Next steps

I miscarried the weekend of March 13th. Man that seems like a lifetime ago. The frozen transfer and the subsequent short pregnancy just feel like a bad dream.

After my follow-up ultrasound, the nurse said that I would get a period within 2-3 weeks.That period has gone missing until today. I'm fairly certain that I ovulated over two weeks ago which I thought was odd, but after the usual 10 day luteal phase, my period was still missing. 

Yesterday I headed to the RE to see what was going on. My hormones were quiet and my lining was still very thick. I was given a prescription for Provera to help induce my period and it worked rather quickly!

So tomorrow I will have an ultrasound and bloodwork done for my baseline. I have a consult with my RE on May 15th to go over the frozen transfer/miscarriage and to discuss the next fresh cycle. Hopefully CP will be able to make that appointment as well. I will have a saline sonogram to make sure my uterus looks okay on May 29th. It all depends on this period. We are hoping for a heavy flow to get rid of my lining so that I don't have to have a hysteroscopy (when the RE has to scrape the lining out of your uterus while you are under sedation. This is not a great procedure for those of us with endo so I'm hoping that we don't have to go that route.)

From there, who knows? Based on how long it took for me to get my period and how long it will take to get through all of these procedures before I even start any drugs, I would say I won't need to worry about the positive CMV test.....so that's at least a plus. So maybe a June or July fresh cycle? I know that tomorrow is already May but that seems so far away.

17 months!

Height: ?

Weight: 27+ lbs

New Tricks: Izzy is getting much better at using a fork and spoon to pick up food. Sometimes if she is getting frustrated she will pick up the food with her hands and put it on the fork and then try to shove it in her mouth before it falls off. She wants to replicate everything we do so when I spit after brushing my teeth, she tries to do the same (although she fails). She continues to push herself at the park and this past weekend went up a metal ladder all by herself (last time she tried it she put her feet through the holes and didn't get very far).

Playing in the sand at the park

Cute things: In past few months, bedtime has been the same routine and then kissing various stuffed animals and things around the room before I can put her in her crib. This month she doesn't want to kiss anything but as soon as she gets in her crib she takes her four items- a stuffed bear, a stuffed bunny, a dog lovey, and a pig lovey- and stuffs all of them one-by-one through the crib bars for me to kiss. The funny thing is that she has a different routine for CP when he puts her to bed!

Also, Izzy is obsessed with trains. We see them daily but whenever she sees them when we are at the park she flaps her arms (her cue that she is very excited) and runs over to the fence yelling "CHOO CHOO."

Language: New signs this month- please, thank you. New words- flower (fla-wa), book (bak), hi, all done (ahh dah), turtle (urt-ell), water (wa wa), dog, outside. She generally doesn't put two signs together but this month she said "more please" at the park which was awesome.

Playing drums at the kid's museum

Personality: When she wants to know where something/someone is she will throw out her hands and say "duh?" in a high pitched voice. She is definitely starting to test us as she knows that she isn't supposed to put things in the dog water bowl but loves to put toys, her shoes (while they are on), and hands in it all the time. She is starting to get a little bit of separation anxiety this month- ever since she has been at daycare Izzy has been VERY happy to see us when we come pick her up and indifferent to getting dropped off. But now the situations are reversed- now sad to see us go and wants to be picked up again before we leave, and rather indifferent when we pick her up.

Teeth: Four more teeth- all of her cuspids coming in this month!

Favorite Toy: I picked up a Tickle Me Elmo and a Cookie Monster toy from a local woman who was selling them secondhand. While it breaks my rule of only really buying "active" toys (ones that kids actually have to use their imagination and think instead of the toy doing everything for you- think blocks), the two together were only $5 and I thought she would like them. Turns out she is obsessed with the Cookie Monster toy especially. He comes with three cookies that you feed into his mouth while he talks to you. I've created a monster!

Such a little trendsetter- an octopus sand bucket purse.

Favorite Book: The Pout-Pout Fish. Izzy has become very picky about what books we read every night. If I pick one up and she doesn't want to read it then she will push it away and say "nah" and I have to find another book. I have started to say "one more book" and put my pointer finger in the air after we have read too many and it is time to go to bed.....so now she constantly points her pointer finger in the air to ask for "one more." I absolutely LOVE that she is so into books but I am starting to be able to quote most of them in my sleep so we may need to get her some more....

