Tag Archives: Follicles

IVF #5 – Stim Day 18 – The 411

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ivf 5 - thou shall respect the stim

Today is the 18th day of stims.  I went in this morning for monitoring and blood work.  I have 11 follicles on the right and two on the left according to the technician who did today’s scan.  I have not logged into the patient portal as of yet to read the follicular report, so I am just regurgitating what was told to me this morning.

I did my morning injections of Ganirelix, Lovenox (which is causing to me to bleed from the little scabs on my tummy where I have been injecting the past 18 days) and the Neupogen.  I took my synthroid today, which I have been taking every 2-3 days because my TSH plummets when I take it daily and I also took the prednisone, prenatal vitamin and Claritin.

This evening, I will take my vitamin d emulsion and inject the Menopur and Follistim.  I will also take the second dosage of Prednisone.

So far, I do not have that overly full ovary feel that I am used to having.  By now, on the other protocol, I would have had a hard time sitting up straight by now.  My nurse said my largest follicle is 17 mm so I have a little ways to go.  I am scheduled to trigger on Thursday and my retrieval will be on Saturday morning.  I assume that my transfer will be on Tuesday or Wednesday.  I am not doing a five day transfer, but a three.  I want to get back and spend Mother’s Day with my mom.

ivf 5 - stim day 18 scan

I am relieved that my uncle is going to come get my grandmother the day before I leave for New York and keep her until I return.  My mom started radiation this week (tomorrow is the 1st actual radiation as today was just practice) and I was worried about how the radiation will affect her.  My grandmother is a sneaky little thing and if left unattended (while my mom is asleep) she will plunder throughout the house or do things she knows she is not supposed to do, like feed her dog my $23 pot roast complete with rice and gravy, as my mom caught her doing while I was at the theater on Sunday, lol !

It is akin to having an 83 year old child in the house.  You can not leave your mail or documents lying around unless you want them read.  Alzheimers or dementia causes the elderly to become extremely suspicious.  I am not exactly sure what it is she thinks she is going to find…. It drives me mother crazy and I find it hilarious.  Well, I found her antics funny until she fed that damned dog my pot roast !  I made the pot roast for myself and got a really good cut.  I gave my dog and her dog what was left over on my plate that I had as an early lunch, so I guess in her mind that translated to FEED THE DOGS POT ROAST !  When my mom came into the kitchen, my grandmom was preparing a plate for her dog and almost jumped out of her skin when she got “caught”.  She knew I was gone because she can see me pull out of the garage and out of the driveway from her room.  I think she assumed my mom was with me and she was at home alone lol.   We have cameras up all over the house so even when away, we can see what she is doing.

I am excited to report that tomorrow is the first day of filming for my cooking show. I got my final SAG documents today and I faxed them my taft hartley paperwork so that I can get my SAG AFTRA card.  I got a cute grey and white pj set to cook in.  I only wish my make up artist were here to beat my face, but for a cooking show, I can pretty much handle a simple make up job.   I can not wait for you guys to see my logo !   🙂

Have a great evening ~

IVF # 5 – Stim Day 16 – The 411

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ivf 5 - keep calm and stim on

Today is stim day 16 !  Wow !!! 16 whole days of injecting medications into my belly AFTER popping birth control pills for 21 days plus injecting Lupron for 7 days.  This has been the longest cycle…  37 days on this protocol thus far.

This morning, I popped the Prednisone and then injected the Lovenox, Ganirelix, and Neupogen.  I had a class to attend at Howard University School of Divinity this morning that ran until this afternoon.  On the way to my mom’s I stopped off at Target after lunch to grab another box of Claritin, that I take every morning as a part of the immune suppression in this protocol.

I pray that all this long drawn out effort brings me two of the sweetest, most intelligent and gorgeous babies this side of Jordan ! lol

Tonight, I will mix up the Menopur and inject it and also my Follistim.  It is so hard to believe that I only have a few more days.  I still do not have the swollen ovary feeling I normally have on the Gonal-F.  Maybe it is because I do not have a ton of oversized follicles yet.  I thought that I would feel something by now.   I wonder if it is attributed to the new meds?

I hope everyone is having a great weekend !  Tomorrow I am going to church very early and then going to see Blackbird at the theater in Maryland.  I have to pack my things for Albany and ship them out on Tuesday so that my clothing, sheets, meds, and gifts for the staff will arrive on Thursday.  I will be heading to Albany after the funeral on Thursday, provided I do not have substantial growth this weekend and get pushed to trigger and report earlier.  Right now the plan is set.   I so not want to haul luggage with me to a funeral, so I will pack a box and ship the things to the hotel and then just ship them back home the day I leave.

