March 2022

I am supposed to be 8 months pregnant right now. Instead of putting the final touches on a nursery, washing onesies, and worrying about delivery, I am instead fearful that things won't ever happen. Everything my body does is atypical, wrong, abnormal. I'm sick of it. Even in starting fertility treatment and on hormone medication, my body STILL doesn't do what is expected. "Is it normal to bleed heavily mid cycle?" "Well... no..." SUPER reassuring! Staying positive will be a synch. I never seem to be "textbook" and it is beyond frustrating not to have just one tiny thing go right. I just want an ounce of a break because I fear I will break myself.

The beginning of my first fertility cycle at Shady Grove Fertility (SGF) has been a roller coaster so far. We decided to start with the least invasive option: timed intercourse (TI). The medications have been less than fun. Letrozole, intended to make me grow eggs has made me feel like crap. It made my period bleeding get really heavy, gave me pins and needles feelings in my limbs, and a lot of nausea. I even had to take off work one day. As days pass, I get more bloated and just have this uncomfortable feeling in my abdomen. I basically want to just sleep, but life must go on. On day 11, I go in to see what is going on and the scan shows two follicles (eggs), but they are too small so I have to come back a few days later. On day 15, one follicle is mature so they gave me the go ahead to do the trigger shot that night. Yep, that's right! I gave myself a shot right in the stomach. I iced it before and after to try and reduce any pain. I think the build up in my head was worse than the actual pinch. Timed intercourse is aptly named ad you have intercourse at very specific times; one being the night of the trigger shot and the second being about 36 hours later. You know what makes scheduled love making even sexier?! You guessed it- blood! I bled all the way through day 19. It think it was starting the progesterone suppositories that finally made it stop. So they solved that problem, but have brought on a whole new set of symptoms. I am just hoping they are a positive sign.