Saturday, May 28, 2011

Emby number 3

Hi,

Well, last Thursday we travelled to Dunedin to have our third transfer. We met with some friends who are on their own fertility journey and they looked after Abbigail while we were indisposed. It always seems rather surreal, in the infertility waiting room waiting to be told that we're ready to impregnate you now! Wow, just gave myself visions of alien abductions and the usual probings that go on during such events... Funny how it's not too dissimilar from that really... Don't get me wrong they do everything possible to make you feel comfortable and at ease (aside from numbing and paralysing you I guess), but somehow it just never seems to feel right, it's just odd. But I guess as infertiles we should probably feel used to not feeling normal, right?

Anyhow, they seemed to have more trouble this time getting the catheter in the right place, and Sarah described it like she felt they skewered her uterus trying to get the the top part. They told us this time that Sarah has a retroverted uterus and cervix, which means the birth canal is simply not straight, it kinds of bends back towards the spine, which apparently will go some way to explaining her wicked abdominal pains every month. I also wonder if it contributes to our infertility, when combined with sperm that don't know what's good for them, or where to go to get it.

But the proceedure was over just as quickly as last time, and given 10 minutes to let the embryo rest and settle, we were up and away again. I took that day and the next off work to take as much pressure off Sarah as possible and allow her to stay as horizontal as possible. It was a good opportunity to have some daddy daughter time. I LOVE that!

Sarah had some spotting and cramping, but has otherwise felt no different to normal, and once again we find ourselves reminded that this is actually normal. And once again we are counting down to Monday when all will be revealed!

Somehow we still end up thinking too fat into the future - somehow thinking about names pops into my head and I have to tell myself to stop. We haven't thought about names since we decided on Abbigail's name over two years ago!

Abbigail has been sick with a cold this past week, and now both Sarah and I are down with it too. So nothing to do, and no where to go because we're all cot cases needing a rest!

Anyhow just had to let you know where we are at, and that we'll know in a few days where we are at.

Abe

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Back to square one...

Hi everyone, it's been a very long time since I've even looked at my blog, let alone considered writing in it! I must confess to having been negligent in writing, I do hope you can find it within yourselves to forgive my tardiness (in the extreme!)

Abbigail is almost two, she shows no signs (other than a little waddle as she runs) of having been "cast" for want of a better adjective, in her hip spica. Her reflux is still a problem and she is now having 30mg of Omeprazole daily to control her reflux (to put it into perspective the starting adult dose is 20mg). They may operate in the months to come to band up her oesophageal sphincter to prevent the reflux, but we will wait and see...

She is a delight, and it is a privilege to be her Daddy. She is so articulate, and knows all the letters of the alphabet, and can count to 10 by herself (but doesn't always get it right ;-)). She is a rather independant soul, but loving and caring just the same. Every night when we say grace before our meal she interrupts me and says "Thank the Lord for the swing, and the slide, and the trees, and the flowers... AMEN!", have you ever heard of anything more georgous?! She loves her stories, and in particular the one about the easter story - she calls it the "Jesus is alive story".

So anyway, we find ourselves back at the starting blocks, infertility-wise. We have an appointment at our clinic on Thursday to have our third transfer. Once again we find ourselves wondering what the outcome will be, and I'm not even 100% sure we are ready for our next child. But I guess most fertile couples just find out that they are going to have another child, whereas we have to plan things out - and it could be easy to just wait - but we have commited ourselves to giving our frozen embryos a chance at life regardless of our circumstances. We will see it as a blessing to be pregnant again, but hopefully we can forego some of the complications of pregnancy, birth and post-natal period this time.

For those of you who know us personally, be advised we are keeping this attempt to ourselves at present. Just because everyone else gets to surprise people close to them with the great news of pregnancy, but us infertiles often don't get that joy, so we are using whatever means necessary to keep it under wraps. It also means that we won't have people asking us in about two weeks time if it was a success or not. It astounds me how people want to know such private details, perhaps it's because we open ourselves up to someone when we tell them we suffer from infertility, and they somehow guess that it's then ok to ask questions like "So... did it work??!!", I almost felt like saying something like "The answer will be obvious in 9 months time, if you haven't figured it out by then, then don't bother asking again".

Anyhow, Sarah's on the estradiol, and progesterone pessaries (she'd forgotten how inconvenient and disturbing they were), and we're all primed and ready for another shot at this... Sooo wish us luck!

May God be the director of our paths...

Good to blog to you all again,
Abe