More Waiting

You'll have to forgive me for the extremely poor blogging around here lately. I wish I could blame it on something awesome like a secret pregnancy or vacation, but it actually has to do with this: I have nothing to say. Womp womp. There is a constant internal dialogue going on in my head, but I can't really explain all my thoughts, feelings, emotions. I think November (and part of October) just got to me... way too much awfulness going on. I'm pretty sure there were a lot of "Hallelujahs" being said as people flipped the calendar to December! The good news is that December is off to a great start. Within just a few days I've heard AMAZING news from some of my favorite ladies... I mean "get out of town," "be still my heart," "thank you, Jesus" kind of news. If you haven't heard, Aubrey, Hopeful and Hungry, and Mrs. Lost all received their first BFPs ever... head on over and wish these girls luck and give them lots of love.

As for me, just imagine the Jeopardy theme song playing on repeat... dum, da dum, da dum, da dumm... we're just hanging out waiting on my cycle to start. You may remember that we're traveling for IVF. As you can imagine this requires a LOT of time off work. My clinic doesn't allow outside monitoring for the initial appointment so I will be there from the first day of stims until the transfer and unfortunately I haven't accumulated enough leave time yet. The only reason we are able to move ahead with IVF is by linking my leave with my employer's holiday schedule. We are off from Christmas through New Years... by starting IVF on the first possible day the clinic opens after Christmas, I have just enough time for 12 days of stims and a five day transfer. In order to start IVF on December 27th (the first day the clinic reopens) I have to start my cycle by this coming Monday because they require a minimum of fourteen days on birth control pills. I'm on CD33 today and by BBT was 98.1 today... lovely.

November 2013 BBT- last one before BCPs

To say I'm slightly anxious would be an understatement. If I haven't started a new cycle by Tuesday of next week, I'm pretty sure we'll have to cancel IVF and wait until I can accrue more leave... placing IVF in March at the earliest. Two months is not a big deal in the big scheme of things, but I've waited sooooo long for IVF. It's been thirteen months already since we were told to move on to IVF. And the CRAZY thing is we actually have the money now, yep, you heard me: we have reached our goal of $12,000 in savings. There is literally nothing holding us back other than my stupid cycle.

Other than playing the waiting game, I guess I'd describe myself as pensive. IVF, the trip, the details, the meds, the needles, all of it is on my mind constantly these days. But I wouldn't say I'm excited... I'm not jumping up and down or thinking "this is it! hello 2014 baby!". I'm not particularly anxious yet either... I'm guessing that is still to come. I say pensive because there is still a lot to think about: how many should we fertilize? how many should we transfer? do we want twins? IVF still seems like a really, really big deal to me. I know a lot of veteran IVF girls probably think of IVF like I would a medicated cycle... no big deal, here we go again, let's hope this works. But for us, this will be the first time in more than a year that I have felt like there is a real, measurable chance that we could get pregnant. Sure, I'm "hopeful" every month, but I had to get off the crazy train months and months ago of thinking "this could be it"... I literally could not pull myself off the bathroom floor one more time. So I stopped hoping in every month and placed my hope in one month. And it feels like this might actually be that month. But I obviously recognize that IVF fails more often than it succeeds the first time around, so my defense mechanism is to follow any "maybe I'll be pregnant in a month" with "and maybe you won't". Anytime my mind starts to look forward to an October due date, I think back to last January and all that I thought would have come to fruition this year that hasn't... I'm not trying to be pessimistic, I'm trying to keep the hope realistic. I think any time we try a new treatment there is a renewed sense of hope... I'm just trying not to get swept away in the giddiness of IVF promises.

So that's about it. I'm just patiently not so patiently waiting for my cycle to start while thinking about what might be, could be, hopefully will be my one and only IVF.