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Okay I’m not sure if anyone is still reading this because as far as you are concerned the story has now ended – yet it has not. It’s turns out that the wee on the stick I did was wrong, yesterday the clinic call me to tell me my blood tests have arrived back and apparently I am pregnant!!! However unfortunately I had to tell them that I have been bleeding very heavily for the past 2 days – which I thought was a normal period bleed just extremely heavy. So it seems that yes I was pregnant but I am unfortunately miscarrying. This is so difficult I keep asking myself is there something I could have done to have stopped this. When I thought I was not pregnant I cried could of those tears made me miscarry, I went surfing (albeit in a gentle wave) could that be it? I had a couple of glasses of wine is that when I lost our baby? However I have been re-assured by many that these things would not have caused me to miscarry people do a lot worse and still maintain a normal pregnancy. I must not blame myself, it is natures’ way of saying things were not right. So I have to have a blood test on Monday to confirm that I have in fact miscarried – and then the story I suppose will finally have ended. It will be deemed I was 5 weeks pregnant then miscarried. In one respect I am going “yay” I was pregnant my body knew what to do – on the other hand I keep going, god life is cruel I have journeyed such a long way to get here why take this precious gift away from me? So it is 01/01/2009 and today I turn 34 – what will this year hold for me? Please let it be better than 2008!

Negative

Unfortunately the results were negative, we are not having a baby. This is the end of the family making road for Lee and I, we will not be making this journey again it is too hard on us as a couple and way to hard on me both mentally and physically. I think it is finally time after all these years that we accept we will not be Mom and Dad and try and move on, (if that is at all possible). There is no real need for me to tell you all how devastated we are as words will never be enough to express the empty, hollow pain we are currently experiencing. Thank you all so much for the support you have given me along the way – your texts, phone calls, emails and hugs are what got me through when it all become too hard. I will never forget how you helped me ride this horrendous roller coaster. So this WAS how the story goes and is now, along with our hopes and dreams how our story, for now ends. xx

Am I or aren't I?

So one last post before test day. Have to be honest I really do not know what to think anymore; after hitting rock bottom thinking it definitely had not worked all period like symptoms ie cramps etc have now left me. So i think someone up there is messing with my mind a little bit because they have given me hope just when I thought I was starting to deal with the fact that we had been unsuccessful again. Mmmmmmm am I or aren’t I? 3 more sleeps until I know . . . . PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE it's not often i beg!!!!

Oh they tell you this two week wait is difficult and you have so many wobbly moments. Well yes right now I am having a very wobbly moment, not unlike standing on a swing bridge over a deep ravine with gale force winds. YES today I am that wobbly. I have been awake half the night with very recognisable period pains in my tummy and my back. So game over? Not really sure, I know the pessaries themselves throw out some crazy signals BUT this is so damn awful. Everyday is a million hours. All I have done for two days is sit on the couch reading my book like a good girl yet I am still getting these pains , PLEASE PLEASE don’t let this be my period please let little ‘em’ still be developing. The clinic just called me five minutes ago also to tell me that they are disposing of our 2 other embryos today; I know I am being highly emotional but that makes me sooo sad. I know they were only embryos but they were our embryos and those embryos carry both mine and L’s hopes and dreams! Oh I hate this game it is so bloody cruel!

