Bumpdate - 18 Weeks

Warning: Ultrasound pics at the end of this post!

It's Bumpdate time again!!!

How far along: 18w1d

Weight Gain: I'm up another pound, that's up 8 total.  I'm doing well at this 1-2 lbs. a week thing!

Maternity Clothes: In NYC I wandered into the maternity section at Macy's, ironically I was looking for the bathroom and not actually shopping but OMG have you guys been there?  I've heard of Pea in the Pod but I've never actually been inside one.  It's amazing!  Everything a pregnant lady could possibly want!  Dresses, pants of every style, jeans, cargos, capris, corduroys, shorts, tank tops, T-shirts, blouses, tight shirts, loose shirts, bras, swimsuits.  You name it, they got it!

I finally broke down and bought my first pair of maternity jeans, I hate to admit it but they're designer jeans, that's right I totally overspent on jeans that I will only wear for a few months.  BUT, I plan on being pregnant for a good majority of the next 5 years (fingers crossed!!!) so I'm figuring I can get some good use out of them.  But I will not be living in these, so many of you have said how comfy they are, which is true, but I still can't see myself wearing them more than once a week or so.

I came home from NYC with the aforementioned maternity jeans, a dress, a tank top and a shirt.  Not too shabby for 18 weeks along and still fitting into the majority of my clothes.

Food Cravings: I had my first real craving besides that one many many weeks ago when I really wanted Oreos.  I was on the subway in NYC and suddenly I DESPERATELY wanted milk.  Like I was salivating specifically for MILK.  Water wasn't gonna cut it, orange juice wasn't gonna cut it, I had to have milk!  This is significant because I don't drink milk...ever.  I put milk in my coffee and every once in awhile I have cereal, but other than that, no milk, I don't even remember the last time I poured myself a GLASS of milk.  But suddenly I NEEDED it.  Conveniently when I arrived at my destination my friend just happened to have bought milk which she NEVER buys!  Perfect timing! It should be noted I was eating like shit the whole time I was in NYC also, so perhaps baby was just like OMG Mom, give me some CALCIUM!!!

Movement: I'm not sure.  BUT since I just wrote I'm not sure instead of a resounding NO I'm thinking whatever it is I'm feeling that I think might be the baby probably is indeed the baby.  It's definitely nothing distinct or strong and on the ultrasound today the little wiggle worm was moving around like crazy and I didn't feel a thing, so...I'm still not sure if I've felt movement.

What's up with my body: Traveling wreaked havoc on my digestive system.  I had the constipation under control with the magic oranges and then BAM throw me on a plane and all my hard work just went out the window, I have been SO uncomfortable the last few days, but here's hoping that with a few more days and a few more oranges we can get back to a little more regular.

Aside from the constipation there is SO much pressure on everything in there, I still have not "popped" so my uterus is sitting rather low and heavy on my bladder and intestines and boy oh boy can I feel it! I have pretty bad gas pains every time I eat and I can't stop peeing to save my life.

On occasion I'm also dizzy when I stand up.  I've had to lean against a wall or sit back down after standing up too quickly.

Gender:  I'm kind of stuck on girl now.  Are you guys sad that I COULD know now but I still don't?!  It was HARD to look away at the ultrasound today!  BUT, baby had it's legs crossed the whole time so I don't think she could have told us even if we had wanted to know.

Did you know they check your cervix at this ultrasound?  For some reason I assumed that a cervix check would have to be done via transvaginal ultrasound, but nope, they measure your cervix with the abdominal one!  For the record, my cervix is fine, even though I'm fully convinced at one point or another almost every other day that I'm going into preterm labor.  Don't know why!  I think all the gas pains make me think of contractions even though they're absolutely NOTHING like the contractions from my miscarriage.  I just can't shake the fear, especially now that in 2 weeks we leave miscarriage territory and enter stillborn territory and we're still 6 weeks from viability!

And another interesting little tidbit I learned from the ultrasound today and this gets all caps and a lot of exclamation points, I DON'T HAVE CYSTIC OVARIES RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!  Wait, what?!  I am now thoroughly, THOROUGHLY confused about my PCOS diagnosis because as far as I was aware with PCOS you ALWAYS have cystic ovaries and up until this point this has been true.  EVERY ultrasound I've ever had I have had polycystic ovaries, including the one immediately after my miscarriage.  But apparently right now they are beautiful cyst free!!!  So, if I wasn't already planning on it I pretty much have to have all my babies as soon as I can.  The MINUTE I start ovulating after giving birth (which hopefully breastfeeding will put off for at least a year) we have to start trying for #2, hence my being pregnant for the better part of 5 years reference above!  And that is also assuming that cyst free ovaries means ovulation for me!  But does this mean I don't actually have PCOS?  Why do I have polycystic ovaries that keep me from ovulating if I go hormone free for too long if it's not PCOS?????  So many questions I now have!  I guess it will all be a big fat wait and see game after giving birth.

