The mind numbing boredom of infertility

[icy121]

Two years. Month in, month out, and no change. I'm finding a huge part of this whole nightmare is trying to cope with the boredom. I bore myself incessantly googling variations of the same question, staying up late at night to the glow of an iPad, reading more and more obscure medical research abstracts. Asking my doctor friend if I can borrow her password so I can see whether the BMJ has any updates from last week. It's fucking monotonous. Nowhere else in my life have I had to strive so hard to get absolutely nowhere.

I don't talk to friends about it, they don't want to hear it and frankly I've cried too many times when it's come up for them to have any sympathy left. They're bored. So we just ignore and and plod on, except I'm not bloody plodding on. I'm wallowing side to side and achieving absolutely fuck all. And secretly dreading the fact they're all getting married and their babies will be on the horizon. I'm going to lose my friends.

I decided not to put my life on hold, got a new job in a small firm, booking holidays but it all feels very empty because what I'm really doing is waiting. And it's so fucking tedious.

And the "maybe when you come back" comment is BS. Like the neutral nurse - just don't say anything like that. Yes for vast majority they will come back pregnant but for us sad fuckers we fucking well won't. Even te experts don't get it!!

Triple post - turns out period HASN'T started - I saw some pink on bog roll this morning so assumed it was on and whacked in the mooncup as in car all day and didn't fancy a repeat of last time I came on suddenly in the car, accelerated by a sneeze. Anyway just checked mooncup and no red/brown gunk. Just the usual gunk that looks like the bits on top of a yogurt. So enjoy dinner anyway...

Jesus, Biscuits, your doctor sounds like a patronising fuckwit. How is it that hadn't checked your bloods from ten months ago? What the fuck? And what on earth is their thinking behind losing 10% of your weight, when they don't know what's actually going on? From everything I've read around 22 is the ideal BMI to conceive.

Really sorry you're stuck waiting. You might ask for a copy of the blood test results. To hazard a wild guess (based on the reference ranges of the stuff I was tested for), the one that should be around 5 might be LH (luteinising hormone) - and high levels could suggest PCOS. Don't know what the one could be that ought to be 1 something - TSH maybe? (Thyroid?).

Shitty that they didn't talk you through it in more detail. Why do they treat us like idiots?

Wish I had more advice. What Icy suggests sounds like a very good approach.

Icy any news on the period front? How are you feeling?

Ach period showed today. Yawn.

Still in bed! Had a load of chocolate and 2 glasses of last night as OH was "playing a joker" yesterday and had had wine with lunch on his business trip. So finished up the open wine from NYE. Anyway no plans this weekend beyond going for a run at some point and drinking coffee in sunny kitchen.

Anyone doing anything interesting?

Aww icy it's a fucker! That wine and chocolate has got me drooling!

Thank you so much for all your advice. Definately going to look into second opinions. Currently having a clash of opinions with my husband over doing the tests privately, so my weekend plans involve mainly ignoring him and turning into a total psycho bitch when the sugar withdrawal kicks in. Hey ho.

Bastard periods. Glad you had a tipple though Icy. Always helps.

Biscuits sorry your husband's not on the same page. Hope it blows over - men need a bit more time for these things to settle in as they're not the ones who've done all the fucking research.

Clinic let me know that they may be able to squeeze me in for IVF next week after all. (!!) Had just got my head around waiting & was back to thinking maybe we wouldn't bother at all. Now I don't know what to do. Appt with consultant Monday lunchtime. Fuck.

Pros:

• My eggs aren't getting any younger; if we're going to do it at all, may as well do it now.

• At least sperm will reach egg - having the fuckers physically injected in leaves no room for doubt & may save us months of wasted shags.

• We'll learn something about my egg quality that will help us to decide whether there's any point continuing to try.

• Will feel like I'm doing something.

Cons:

• Statistically no more likely to succeed than regular shagging in geriatrics like me w/ no official diagnosis.

• Been told not to do pgs, so won't get to know if any embryo transferred has the right no of choromosomes, therefore quite likely to miscarry again.

• So much money.

• So much stress.

• So much horrible body stuff.

• Desperately frightened of being pregnant - it's only ever turned out badly before & I'm fucking terrified.

Kind of hoping my period arrives tomorrow and takes the matter out of my hands for another month. Feeling crampy anyway and prob cruising for one of my special 7-day post-miscarriage luteal phases.

Ugh.

^ sorry for enormous post!