17 months is pretty early for road rage....may want to lay off the horn Izzy!

Sleeping Habits: Izzy generally falls asleep anywhere from 7:30-8 and most nights sleeps through the night. Most days she will take one two hour nap starting around 12:30 or 1. One night we had the fire alarm go off three times in the middle of the night (she has an alarm in her room) and she slept through each one of them (amazing!).

Eating: Getting better with her spoon and fork but man it is still such a mess. We continue to try to get her to eat more veggies without much success. She likes peas, sweet potatoes, eggplant (in baba ganoush), spinach (in quiche). I may start hiding things in her food..... This month she realized that sauces are lots of fun because we went out to dinner and ordered her BBQ chicken. She ate a lot of the BBQ sauce and not much of the chicken. :-/

Spoon work with yogurt

Diapers: Seventh Generation Size 4 diapers during the day. Halfway through the month we switched to Pampers Overnight Size 5. Moved into a size 6 shoe.

Clothes:  18 month clothes, some 2T clothes

Illness: Ruptured ear drum and an ear infection. Viral rash at the end of the month.

Other highlights: We have a soft serve ice cream place near our house and on the first nice Friday this month we headed there after dinner. Because CP and I were technically sick with CMV, we got Izzy her own vanilla soft serve cone. She LOVED it. 

First trip to a local farm to see animals in person!

First Easter Egg hunt.

You are not alone

This week is National Infertility Awareness Week. I may only have a few family members and friends that know about our troubles to get pregnant, but the more people I open up to over the years, the less alone I have felt.

I always had an inkling that it would be tough for me to get pregnant. My crazy heavy periods were my clue, but every GYN I spoke to about them didn't think that it was worth investigating. After a year of trying on our own, CP and I started to get some tests done and we found out that we have both male and female factor infertility.

Three years of timed intercourse, doctors visits, major surgery to remove fibroids and endometriosis, getting violated by the dildo cam more times than I can count, 3 unsuccessful IUIs, lots of expensive drugs, and one IVF cycle has led to my amazing daughter Izzy and a recent miscarriage. Unfortunately I'm sure I will continue to add to this list as we try to complete our family with a second child.

I may not talk about infertility quite as much these days because of Izzy but it doesn't mean that I never think about it and others that are going through similar hardships in an effort to get pregnant. The best thing I ever did was to find other infertiles on the internet. Reading about their journey, even if it was quite different than mine, and being able to write about my journey has helped me feel less alone.

If you feel comfortable, reach out to a few close friends or family to talk about what you are going through. See if there is a Resolve group near you and attend a meeting- meeting other ladies in my area that could validate my feelings and understand what I was going through was also very helpful.

Unfortunately because 1 out of 8 couples these days has trouble getting pregnant, there are many of us out there even if we are not completely open about it. I have been shocked with the number of people in my life that I have learned are also infertile.

Please know that you are not alone.

Yay me!

I did it! I actually woke up with CP at 5:30am this morning, got dressed while he jumped in the shower, and did Level 1 of the 30 Day Shred. I can practically recite all of the Jillian's speeches during the workout. 

I'm sad to say that it has been a while since I did any sort of weight training. I tried 30 Day Shred twice after having Izzy but I was still breastfeeding and the bouncing was hard on my body. I am sick of being so jiggly everywhere- especially in my stomach above my c-section scar so it's high time I work on my whole body- not just my legs! Since my only form of exercise these days has been a lot of walking and picking up Izzy, it was definitely a bit more difficult than I remember. But it felt GREAT to get my workout in before heading to work and I feel more awake this morning. Now the question is if I can keep this up as we all know that the first day is the easiest....

My goal is to do it every weekday morning while taking a break on the weekends. In the shower I could already feel tired in my arms and my legs were not super happy with me when I had to run to catch my train this morning. I assume tomorrow will be rough as well- we'll see!

Microblog Mondays

It's Monday and it's raining so it's a bullet kind of a day....

-On Friday CP went in for a follow up dr appointment- he also tested positive for Parvo/ Fifth's Disease. At this point it is just piling it on, but it is because his immune system is so shot. He is starting to feel better but still has a lot of fatigue. He went into work today (first time in three weeks!) because his fevers are gone- hopefully he lasts the entire day!