So, without further ado...

Bumpdate:

And...Baby!

Baby Feet!

Soul Sucking Sadness

I am about to get my period again.  I can feel it.

I have such ridiculously messed up cycles these days hormone free that I forgot what my "normal", ie BCP periods were like. 

A few days before AF comes to town I get overwhelmed with sadness.

And today, today I feel it.

But there's something new to add to the period induced sadness this time.  It's the very real sadness that I am without a doubt not pregnant this once in a lifetime natural ovulation cycle.

It's like the sun has been blotted out.

It's a bone-crushing, soul-sucking sadness that I wasn't expecting.

I stayed off the crazy train, I didn't overanalyze symptoms, I've peed on nothing and I told myself I wasn't expecting a pregnancy this cycle, that it was just good to ovulate on my own.

But a little thread of hope found it's way in and I did, I hoped.  I hoped this would be it.  That since I magically ovulated on my own that I could magically get pregnant on my own and that I could get the fuck off of this infertility rollercoaster that I have found myself on.

Unfortunately I am unlikely to be able to ovulate again on my own.  The pregnancy gave the ovaries a chance to de-cyst for a bit but I am expecting they will soon be covered in cysts and clogging up any chance of a natural ovulation again.  I can't help but feel that was our only chance at a natural pregnancy without any medical help.

Unbelievably today seems to be pregnancy announcement day in infertility bloggerland as well.  And though I know it's not true and that many of you are still down here in the trenches with me, today it really and truly feels likes everyone is pregnant...but me.

Paleo Baking

I've mentioned before that I generally stick to a paleo-friendly diet. Not only is it a fantastic way to stay skinny without going to the gym, but it's also very PCOS friendly in that it keeps your glucose levels from spiking, thus supposedly helping the little ol' ovaries from reacting to too much glucose and producing too many follicles and clogging them up and preventing actual ovulation.

Not that sticking to this diet has helped me ovulate AT ALL, but whatevs, I actually believe it's a healthier way to eat REGARDLESS.

So whether I have PCOS or not, which I am STILL on the fence about, I find it helpful to stick to a paleo diet in my day to day life...most importantly when I am the one cooking. Eating out is a whole other ballgame in which all diet restrictions go out the window, thus we only eat out on the weekends!

That being said it's been hard to find ways to incorporate fall flavors like PUMPKIN into anything besides baking.

And baking paleo-style is a bit of a...challenge.

Luckily I stumbled upon this blog and I've spent the better part of a day baking my face off.

First up I made these lovely pumpkin bars, which are sweet, moist and just plain delicious. Especially for being carb free, gluten free, sugar free, wheat free etc!

Pumpkin Bars

½ cup pumpkin (acorn, butternut or other squash) puree

½ cup agave nectar

2 eggs

1 cup blanched almond flour

¼ teaspoon celtic sea salt

½ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

¼ teaspoon cloves

1. In a food processor, combine pumpkin, agave and eggs and pulse for 2 minutes
   
2. Pulse dry ingredients into wet for a full minute, until well combined
3. Pour batter into a greased 8x8 inch Pyrex baking dish
   
4. Bake at 350° for 30-35 minutes
5. Serve

I don't own a food processor, so I just mixed it all by hand and since the flour is actually almond flour it doesn't really matter if it's a bit clumpy, it tastes delicious even if it's chunky because it's almonds...not flour, flour chunks are gross.

Anyway, I also threw in some chocolate chips because my husband is a chocolate fan and doesn't really think a dessert is a dessert without chocolate. My chips were 70% cocoa which means I had THE TINIEST BIT OF SUGAR IN THIS DESSERT but that was my own doing and was unnecessary. Either way, DELISH!

I also decided to make pumpkin bread, again using Elana's Pantry recipe:

Paleo Pumpkin Bread

• 1 cup blanched almond flour
• ¼ teaspoon celtic sea salt
  
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• ½ teaspoon cloves
• ½ cup roasted pumpkin (I used canned)
• 2 tablespoons honey
• ¼ teaspoon stevia
• 3 eggs

1. In a food processor
   
   combine almond flour, salt, baking soda and spices
2. Add pumpkin, honey, stevia and eggs and pulse for 2 minutes
3. Scoop batter into a petite loaf pan
   
4. Bake at 350° for 35-45 minutes
5. Cool for 1 hour
6. Serve

I didn't use the Stevia, because I don't like Stevia and again, turned out DELISH! It's sweet and cinnamony and YUMMY.

I was actually quite proud of myself that these both turned out. In the past my paleo baking has been a bit...meh. I tried using regular recipes and just substituting regular ingredients with paleo friendly ingredients and let me tell you...that doesn't work. And since I don't have the skill or the inclination to make up recipes that DO work myself I am beyond pleased to have found Elana's Pantry because then she can do all the hard work and I can just bake and enjoy!

