Saturday, March 7, 2009

A lot

Realistic.
AF came swooping in and dashing hopes on Tuesday.
You guys, this was a tough cycle for me. I had hoped. I had thought that since there is so much turmoil going on with my job right now that this was God's way of ensuring that His timing was more perfect than me trying for almost 3 years. I thought this would mean that if I was pregnant this month that I could lose my job (or be forced to go part time) and this would be the reason why.
So then Naturally I got stuck on , "why!?". This is a REALLY bad place to be stuck. I was there for about 3 nights. Not the bitter stuck where I can't deal with life, but the sad stuck where I was left wondering what the plan God has could possibly be. I cried for 3 nights in a row, which is kind of unusual for me. Now yes, I am a crier. Put Steel Magnolia's on and let's see everyone "hit Weezer" and I'm gone. But I generally can pick myself off and dust my shoes off and move forward. This month was harder.
That's why I didn't post for a few days.
Now, I am going to say that I'm through the dark valley and headed to the mountain top (all of which of course happens over a 26-28 day time period each month, the lows and the highs) but I was left trying to decide what our reproductive options should be this month.

Option A: Another IUI cycle
Pros: being agressive about having future baby. Increased hope.
Cons: 800 dollars to be spent at a time when money should be saved for mortage in the fall if I don't have a job or am forced to substitute for reduced pay.

Option B: Another Timed intercourse cycle
Pros: Only 200 smackers
Cons: Feeling that it's not enough and should save the money for the big hitters at a later date.

And then there is the timing. It was really hard to schedule the IUI. I tried for 3 days in a row to get a hold of the right DR's office where my chart was and the scheduling would be an ultrasound next Sunday morning. Now I do play in the band at church, and while I would gladly give that or many other things up, I just didn't get a good feeling about skipping church to do an ultrasound. I didn't feel like sharing with people why I twouldn't be there, and mostly I just felt that through all of this I want to be honoring to God, and celebrating with believers is where I should be. This may be controversial, and I'm okay with that. I really did deliberate about this choice and finally deciding yesterday that I was trying to cram in too much felt good.

So. This month we are trying on our own (again) and I'm still waiting to hear if we have jobs in the fall. To remind: If my DH and I both have our full-time teaching jobs back in the fall we will (Lord willing of course) be doing an IVF cycle during the summer. The good news is I found out yesterday that I got a summer school position so this means that instead of having to save for two months of summer I get to save for only one. So ... I can't even begin to start making any reproductive plans, but I am going to be getting busy with the DH next week.
What's funny, is last Sunday our pastor talked about Sex (in church of course) and he challeneged all the married couples to have sex for 7 days in a row. Being that AF showed up we decided to put this off. And even in our BDing escapades we've never done that. I'm going to be bold here and ask you guys, when trying on your own (if you feel like sharing) what is the most about of BDing you have done in a row? I'll start by saying my dr recommended every other day, so our record for BDing purposes is only 3. Do any of you subscribe to the method that you just have to do it every day for a month?

Curious.

Enjoy the rest of your weekends ladies.

7 comments:

Lisa said...

I'm sorry this cycle didn't work out for you. I had the same issues about skipping worship services to have an ultrasound. Luckily, my eggs grew at the right times and I didn't have to ever do that.

About the sex part, there were about three months after we had been trying for a year that we had sex every day almost. You would think that would be great, but it really wasn't. The first bit was great, but then it just got tedious. The last medicated/home bd cycle that we did, we had sex on a Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday morning, Sunday morning and Sunday evening just to make sure we hit all bases. Still didn't work. During the successful IUI cycle, we had sex once about a week before, had the IUI and then have had sex once since then. I think it just got to be a chore and we stopped enjoying it. I know it'll eventually be fun again, but I don't see that happening for a while. Infertility sure wreaked havoc on that aspect of our relationship. Was that too much information or what!?!?

I know how extremely frustrating this is and I am hoping for you.

Leslie Laine said...

Hi Courtney - Sorry to hear that this cycle didn't work out for you. I agree with you - it gets harder and harder to understand God's plan, and the ups and downs of this experience are almost unbearable at times. It sounds like you're making the most of things, though. I have really been working on the faith aspect of my relationship with God lately and really just trusting in His plan for us instead of our own. Hard, definitely, but I have been working at it every single day. It sounds like you're doing the same.

