But it was only fantasy. The wall was too high, as you can see.

To make a long story short, 1 fertilized.

It's over.

I give up.

I sentence you to be exposed before peers

I got an extremely painful phone call tonight. Here I am in Denver, on our 6th ivf procedure. Our savings GONE, vacation time GONE and hope about 90% gone and I got a phone call. One of my very best friends is a man and he knows everything we've been through the last few years. Anyway, he called adn this is how the conversation went:

Him: "where are you? What are you doing?"
Me: "I'm in Denver."
Him: "Are you getting poked?"
Me: "yes"
Him: "Does it hurt?"
Me: "not so much physically."
Him: "well good luck. Guess what? I'm going to be a dad."

:( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :(

I can't get away from it. I'm happy for him. I know this is something he's wanted since he was in his early 20's but never had a long term girlfriend. He's only been with this girl for maybe 6 months and they weren't actually trying. She's my age. WHY is it so easy for everyone else???

I just finished telling my mom and her response was "lots of people have other issues you don't have. You only think this is so terrible because it is happening to you." I know she wants to make me feel better and ALWAYS does whenever anything else was wrong but this is an area where I wish she'd just hug me and not give me an opinion.

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking

I had a huge breakdown today. I f*ing hate my gut. I knew this protocol wasn't going to work well for me but I decided to defer to Dr. Schoolcraft who assured me that he believed I would be "pleasantly surprised." After all, I'm not a doctor. What the fuck do I know?

A history of my IVF cycles:


#1 - MDL. 10 eggs, 7 mature, 1 fertilized. BFN

#2- MDL 5 mature follies after 4 days of meds. I canceled the cycle (converted to IUI) and switched my RE. BFN

#3- Antagonist- 9 eggs, 6 mature, 4 fertilized. BFN

#4 EPP Antagonist- 12 eggs, 6 mature, 4 fertilized. BFN

#5 switched to CCRM- 9 eggs, 4 fertilized and frozen on day 1.

After #5, I had a regroup with Dr. Schoolcraft and he convinced me to do another MDL protocol even though I was hesitant given my past experience with it. He believed I would end up with more eggs. Guess what? I have about 5 good looking follies and will likely trigger tonight. Given our history, we will end up with 1 or 2 fertilized eggs if we are lucky.

I know it's not over but it's obvious to me how this will end up. Here I am, wasting more money for another IVF and we won't be cycling again. I know I recently said I was done but I don't know anymore. I don't like being done before I succeed but $ is going to control this and it sucks. I probably just feel like this because I'm in the middle of it all. I knew this would be an emotionally tolling experience which is why I avoided it for so long. In any case, I can't wait for this to be over. It really just sucks.

Hello? Is there anybody in there?

Not sure if any of my old buddies are around anymore. From what I can tell, almost all have conceived and I am really happy for all of them (you). Whenever an infertile conceives, it gives the rest of us some hope. Anyway, it's been quite a while since my last post. 7 months actually. WOW. Time flies....Here's my not so brief update.



Our cycle in July was ok. We ended up with 4 embies that are still frozen. After that cycle, I needed another break from everything. Over 2 years of treatments just got the best of me and I was tired of it all. I also got really busy with other things and decided I cannot allow the weight gain, the schedules, the emotional pain, the hormones, and the absolute control of my life to continue while I just "waited" for something to happen that didn't look like it would. DH and I went on a bunch of trips and went back to our old lives; free from needles and schedules, back to the gym, alcohol and coffee, etc. I kept my pain inside, hidden from almost everyone.



I knew I wanted to do another frozen cycle at CCRM (so that I could have more embies to work with) but I didn't know when. I got laid off in December and decided, it's the right time to have another cycle. I also realized, that no matter what, even if I win the lottery, this will be my last IVF cycle with my eggs. I've had enough. I used to think that I was crazy enough to cycle over and over and over again until I find that golden egg but I'm ready to throw in the towel. There is almost so much a person can take and as many wise woman told me, I will know when I've reached my limit. They were right.



On Wednesday we are heading to Denver. My mom is coming too. I'm really looking forward to spending time with her. Retrieval is set for around 2/24. I'm looking forward to closing this painful and long chapter in our lives. No matter what the outcome, I will never understand why it's been so hard for us. I'll never be who I would have been had we never been through this. But I do think the worst is over. I do think that I've come to accept that this may not happen for us and there's nothing we can do about it. These are the cards we were dealt and we can either bury ourselves in a hole or we can keep living. I also know that we are much closer now. We are both more compassionate towards other people. We are less judgmental. And of course, we are much much stronger.

