The Blind Date

Sooooooooooooo.....................
Picture it.............Sicily..........
Ummmm......Rather Townsville Day Surgery........Friday 18/9/2009
12:30pm (approx) When Seth the super sperm and 300 million of his super sperm mates headed from the rather chilly test tube to syringe, syringe to the warmth of the of the Uterine Lounge Bar in search of Estelle the egg. Seth had heard via the grapevine that Estelle was due to make her grand entrance any time and he was eager to get their blind date under way. While some would swim in cirlces, it would probably take Seth and some of his stronger counterparts a good 5 hours to make their way along the dimly lit tube to reach Estelle......Cue music (Start humming Afternoon Delight)!!
The IUI itself took less time than the 45 minute wait in the waiting area. Infact we were in and out in under 10 minutes. The procedure itself was pretty painless and I didn't suffer any cramping afterwards. It was an emotional time for the both of us.....we have spent a good 6 months preparing for this moment and it had finally come. I cant speak for Kylie, but I felt excited and overwhelmed at the enormity of what we are are doing and moved by the love and support of our family and friends. Thank you all for your thoughts and words of encouragement. It's now up to Estelle and Seth!! Fingers and legs crossed that they hit it off!!
Now the 2 week wait begins.

Batter Up

Well............ all I can say is lucky I'm not really a betting lady!!

The cup did not runneth over as we had anticipated and this aint no dress rehersal!!
Mother nature did her own thing and completely blew us away by producing the 1 sought after dominant follicle. There were plenty of smaller follicles but one put its hand up and said pick me. Take your marks, get set, we are a goer!!!
Yesterday we left the clinic completely dumbfounded, but pleasantly so. We are at least a chance to conceive this cycle. Its a bit like a lottery - the odds are long, but you gotta be in it to win it.
After our TV Scan and subsequent good news, one of the nurses went through the administration of the Ovidrel injection. This stuff helps with the final maturation of the follicle and release of the oocyte(egg). The idea is that the egg is not left hanging around waiting for the sperm. If there is any waiting around to be done it is by the sperm which lives longer.
The injection had to be administered at 6am this morning, 30 hours prior to insemination. The injection itself was simple and painless. Kylie was planning to do it, but was worried she was going to hurt me. Whilst I tried to convince her this wouldn't be the case I totally understand her hesitation. If we dont strike it lucky this time around, maybe she will feel more comfortable sticking it to me next time!! So tomorrow morning our egg/s have a date with our donor sperm. Lets hope the blind date goes well and a long lasting relationship ensues.

A Sneak Peak

I have a confession to make...........
Yes I cheated...........working in an x-ray department gives me access to Ultrasound every day. So it is tempting to sneak a look at the progress of my ovaries and their fledgling follicles. I know not every one has this opportunity, and I'm sure many people have different opinions about whether I should be sneaking a peak. However, you try living with a carrot being dangled under your nose daily and tell me you wouldn't be tempted to take a look. So look I did.........
Whilst part of me is glad I did, part of me walked away feeling prematurely deflated. 3 Follicles on the right and 5 on the left all of which appear to be racing to maturity with gay abandon.
1 or 2 is what we are aiming for NOT 8!!!! The frustrating part is that you cant put the brakes on this runaway train....nature decides its own destiny......and the total lack of control is exasperating. I guess there is the chance that some of these follicles wont mature, but if I were a betting lady I'd say the odds of just 1 or 2 being mature by Wednesday are pretty slim. Sigh......we want to hold on to some hope until Wednesday, but realistically it looks like this cycle will be another dress rehersal. The optimist in me says wait until Wednesday....you never know....so we will wait and cross our fingers.

The black circle like structures are the follicles.

A New Month a New Cycle

September 5 bought with it Day 1 of IUI cycle #2.
I have finished my 5 days of Serophene 50mg. Like last cycle I have experienced some hot flushes and am just now (Day 6) starting to experience some twinges in the ovaries. We are scheduled for a TV Scan September 16 and the results of the scan will determine if we proceed to insemination.

August - A retrospective

Day 1 of our first IUI cycle arrived early August and it was with great excitement we rang the nurses at the clinic to inform them and receive instructions on taking the serophene from Days 2-6. I was a little anxious as to the side affects of the serophene, but apart from a few hot flushes there wasn’t much else to write home about. Come Day 12 I could feel my ovaries – especially the right. Our scan showed 3 mature follicles and several smaller immature follicles on the right ovary. The Dr gave us the news that we could not proceed with the IUI this month due to the risk of triplets. With “cycle cancelled” stamped on our notes we were sent away with instructions to wait for day 1 of our next cycle and follow the same game plan. Whilst we understood we were disappointed with our false start. Since when did being an over achiever go against you?

