Planning for #2

With mixed feelings, we went to the fertility doc on Friday.  I told hubs that I would go, hear what he has to say, with no promises on timing.  I don’t know why, I’m just not super excited about doing all this again.  I’m loving my life right now, and I’m afraid of screwing anything up…

Anyway, we met with the doc, which was actually a new doc.  Apparently the guy that runs the practice that treated me for the 3 IUI’s, a fresh IVF and a FET is taking a step back in the practice, and only doing surgeries.  So I now have a younger doc, which is fine.  I’m hoping that this should be an easy process.  Hopefully…  In the words of my new doc, “If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.”  We’re going to follow the same protocol that we followed in the successful FET:

-When AF comes, go in for day 3 baseline.  If all goes well, then start BCPs.  Take these for about 3 weeks.  During those weeks, get a hysteroscopy and biopsy.  He said that both hysteroscopies and biopsies have been shown to increase pregnancy rates for IVF. 

-Stop BCP’s, and then AF will show up again.  Day 3 baseline, then start estrogen pills and patches to build up my lining.  Start baby aspirin and Folgard at the same time as estrogen (for MTHFR). 

-About 7-10 days prior to transfer, get intralipid infusion (for NK cells.  Now that I’m thinking about it, it would be smart to get this tested again, considering pregnancy can affect NK cells.  Ugh.  Probably won’t unless this FET fails…).  I will need to have this done at home using a home nurse since the office won’t give me an IV infusion.

-Transfer 2 embryos.  Start Lovenox (for MTHFR) upon transfer.  We talked a lot about the possibility of twins, and how their office is encouraging everyone to do a single transfer, but given our history (1^st IVF with 2 embryos didn’t work, and 1^st FET with 2 embryos made a singleton) we’re going to try with two embryos.  To be honest, I’m petrified of twins.  I used to want twins, back when I didn’t have any babies.  And I still would have loved to have twins.  But now that we’ll have a toddler when the next one(s) comes along, I can’t imagine going through the newborn phase with two babies and a toddler.  Oh well, if it happens, we’ll just deal with it.  My marriage may not survive it (only half-joking) but we’ll figure it out.  Right?

-Upon a positive beta, get a 2nd intralipid infusion.  Take Lovenox, baby aspirin and folgard until the end of pregnancy.

-Whole thing is about $5K.

Currently the plan is to start this whole process when AF comes next.  Which considering it’s now day 25…  Ugh.

To say my heart is not in it is an understatement.  It’s not that I don’t want another child – I do.  And although it seems a little quick, and some people think it will be too much to handle to have two babies under two years old, that’s not really the issue either.  (Although three babies under two terrifies me…)  The real thing is I just don’t want to go through all this again.  The trying part.  The hysteroscopy, and going to the doctor, and all that crap.  Taking precious days off from work to have the procedures done.  The coordination.  The wondering, the waiting.  And then when/if I actually get pregnant, the fear.   What if I lose another baby?  And going through all of this while being the best mother possible to Alex.  How do I do that? 

The other thing that’s distracting me, thank goodness, from all this fertility stuff, is I’m super into exercising right now.  I can’t believe I actually just said that – this is definitely not normal for me.  But about a month ago, I started the couch to 5K program, but would sputter around and start and stop for a few weeks.  But then I signed up for an online boot camp run by this program.  It started a week ago, and holy cow!  It’s incredible.  I work out six days per week, for about 30 minutes a day, but it’s intense.  My goodness it’s intense.  It’s all about interval training and strength training, but using only your body weight as resistance.  There are daily missions, videos to watch, and written assignments to do.  Because the boot camp is more about the mental issues of weight loss than it is about nutrition and exercise.  One of the early missions asked us to put percentages by each area that is causing us to not reach our fitness and weight loss goals: (1) lack of fitness knowledge, (2) lack of nutrition knowledge, and (3) lack of mental muscles (your negative voice is constantly feeding you excuses to use to blow off workouts and eating correctly).  Um yeah, that last one there.  About 100%...  So that’s what the boot camp attacks – my negative voice.  There are checklists, and online community support and all that.  I’m so committed, and loving it.  Something about this time is different – I’m finally addressing the cause of my weight issues – my negative voice.

So one week down for boot camp, and I had my first weigh-in this morning.  Unlike any other week in my whole life (with the exception of the week I gave birth to my little one of course…) I lost 4.8 pounds.  In one week!  I’m not starving myself – in fact, I think I’m eating more than ever by following the guideline of eating every 2-3 hours.  But I’m making better nutrition choices.  The biggest thing is I’m dragging myself out of bed every morning at 5:00 am and really working out!  It’s the only time of day that I can really commit to have the time to myself.  Alex is still sleeping, and I know I can get a wonderful workout in before doing anything else.  It’s hard – so freakin’ hard.  But like the coach of the boot camp says, if this wasn’t hard, over half of America wouldn’t be overweight. 

This program lasts 8 weeks, and I would really like to finish it.  Or at least get most of it done.  I talked with the doc about exercise, and I liked how specific he was.  My old doc would say something like “you can moderately exercise.”  What is that exactly?  This new doc said the exercise restrictions start when I start the estrogen pills and patches and “You can exercise for no more than 30 minutes per day, and your heart rate shouldn’t be over 140 beats per minute.”  During the workout sessions, I’m topping out at 170ish, but with those guidelines, I could tailor a moderate workout within the bootcamp instructions.  But do I want to?

Depending on when the next cycle comes, I may or may not push off the FET.  Hubs thinks we should start right away, and we probably will.  But if AF shows up in the next few days, or anytime this week, I don’t know if I’ll be ready to give up this boot camp three weeks from now.  I know I won’t be able to sustain an almost 5 pound per week weight loss going forward, but this is about more than weight loss.  It’s about being healthy.  It’s about taking back my body after years of fertility treatments, and pregnancy, and the incredibly frustrating process of breast feeding.  I want to have this time where I control my body.  Every day, my muscles hurt in different ways, but it makes me so happy.  Every painful step reminds me of the time I spent outside in the dark, running.  Or jumping around in my living room, following an online video.  Or forcing myself to do yet another push up.  I’m so proud of myself for getting myself out of bed and doing this – every day.  It gives me a sense of pride, of accomplishment, that dragging myself to the doctor for another test, another procedure, never did.  I know I’m only a week in, but I’m so excited, so shocked by the results, that I can’t wait until the next week to see what happens.  What new muscle will I discover?  How much longer will I be able to run?  (I ran for 8 minutes nonstop on Saturday – this is HUGE for me!) 

Yes, I want another baby.  But right now, I want to do this.  I want a better me.