As for the sex thing, we've tried everything. At one point, we convinced ourselves that we needed to ignore the every other day advice and just do it every single day. Didn't work. Obviously.

Thinking of you and hoping that you're feeling a little brighter today. Glad to see your post today.

Jill said...

I first want to say that I'm sorry this wasn't the month. My heart hurts whenever I read that news.

I've been lucky with the U/S on Sunday issue...I let them know that I have church and they schedule mine for their earliest apptm. Of course, if your doc's office is far from your church, this would be hard. I'm lucky to have my doc's office within 10 mins from where I live and 20 mins from my church. Once you get down to the last steps of IVF (like we are now), you have no choice in the matter...if transfer lands on a Sunday, you have to do it...otherwise you could lose your embryos. I'm with you though...I would rather not miss church for anything.

As for sex everyday...when we first started trying, it was like that a lot, but it starts feeling like a chore, instead of the spontaneous, fun, thing it's supposed to be. :) Plus, your husband's sperm will have a higher mortality rate if you have sex everyday, which will make it harder to get pregnant. Our doc recommends 3-5 days abstinence, before a sperm sample is given for fertilization. So if you go by that, you would have sex twice a week.

I'm always praying for you guys. I have no doubt that you will be a Mommy. Like you said...in His perfect timing.

((HUGS))

Scrambled Egg said...

Dang it. I was really hoping that it would happen for you this month.

As for the sex thing, we (like the others) have tried almost everything. I think we've come close to every day for a week, but by the end of the week, we never wanted to have sex again. And we didn't, for almost 2 weeks. This infertility thing does have a way of taking the fun out of things. I've found that IUI has somewhat given us our spontaneity back--as we don't feel like we have to time everything as perfectly. I have a friend who's husband and she have had sex everyday since they got married (except when af is there) and they've been married for 11 years. So, it can be done. But definitely not for me.

who said life is fair said...

so sorry this cycle didn't work. always a bummer but glad you took time to be sad and now are ready to climb back UP the mountain!

most we've bd'd is 4 days in a row. I've heard a lot of different recommendations though. The one that I think makes sense is to bd every 3 days.

As for doing it SEVEN days in a row, I'd find that difficult! lol.

The last time we got pregnant (followed by m/c but still, we got pregnant), we bd'd 3 days in a row starting when I hit peak on my fertility monitor.

good luck this month!

Courtney said...

I'm so sorry to hear that this wasn't your cycle. My DH didn't have any sperm issues so here was our bd plan. And yes it was extremely hard. It was really sad when sex became a chore...hurt me to the core.
Trying with bding at home (no ultrasounds)- We would BD every other day until I got a positive opk, then we would BD that night and the next.
IUI cycles- We would BD the night of trigger shot, then the sample for the IUI 36 hours later (DH's sperm count was always great with a 36 hour break so we decided to keep doing it that way), and we would BD again that night sometimes or definitely the next morning or night.

I really think the BD every other day seems to work best. One mistake I made over and over was starting the BD fest a little early. I finally realized that it was killing us so I started not asking for it or talking about it until I knew it was really time. I never had an early ovulation so I didn't need to worry about getting any bding in before cd 12.
HTH!! And I'm hoping with you that this is your cycle!

I Believe in Miracles said...

I'm so bummed to come back to this news. Oh. Bummer. I'm so so so so so sorry!! I can't say that enough. I can so understand the hopeful hope and then the big crash. That was my 2nd IUI precisely. It sucks. No other way around that.

The most we BD'd was every other day for a month. We definitely did the 2-3 days pre/post around, mostly doing an every other day option, but never got pregnant that way. We found out that a rest pre ovulation was good for the sperm count, but unfortunately the predicting the O was not really good, so we took what came.

Needless to say - we had the most fun when there was no pressure to create something. ;o)

As for the Sunday thing - I had plenty of days where I had to go in early on Sundays for blood draws or u/s. Luckily the way our clinic does them so early in the morning, we were easily out in time for church. I did have an IUI on a Sunday (I think we skipped church for that) and my FET transfer was on Sunday afternoon and we had to leave a little early (as in we couldn't clean up communion duty for the 2nd service). It's sort of a tough call. At the point we were in our road, we just tried to let it roll and take what came. If we missed church, we listened to the serman online.

~~HUGS~~