The mind numbing boredom of infertility II

[PotatoesPastaAndBread]

This is a thread for peole who really want to get pregnant but can't, who have tried pretty much everything, and are really fucked off about it.

Have you ever nearly punched someone for advising you to "relax", "go on holiday" or "just get drunk - that's what we did"? Well then this is the thread for you.

You won't find much sentimentality here and there's no baby dust, but there is empathy, a lot of swearing and a surpirsing amount of glittery dog shit.

Link to the original thread
original thread

I've always been of the opinion (even before this infertility shit) that people who bang on about only knowing the meaning of life/love when they had kids were absolute fucking narcissists.

inthistogether So sorry you are going through this.

Bip if you're editing, may I suggest tinkering with line breaks so the first letter of each new line during smug motherhood bit spells out YOU ARE A SMUG CLUELESS BINT AND YOUR BOOK IS QUITE SHIT TOO, acrostic-style?

Thanks for humouring me yesterday about baby bombing, guys. Know you all get it (though rant about it less frequently and repetitively than I do). I do usually get over them after approx 48 hours but they are v shit indeed when they first explode.

Urgh bip I assume she's popped out a billion kids all one after the other and I bet they are called Fifi, Honey trixabelle and the like. Well no glittery poo for her, just a steaming hot pile of turd right in the gob.
Let's wait until her novel comes out and give it real dog shit reviews!

I got the pre theatre planning call today.
Reeled off a whole load of do's and donts.
I wanted to ask how come I do buselerin tonight but not tomorrow. What if I ovulate those precious few eggs before Thursday and why can't I wear make up because due to all the drugs I have pumped myself with, I have a face full of teenage acne. I mean, I feel shit already and that's just the icing on the cake! I'm not vain honest but I sensed I was one of a hundred people on the list she had to call and my 1 minute was up so hardly got a word in!

karla amazing idea I love it - bip PM us all the book name when the time comes!

Re the pre-theatre call, I think the makeup is all about germs. Do you need to take public transport to the place or can you drive? Take your makeup with you to slap on afterwards? I don't know about the buserelin though. Have you got the trigger shot?

Is the Buserelin not the trigger shot? They were going to have me use Buserelin as the trigger to prevent me from getting OHSS if they'd overstimulated me. Changed their minds when it became clear I was in no way overstimulated. I was taking Cetrotide to prevent ovulation and they had me take that up until 2 days before EC. Was also frightened of rogue ovulation & spent 2 days convinced every twinge was my eggs breaking free. But it wasn't.

Grumple I think you get the prize for most baby bombs this year. You need some sort of war decoration and a ceremony to honour your bravery.

Girding my loins for dinner with 3 friends I haven't seen in a while. 1 is 49 and married, and one is a single 40-something lesbian. Of course, both of these women are several times more likely to get pregnant than I am! But the real danger is the one who's in her early 30s, with a long term male partner. She's lovely. It makes me sad that I'm so scared to see her. I am practicing my 'happy for you' face in the mirror.

bip I understand that dread, think it's why I became a recluse.
Busereline is the down reg drug that keeps the ovaries asleep, ovitrelle is the trigger shot - yes icy that's in the fridge for later. I YouTube'd how to accurately inject to make sure I don't cock it up.

GS to all of you.
grumpel everyone is dropping baby bombs lately! Fucking sick of dodging them tbh. I hope your friends understand how difficult it must be for you. pea I've resorted to food after a baby bomb. Felt better for all of two seconds. Then hated the bitch even more for making be eat.
Bip can you not write an awful anonymous review of that bitchs work? Or send us all a paper copy so we can burn the shite
Once again icy you never fail to make me laugh. Hope your ovaries settle down. Are you finding it hard to stick to your diet? Hats off for the weight loss. I try be good but have such a sweet tooth after a long day in work. Sick of eating spinach, tuna and avacado salads for lunch.
karla your no. Of eggs seemed OK to me! Your bound to worry every step of the way. GL for EC. Bet you cannot believe how fast it's gone for you.
sleath I remember you from Roses thread! Big congrats on getting this far. Best of luck and I hope all goes well.
banana Glad your hyst. went well. I bet you cannot believe how long those positives lasted. Hope your tests tomorrow indicate that everything is settled down and you can begin to concentrate on your next cycle.
I am all to aware that I may not get to do a fresh transfer, that was another reason why I wouldn't commit to a trial. I also wouldn't want to assume that anything that was frozen would successfully survive a thaw. My personal opinion is that having IVF drugs still in your system will not hinder the result by much anyway, there are woman with far more harmful drugs in their system who mange to have children (unwanted at times).