-I went bra shopping last week because the underwire was about to poke through on all of my bras. Sadly, I now measure as a 38H. Izzy didn't do a good enough job draining my boobs and now they are bigger. :-(

-On Saturday we took Izzy to a local farm to see some of the farm animals that she can make noises for. We saw horses, sheep, cows, pigs, and chickens. (She can't say oink yet but the rest of them she does great impressions of their sounds.) She looked a little dumbfounded to have them right in front of her which was hilarious.

Hi chicken!

-Yesterday we heard that it was going to rain all afternoon so we took Izzy to the park for about 2.5 hours between breakfast and lunch! She had a great time on the playground, running around the baseball fields, and playing in the large sandpit. Her afternoon nap then lasted over three hours and then she went to bed a little early as well!! It was pretty obvious that we did a great job tiring her out. :-)

First time on the teeter-totter

-Today we started a new weekday routine to see how it goes. CP is able to get out of work at the same time every day and doesn't have to worry about late trains. Recently I was having to call him to pick up Buster and Izzy at daycare a lot....so we are trying out switching up our roles. This morning he got up at 5:30 and before leaving for work took Buster out and feed him. I woke up at 6, showered, got ready for work, ate breakfast, and then went upstairs to grab Izzy. I then dropped her and Buster off and caught a slightly later train. CP will do the pickups on his way home today. Tonight I hope to set up the DVD player with 30 Day Shred and just wake up with CP to do the Shred every morning. I wake up with his alarm anyway....

-According to my PCP I should wait "a few months" before trying to get pregnant because I tested positive for CMV. She consulted with an infectious disease doctor and a MFM. I may ask to get another bloodtest in a month or two to see if I still have an active virus in me just to make sure. I pretty much feel almost 100% already....just a little tired.

Positive

You have got to be f*cking kidding me. That's right kids now I have tested positive for CMV! Hooray!

Thankfully I am just feeling a little tired and having stomach issues...no fever or rash so far and I'm still at work armed with Immodium if I have to take more. Please please don't let me get any more symptoms.

*sigh*

I have a call into the doctor to see what this means. Do I need to come in for liver testing to see if I have an enlarged liver like CP too? Do I need to get tested again in a few weeks to make sure that I don't have active CMV before getting pregnant? How long will we have to push off getting pregnant?

This is truly not what I needed right now.

Four

Today it's rainy in Chicago and my household is still sick so it's a meme kind of day....

Four jobs I’ve had:  
1.  Tennis teacher at a country club (summer between freshman and sophomore year of college)
2.  Sold tickets at the Philadelphia Eagles training camp (two summers at college)
3.  Promotional rep for various brands in clubs/bars in Philly (side job after college because I wasn't making enough money at my day job)
4.  Sales for Canon copier leases.

Four movies I’ve watched more than once:
1.  Goonies
2.  The 40 Year Old Virigin
3.  50 First Dates
4.  The Neverending Story

Four books I’d recommend:
1.  The Girl on the Train- Hawkins
2.  Devil in the White City- Larson
3.  1Q84- Murakami
4.  The Omnivore's Dilemma- Pollan

Four places I’ve lived:
1.  Connecticut
2. Illinois
3.  Colorado
4.  Pennslyvania

Four places I’ve visited:
1. Arctic Circle, AK
2. Argentina
3. Mozambique
4.  Bermuda

Four things I prefer not to eat:
1. Olives
2. Pepperoni
3. Honeydew melon
4. Dark chocolate

Four of my favorite foods:
1. Corn
2. Pineapple
3. Bananas
4. Salmon

Four TV shows I watch
1. Grey’s Anatomy
2. Orange is the New Black
3. Bloodline (new Netflix series that CP and I just finished- very good!)
4. The Good Wife

Four things I’m looking forward to this year:
1.  Trip to central WI with friends in August

2. Starting a new IVF cycle and hopefully getting pregnant again

3.  Fresh veggies from our garden
4.  Playing outside with Izzy this summer

Four things I’m always saying:
1. Don't stick your hand/foot in Buster's water (to Izzy of course)
2. In your mouth (as opposed to throwing it on the floor- again to Izzy during meals)
3. Lie down (to Buster of course)
4. I love you (to CP, Izzy, Buster, parents, etc)