Assisted conception (and the bits in between!) - part 4 - all welcome

[mummycat1]

Starting new thread with massive congratulations to Nanoo I reckon the old man can wait till he gets home! But of course - it's up to you really xxx

Hi PerfectDromedary - love the name and welcome back!

Idream I'm sorry about your delay, I know how frustrating it is but just think of all the months of waiting you've been through and now its just a few weeks. If that doesn't help its time to get the choccy biscuits out and (try to) relax. I'm on the long protocol and I think you are on the short protocol (is that right?) so maybe you'll catch me up after all.

MM you definitely need to get in on those biscuits to. I can't believe noone will give you a blood test, do they not know how stressful this is. I don't really know much about it, not having got that far myself, but I know you can get bleeding while still being pregnant and I think your clinic would do something if they were worried so hopeful your all OK.

Penguin - more biscuits for you as well. I was told that if you had a negative test but your period didn't start to test again a few days later so maybe your faint line will get darker over the next few days. Best of luck, if not for this time then for the FET - at least you get to miss out the EC and all that goes with it!.

Bumpless I love the idea of your donor writing a letter, glad your feeling a bit better too.

Hi to everyone else, have to go and make dinner.

Thank you Bumpless. Had a mixed day. Blazing row with DH & a nice afternoon with one of my best friends. She's got 2 teenagers & it was nice spending the day with them. Especially watching her eldest getting ready to go out with her friends just took me back to being her ago - young, free & worryless!

Still no af (CD36), occassional nausea (prob in my head) & just feel really down this afternoon! [passing round a large tin of chocolate biscuits]

Thanks for the biscuits!

Penguin I too am keeping everything crossed for you tomorrow. I know there is nothing worse than suspecting the worst but still not 100% certain - you just get stuck in an awful kind of "but maybe" limbo.

Isle - keep testing! Its early days and I hope your top class embies are planning a week-end surprise for you!

Big wave and a pass of the biscuit tin...

Bumpless - just amused myself greatly mis-reading your post "pissing on the cat"!!! Yes, but must actually get off my BFArse and get round to doing the things I need to do!

Hey new cycle buddy Italiangreyhound! I think my name gives away my proclivities - to get to a BMI under 25 I need to lose just over 2 stone, but to get under BMI 30 I just need to lose 6lbs, which I can definitely do in 6 weeks if I pull my finger out. However the fact that I'm a greedy pig my PCOS makes it quite hard for me to lose weight. So go on - what are your figures (so to speak!)? BTW - where does your "Italian" come from? I married mine!!

riggly, thanks for they choccy biccy - I'll just have one this round (see above!!). Yes you're right - I'm on the short protocol. Reckon I'll be starting Gonal-F somehwhere around w/c 29th March - what are your dates looking like?

Welcome PerfectDromedary - I like the synonym name change - might have a go at that myself, how about onereveriesincandy (a reference for our American ladies there!). Not sure that scans too well, maybe Idreamincarrots would be more appropriate right now?

Hey ExcellentHumpyOne welcome back! I didn't realize how YOUNG you are, you will surely have great success once your ICSI starts.

Penguindreams what to say.....dreadfully frustrating for you but you'll have to wait a bit longer. I second the blood test thing, if you can get it.

Isle thought of you as I had a big pink blip on my hip! Thinking of you testing away. Really wishing you a change soon!

Bumpless Hi, yes, I am OK about the 6 week wait. It means I get to have my two weeks off at Easter with DD. I guess not relaxing but it makes life easier. Always happy to talk about our donor! The first donor who we were due to have last year, got a bracelet, which I went to look at in the shop twice before I bought it. It was really beautiful, Fair Trade, something I would personally love. We left it at the clinic for the donor and then found out no eggs! But we asked the donor nurse to give it to her anyway because it just felt right. Would have felt weird to keep it or give it to another donor. We wrote a slightly slushy card, which I had picked out specially and I actually bought a spare copy of the card so I could keep it as a reminder of our donor. As I say, you don?t get anything except the eggs (in our case)! The gift we bought for this donor was more spur of the moment. This time we chose a necklace to go with the donor?s colouring. It is not something I would go for but it is really beautiful, classy and unusual. This time we just kind of wanted spur of the moment gift, not investing lots of time in making the choice and it felt right, it was handmade. I think the cost is irrelevant, we could never make up for what our donor was giving us but the amount we decided to pay was about thirty something on each of the gifts! I think I am quite a practical person in that I like objects, colours etc, they convey things to me and maybe that is why I put so much thought into it.

PerfectDromedary welcome.

