Baby Girl in 11 weeks or less!!!

Had my 28 week growth scan today, baby girl is looking great.  

She weighs an estimated 2lb13oz which is in the 48th percentile.  She definitely felt like she had been growing these last 4 weeks...to the point where my belly felt so stretched and uncomfortable some days that I didn't want to wear clothes!

This picture shows her left hand on her head and both feet touching her forehead with her ankles crossed.  Babies sure are flexible!  She didn't cooperate to give us a nice picture of her face.

I passed the 1 hour glucose tolerance test, which I'm happy about because being pregnant gives me a sweet tooth!  I also got my Rhogam shot and flu shot this week.  Blood pressure is up slightly, hopefully this will stay in check.

In nursery work, I found the perfect glider, which Mike got for me/us as a double early Anniversary present (10 years next week!).

It's a glider big enough for the whole family to share!!!  Painting is still a work in progress, one more coat on the pink and turquoise stripes and we can peel off the tape to see how it turned out.  

Here are my helpers assembling a bookcase!  Curtains and crib sheets are on the ladder.  This is going to be a fab nursery!

It's nice being 28 weeks pregnant and NOT on bed rest as I was with the twins! I am really enjoying some beautiful adventures with the boys, we went to Longwood Gardens this week.

It finally feels like fall!

I'm It's feeling like fall, which means I'm feeling like we should have everything ready for our baby girl!  But, with very curious twin toddlers to work around, spending time getting a big chunk of work done is almost impossible.  

With the help of my friend Tammie, who's a fabulous painter, Mike has the nursery almost painted!  Of course, I chose a complicated painting and decorating scheme involving 4 different paint colors and lots of wall decals.  But, it's going to look amazing when it's done!

Here's a work in progress shot.  We still have to add pink and turquoise stripes and the wall decals, however, I want to finalize the furniture placement before we put up the wall decals.  Of course, we have to buy and assemble the furniture still, and that will take at least two or three weekends...

Jack fascinated by all the leaves starting to fall!

Ben with some green leaves!

Fall bike ride at Glasgow Park!

Final catch up post and Fetal echocardiogram

Yep, the DNA test can now give you the baby's sex so early!  A girl!  So exciting!

Our anatomy scan at 19 weeks confirmed what we already knew from the blood test!

We also got to see her beautiful profile at our anatomy scan!

Weight at 19w3d was 10oz. which is the 35th percentile.

These chalkboard files are going to get photoshopped into our weekly bump pics...we just haven't done the photoshopping...is that a word?!

Oh, would you like to see some bump pics?  Sure!

We have one from each week, hopefully I'll get around to posting them all soon!

This past week, at 24w2d we had our fetal echocardiogram, which is an ultrasound where they focus on the baby's heart and blood flow.  With the twins, this was the first ultrasound where issues with blood flow were detected.  This time, everything looked perfect!  Her weight was 1lb7oz which is the 31st percentile.

Profile shot

A 3D shot, she looks like a sweetie already, though I think ultrasound photos are one of those things only a parent can love!

Next OB checkup at 27 weeks and next growth scan/ultrasound is at 28 weeks!

Jack and I snuggling on the couch before bedtime today!

Jack and Ben at Wooside Farm Creamery (local dairy) today.

Pregnant after IVF #2!

Those two pink lines kept getting darker. If you've never done IVF, you will think I'm a bit crazy.  Scratch that, even if you've done IVF you might think I'm a bit crazy!  Why?  Remember me saying a bought a 50 pack of cheap ($0.35 each) pregnancy tests from Amazon?  Yeah...well...true confession...I might have used up all 50 in 2 weeks time.  

There is so much uncertainty and after all of our failed cycles, it was so thrilling and joyful to see those two lines getting darker with each passing day.  Plus, they would have expired before we got a chance to try again.

Getting darker each day!

Getting really dark.  Blood test is coming up at 13dp5dt.

Of course the blood test brings more things to worry about.  They give you a numerical value that tells you how much HCG is in your blood.  So then you ask yourself, is it too low?  Too high?  

