Irritable

The switch to gluten free has made me irritable. This happened last time as well. I crave (read NEED) refined carbs during the first few weeks of the switch each time. If it wasn't so difficult to maintain I would stay gluten free to avoid this. But on the plus side I've lost 6 of the 20 lbs I'm looking to lose before our next IVF attempt.

Due to the irritability I had to really watch myself at work today. Granted, Mondays are hard ANYWAY as the girls readjust to my parenting style and the routine of the weekday vs the non-routine of the weekend. I kept finding myself stopping and counting to 10. That seems to help when I'm about to say something I don't mean to say.

I came home from a LONG day of work and the dogs had found my newest knitting catalog and ripped it to shreds. I had to pick all of it up (did I mention my lower back is hurting and bending over intensifies the pain?) and then vacuum the scraps. Grrr...

The dealership got back to me and doesn't have a loaner for me to use while the fix my car until the 23rd. Argh. I hope my car doesn't die before then. It shouldn't, but who knows why the check engine light is on. I wish I didn't need my car for work with the girls 'cause they had earlier appointments if a loaner wasn't needed.
Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day.

A Plan of Sorts...

I saw my amazing acupuncturist yesterday and had a check-up/check-in with her. I told her about our consult and that Dr Opie would like us to move forward next cycle and that we told him we weren't ready. I also let her know that he doesn't want us waiting until summer for fear of lower AFC's. She felt my pulses and agrees with me that I need to let my body heal and replenish before starting the whole IVF craziness again. The plan is for me to eat healthy and exercise heavily to try to lose weight in the next couple of months. Healthy eating = Gluten Free as much as possible, cow dairy free, adding goat dairy and lots of veggies and eating most of my food cooked and not raw. In March I go back to see her and she'll prescribe a liver detox for me. I'll continue the healthy eating and exercise and then check in again in April. In April I'll hopefully start the suppression cycle with the hope that we'll do stims in May with a May retrieval and transfer. I'll increase acu sessions accordingly as we get closer to suppression/stims. After talking with her I feel a bit hopeful.

On another note... my 1st of 2 remembrance necklaces arrived this week. This is the "dressier" one that I won't necessarily wear every day. I wore it to work and the little one was constantly trying to touch/play with it. I'm really happy with it and to have a reminder of Rowan.

The picture is a bit blurry, but it's a emerald cut peridot gemstone. Peridot is the August birthstone.

Stress

This week has been another stressful one. Things have slightly calmed down on the work front. It is calmer, in my opinion, because the girls Auntie went back home. The mom is still in the hospital and hopefully will be home next Sunday.

We had a couples counseling session on Wednesday which was good. We were able to figure out what we are thinking of doing for future cycles. For right now we are taking a break. I am planning on talking with my acupuncturist this week about a timeline for trying IVF again. We are thinking that we will move to this more aggressive IVF in a few cycles. This will hopefully give my body time to recover a bit and grow strong again to support a pregnancy.

I had decided to take this Sunday off from my music responsibilities at church. I started calling and emailing women in my church to be a sub for me on Thursday. I didn't hear back from many until Friday. I only found someone for 1 of the hours. I then ended up calling more women on Saturday to find someone for the 2nd hour. It was such a hassle and more stressful than I had hoped. I had to contact 10 women to find coverage. STRESS!!

Emotionally I have had ups and downs this week. Yesterday and today have been a down day. I'm missing my baby. I keep thinking of what might have been and it's sad. DH has been sad too. He said in our therapy session how much harder it was for him to deal with our miscarriage now that we know she was a girl and have named her. He said it seems more real now. For me, it has helped to name her. It DOES seem more real. We had a daughter and she has passed away. Now we can begin grieving her before we move on to try again.

The name we chose for our daughter is: Rowan Emma. I'm so pleased that we found such a beautiful name for our little one. I ordered both of the memorial necklaces and they should arrive next week. I can't wait to have something to wear and to physically touch to daily remind myself of our little girl.

LEAP

Luteal Estrace/Antagonist Protocol. This is the new protocol being recommended by our RE for a future cycle. It seems (from what I've read) that it is an estrogen priming protocol. Basically, I call when I see ovulation based on OPK's and then start oral estrace. The next day I add an atagonist for 2 days. AF arrives after 2 days and then it's a baseline U/S. If all looks well then I start stims. 5 days into the stims I start the antagonist again (once follicles are 12-14mm) and continue until the trigger.
It's a lot to consider. DH and I know we aren't moving forward on the next cycle, February, as our RE suggested. We aren't ready that quickly. For now we are thinking about it, but trying not to obsess.
I am planning on getting into my acupuncturist to find out what she thinks. I want to have a good chance of this working if we move forward, so I want to do all I can TCM-wise to make that happen.
I'd also like to shed some of the weight I've gained through the past 6 months of IVF craziness.

On another note.... we've picked our daughter's name. Once we've told our family I'll post it here.

IVF cycle review

We had our cycle review meeting with Dr. Opie yesterday. It was a bit overwhelming and I kept getting hung up on a few things he said. Here are some of the highlights/low lights of the meeting:

Our baby was a chromosomally normal girl

Even though the genetic test came back normal he still believes there was something abnormal with the pregnancy

He doesn't want to do a recurrent miscarriage panel for me as he believes the tests won't show anything anyway and we are OOP

There isn't anything we could do in the future to prevent other miscarriages

This miscarriage doesn't decrease our chances of conceiving again

He thinks we should go forward with IVF again- in his words "All hope is not lost. Given enough time you could become pregnant and deliver a baby"

Also his words "You are not the best reproductively" Gee thanks.