My drugs have arrived.
Anyone else have to take 21 days worth of the pill during their cycle? I also received cetrotide and merional, they don't have to be refrigerated. All seems very complicated
Have some more GS

Shit scan. One follicle has grown to 13, The rest are just small ones that are growing. Got about 4 over 10mm, but 20 in total. Fucking pcos bollocks

Excellent junk email today, which I can only take at face value. Look! She has $20 million and wants me to help her open a home for 'barren-women'. We need more like her, fiends.

icy did they tweak your dose up? Don't worry too much, you're PCOS so they WILL grow eventually. Better slowly than the opposite (which is where they all go off like rockets and are not mature when they're collected). Still shit I know, but keep the faith.

grumpel that is pretty awesome. Mrs Grumpel's House for the Barren and Perpetually Cynical. I like it!

Icy sorry the scan was shit - did the clinic comment at all? Follicles grow around 2mm a day at this point, so you should be OK I imagine. It's fucking shit though, all the wondering and speculating and feeling like nothing is going the way it's supposed to.

Grumps Do make sure this philanthropist understands that any barren-home worth its salt needs a sauna, steam room & Olympic sized pool.

Good luck everyone.

I think I can tick both down-trodden and barren-woman boxes! Sign me up!

Who heard about the 72 year old first time mother IVF lady in India. Wow. 2 years of IVF, so presumably 20+ goes? They apparently used their own egg & sperm. Ffs.

Slow and steady and non OHSS I guess wins the race albeit I just seem to be growing lots of small ones vs a few big ones. A bit like when you get a punnet of loads of little strawberries - and it's a massive shag to destalk them all. All the hate today.

icy sorry to hear your scan didn't go as well as you had hoped. Will you still be aiming for EC on Friday?

Hello all, I have read but not contributed to this page before. Been trying month on month for 18 months with not even a late period, got nowhere, at least another 18 months off being eligible for help. Boring, boring. But today I felt I had to post apart from everyone and their blooming dog being preggers i saw this on FB and it made my blood boil:

Motherhood dare! (I accepted) I was nominated to post a picture that makes me happy/proud to be a mum... (only one picture) I'm going to tag some ladies that I think are fabulous mothers (I know way too many to tag you all - sorry), and can rise up to the challenge of posting a pic of their own. If I've tagged you as one of the awesome mums, copy the text and paste it to your wall with a picture, and tag more mums.

WTF! Oh yeah, too many to tag all of you mothers. How's about tagging all the barrens, hmm, how many of your friends, not people you met through NCT classes. How, how can people be so wrapped up in themselves that every crappy picture on their pages is their herd of children, that happened without really trying... and then do this, I mean really, REALLY. Argggghh!

I will be hitting the Prosecco at the weekend to celebrate yet another barren end to the month, another month older and closer to being less eligible for NHS help.

Sorry rant over.

karla nope - next weds earliest. Ugh. You in on Friday??

Moved onto leg jabs as my stomach is FUCKED.

STTC yup it's shitty bollocks eh?! Block them all. NEXT!!

Hi fiends

So the latest in the banana-saga - that high LH that we thought meant I was about to ovulate? Well came back in for bloods and appt 1 week later and LH was still high and progesterone the same - so obv hadn't ovulated. Dr said hmm, this looks very much like PCOS type blood profile....ie how my bloods looked 5 years ago when I had PCOS (before it disappeared, among with all of my eggs)

Say hello to my old friend dildocam and whaddya know, ovaries are quiet so def no ov, but classic PCO-like string of pearls appearance and reckoned baseline follicle count of 15-20

In September my baseline was 5

Started stims straight away, short protocol as before, except this time instead of the sledgehammer dose of 450iu, I'm on a mild dose of 150iu Gonal-F. Oh and he got me to start on the Cetrotide immediately as he said with follicles already at 8-10mm he didn't want my ovaries going off like rockets

So I am still very much filed under 'no fucking clue what's going on',but Dr is v v pleased as it appears my ovaries haven't completely dried up after all

Reckons EC two weeks today hopefully...

Shuffling on here to vent my anger at the last 48hrs. Reading your posts has filled me with hope that barrenness can exist without flipping baby dust and platitudes.

Anyway we were doing our first cycle of IVF. Quoted good odds since we are incredibly lucky to have a small person already gained after lots of meds and 4 surgeries. Ec went swimmingly, the boys sample was above average. Then yesterday get the phone call that nothing has fertilised. None of the 10 supposedly great eggs has done bloody anything.

Currently destroyed by the process. Still having to take the stupid progesterone until they confirm its def over this morning as they said something like a 1% chance they could have missed fertilisation - seriously how can you miss that? Isn't that your job????

So yes I'm angry. And now poorer and don't even get to stress over a 2ww and whether I can see a fictional line on a preg test.