That's a lot to think about bip.
It's tough and sadly (or maybe not) noone can make decision for you. I wish you all the best - and I also wish you a burst of sudden certainty, if that's possible. Either way there's no wrong or right answer, only what you think is best for you and then everyone else's opinions. Good luck and let us know how you get on!

Hope everyone's having a nice weekend. The 2ww is going on forever here. Today my husband and I had sex for the first time in ages and for no reason other than that we wanted to and it was bloody great. Best thing to come out of this whole cycle so far quite frankly.

Bip - that's such a difficult decision. How are you feeling today?

Potatoes - well done haha I can't remember the last time we had sex for the fun of it! My consultant has told us to ignore the "fertile week" as they don't hold much stock in it and to just stick to three times a week, and while I was a bit at least it can take the pressure off! How long now until you can test?

Potatoes this must be the longest 2 weeks you've ever lived through. I'm awe struck by your calm and sanity & delighted you had a good shag! Also quietly hoping some other good things come out of this cycle, too.

I've always quite enjoyed the 'fertile week', as we make a bit of a thing of it. I swan around in my fancy underthings with a glass of wine while dh cooks, music on, flowers by the bed, etc. I'm a bit worried what will happen to our sex life if we give up ttc and lose that sense of occasion.

No idea what we'll decide tomorrow. We're thinking of flipping a coin, since the whole thing is such a big mad crap shoot anyway.

I test next Saturday. More days left than I've waited so far. Although still relatively calm, I have to confess to carefully inspecting toilet paper after every wipe looking for blood spots.

I love that you might flip a coin bip - but genuinely you might flip a coin and think, shit I wish it had been the other answer, and then you'll know what your hears wants (although head vs heart in all of this is a whole other mind fuck).

I hate the "fertile" week because we both have lots of hobbies and work things so we literally discuss "will you skip flower arranging tonight if I miss morris dancing on Thursday?" and it just puts so much pressure on those scheduled nights. I have pre existing issue (vaginismus) which is the reason we dodn't start ttc for a long time (and which also made ET very unpleasant, but that's another story), so the scheduled sex thing really doesn't work for me. To get around it in the last three years we have also tried artificial insemintaion ourselves - not exactly a turkey baster, you can buy syringes and pots on the internet. Anything to increase frequency without overscheduling sex.

Well there's a lovely Sunday afternoon overshare for you

Potatoes while we're oversharing, I also had vaginismus. It took a weird 2-week intensive sex therapy course (!) to sort it out. Sex life is fine, but medical stuff is tricky. Have been known to involuntarily kick anyone who approaches me with a speculum.

Basically chose my IVF clinic on the basis of who would give me valium for scans & do everything else under GA so I don't freak out & kick consultant & spray £16k worth of embryos all over the room. So I can well imagine the unpleasantness of ET. Well done for getting through it.

Also, we have used syringes & pots on the nights we can't be arsed. No shame in that. We have also looked at DH's sperm under a microscope.

Bip I think potatoes is right, flipping a coin might seem abit like you aren't taking this very seriously but it'll tell you without realising, the answer you really want. I also think you could write a book - a lesson for us on -especially those fertile idiots who post "ttc for 6 weeks and at my wits end".
It makes my 2 years of trying seem piss easy in comparisons to all of your ups and downs.
My 'fertile' day is any time now since I ovulate anywhere between days 9-12. So have casually been floating about the house today cleaning,baking etc with that faint glimmer of excitement mixed with nerves that month 25 could be our month. only for it to be dashed again in the next 14 days so will enjoy while it lasts.
I do agree though that if i were ever to be one of the lucky ones and actually conceive, I think I would be in utter shock and think 'oh fuuuuck what have I gone and done'..

Hope you're surviving the 2ww potatoes. Does your clinic make you wait the full two weeks post transfer? I found it hard going in the second week if I'm honest. Distractions are good, and gentle walking to get the blood flowing. I don't think we had sex for a couple months before/during/after IVF. Kind of needed the break after 2.5 years ttc. I need to take a leaf out of bips book and start making fertile week a bit more exciting!