All aboard the mother ship

So yesterday was egg transfer day! I got up early and had my pre transfer acupuncture (this was without even knowing if my embryos had made it through the night) then L and I headed over to Hamilton. On the drive over there at 9am I rung my embryologist with my heart banging so hard in my ears (um er maybe that was blood from my heart not my actual heart!!!) I had to ask her to repeat herself a couple of times because I was just sooooo nervous! Anyway the news was we had lost two out of our three embryos overnight BUT there was still one little fighter hanging around waiting for its mom and dad to come and pick it up. YES we had made it! Now the embryo was good quality, ie it had divided nicely and there were not lots of little bits everywhere but it was only a 7 cell when we would have liked to see an 8 cell by this stage. So in the grading system of five being the best embryo you can get ours was a four. Still not bad and we actually did have something to transfer, a lot of people do not have this luxury so for this I was VERY grateful, plus it’s the best embryo we have had out of all the other transfers! I arrive at the clinic with a bladder so full I actually thought I was going to wee myself (lovely put that next to the throwing up on myself a couple of days earlier and I’m sure L will soon been seen running for the hills!!) So after a difficult transfer, for some reason my cervix had grown longer from last transfer (go figure!!) my little embryo (‘em’ for short) is now floating around my uterus. After transfer we drove home and I went straight to acupuncture for a post transfer session and then back home to the couch with my little ‘em’ aboard its mother ship! The waiting game really begins now, official test date (blood test ) should be the 28th however we are away camping around the East Cape with not a laboratory in sight so we will test on the 30th. Ummmm I might do a sneaky wee test on a pee stick though beforehand (susssssshhhhh don’t tell the Dr’s they don’t like those sticks!!!) Yesterday was spent sitting on the couch not moving and today will be a day of pretty much the same. L keeps telling me to put my legs up in the air – I don’t think he understands that this is A) an old wives tale and B) woman do that to help the embryo move along the fallopian tubes into the uterus NO need to do it once it is already in its final destination!! Still anything to please him and keep him quiet, plus if I’m sitting on the couch with my legs in the air as instructed my only option is to order him around! ‘L I need a glass of water’, ‘L I need another cushion’, ‘sorry honey I can’t quite reach my book’, mmmmm I might actually begin to really enjoy this!!! Last night I slept properly for the first time in 5 nights – and I actually feel human again – well as human as someone can be who is holding constant conversations with her own belly. Occy keeps looking at me thinking I’m talking to him then walks away in disgust when he realises the words are not the two he recognises ie WALK and LEAD!!! So this it is, there is nothing else we can do now but hope and pray that little ‘em’ is starting to embed deep into my uterus. I am taking two pessaries three times a day to maintain a thick lining of the womb – I’m sure they do so much more as well but that is the main thing. They are quite weird actually because they make your boobs and tummy grow huge – I look like a little bloater, who is already approx three months pregnant, how cruel is that!! Every symptom I now get I am analysing. Is that a period pain –is the game over already? Or is that little ‘em’ digging deep and embedding itself? Oh the parts of waiting were hard before and yes I have even described as torturous, but this, this is . . . . . . is there another word that means torture, but is actually worse????????

Torture!!

So after an agonizingly long night, literally (as I was in sooo much pain from the egg collection, at one stage I thought I may have to go to the hospital for pain relief) and metaphorically (the night lasted 1 million hours) I was finally able to call the embryologist at 12 o clock today. The news for today is good. Our embryos have made it through the night and we have one four cell which is looking VERY good it has divided perfectly, another 4 cell which has not divided quite so well , but is still doing good, and a 3 cell who’s trying hard to keep up with the other big players. So once again today’s result today, is good. I am feeling a little optimistic that we might actually make it to transfer tomorrow at 10.25. One thing really holding me back though (yes there is always one, but I learnt in this game a long time ago to NEVER get your hopes up) is that we were at this stage last time and then the night before transfer (which will be tonight) they just stopped dividing. So yes my little roller coaster is going up slowly and is thus far not hurtling me down to the ground since egg collection. Come on coaster keep climbing higher we can do this. Go on my beautiful little embryos keep fighting for us to be your family – we want you sooooooooooo much!!!! Do you know what? If you could make a baby through others caring about you and holding your hand though this journey then we would have triplets!! Thank you all for being there all the time xx

