Back in the Saddle . . .

Ok. Ryle and I had our first visit (after a very long six months) with the RE today. His name is Dr. Vandermelon - but I'm going to call him "Dr. V" for short. It was an okay visit. Let me just back up a little bit for you and explain the past two days!

Yesterday was a day spent on the telephone! Literally I was on the phone all day long. I had to call the bank and up my debit card limit so I could purchase my $1200 worth of medicine! Which, by the way, I got in the mail today!! Then I had to call the RE's office to ask some questions. When the nurse called me back, we discussed how many vials of medicine to order and she answered all of my questions about my cylce. I know it sounds terrible that a 26 year old woman doesn't know about her own cycle, but believe me, it's confusing if you are as irregular as I am. I can go months without one -- but that's a whole other story. Anyway, then I was told that I needed to come in for an ultrasound, which meant that I needed to find a substitute. Well it took me about two hours of calling all of the usual subs that we use, but I finally found one! And then I had to call and order my medicine - another 30 minute conversation. Basically, the bottom line is that yesterday was a wasted day - a day spent on the phone. But I was in a great mood. Everyone said that I seemed happier and my husband was happy that I was finally happy!

So we got up at 5:30 this morning to get ready for our long drive to Shreveport. I was a nervous wreck! I forgot how the drive makes me think about everything that could happen on the visit ... it makes me worry about stuff that I shouldn't even be thinking about in the first place. I should have just been happy to finally be back with Dr. V!  And I am happy - but I was still nervous.

When we finally got there I calmed down a little - or so I thought. If you have never been with someone to a baseline ultrasound appointment, well let's just say this: it's not a girl's favorite thing to do. We don't usually like getting ultrasounds done while we are on our period ... and no it's not the ultrasound like when your pregnant! That's all I'm going to say about it. Well we had to sit in that room for almost an hour this morning waiting on him and I was his second patient of the day! This gave me some more time to think. I just had a bad feeling. I knew he was going to give me some kind of bad news. I could just feel it. I guess it's the woman's intuition thing.

So basically what we learned is that I'm not really on my period. I mean I am ... just heavy spotting ... not like what I should have. The lining of my uterus was really thick - because I have not had a cycle since March. So he is putting me on Progesterone pills for 10 days. I will take one pill a day for 10 days. After that, I should have an "actual" period within another 10 days. I will have to call on day 1 of my cycle and go in for another baseline ultrasound and then we can start the round of injectables. At first I thought this was a bad thing because I wanted to start NOW! I do not like to wait for things - not at all. But the more I think about it, the better it sounds. I get to finish the last week of school without missing any days and then we can start with Dr. V in the summer where I will have nothing holding me back.

While we were there, I also asked him how many IUI's he lets his patients do before he moves them onto IVF. He said for normal women who have no problems, he gives them 3 IUIs to get pregnant. For women with problems like me (no ovulation, etc.) he gives them 6 IUIs. Well this will be IUI #4 for me! Scary! I only have three more tries to get pregnant. I don't even want to think about that because we canNOT afford IVF. We simply cannot afford that. He also said that if this IUI does not work, then he wants to check my tubes. (I forgot to ask how he does that -- guess I get to Google something now.) I have not had this done yet, and he would atleast like to rule out blocked tubes. So the good news from today is that we got a game plan! But I'm going to try not to worry about any of that because I know that this IUI is going to work. That's what I want the most ... I just want a happy ending!