Spring

Hello and welcome ICLWers. It feels like Spring here in San Francisco! I've had a good weekend - a little time outside, exercise, basketball, sleep, acupuncture and even getting my tax stuff together. But, I'm not pregnant. CD1 was Friday. It hasn't been to tough to process given that this cycle seemed to be doomed (i.e. thin uterine lining, low sperm count on top of the fact that even when things are normally perfect we've been trying to conceive for about 4 years now). So, it's on to the next cycle. We'll be doing letrazole/femara + IUI this go around. We did Clomid last month and my RE thinks that may have caused the thin lining. I did 3 cycles of letrazole 2.5 years ago, including one with IUI, and it didn't work. So, it feels we are just going through the motions. But, maybe the stars will align for us. Oh, please!!

I'm going through one of my "I need to do more things to make my body healthy" phases. My acupuncturist gave me a bunch of food recommendations which I will try to incorporate into my diet. Some of them are easy to do, like eating more meat and fresh vegetables. Some are a little harder, like eating blue-green algae and longan fruit! I don't think I've talked much about acupuncture on this blog but I absolutely love it. I find it incredibly relaxing, and fall asleep pretty much every time.

Now...something I don't absolutely love is friends giving me "IF cures" they've heard of. We all know how this goes and that it is usually driven by good intentions, but it is just not what we need. On my ski trip with girlfriends last weekend, one friend told me that she heard cutting gluten out of the diet can lead to pregnancy and another told me that she heard regressive therapy can help. I'm not totally sure I understand regressive therapy but it is something about unearthing latent memories that may be creating blockages of some kind. Again, I know these friends were only trying to help, but hearing these things makes it seem like I'm NOT doing enough. They don't understand how much we have tried and how many possible "random" ideas people have out there! I know that other people beat IF all the time, in a variety of ways. But, I'm still trying to find my way. Despite these comments, the two friends who made these comments were really sweet and supportive in everything else they said. Having shared my struggles with a number of friends, I really appreciate the one who "check in" on me, as opposed to the ones who never bring it up.

I'm wishing you all a very happy & FERTILE spring!!

An Appropriate End to 2009

Today, DH found out and told me that his brother is pregnant (well, his wife is pregnant). They got married in March and his wife is 39. Given her age, they went right into fertility treatments. Apparently her egg count/quality was so low that IVF wasn't even going to be an option. And, apparently they only had like a 2% chance of success. But, they beat the odds and she's 8.5 weeks pregnant after IUI. This is another one of those bittersweet moments. The ratio is about 99% bitter and 1% sweet. I can't fucking deal.

I have so many friends and have heard so many stories about people beating the odds. When am I gonna beat the odds? I don't even know what my odds are. I am not that old (35), I have lots of eggs (my IVF cycles have resulted in 4+ high quality blastocytes), and I'm as healthy as a horse. I am so sick of this shit. Why didn't someone just tell me 4 years ago that I had 0% chance of success, so I wouldn't have wasted all this time and drained so much of my spirit? I hate being a failure. I hate that I've "worked" so hard and this and have nothing to show for it. I really, really hate what this has done to my friendships. I feel like nobody understands me. Lately, I've been thinking about how I need a fun girls weekend away, but all my friends are knocked up or busy with families. And, even if we went away together, I feel like we don't relate so well anymore. Ugh!!!!!!!

So, I guess this is an appropriate way to end 2009. Another dagger to the heart.

I'll be fine, this is just one (of many) of those moments.

Ok - now I'm going to drink a lot of alcohol.

Happy new year to all!