SUNDAY: So the day of egg collection is finally here. Oh I was so nervous! I started the day with a walk along the beach with Occy just to calm me down a little bit and then L and i made our way over to Hamilton. We arrived at 10.40 I was given a sedative instantly to relax me and make me sleepily then I had a lovely snooze to 11.00. My Dr came in and put in an IV line and I went through to the operating theatre. It was a full house there were 2 doctors 2 nurses and L. So they started the procedure which basically involves a needle being guided along the side of an ultrasound probe which enters the vagina. The needle then pierces through the ovaries into the follicles and collects the egg - okay sounds ouch and it really is ouch. I was meant to be all sleepy and relaxed but believe me I felt every pierce, in fact at two stages it got so bad L asked them to give me more drugs!! Then just like a little lady I threw up over myself twice on the drive home – probably due to the extra anaesthetic I was given. All in all 15 eggs were collected which sounds good but nothing is a definite until you know how those eggs are. I have to ring the clinic at 10am on Monday to see if we have anything fertilised. Standing straight is quite a problem right now, but this should heal pretty quickly and I should stop bleeding over the next 24 hours. God this is a long drawn out process with no guarantees. Every day I find myself praying for miracles. MONDAY: Talk about nervous, I called the embryologist at 9.45 I just could not wait any longer. Unfortunately it was not good news – but then L and I have never had amazing fertilisation rates so I wasn’t expecting anything amazing just 4, I would have been happy with. Out of the 15 eggs 5 were too immature to do anything with. That left us with 10 eggs which they injected with sperm. Out of the 10 4 fertilised but one fertilised abnormally so it will be discarded. All in all we are left with 3 but still have a long way to go. Because they do tend to have the habit of arresting (which means not developing or dividing any further after day 1) we really do not have much to play with. I wll have to call tomorrow lunch time to see if they have divided normally overnight. Oh this waiting kills me. Because they have to be so honest we have been told to keep our fingers etc crossed because of the low fertilisation rate there is a very real danger of them not continuing to develop. You know what is really horrible; you go through all of this and are left with so little. Each day waiting is just more and more stressful. Please let at least one continue normally we only need one to be a little fighter and decide it wants L and I to be it's mom and dad, one is all we need to make our baby . . . . .

My fur baby

Okay it is Saturday and not yet Sunday (day of egg collection) however it is Occy’s birthday and in his eyes this is just as important. We had a little party and invited some friends and their 3 children over. What a lovely way to pass this day of rest before all the work begins. Just wanted to share a picture with you all of my handsome fur baby wearing his party hat! ha ha

Ohhh I’m a little bit nervous about tomorrow if I am being completely honest . . . .

Go on boys go go go . . .

So yesterday, (Thursday) I had blood taken, my levels are still within a normal range sitting nicely around 4000, thank you I am doing so good pat on my back for me for controlling my hormone levels so well, ha ha! Today I had to have another scan and another blood test – my vein they like to use looks like a heroin addict has been having a party, it is a little bruised BUT that old vein still did its thing it and gave blood like a seasoned pro. Next my scan, hmmmmm so I am happy my vein still works I waltz in to find the clinic is running an hour behind schedule because they were struggling to extract sperm from some poor blokes, as the Dr puts is “testicales” (okay they are called BALLS, not testicales please stop trying to bamboozle us in the waiting room with Dr speak!) Then finally my turn to be scanned ah life is good nothing I like better that to lie back and have a stick complete with condom pushed up my fandangle on a Friday morning when I have a whole load of eggies growing. Now the Dr who did this is the one who stuffed up last time so you can imagine how relaxed I am right now, yip you guessed it not really relaxed at all. Not to mention when I first lay down she said to me “so Leeanne your pregnant right now”, um excuse me but have I walked into the wrong place??? “Actually I am here for you to make me pregnant” I say back to her, hmmmmmm lucky it wasn’t a man Dr I said that too or it might have been taken the wrong way he he!! Anyway she apologised profusely she had me mixed up with the another Leeanne - WHAT there are two or us, and there I was thinking I was so unique. Anyway after a long stressful day of waiting for results and waiting for the right outcome in regards to the results, I have been told to use my trigger injection (the pregnancy one) tonight, I will then have egg collection on Sunday morning at 11.10. Can you believe that this is the last injection I will ever give myself, seems a little bit weird to be sad about this I know BUT these injections are the closest I will ever get to making a baby so when I am injecting I always feel like I have got hope when I stop injecting and if it doesn’t work where is the hope then?? So yes I do feel sad saying goodbye to my injections we have travelled a long way together. After 4/5 years of trying for a baby both naturally and through IVF it all rests here at the end of this last injection – oh pressure or what!!! So NIL by mouth for 6 hours before collection on Sunday, oh my goodness that is a long time for food and I to be apart!! After they collect the eggs L will have to do his little part with a good magazine for company (poor L) so unromantic!! Then they will put the sperm into the egg whilst it all sits in a little petrie dish and we all have to hope and pray that there will be a lot of loving going on in that dish on Sunday evening. Mmmm I might ask if I can leave a CD with Barry White singing just to keep everything in the loving mood. Oh I hope they dim the lights as my eggs could be a little shy. Go on boys swim, dig deep and fertilize those lovely eggs I have been growing just for you, go go go . . . . . .