YUP! It's definitely the drugs.

I was on some sort of IF drugs for so long I lost touch with myself and found myself unable to decipher between my real self and my drugged self. During my break, I slowly started to revert to my less moody, less teary and definitely less bitchy self. I will never be the same of course. Never. But I do know that the bitchy, angry, teary woman of today isn't really me. It's the drugs. I am on my 10th day of stims and I'm really starting to feel it. For absolutely no reason, I want to pound the shit out of something. My poor DH!

Besides that, we are really enjoying Colorado and made this into a mini vacation. We spent Friday in Cheyenne, Wyoming, Saturday in Canon City, and yesterday in Vail. Yes, DH is an adventurer and rarely leaves a moment free! We both worked from the hotel today so it was a pretty uneventful day.

I did get a message at CCRM and I HIGHLY recommend it. It's $50 for an hour and she is not allowed to accept tips. I've been to some top end spas and this is one of the best massages I've ever had.

According to their original schedule, I was suppose to trigger tonight but I'm being moved by at least one day. I'm not really paying much attention to this stuff because I don't want to feel stressed about numbers but I can't help getting some minimal info.

As of this morning, I had 9 or 10 measurable follies. Some were pretty small. My E2 came back at 1924.

Overall, I'm really happy with my decision to come here. They seem very meticulous and detail oriented. I have the peace of mind knowing that I'm with the best.

So I Took a Break...

Just a very quick update.



Thanks to all of you who have been concerned. I am sorry I was such a bad blogger for so long. I thought about writing an update oh so many times but for lack of a better excuse, I didn't.


After my last failure, I was devastated. I realized that I had been on drugs nonstop for well over a year and really needed to give my body and mind a break. Given my obsessive personality, I quickly found new obsessions to focus on. To name a few, since mid April, I studied for and passed the Patent Bar, I implemented a huge event relating to an important case that I am not representing but is very important to me, and I am deeply involved in something else that I don't want to reveal on my blog as I may lose my anonymity. Those of you whom I know personally, know exactly what I am talking about.

So, what did focusing on other things do for me? A LOT! I eventually found my confidence again! The morning I was leaving for the patent bar exam, my conversation with my hubby went something like this:

me: "I am going to fail. I am not prepared, I didn't study enough." (It is true that I wasn't fully prepared as I studied about 1/4 of the recommended amount).

Hubby: "Of course you will pass! You always pass. Stop it!."

Me: "That was before I became a loser."

And I left the house.

On my way to my exam I realized that I had let IF take over not just my body but my identity as well. I was so entrenched in my fertility failure that I saw myself as a failure in everything. I decided right there, on my way to my exam, that I may have IF, but I can't let it define everything I am anymore. I went into the exam with an amazing level of confidence and I passed the exam.

After that, things just started getting better and I started to see the old me again. Of course, there were many moments of IF related sadness but I tried to minimize them and move on as quickly as possible.

Sometime during this process, I got the call from CCRM. I immediately started to panic because I was having too much fun to go back to that hell and wasn't ready for the possible final blow. I also didn't want it to ruin my entire summer. I decided to delay by one month and think. A few days later, after a an amazing yoga session, it all came to me! A thought peeped in and said to go through with retrieval and freeze all of our embies until at least the fall. I immediately knew that was the right decision and it is what I decided to do.

I am leaving for Denver tomorrow evening and retrieval is tentatively set for July 21. I am not stressed out and have barely paid attention to this cycle outside of remembering to do my shots. I hope this continues but I know there will be some moments of stress that will come in the next week or so. I think I'm prepared.

Ok, so maybe that wasn't such a quick update.

Don't look so frightened, this is just a passing phase, one of my bad days.

I had a bad day today.
I had a really bad day.
So much went wrong today.
Sometimes I don't know if I can keep going.
Today, I took a long look at my left over needles and bottles of sodium chloride and I wondered what over the counter drug I could break up and inject myself with for a painless death. Pretty pathetic, I know.

Don't worry, I won't go through with it or anything. I could never do that to my family. Sometimes though, I wish I could. Tomorrow is another day. For sure it will be better than today.