Then they repeat the test a few days later to see if the number is rising appropriately.  My first two numbers looked great!

I was a little worried since my numbers were "off the chart high."  More twins?  Oh.My.God.  If it's more twins I just might not survive!  I'd be blessed for sure, but blessed and scared out of my mind!

They repeat the blood test a third time, the number isn't as high and the rate of increase seemed to have slowed down.  Does this mean something is wrong with the baby?  Only more time will tell!

Comparison of my twin pregnancy numbers to this pregnancy.  So far, this pregnancy has higher HCG values.  Usually higher values are indicative of multiples, but it's unclear if identical twins have higher HCG values.  If we had another set, it would have to be identical twins again since we only transferred one embryo each time.

First ultrasound wasn't very revealing...confirmed an intrauterine pregnancy measuring appropriately for GA of 5w4d.  Too early to see a heartbeat.

Second ultrasound was one week later!  One perfect little heartbeat!  We were monitored weekly and everything looked great each time!

We decided to take weekly pictures this time!  Except printing the chalkboard style graphic each week is super expensive.  And hard to see as printed at 11x14.  So we are going to photoshop the chalkboard graphics into the frames. Except we haven't done that yet...  But, we have all the pictures and graphics made!

Measuring big at 10w4d.  The previous week, measurements were 3 days behind and I was so worried.  Unecessarily worried.  Again.

We announced our pregnancy after our first trimester screen and free fetal DNA tests came back low risk for genetic disorders (things that might lead to early miscarriage).

The new DNA tests are cool, they took my blood at 10w4d and we got results in 10 business days, including the baby's sex!  It's a....

Catching up

I had planned on updating the blog with all the details of our infertility journey.  I haven't had the time to do that, but I'll at least take a moment to write down the highlights.  After my late December surgery, we proceeded with transferring our final frozen embryo in January.  She was our last hope for getting pregnant, our little Day 6 blast.  However, it just wasn't meant to be, 14 days after our embryo transfer, in early February, we got the call once again that our beta (blood pregnancy test) was negative.  We were devastated.

We knew our insurance coverage for fertility medications had met our lifetime maximum of $5,000 already.  The medications from one IVF cycle vary depending on your individual protocol vary, but we estimated our out-of-pocket costs for medication alone would be $12,000.  Plus doctors and procedures fees upwards of $3,000.  Mike got right on our income taxes, and decided to use our refund plus borrow against Mike's 401k to cover the estimated $15,000 expense.  We got started right away with our doctor.

Well, you don't just jump right into IVF, you start with a medication to suppress your hormones.  I needed to use Lupron due to my hypertension, an injection into the abdomen daily for a month.  Then they check your ovaries, uterus, and blood work to get a baseline before you are cleared to start your cycle.

We started stimulation meds on April 3, which happened to be Good Friday.  Since I am older and a poor responder, we did most of the meds twice per day!

All of our medication when it came in the mail!

Starting protocol, only 4 injections per day.

Add a fifth injection on day 4, adding near daily trips to the doctor for an ultrasound and blood work to monitor my progress.

We did our "trigger shot" of HCG on Saturday, April 11 at 11pm, day 9 of stims, one day earlier than our previous fresh cycle.  Our egg retrieval was 36 hours later on Monday, April 13.  They retrieved 18 eggs, but only 6 were mature.  We got an updat the next day that only 5 of the 6 eggs fertilized (used ICSI).  No updates on Day 2, they let the embryos incubate.  Day 3 update and all 5 embryos were still growing and dividing appropriately!  No update until embryo transfer on Day 5, Saturday, April 18.  

We transferred one perfect hactching Grade 5AA blastocyst.  

Three more embryos were able to be frozen, the fourth stopped growing before making it to the blastocyst stage. 

Frozen embryos are graded:

5BB

3BB

3BC

Now we wait until our blood pregnancy test a edited for a tortuously long 13 days after the embryo transfer.  

But...I'm not very good at waiting, nor am I patient.  I bought 50 uber cheap ($0.35) pregnancy test strips on Amazon!

