across the way looking toward me. I look away. Was I embarrassed for being a 4 time loser or just not ready at that moment to expose my vulnerability? I don't know. A few minutes later we both look up at the same time. We say a simple "Hi" to each other. The conversation flows. She is from out of town and staying in a motel. I offer to get together. We have each other's phone numbers. We will be getting together tomorrow night for dinner. Yeah!

This has gotten me thinking . . . what if we all made an effort to connect with another individual in our clinics. If it seemed we were compatible at all, we would offer our phone number or email or whatever and make an effort to get together at least once. Even if the connection ended at the end of the cycle, it would be a connection. What if, eventually, it became the culture that people were expected - and happy - to chat and connect and exchange contact information in the RE's waiting rooms across the world? Maybe going in for those monitoring appoints would be just a little bit less stressful because we would feel we were walking into a room full of support instead of into a room full of lonely, anxious people.