If we move forward I would be on what he termed the "LEAP" protocol. It's not MDL or long lupron. I tried googling it but haven't found anything. He briefly described it but didn't go into details. I would start hormones (he didn't specify which ones and I didn't ask believing I could find more info online) after I ovulate. So it would be similar to a long lupron in that it is over a 1 1/2 to 2 month time period.

He wants us to try again soon. I brought up lab closures (wanting to find out when it was so we don't run into it again) and he said that we shouldn't wait 4-6 months. (The next closure is in the summer- July/Aug time frame) He thinks that when the next AF arrives would be a good time to start. The reason to move forward now is my past history of low AFC and poor response. Time is not my friend or on my side.

He believes our chances of conceiving again are the same as last time- 40%. He said possibly higher but definitely not lower.

Overall he told us we had a bad streak of luck with our last pregnancy but that we should be cautiously optimistic and hopeful.

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I'm disappointed that we don't have more information for why this happened. We both figured we would have some answers, but not all of them. But, this is my 2nd to worse case scenario for the meeting.

I am glad we know that our baby was a girl. We are now picking her names. I love my daughter and want her to have a name. We are running into problems picking her names as we are hesitant to use names we would use for a living child. That sounds awful, but that's how I'm feeling right now. DH and I hope to come to a decision soon about her name. I hope that I'll be able to grieve her more fully now that I know a bit more about her.

DH and I have discussed what to do moving forward. We haven't come to any decisions yet. I need to find out more information about the protocol before I can make a decision I think. It's hard for me to make any decisions right now because of my exhaustion level (emotionally and physically) due to my current work situation.

On my psychiatrists advice I'm taking it as easy as possible this weekend. I've found a substitute music teacher for church. DH and I are doing dinner tonight with our dear friends and goddaughter, but that's about all the social stuff I can handle. I'm hoping that I won't be needed at work this weekend, but the situation is still so tenuous and things could change quickly.

I have a lot to think about and process and I'm hoping that I can do it quickly so that we can make a decision soon.

Awake

I can't seem to sleep. My mind is full and my thoughts keep swirling around. I hope that by writing them out I will get some peace and that eventually the sleeping pill I took will kick in...

- I'm missing my little one intensely today. AF arrived today and is a physical reminder that my little one is no longer being carried with me. All day I missed you little one.

-I'm worried about my employer. I'm glad she's finally in a hospital that can help her. However, I know she is scared and feels alone. I know that this is the right decision for her family, but my heart goes out to her.

-I'm concerned that I may be unemployed at the end of this. My employer owns her own business and is a contract employee to another larger company. She was in the middle of negotiating a contract for next year when this all happened. If she is unable to have an income, then they will be unable to afford a nanny.

-I'm physically exhausted by all of this stress over the past week. I am not sleeping well or eating well. I know this is adding to the exhaustion I'm feeling, yet I have a hard time breaking out of this cycle right now.

-I'm anxious about our upcoming IVF cycle review. I am worried about the answers we will receive if any and anxious that Dr O won't have any good news for us if we were to move forward again with IVF.

-IVF... can I do it again? Emotionally it was so difficult. Physically it was really rough on my body. Financially... I may not have a job which is all that could enable us to try again. Our chances last go were 40%. Yet, to have our child I know all of the pain, hurt, discomfort and challenges would be so worth it. For those few weeks when I was carrying our baby it was bliss... I was constantly worried, but it was bliss... a miracle. But, if I did conceive again would the baby grow to term? So many, many questions and no answers for now.

Draining Day

Today started out ok. I slept in again (I can't seem to get enough sleep this weekend) and then puttered around getting things together for church. DH took off to do some photography and I got dressed for church.

Ten minutes before church was to start my cell phone rang. I instantly was concerned that it was my employer. It was. He stated that he needed to take his wife to the ER and asked if I could come take care of the girls. I immediately told him I could and that I had to call some people at church and then I'd come over. Of course, I couldn't get a hold of anyone from church since they were AT church. I drove to the chapel and found a friend who agreed to do the children's music for me.

I headed home and changed out of church clothes and into nanny clothes and headed to work. I was shocked by my employers appearance. This is not the woman I know. She has deteriorated fast. She was restless, confused and looked very, very tired. The girls were happy to see me. My employer eventually was able to get his wife ready to leave and then he took her to the hospital.

I took charge on the home front and got the girls lunch and then ready for naps. They both took good naps. During nap time my employer called and filled me in. He told me that his wife would be staying at the hospital and he wanted to try and stay until a Dr. was assigned to her. He asked if I could stay a few more hours and get the girls their dinner. I readily agreed.

The girls woke up and we watched part of a Disney movie and then I fed them dinner. Their dad came home and we had a quick talk about how to handle the absence of their mother. Originally he wanted to tell them that she had flown to be with her ill father (who passed away last week) but he brought up the idea of telling them the truth. I pounced on that and he decided to go that way and asked me to stay as he told them.

After the girls were cleaned up from dinner he held one and I held the other and he told them that 'mama is sick and needs to stay at the hospital with the Dr's and nurses until she gets better.' The oldest asked 'how did mama got sick?' He told her that he didn't know but hopefully the Dr's would find out and help her get better. Then the kids asked if they could finish the movie. I turned the movie on for them and spoke some more with their father. He is so distraught and at his wits end. He told me that his mother and probably his sister-in-law (the mom's sister) would be coming to town to help.

I came home and filled in DH. I can't imagine if this was happening to me and I had to make these kinds of decisions regarding my spouse. I hope that the girls mom is able to have a quick diagnosis and recovery and that their dad is able to handle the stress of caring for his wife and the girls. I'm emotionally drained and I'm assuming this will be a difficult and stressful week for all involved.