I started testing the day after the transfer.  The trigger shot contains the same hormone detected by pregnancy tests, so the early tests are too early to test for pregnancy, but allowed me to make sure all of the hormone from the trigger had left my system.

Then, a miracle!  Or was it?  It was so faint but definitely something!

Abbreviation explanation: 4dp5dt means the test was taken 4 days after my embryo transfer and that the embryo we transferred was 5 days old at the time of transfer - 4 days post 5 day transfer.  

4dp5dt is the earliest anyone on the internet reports seeing that faint positive line indicating an early pregnancy.  Some women don't see a second line until as late as 9dp5dt, with 6dp5dt being the average.

So was it real, or some kind of fluke.  I was so desperate for the day to pass so I could test again first thing the next day!

Then this the next day...the line looked lighter.  While the tests are specifically quantitative, in general, as your pregnancy progresses, you make more of the hormone HCG detected in the tests, so the line on the tests gets darker.  This line looked lighter.  Maybe a chemical pregnancy.  Ugh!

I have 45 more tests, why not test more than once a day.  This second test seemed darker, but still not darker than my 4dp5dt test.  Not looking good:(

Totally going crazy wanting to know what was going on, so I took a third test.  Oh. My. God!  It's darker than the 4dp5dt test for sure.  What does it mean?  Why were the first two lighter?  Was my urine too dilute?  Is it a chemical pregnancy?  Ahh, still not sure what is going on!  Only time will tell...

I manage to wait until the next day to test again.  This time I try a new approach.  I read online that the amount of dye in the tests can vary, so some may look lighter/darker and the color should not be used to compare to previous days tests.  

So I decided to test by dipping 4 strips into the same cup of urine.  It's hard to tell in the pic, but the three that are the same brand all were a different shade.  

BUT...they all had one thing in common...I'm pregnant!  Woo!

I had to run to the store, so I bought one of the digital pregnancy tests just to see it in black and white.

So there it is, 6dp5dt, PREGNANT!

Of course, early miscarriage rates are high in IVF pregnancies, but I was feeling super optimistic at this point!

Surgery

I was able to get scheduled for surgery at the end of the calendar year, 12/31 (Happy New Year to me😭😲).  She found a removed a piece of tissue, leftover from my previous pregnancy, from inside my uterus.  She checked for the reappearance of my stage 3/4 endometriosis, but there was very little.  She found numerous adhesions, including my ovaries and bladder, all of which were attached to my abdominal wall.  She had to do a lot of work to free my bladder, so I got to take home my very own catheter for New Years.  I was in extreme pain compared to my last laporoscopy.  Last time I was fine taking ibuprofen instead of the prescribed painkiller (Vicodin, I think).  Not so much this time.  Plus, the four incisions took forever to heal and were weeping straw colored fluid for over 2 weeks.  Not easy to recover from with two demanding toddlers.

FET #3

Well, after our second frozen embryo transfer didn't work, I wanted to move on to our third transfer as soon as possible. Fortunately, with a natural cycle transfer, you can move on right away.  The downside to natural cycle transfers is that the transfer has to be done at the exact right time based on your cycle.  Well, my REs office is really great, open weekends and early mornings, but they were not going to be open Thanksgiving Day or available for transfers the first weekend in December.  All I could do was go in for daily blood work and ultrasounds and HOPE it wasn't all a waste of time.  If we missed my ovulation due to Thanksgiving or if I my transfer needed to be the first weekend in December, we'd have to cancel be try again next month.  If we tried again in December, we'd run into the same potential problems around the Christmas and New Year Holidays.

Monitoring appointments start on cycle day (CD) 9:

Sat Nov 22 2014

Tues Nov 25

Wed Nov 26

Closed thanksgiving day Nov 27

Fri Nov 28 - based on the ultrasound, they were pretty sure I ovulated (dominant follicle average size greater than 20mm) on Thansgiving Day.  What are the odds?!  The blood work would confirm (high estrogen and high luteinizing hormone).  I was expecting to either trigger that night or be cancelled.  The nurse who called later that day told me nonchalantly that they wanted me to come in again on Saturday.  I flipped, insisting she was making a mistake, or had the wrong bloodwork.  I made her check and double check and reconfirmed, and my hormones had not spiked yet.