Bumpless Just realised I said of the necklace....?It is not something I would go for but it is really beautiful, classy and unusual.? That makes it sound like I am not beautiful, classy or unusual, would like to hope I am all three, at times! But I guess we all have different tastes.

I think your idea of a letter is really interesting. Was it your own idea or one from the clinic? Do you know about a charity called the donor conception network? They run events in the UK and they have an event about telling donor conception children, which I am guessing you plan to do or the note would not make much sense. They are called telling and talking workshops. If we are fortunate and conceive I would plan to go on one but not until we had made it half way (I think).

Penguindreams you are not in the losers' corner; you are in the 'I am feisty enough and fierce enough to go through this' corner. It just doesn't feel like it at the moment. I have spoken to or heard of people over the years who say they want kids and yet are perhaps afraid to pursue it; you are pursing your penguin dream. Hang on in there. Penguins love the cold and if this one has not worked there are some lovely cold embies waiting for you.

Fairygodmother1 Sorry to hear you had a row and feel bad, hope that you can repeat your nice, fun day and feel better soon.

babybarrister Hi and welcome back, I had C-section but we had fertility treatment (IUI) for DD so I don't think we count as secondary infertility.

Yes Idreaminchocolate and Bumpless I thought that was actually pissing off the cat (as in trajectory!) and wondering what that was all about!

Idreaminchocolate my Italian comes from wanting to be the most elegant of creatures, which I believe is an Italian greyhound! I have so much to lose but let?s be optimistic, if I could lose 1 to 2 pounds a week I could be down by 6 to 12 pounds. Let's go for it. Yes, I LOVE chocolate too! I have found yummy rice cakes coated in plain chocolate. They are like polystyrene with choc on it but curiously I love them!

londonlottie How is it going? Do you get support where you are and do you have a mum's group or anything? I know with my dd (5 years ago, eek) it was so helpful to go on a post natal course and meet other mums. I think had I not done it I might have ended up as an agoraphobic, just staying in.

Waves to all and all best to you lovely ladies who are trying. My dh thinks you are all blokes! I mean, he says how do you know they are really women writing in! I don?t think blokes would know what to say, or would be bothered to sit up at night typing messages of support ? but I could wrong! I know DH wouldn?t manage it!

Anyone watching one born every minute or is that an insensitive thing to ask? Felt so sorry for the twenty-something in pain with everyone telling her off! I think we all have a different pain threshold but that is a discussion for a different thread.

Waves!!

Hey all.

Ta for the welcomes!

I was just wondering how you all handled the wait before starting the AC process. I sort of feel that I ought to use the time to do something helpful, but I'm not sure what that would be...

i'm in agony. i'm fairly sure i have OHSS. anyone hd this?

Good morning campers, how are we all today?

Amberc, there was a poster called Mummycat who had it last year - get to the hospital quickly! But on the plus side, I have heard that OHSS flares up after transfer if stimulated by pregnancy hormones...

Dromedary welcome back and come and play! I handled the wait by ignoring the whole thing and pretending it wasn't happening (Isle's now patented 'sweeping under the carpet' manoeuvre ), but I'm sure someone else has more positive suggestions for you!

IG your present for your donor sounds lovely and I'm sure was/will be appreciated.

Islebesmilingwhenthetestgoespositive, what updates your end?

LL, how are you doing with your lovely twins? Has the RC started helping yet? Whenever I think of you in Switzerland it reminds me of spending the Millenium in Geneva... 10,000 people walked calmly down to the main square, stood in orderly silence, watched the ball fall, waited calmly but in vain for fireworks, and then walked calmly and in an orderly manner back home... We were back by 12.30 so we put the television on and watched the celebrations in London!

Idreamincarrots, that is obviously a fantastic name, although it does sound a little horsey! Idreaminricecakes perhaps?!

Continuing the adventures from CrazyTown, I will shortly be uploading a picture of this morning's FR test... There is definitely a line there (even the H had to admit to seeing it), but it is still insanely faint given that I'm 19DPO today. Can't leave a message for Guys as their answer phone must be full. Will wail and whinge until they give me a blood test as this is just mean!

On the plus side, if this does turn out to be a success I will be something of a medical marvel with the latest implantation ever recorded, and will return once rich and famous to shower you all with biscuits, except they'll be made of gold and studded with diamond raisins!

Is this the time to mention for IG's husband that I'm actually a trucker called Dave who gets his kicks talking about ovaries and pregnancy tests?

AmberC yes, please go get seen about this possible OHSS, they need to treat you for it, obv if that's what's causing you pain. It will only get worse.