IVF #5 – Stim Day 9 – The 411

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IVF 5 stim day 2IVF 5 - Follistimivf - menopur                                           ivf 5 stim day 4 neupogen

Well, today is Stim Day 9 !   I am completely wiped out !!   I did not do my am injections until around 11 am this morning because I had to drive to NC at 3 am to meet my sister to drop off her kids.  My two year old niece and my 21 year old nephew were here visiting for two weeks over Spring Break.

I got back around 10:30 – 11 am this morning and immediately did my Ganirelix, Neupogen, and Lovenox injections.  I will wait until around 8pm to inject the Menopur and Follistim.

I am hoping that the Follistim is starting to do it’s thing and that the follicles will start growing to a measurable rate and not drag on.  I am beyond exhausted on this new med protocol.  I took a four hour nap !   I am still sleepy, but decided to get up and make the organic, homemade Strawberry ice cream I cooked and refrigerated yesterday morning.  Now I have two huge tubs of Strawberry and one fresh Peach in the freezer.   Now that my niece has gone home, I MAY be able to eat a little of the ice cream LOL.  Before she got here, she would never eat anything cold… go figure !  I started making the ice cream for my mom in the Cuisinart Ice Cream- Frozen Yogurt Maker I have.  My niece was infatuated with the machine and the ingredients churning, so when I finished a batch of Vanilla Bean, I gave her some on a spoon and then she insisted she wanted more in a bowl.  That began her love of ice cream.   I sent my sister a link to a Cuisinart that was now on sale so that she could make this at home for the baby.

I missed the Earth Day Concert on the National Mall today since I had to travel, but it is okay.  I am trying to avoid crowds and people …. and pollen !  No sense in hanging around outdoors too much and risking getting a sinus infection prior to these procedures in a week.

I think the only thing I wish I could do right now is enjoy a glass of white wine.  I hear a German Eiswein calling my name, but I can not have it 😦

Have an awesome Saturday !!

IVF # 5 – Stim Day 6 – The 411

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baby- lovenox shipmentIVF 5 stim day 2ivf 5 stim day 4 neupogen

Today, I went in for monitoring and blood work.  My nurse just called to give me the instructions for the next two days.  My estrogen is 1000 because of the Delestrogen, so they decided to add the Lovenox now instead of waiting until after my retrieval so that I do not have clots due to elevated estrogen levels.

IVF 5 stim day 6 monitoring

Tonight, I do my first Follistim (125 units) injection and again tomorrow night and I have another monitoring appointment for sonogram and blood work on Friday.  On Saturday, I will start the Menopur.

Things are progressing nicely, as I have 7 follicles on each side and that is before adding the gonatropins. !!  I hope to have a lot of good follicles with mature eggs in them this cycle, that will develop into awesome/beautiful STICKY embryos ! 🙂

I am going to order my sperm vial to be sent to CNY on tomorrow so that it can ship out on Friday and get to CNY on Monday.  It appears that my mom may not be able to come with me to Albany because she is due to start radiation on April 27th and if my report date for procedure is closer to the end of next week or pushed back to the 27th, I will be traveling alone, but my film crew will be coming up the day of procedure to film everything….

Infuscience came today to do my intralipid infusion.  I decided to do the infusion on stim day 6 and then again at retrieval and weekly thereafter.  There has been promising data on increased live birth rates when the intralipids are administered in this manner as it helps put the immune system to sleep !

IVF 5 stim day 6 intralipids IVF 5 stim day 6 intralipids 2

As you can see, I have converted my mom’s quilting studio in to a make shift infusion center !  lol

Please keep me in your thoughts and prayers ~

IVF #4 – Stim Day 10 – The 411

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baby - my body is not ready yet

I went in this morning for my monitoring appointment and everything is looking good.  Unfortunately, I have two leads on the right and three on the left and a gang of additional follicles that have not caught up.  My E2 (estrogen) level is just under 1000.  My nurse conferred with Dr. Grossman and Dr. Kiltz and I have to stay on meds another night or two.  I am sooooo glad I did not sell off all of my additional meds or donate them !  I kept two boxes of Menopur and some of the Gonal -F and of course I still have some Lupron left in the vial I have been using.  I am completely out of Omnitrope, but I am not flipping out about it.  I took in three vials over the past 9 days.  The HGH/Omnitrope was an added medication to help with egg quality and maturation.

I was all packed and ready for my 7 am departure tomorrow, and am kinda disappointed that I will not be leaving until this weekend.  Not that I want to rush anything, I am hoping my follicles grow like gang busters overnight so that I will do my retrieval on Saturday and my transfer on Monday or Tuesday.  I am pretty sure my mom has her next chemo therapy treatment on Wednesday, which means she has to come back on Tuesday.  I just hope I am done by Tuesday so that we can head back to DC for her treatment. Again, I am not going to stress about it.  It is what it is.  My mom can just hop on the train back to DC if need be and I will just come the day after.  Her chemo treatments are now 5 hours long so I do not stay with her anyway.  I was just hoping she would be at the clinic when I put her grandbabies back in 🙂

Baby - keep calm im not ready yet

Here is a picture from the monitoring screen today:

baby - ivf 4 stim day 10 scan

Time to go mix my meds and inject them !  More tomorrow after my monitoring appointment.