Sat Nov 29 - ultrasound was with one of the doctors, who is also a surgeon. She right away pointed out a shadow in my lining.  She thought it was a possible uterine polyp or leftover piece of tissue from my previous pregnancy.  We decided to cancel the cycle after all and scheduled surgery to have the tissue removed.

Back on the infertility roller coaster

After our first Frozen Embryo Transfer (FET) of our PGS tested normal embryo did not work, I talked to my doctor about trying what is known as a Natural Cycle FET.  Rather than using synthetic medication to thicken your uterine lining in preparation for pregnancy, they follow your natural cycle and time the frozen embryo transfer with when you would have gotten pregnant naturally.

The downside to this is that there are many more monitoring appointments prior to the transfer and you won't know when you are transferring until a few days before hand.  After transfer, you are supposed to maintain 24 hours bed/couch rest.  With two crazy toddlers at home, it's not an easy task to go in for daily doctors appointments or take 24 hours to rest.  But, we do what we have to do, right?

The appealing thing to me about the natural cycle FET was that I didn't have to wait long after my previous failed transfer.  I got my period 3 days after stopping the Progesterone in Oil Injections (stopped the same day I got our negative blood test).

I went in for my first monitoring appointment on October 14, 2014.  At each monitoring appointment they check your blood for levels of estrogen, progesterone, and luteinizing hormone.  These levels and their changes from appointment to appointment indicate when your body is getting ready to ovulate.  They also do an ultrasound to measure the thickness of your lining and the average size of your dominant follicle.  They are trying to catch a small window immediately preceding ovulation during which you take a trigger shot of HCG.  The frozen embryo transfer is exactly 6 days after you take the HCG trigger shot.

Monitoring appointments:

Oct 14

Oct 17

Oct 20

Oct 21

Oct 22

Oct 23 - Finally trigger shot day!  This means I didn't ovulate until cycle day 18. Since my normal cycle is 25 days, I was shocked by this new information.  Once an embryo is fertilized, it doesn't start to implant until 6-9 days later.  So I would have started shedding my lining before any baby even had a chance.  This is part of my original infertility diagnosis, called luteal phase defect.  

Frozen Embryo Transfer - Wednesday, October 29, a perfect baby girl embryo

Two weeks of waiting and negative home pregnancy test later - official blood test is again negative.

To be continued....

 

It's been awhile

I haven't written in a long time.  The truth is, I haven't written because I was hoping to write again and announce another pregnancy.  As each month passed and I had no good news to share, I just couldn't bring myself to write about anything else.  For anyone who has ever struggled to get pregnant, you would probably understand.  The trying, the endless waiting, the effort to be hopeful but not too hopeful...it's very consuming.  

But before I get to philosophical, I'll rewind a bit.  

June 2014  - you might recall that we froze 5 embryos with our first IVF cycle. We had the embryos biopsies before the freeze, but hadn't had the genetic testing done.  We finally shelled out a lot of money to have the embryos tested.  Of the 5, 3 were capable of producing a viable pregnancy.  Two girls and a boy!

July 2014 - goodbye Mirena

Late July - start Lupron injections for medicated Frozen Embryo Transfer cycle

Early August - stop Lupron, start Estance tablets to build up uterine lining for the transfer

End of August - after 2 weeks on estrace, it's a lining check to make sure the lining is above 6.5mm.  Mine was only 4.  Increased estrace dose and wait 7 days to check again.  

Early Sept - Lining was only 6mm at second check up.  They said they'd call back with instructions based on blood work, but a transfer this month was going to get cancelled due to poor uterine lining.  When they called they said my Stephen level wasn't too high, so I increased the Estrace dose again and waiting another 7 days for another check.

Mid Sept - third lining check, 7.5mm. Transfer scheduled for following week.

Transfer was September 18, then wait 2 weeks for blood pregnancy test, on October 2.

October 2 - blood test negative

To be continued....