Camel ummm, how about learning to juggle? most people make their habits better, or do vits, or do acupuncture, massage, herbs, etc. I didn't really have to take a stroll down that road, only had to wait between IVF cycles 1 month of downregging so online poker did the trick for me. In total I've had 4 tests/procedures, 5 IUI cycles and 3 IVF cycles all within one calendar year, so there wasn't much waiting around, but sometimes the downregging feels like for-eva.

BlackandWhiteBird I'll be SCREAMING and tackling TTF when the test goes positive!!! -- no news yet, still night time here, so we'll all have to hold our pee for a little while longer. Test #3 of 5 coming soon.

hey hey hey... where's the pic of this second line??? (shamefully I've wanted to put drops of pure HcG on my sticks just to see if a second line would actually appear )

OK, it should be there now. What do you think?? Am I going mad, or indeed blind??

I see it! but I still call for a recount of actual NUMBERS, go get poked with a needle and lets settle this!

If hope helped, you'd be diffed just with the amount I'm shelling out for ya! Can't wait to hear. The strange thing is my doc's office won't let me ESCAPE the blood test, even if I have tested an hour earlier with a 20iu test, they still INSIST that I go through the jab. oh well... different strokes for different countries.

PS - it was taken after about 5 mins so if there is anything there, it's not an evap line.
Off to Guy's to go and throw some blood at them, in a manner of speaking.

I can see the line, too! And it's pink, which means (I think) that it's unlikely to be an evap line. Good luck at Guys.

Amberc OHSS sounds horrible - if you're in pain, go and get yourself checked out.

Am swinging between the under-carpet manoevre and the need to do something. Exercise, that'll help. I need to lose some weight to get my BMI into a useful (ie sub 30) range, so I should probably get on with that.

Morning ladies

Can I grab one of those biccies please while I catch up?! There are about another 100 messages to catch up on since I last posted, jeez you girls can yap...but I'm going to try to stay on top of this so here goes:

Penguin, the line is faint but absolutely the right course of action is get to Guy's and ask them to make sure for you. Really hoping and praying that this is good news for you.

Isle you know they say third test is a charm! You sound so positive, I think you are doing so well with this and can't wait to hear good news from you soon.

Amberc you must get that checked out ASAP if you are in so much pain. They will know what to do to make you feel better. Please make sure you rest and don't overdo it for a few days - good thing it's the weekend now. I'm sure your little boy won't have done anything to harm the bambino either, as everyone else says - we are well designed to keep the little pips safe at all stages.

Belated happy birthday Italian! Hope you enjoyed your day. I think it's a lovely idea to buy something personal and thoughtfully chosen for your donor. I'm sure they know how much their altruism means to people, but how lovely to get a memento of it - must make it feel very "real" to them. Hope you are OK with spinning your wheels for a bit and you must enjoy those glasses of wine you're treating yourself to. Have one for me - perhaps a nice pinot noir or something? It's bloody ages since I had a drink!!

MM, how are things now? So worried for you about the spotting, but one thing sounds positive - you don't say you've had any pain with it. If you have pain AND bleeding it can strongly suggest bad news, but bleeding on its own could just be old implantation blood, or a result of a bit of a surge in hormones. It's so hard to do but take it easy, and keep believing that it will be OK. Let us know how you are - I hope things have settled down again.

FairyGM am willing the hospital and postal service to kick into gear and get that letter to you ASAP! I know how long it all seems to get the ball rolling, but that seemed to be the slowest bit for me as everything began to be a lot faster moving after that.

Dueling I agree with everyone else - get the facts on the semen analysis and make sure you know how things stand. "Satisfactory" isn't much to go on, and has a whiff of damning with faint praise - but with luck they are just playing it cool and should be saying "amazing sperm, off the scale!"

KK well done with mastering the injections. It must be so hard to do the first one but you'll soon be spiking yourself like a pro I'm sure. Your nurses will have seen worse reactions too! Good news that everything was on track from your scan, and good luck with the next phase. It sounds terribly complicated all the drug names, and a couple of days of this following by a couple of days of that - my brain would definitely have been overflowing after it all as well.

Yay Bumpless, glad for everyone's sake that you are feeling more human again!

Cerubina - thank you hon, me too although I suppose it will give me time to make myself mentally ready for the hardship that is IVF. My life has pretty much fighting for what I want - working hard isn't a stranger to me.

xxx

Right - part II now.

Have had rather an exciting 48 hours, not in a good way. On Weds morning right after breakfast I began having some pains in my tummy, like a sort of cramping that kept coming and going. Went to work and by late morning it was intensifying so I thought I would look up on the internet whether I should do anything. All the sites I looked at seemed to say it was something to get checked out, especially as it was rhythmic and sort of pulsing. So I rang my GP and she sounded very concerned - said it was 50/50 that it could signify a miscarriage (had no bleeding at least) so I should go to the early pregnancy unit at the hospital and get checked out.