IVF #4 – Stim Day 8 – The 411

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baby - ivf 4 stim day 8 scan

This morning, I went in for my monitoring appointment and labs and I now have 14 follicles !! One on the left is 2cm and there are two on the right that are larger than the others.  By Wednesday, they feel the smaller ones will catch up and I will be able to trigger on Wednesday and double trigger on Thursday for a Friday morning retrieval.

I am starting to feel very tired and ridiculously sleepy.  When I came in from my appointments this morning, I climbed back in my bed, turned on the heated blanket and went to sleep ! I woke up a few hours later and went upstairs into the kitchen and whipped up another pan of the soft and fluffy yeast rolls I made for the first time on Sunday.  They are so soft, sweet and yummy !  I had several colleagues who saw the pics on Facebook and demanded that I send them some.  I now have 8 bags of them in the freezer and will ship them out tomorrow after I get back from acupuncture.

I am having trouble trying to  focus.  My godmother was just diagnosed with recurrent breast cancer and my best friend’s mother was just diagnosed with lung and spinal cancer.  Although my godmother will be okay, I worry about my friend’s mom because the cancer on her spine has been there for years undiagnosed; to the point that it has mangled her ribs !  The good news is that the cancer on her lung is on the outside and the doctors feel that the cancer is treatable, but the work “inoperable” is what scares me.  2015 has been a true bitch for a lot of people I know.  I am just trying to stay positive and spread as much love and faith around as I can.  I am a witness that God can do exceedingly, abundantly above all we can ever think or imagine and He is also a healer.  I am putting all of them, my mom included, in the palm of His hand and I am standing on the unshakeable faith that God is bigger than any problem.

IVF #4 – Stim Day 5 – The 411

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baby - ivf 4 stim day 1

This morning, I went in -15 degree weather to the women’s imaging center for my ultrasound.  Guess who has 12 follicles?   ME !!!!   I am glad that the follicle count is increasing, which is indicative of my body returning to normalcy after my miscarriage this past summer.    After my transvaginal and pelvic ultrasound, I trekked over to LabCorp and got the blood work done.  It is really sad when the entire staff KNOWS you !  They are all rooting for me too.

I got instructions from my doctor to remain on the same medication dosage and return on Monday for another ultrasound and more blood work.

From the looks of things, they anticipate my egg retrieval being on Friday, February 27th.  I was thinking it would be on Monday instead.  I have a monitoring appointment on Wednesday, and depending on what things are looking like then, they will let me know if I am to trigger Wednesday night and again on Thursday night for a Friday morning retrieval.  That puts my embryo transfer on Monday, March 2nd, for a three day transfer.  This time, I am doing a double trigger and doing a three day transfer in lieu of a five day.  Dr. Kiltz wants to put back all of my embryos on day 2 or 3 and take it from there.  He feels that putting them back in earlier will possibly increase my chances of them sticking and staying.   Fingers, toes, legs, and arms crossed !  Prayers sent up….

IVF #3 Stim Day 9 – The 411

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baby - 12 eggs

This morning, I had a monitoring appointment and am delighted to say that I have 12 measurable follicles and a few more small ones developing.  My E2 levels have come up to almost 500, which I am really happy about.  I will be stimming for 3 more days so it is a good sign that it more than doubled in two days.

Tomorrow, I will be going in for an acupuncture session. That should be a bit relaxing.

Tonight, I mixed my meds and injected with ease.  Just when this becomes second nature, it is time to stop the injections.

I am looking forward to leaving for Albany on Sunday.  I am meeting a few ladies who are at my clinic having their procedures done this week.

As far as how I am feeling, my right ovary feels SWOLLEN !  I feel a bit of pressure on both sides but more so on the right, although my left has more follicles.

Diez Huevos ! – The 411

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baby - 10 eggs

YAY !  This morning I had a monitoring appointment and I currently have 5 follicles on each side and more little ones developing.  My follicles are small and the nurse thinks they should be mature (18-25mm) early next week.  My initial target retrieval date was Friday or Monday.  I am hoping it is not until at least Monday to let the follicles mature properly so that I do not end up at retrieval with immature eggs this time.  My doctor is not on vacation and is closely monitoring what is going on, so I am relieved that he is watching and not the nursing staff.

On Friday, the hospital’s lab did not send my bloodwork in STAT !  I was sooo pissed off because the blood work they did would not be back until today or tomorrow, which means the whole weekend I went along without know what the numbers were looking like.  My clinic and I discussed it and I am going in to Labcorp the rest of the week for the blood work.  The blood work will post to an interface within a few hours of the pick up.

I am anxiously awaiting the blood work results from today.