Grump.

bean welcome on board and sorry to hear it hasn't gone to plan. 10 follicles sounded like a good number to have. I'm not surprised your gutted.
banana does the roller coaster ever stop? Glad your on with your ??plan (maybe wrong choice of word)
icy fingers crossed for you and hope you get to Wednesday ok.
I'm just sat waiting to leave for the clinic-egg collection at 9.30 and I'm shitting it. Not because of the procedure but like bean
What if nothing fertilises or lovely follies but no eggs..😳😳
Anyway, if you don't hear from me it's because it's all gone tits up.

Karla - don't use me as an example! They said this is really uncommon.

Further crappy update. Ok so 9 are still totally crap. The 10th is now 2 cells but the embryologist thinks it might have just been the egg dividing spontaneously rather than fertilisation. Senior will review it at 9 but I think they want to see what it does. Confused as yesterday they said if there was anything they would rant it back. It's like dangling a carrot in front of a bloody starving donkey. Bollocks to it al.

oh fiends it's never bloody ending!
karla best of look for today. I am sure they will get plenty, of good quality eggs. Take it easy afterwards.
icy you must have been frustrated. Seems looong and slow is the best option for you.
banana ffs! Well you certainly wasn't expecting that was you? Do you think the meds have switch your ovaries back to PCO? Hope their POA throws up no more surprises.
Welcome STTC I feel your rage. This is one of the many reasons I deleted my FB. MN is the only form of social media I need
The sun is out, sort of makes me happy.
Dog shit to all X

Sorry to hear that bean. Good luck karla!!

Guys I'm back- just caught up with the last few pages and lol'd a good few times. You really are the best bunch. So, my ironidiff was (obviously) too good to be true. I stupidly started to relax a bit as we approached 12 weeks, then started miscarrying (while in another city for work training, of course) three days before my 12 week scan. Had scan yesterday, confirmed miscarriage. Then had to go and ask to cancel the 12 week one (luckily DH did that).

I'm such a cynical barren that we then headed straight down to the infertile basement part and asked to get an appointment with our consultant. We were then told she hasn't cancelled any of our appointments- so we still have a nurse appointment for IUI next week and an IVF appointment in June. So weirdly we are straight back into it. Feels like a good idea right now but I think at some point I may just have a breakdown.

Anyway thanks for listening and it's good to be back. That's the silver lining! I'm going to need you guys to get through the next bit.

Oh kiwi, so so sorry to hear your news. It's so cruel. Life is fucking shit sometimes. I've got nothing useful to say, but I understand something of how you must feel and we're here for you.

Bean sending you heaps of dogshit too. Hope you manage to get some answers. More than anything what a fucking waste of time and effort. Will you switch clinics after this?

Banana so you're back being somewhat PCOS again?! Either way I'm pleased that you've been able to start stimming off the back of it. We may be testing buds once more if AF comes this week (FET would therefore be end-May ish)

Icy in amongst the barren-house plans yesterday I missed your scan update. Agree that slow and steady is sensible but ultimately bloody frustrating. Hang in there.

Good luck karla!!!!!

Kiwi - that's crap. I have nothing useful to say at all. Glad your appts are in place.

Grumpel - I'm not sure. Right now it's too raw to even know if I can do this again if there's a chance of the same outcome. My clinic is good and I trust my consultant. She and the embryologist says that icsi would only have a 0.5% total failure of fertilisation for us. Then again we were quoted 1% this time. It's all such crap. We've made embryos previously in the more normal and pleasurable fashion so this was a bugger of a curve ball.

Kiwi I am so sorry. You must be devastated. Take care of yourself.

Bean I don't think total fertilisation failure is as rare as they say (well, I've heard of it a lot on these boards). But shit nonetheless. I'm so sorry. You might ask your clinic about 'artificial oocyte activation' - fertilisation failure can sometimes be caused a sperm issue and some clinics offer this experimental treatment that can help. There's apparently a test you can do to see if the sperm are missing a protein called Plc zeta, in which case AOA can add this to the egg with the sperm to enable fertilisation. In about 50% of cases this is the cause of low/no fert I think.

Karla one of the hazards of being a well-informed barren is you know 600000 times more than other people do about all the things that could go wrong. You can go mad thinking about it all. I even made flow charts so I could familiarise myself with all the potential disastrous outcomes. I wish I had some advice for how to stop worrying - but I don't. Except try to find some absorbing but meaningless thing to fill the time. Jigsaw puzzles? Sudoku? Something to numb your brain. Hang in there.

Banana good luck with stims. Are you still on dhea? That can tip you into pcos if you've got tendencies in that direction to begin with I think. How are you feeling about it all? So frustrating that our bodies are so fucking mysterious.

I have had horrible thrush ever since my chemical of last month. Am taking probiotics, have been through every type of canesten, tried the tea tree oil tampon thing - it just won't shift. It's annoying as I only ever get thrush when I'm pregnant, and am def not pregnant now, but something must be all fucked up with my hormones for it to be so persistent. Maybe I'm having an early menopause on top of everything. That'd be just my luck.