I rushed over to Guy's and of course it was the wrong place to go - they don't have an EPU so I was roaming around on the verge of tears not knowing what to do, then I thought I'd go up to the ACU and beg them to see me. My husband arrived having covered the ground in superhuman time, bless him. They were brilliant at the ACU and saw me straight away, did an ultrasound and happily found the yolk sac in the uterus looking the right size for my dates (5+4). SO relieved. However, still had the pains so they said I should go to the EPU at St Thomas's and gave me a referral letter.

We went over there and after an hour or so got seen by a nurse who just asked some questions and then said I should be seen by the consultant. I asked if I could lie down, as by this time the pain was near constant and I couldn't sit up straight. They gave me some paracetamol, which I threw up, and then gave me an anti-sickness tablet, which I threw up, and then some paracetamol suppositories. They didn't even take the edge off the pain.

After another hour or so, the doctor came to see me and examined me and said he didn't think it was a gynae thing but could be appendicitis. I would need to be seen by a surgical consultant but had to be sent down to A&E for that. Eventually got sent down and spent a couple of hours on a trolley in A&E racked with pain and not able to lie still or get comfortable at all. Poor husband was really worried - I think it must be awful to be looking on helplessly and I know he was very scared.

They examined me again, all seemed to be pointing to appendicitis so they said they'd admit me to see how things were looking in the morning, and finally were able to give me some decent painkillers. Also put me on an antibiotic drip and between the two things I was pain-free by about 11pm and able to get some sleep.

When I woke up in the morning I felt absolutely fine again - the pain was all gone, so it seems the antibiotics were able to calm it all down and they decided an operation was unnecessary. They also did an ultrasound of my abdomen to make sure there wasn't anything else flaring up (eg gall bladder) and all looked fine. I have to keep an eye on things and take antibiotics for 5 days, but at least I am home again now (after a full day in hospital yesterday).

Obviously it was really frightening for various reasons and in the end if I get away without needing an operation at the moment I am very relieved about it. It will sound as though all that story has lots of 'eventually's and 'finally's in it, and it did all take ages, but I have to say everyone at the hospital(s) was lovely and so kind to us. One thing occurred to me after about 12 hours of this pain - I was thinking there is no way I will ever get through labour without cracking! The pain was so relentless and so exhausting, I just can't imagine how I would manage something like it with the need to push as well. I know, that's getting well ahead of myself, but it certainly gave me an insight...

I'm at home today and taking it easy. Just so relieved and grateful that things seem to be OK again.

Blimey Cerubina, what a rollercoaster ride! Great news that the sac looked good for the dates, hopefully next time they'll see the heartbeat. The pain sounds terrifying, v pleased it seems to have gone away (and I'm sure labour is completely different - your body will know what it's doing, whereas with appendicitis your body just goes into freak out mode!)
Where was the pain, if you don't mind me asking? I managed to finagle a blood test out of Guy's just now mainly because I have also been having quite a lot of discomfort on the right hand side and immediately below my belly button. Obviously you know you're not ectopic but just out of interest.
I'll update with blood test results just for Isle later on today!

Bliney Cerubina you've really been through it! Hope you have a restful day today!

Cerubina poor you! I suppose if there is a silver lining its that you got an early scan and all is well!

PenguinD congrats on the second line (I can definitely see it too). As all the books say, every pregnancy is different, so perhaps you've just got an indecisive embie? "Mmmm, think I'll embed there...no, over there looks better... no, maybe a little to the right..."

Think I'm now in the running for Crazy Woman of London. DH, DD and I are enjoying a day off together. DD is very insistent about walking these days, so she and DH walked off to buy bread while I popped into the chemist. After several odd looks from strangers, I realised I was pushing a pushchair with DD's doll in it with one hand and carrying a bunch of pregnancy tests in the other. Sure sign of a crazy woman...

Off to do my mercenary stuff at the crack of dawn tomorrow and won't be back until Wednesday - with my scan scheduled for Thursday. Bleeding, spotting (whatever you want to call it) is continuing but there hasn't been any pain and it hasn't become any heavier, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that my pregnancy is just that little bit different too... Will try to keep up with you ladies from afar, but leaving a big basket of (low fat, very healthy)chocolates for you while I'm away...

Now what would have been really funny in the chemist MM is if you'd said 'we're hoping for another one just like her', and nodded down at the doll ! Anyway, I have long since said to my H that I'm just a short step away from putting a bonnet on my cat and popping her into a pram!

Have fun doing the mercenary stuff (am picturing Mr and Mrs Smith-style heroics here) and hope the bleeding lets up soon.