We questioned the whole process for a few days:

Why do we need the drug stimulation – surely it’s quite clear my ovaries work well enough on their own. Wont the stimulated cycle waste another month of our all to precious time. In the end these people are experts in their field and you have to trust in them and their processes. The clinic wont alter medication/doseage based on one cycle as the over/under stimulation may be a one off. Our bodies can respond differently each cycle. We were told that if the ovaries were over stimulated in 2 consecutive cycles that they would cease the tablets and allow me to harvest my follicles naturally.

With our frustrations worked through, we were somewhat philosophical and positive in that too many follicles was probably better than none. We successfully put the rest of the cycle out of our heads and busied ourselves with work and socialising. Kylie was busy with basketball refereeing and there were several social gatherings that made the second half of the month wizz by.

Prologue

Let us start our adventure by first setting the scene. How we got to this place has been a journey in itself. When Kylie and I first met we discussed kids – did we like them (yeah) and had we ever thought about having them (yep). We had both thought about having kids, but neither of us had found ourselves in a position or relationship where that went any further than those thoughts you find yourself ruminating over from time to time. So after some initial discussions we agreed that having a child together was a definite possibility for us, but down the track.

Down the track for us initially meant 2-3 years as being 37 at the time my biological clock was not going to allow us 5-10 years to settle in together, build up a real estate portfolio and own 2 cars outright!!

As time passed we talked of our future plans with others. Some of these discussions were with couples already well and truly entrenched in the fertility clinic process and some were with people who’d had kids later in life. These conversations led us to believe that this whole pregnancy business was not necessarily as straight forward as one would possibly think. We heard of stories where it took couples 3-5 years and thousands upon thousands of dollars to achieve their dreams of having a child. Others shared stories of birth defects and disabilities which were thought to be attributable to advanced maternal age. Eeeeeeeeek – we were starting to think that maybe we should look in to this sooner rather than later. So we researched the internet, read plenty of books and picked peoples brains………especially the ones who had been there and done that!!

Armed with heads full of information we booked in to see the GP in March 2009 to have a chat and get some advice about our next move. The Dr got all the preliminary tests underway and referred us on to Queensland Fertility Clinic. So our first WAIT began!! A 6 week wait to be precise……..not to bad considering we are in Townsville and there aren’t that many specialists on hand.

At times that 6 week wait seemed to drag and the week prior to our first appointment was a tense time for me. Whilst excited at the prospect of starting this adventure I was also filled with trepidation about what lay ahead. In the hours before our appointment I felt like a school girl waiting to be called in to the headmasters office. Not knowing whether I was receiving a pat on the back for good work or a rap on the knuckles for misbehaving.

The appointment itself was much like an interview for a job or so it felt. The relief I felt at its completion was immense. I felt like we’d passed the first stage and had been shortlisted for the second round of interviews. The second round of interviews included more blood tests for both of us and a mandatory couples counselling session before being able to proceed. We had a 2 week wait to see the counsellor and an 8 week wait until we could get in to the Fertility Clinic to find out what happened next.

The Dr advised us that all our tests came back fine and we could start proceedings as soon as we had picked out a donor and in conjunction with the start of my next cycle. Wow…..just like that we would be off and running!!

Before we could take our position at the starting blocks we had the task of picking out a donor that we were both happy with…….sounds easy…….think again. We both thought we’d be inundated with donor profiles which would take us weeks to pour over and short list our favourites. The cold hard truth was there were 4 Australian donors and 16 American donors to choose from. So pour over them we did. In our initial perusals we picked fault with just about every profile. This one had braces, that one wore glasses, this one had a receding hairline and that one had acne. None of these good samaritans was going to be good enough to be the father of our child. Okie Doke……take a step back for a minute…..I wear glasses, had zits and could have had braces!!! We had to lower our expectations to be somewhat realistic. So we did and came up with a top 2 candidates. Next step was to purchase said donor – fingers crossed they weren’t too popular and already “SOLD OUT”.

Kylie rang the sperm coordinator in Brisbane to see if our donor daddy was available – and yes he was. So how many vials do we get? If you are super keen and loaded with money – heck – buy all 10!! Whilst we were keen we are not “Loaded” so we got 3 vials for our suggested 3 IUI attempts. If were are not successful with the IUI’s we will look to try IVF and put a special order in for our donor at that time.

With the sperm on its way up from Brisbane, our next appointment was with one of the clinic’s nurses to go through the whole IUI process and get required scripts. Now we wait for day 1 of my next period. Although all my hormone levels were fine the process does require some mild drug stimulation of the ovaries so that they can be sure that you will ovulate. They don’t want to waste any valuable sperm if there is no egg to fertilize. This stimulation is by way of a tablet (Serophene – Clomid 50mg) from days 2-6 of your cycle. On Day 12 you have a TV scan (internal ultrasound) and if there are 1 or 2 mature follicles then Ovidrel injection 10pm Day 12 and insemination Day 14 then fingers crossed. Note: any more than 2 mature follicles the cycle is cancelled due to the risk of multiple births.