Just call me Henny Penny

. . . and no today the sky is not falling down, no acorns are landing on my head, today I am feeling good. I went for a scan this morning on day 7 (instead of day 10 which is the normal day) because my body LOVES the drugs and LOVES to over-react to them. So I have lots of lovely little follicles (approximately 14 and they all hopefully contain an egg). My follicles are all a nice size for such an early scan AND my hormone levels are looking pretty good also, they are sitting just under 3000 whereas last time when I was not monitored so closely they soared up to 22 000 (no wonder I went slightly crazy, poor L!!) so all in all a good result today. Where to from here? Well I will have another blood test tomorrow morning to check my hormone levels are still within a normal range and then a blood test and scan on Friday morning, as long as everything is still looking good I will take my final injection which they call the pregnancy injection, (this matures my eggs ready for collection) on either Friday or Saturday evening dependant on Fridays results, then egg collection will be either Sunday or Monday morning. Ohhhhhhhh I really feel like we are getting somewhere and although I do not want to get my hopes up as I have been on this ride too many times before and realise just when you think all is going well and you feel on a high that damn rollercoaster turns around and takes you crashing back down to earth with a ferocity that astounds you, i still have to acknowledge that today things are good! So yes today I am excited about todays results, tomorrow is a whole new day and I will worry about tomorrows results then. Tonight this little chicken with all her eggs slowly developing, growing big and strong will sleep well.

GROW little eggs GROW

Ohhhh I almost feel we are on the beginning of the home straight. I had a blood test on Tuesday which confirmed that my body has shut down (ha your telling me . . didn’t need a blood test to confirm that!!). So I have down regulated (Dr speak) and I am now all ready to start growing the eggs which will eventually be used combined with L’s sperm to make our embryos. I feel that this injection is a really important one as it is the first one which starts stimulating the eggs into growing (hence why I have recordered it for you to all see, the second injection I inject is the one that stops me ovulating early – ohhh two injections a night from now on, yikes!!!). I have a scan and blood test on Wednesday to see how many eggs I have managed to grow from tonight Thursday, to Wed and then to confirm our date of egg collection or to confirm another scan on Saturday or Sunday. I am feeling a little excited as I can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel BUT also a little nervous as it was at this scan last time when the Dr’s got it wrong up’ed my drugs and it all went downhill from there. Bought myself a container of whey protein this evening (like what people take when they are body building), the protein is meant to make my eggs grow big and strong. So now I will have to keep checking myself out in the mirror to ensure I am not growing huge muscles in strange places!! L thinks the only muscle growing at the moment is the one in my tongue which is getting so much extra use from me moaning about feeling yuck all the time, lovely – NOT!! Sooooo GROW little eggs GROW!!!