Tough call bip. Looking at your pros and cons, I'd go for it, if the expensive isn't too much of a worry. Pregnancy will terrifying no matter when it happens, and especially so for long term ttc'ers who have suffered losses along the way. Hope you get to a decision without too much stressing.

fractious I was indeed at BWH. I thought it was ok (of course if I'd been one of the lucky ones who got pregnant then I would have nothing but praise!) Nurses were nice, but I didn't really like my consultant much. I thought their approach was a bit rigid, but ultimately less stressful as you could predict exactly when each stage would be. If I was paying and in the midlands I think I'd look to midland fertility or somewhere else that tailors the protocol more to the individual. Hope you're getting on ok there?

biscuits that sounds like a very annoying appointment. Has your dh come round to the private tests? My DH and I had a row about acupuncture and the cost, he called my acu lady a charlatan! Of course, this maybe true, but I also found her support hugely helpful!

Icy sorry about the arrival of your period. I had a cheeky glass of wine last night too. I made tapas and it seemed wrong not to have one after all that effort! Very quiet weekend here but to be honest I'm happy with hiding away a bit. Did yoga, blitzed the cleaning, went shopping, booked honeymoon! Currently lazing in front of the fire with radio on and a roast in the oven. My week is going to be a fucking slog, and period is due, so I'm taking it easy whilst I can!

karla I still find myself hoping, after 37 months, even when we've not managed sex at the right time. My tiny brain still hopes for a fucking unrealistic miracle!

Evening all, my how busy and productive this thread has been!

Hope everyone's ok and had a good weekend? Sorry to hear af came Icy that's shit, and Bip the CCG sound like utter cunts for not allowing another round.

We went for our initial IVF appointment on Wednesday night. Had it written in my diary (which is THE WORD) for 7.30pm (DH works til 6pm and the clinic is an hour away) but it just so happened that DH went to a funeral that day and we were near the clinic by 5.30pm. So we trotted along to the nearest pub and had a diet coke to wait with. I rang the clinic at about 5.45 and it went to answerphone so no point leaving a message. Anyway, at 6.55pm I get a call from the clinic asking if we know it's our appointment - er yes - and I said 'we'll see you at 7.30' only to be told 'your appointment was at 6.30'. Cue panic and fast driving to get there! Gah!

Anyway, cut a long story short we were hoping to be able to do egg sharing but because of my dad's early onset dementia we're not accepted - apparently it's not enough to watch him die slowly and painfully - and to top it off DH couldn't produce a sample. What a waste of another £150. So we're back to square one and researching clinics abroad again. We've got a week off in March and I'm hell bent on booking in for then.

Oh goody looks like fertile time is next week again. I can barely keep a lid on my excitement.

bip that is interesting shared history. We had couples sessions with a physchosexual therapist that didn't really help, and I did self treatment with dilators. Basically after twelve years and after getting married (having not at the time ever had full piv sex with with my husband, love him) it was the sight of my mid thirties hoving into view with no baby that finally did it. Finding out we had infertility issues after getting over that was a real shitter!

Internal scans I can manage, I can let them near me now. The ET was painful. She was like "vaginas are made to stretch". Not this one love. My internal muscles were going into spasm and clampng down. She had to try three different speculums. But we managed.

DH would LOVE to look at his sperm under a microscope! I'd better not mention it or he'll go and buy one!

tiger they say wait 11 days post transfer. I don't know why. I have asked no questions at any stage, just done whatever they tell me! If this doesn't work I'll be grilling the fuck out of them next time! I'll be asking you all for help with what to interrogate them on!

laura I cross posted with your update. How frustrating for you. Good luck getting things moving for March (that's when we'll be on round two if this fails - I'm planning it already to give me something on the horizon when I just get one line next week - so we can be cycle buddies)

Hello ladies,
I haven't had chance to read what's been happening. Just wanted to share these links I've come across, whilst googling coq10 for egg quality. Will catch up soon xx

www.advancedfertility.com/blog/coenzyme-q10-and-fertility/

www.fertilityafter40.com/co-enzyme-q10--fertility.html

So it looks like game over; I'm bleeding. Fuck.

Oh Potatoes. I'm so sorry. How are you feeling?

Oh no potatoes! Is it full flow or just spotting? Could be irritation from pessaries or from having sex for the first time in a while if it isn't full on? How many dpo are you/would you be - is it worth doing a test?

Oh Christ potatoes no! I really hope it's one of the reasons above! Hope you're not alone today

& for everyone this truly shite Blue Monday.

Laura your appt sounds like the definition of shit & I'm not at all surprised your dh struggled to 'express himself' (so to speak) after what must have been the least sexy day on earth. How awful about the double kick in the teeth of your father's illness.

potatoes been thinking about you all day & hoping you're all right.