I started the week by finally getting up to Syracuse to go to the fertility guru's office. I had a baseline ultrasound and blood work done. Every moment in their office felt like I was in the right place. Everyone was so kind and friendly. And they were extremely efficient.

The first woman who walked me back took my blood, then left the room. The ultrasound tech came in next and took care of that. She left and in came the nurse that I've been talking to on the phone, with my blood work results and a chart of how the next few weeks will go. Daily shots turn into two shots a day tonight, ultrasounds and blood work down here every three days, and then the target date for egg retrieval is September 9.

I'm moving again, and it feels good. And the gym reopened this week -- yeah! I had a great talk with my trainer tonight, we talked about goals and my workout schedule. I told him that I recently realized that I've been so focused on getting pregnant, that I let my focus on working out and being healthy slip away. That I need to take each month that I'm not pregnant as an opportunity to work out hard, and that even if I am pregnant, that's no excuse to ease up.

I will talk with fertility guru and get his okay on everything, so that I can continue with an hour of cardio and strength training five days a week. And Aaron is totally on board to support me, to keep me motivated, to help me stay healthy, pregnant or not. It felt good. It made things seem more balanced. Something I'm not very good at.

And so tonight, I did two shots. And I thought the second one won't be so bad, the needle is the same size. Hmmmm...not so much. It was not only a little longer, but much sharper. It took me a couple times to get the needle in my stomach, and then it was okay. It's always okay. It hurts at the very first poke, but then it's fine.

And as always, it's all going to be worth it.

Shooting Up

I started my injections on Tuesday, and by last night I feel like an old pro. The needle is not as awful as I thought, and I was far less squeemish, too. I will continue with these injections to suppress all of my hormone levels.

Then after I get my period, I'll go to Syracuse for a baseline ultrasound. (I could do that here, but I figured I should start to establish a relationship and feel comfortable with the new office.) After that, I start with a different shot (still in the stomach) that will turn my ovaries into Jiffy Pop, as my friend Nancy says, and hopefully produce lots of big, juicy, healthy eggs.

And then sometime around September 8 or 9, I will go up to have my eggs harvested. I'll need someone to take me, since they will have to give me a local and I'll be a little too loopy to drive back. I'll already have the baby batter at the doctor's office so they can inject each egg with sperm. And then if all goes well, I'll go back a few days later and be implanted with two embryos.

That's a lot of if's. I'm trying to be cautiously optimistic about this whole process.

You'd think by now that would be an emotion I was an expert at, but I'm not. Somehow I always get my hopes up too high, which leads to major disappointments. And for the past year, it has been nothing but a roller coaster of hopeful highs and crashing lows.

Just once, I would like something I hope for to come true. I felt that by securing a known egg donor, by finding someone I knew and trusted and loved to be my genetic "replacement," the disappointment of having the dwindling egg supply was so greatly minimized.

Truly, the minute she offered, my 10-day headache went away. It was so unnerving to have to think about finding a genetic replacement for me. Choosing the sperm was like buying a pair of shoes compared to looking at the egg donor profiles.

I should have known better than to feel so secure. (And while I'm glad if she had reservations, that she voiced them now, it is still disappointing, it is still so hurtful. And I wonder, if I had not written to her and told her I had my phone consultation and that I would call her after so I could let her know the next steps, if I had not done then, when would she have told me?)

And so that's all I have to say about that. It's done. It's over. I need to focus on trying to grow some eggs. To encourage my body to eek out just a few viable eggs, for just another cycle or so. And that Dr. Richard Gere can perform the miracles that he's been performing for over 10 years.

I know of nine babies, by three different women, that he is responsible for creating. Wouldn't 10 be a nice round number?

Dr. Richard Gere

I had my phone consultation this morning with the fertility guru who, if I have not mentioned, looks like Richard Gere.

His voice was very soothing and he made me feel like we're in this together. He looked at my file and isn't as concerned about my FSH number as my regular OB, so he wants to try to see if he can get some eggs out of me.

"You have insurance coverage, let's just try and see if we can harvest some eggs. I may go in and see that you don't have any, but then we'll know for sure and we still have options of using an egg donor." (I put the recent happenings of last night out of my head and focused on being positive with what he was saying.)

We talked for about 10 minutes and we decided that I didn't want to do IUI any more. "I'm 38 and a half....I'm not getting any younger, let's just get this done." And he agreed. IVF is the next best step for me.

His nurse was to call me today or tomorrow and set me up with the meds schedule, and I will start injectables in the next day or two. Yippee....I don't get out of giving myself a shot in the stomach every day. ;)

I felt really positive this morning after talking with him. Not only because there's still a possibility of getting pregnant with my own eggs, but also because we're moving again. I'm the type of person that will go 10 miles out of my way if I can keep my car moving, rather than sit in traffic. And that's what I've felt like, like I was sitting in traffic and couldn't keep moving.

As for my friend who rescinded her offer to be my egg donor....I'm not ready to fully talk about it yet. I'm feeling all the things that Bubbles said in her comment in the previous post, and more.

Disappointment because after serious discussions with her about her reservations, she still said that she and her husband had agreed that it was "a go." Resentment that she is allowing people who don't even know me to have such a profound effect on my life.

I'll get over it. I'm just not sure when.

My Infertility Headache is Back

I received the following email excerpt from my friend, who by all account I was thinking would be my egg donor. I can't comprehend it all yet. I'm numb. More tomorrow after I talk to the fertility guru.


I cannot tell you how sorry I am, but I don't think I can be a donor. At first I was just wondering logistically about where the nearest OBGYN office is, and the fact of dealing with Albany traffic and the hours' drive at a moment's notice, and that was just a concern. We know how my sister works, but when I talked to her about it and she just kept asking about how it should bother me having a biological child out there. In the circumstance of donating eggs to you, I really wouldn't think of it as my child at all. It would be yours. Coming out here, I can talk to my mom-in-law about anything, and she's a very liberal and modern thinker. So it exasperated me when, upon mentioning donating eggs, she instantly turns to Lily and says "You'll have half-siblings!!!" I didn't anticipate, as you have had to do, me having to deal with family member's opinions on it. I never thought of it as an issue, but now I know that I have at least 2 family members that would forever believe I had children out there, even that Lily would have half-siblings. That thinking really bothers me.

I cannot tell you how sorry I am. I hope you can feel that. I think that in the donor paperwork it should definitely mention talking to extended family members and their feelings; obviously it addresses the potential donor's thoughts so much, but I NEVER anticipated having family members who would stubbornly view the donation as giving children away or refusing to budge that if I don't think of the donation as giving away biological children or Lily's half-siblings, neither should they. It just gets me to the core. I know that you've encountered judgements in your pursuit; so I guess it just goes to show that everyone does along the way.

But please know that I am rooting for you all the way, I entirely regret upheld hopes and dropping them down. With all of my heart, I believe in the mother you have waiting to nurture your child, I believe that you have a child waiting to be in your arms, and I love you!

Things are moving forward :)

My file has finally arrived in Syracuse at the fertility guru's office, and I have a consultation phone call on Monday morning at 7am.

My patience has been wearing thin with the waiting and waiting. Now I finally feel like I'm back on the road. Of course it also means that next week I will have to make my final decision about the egg donor. And even though I'm leaning strongly in one direction, I know that making it final will be hard.

And while I've had hopeful thoughts that I might be pregnant this month from my moments of indiscretion, I know really that I'm not. That I couldn't be. And so having the appointment on Monday really keeps me on track with my thinking, and not setting myself up for a major disappointment.