Chinese Herbs

At some point along this road you realize you will try just about anything to bring on ovulation/have a baby. I am not talking about medically, no I'm talking about all the crazy eastern and alternative shit that have no statistics to back up what your acupuncturist/midwife/naturopath tells you.

At some point you decide acupuncture is the answer. Or chinese herbs are the answer. Or that yoga is the answer. Or that your diet is the answer.

To refresh your memories I already went this route, I spent about 6 months last year denying the fact that I wasn't ovulating and trying desperately to avoid taking drugs to get pregnant and sought help from a naturopath who put me on herbs and gave me some diet tips for PCOS and suggested an acupuncturist, all to no avail as I had 1 period in the entire time I was with the naturopath.

I'm not saying it doesn't work...but it sure as hell didn't work for me then at that time.

And THEN I decided fine, I give up, give me the damn Clomid and BAMN I was pregnant.

But one miscarriage later and right now I'm not allowed another medicated cycle until January, so rather than sit around doing NOTHING I'm being proactive and decided that the ANSWER TO ALL is to find an acupuncturist. Along with acupuncture I'm taking some Chinese herbs WHICH IS ALSO CLEARLY PART OF THE ANSWER which my acupuncturist insisted she'd had lots of luck with for other clients to stimulate a period. The sooner I can get a period the sooner I'm allowed a medicated cycle.

I'm on the fence with the whole Chinese herb/acupuncture regiment and how well it actually improved one's fertility, but seriously, I'll do anything that COULD be helpful right now rather than just wait it out.

A word on Chinese herbs...Chinese herbs taste like shit.

I repeat. Chinese herbs. Taste. Like. Shit.

Truly disgusting, and yet someone tells me that they will help me get a period and I'm like YIPPEE, GIMME GIMME GIMME! I TOTALLY BELIEVE YOU! I TRUST YOU COMPLETELY ACUPUNCTURE LADY THAT I'VE ONLY MET ONCE!

Infertility messes with your head. Makes you a little nutty.

Since I know I have some new followers who are part of the infertility club, please tell me, what's the nuttiest thing you've done in an effort to conceive???

RE Appt

For everyone not familiar with an RE, it stands for Reproductive Endocrinologist and if you have an annovulatory disorder such as PCOS you go to an RE rather than a gynecologist to get pregnant. Some gynos dabble in the world of infertility and think they can help PCOSers by handing them Clomid, but truth be told if you've been diagnosed with an infertility disorder, find an RE, they are so much better at this shit than gynos.

Anyway, we had our first appt with our RE since the miscarriage. Normally I'm a big fan of my RE, he might pressure us with IUI's sometimes but he does awesome things like lower my Clomid dosage rather than keep it the same or up it when I know a lot of other Dr.'s would have continued letting me stay on 50 mg of Clomid to pop out more eggs and thus theoretically have more chances of a pregnancy BUT all of that increases your chances of MULTIPLES as well, which I think most people will agree with me...multiples are not the desired result. So, like I said, normally I'm a big fan.

But today, today I'm not a big fan.

Let me remind you of the time frame. Miscarriage 2 weeks ago from Saturday, death of my Grandmother, 1 week ago from Saturday. Both happened really recently and both happened really close together. So, is it any surprise that I still get a bit choked up when I have to recount the story of my miscarriage AGAIN doc? But instead of consoling me and saying it will be OK, he tells me I need therapy.

Really? You're gonna go there doc?

I do not have an issue with someone suggesting therapy. I have an issue with the fact that it's only been 2 weeks and he's suggesting therapy. I feel like I'm handling the situation OK even though I do have a tendency to cry in any and all Dr.'s offices, but I'm dealing. I don't feel overly depressed...and it's only been 2 weeks!

If in 2 months I am still getting choked up at the thought of describing the miscarriage then yes, maybe it's time to seek help, but 2 weeks? really?

Anyway, in a nutshell I'm waiting for my period, which I already knew, but since I don't ovulate and thus don't always get a period the cut off point is going to be 2 months. So if in 2 months time Aunt Flo has still not arrived then we will stimulate her arrival.

But here's the kicker (and again why I like my RE even if I am anxious to start over), no Clomid for that cycle. I have to wait another cycle and THEN we can start over. So, it looks like beginning of 2012 before there's any babymaking action over here in our neck of the woods. We will continue trying on our own, everyone who is telling me to go on BCP to regulate my hormones can kiss my ass, and we will hope for a natural ovulation/pregnancy in the meantime.

I am both happy and upset by this news.

Happy because I have an RE who is not too aggressive and pressuring anything on us. He suggested BCP's for me, but when I said no he did not push the issue and offered alternatives.

But I'm upset because I'm so fucking sick of waiting.

Everything is waiting.

Waiting for a period. Waiting for ovulation. Waiting to pee on a stick. Waiting to take a blood test. Waiting to get through the first trimester. Waiting for a miscarriage to finish. Waiting for a period again.

Waiting.

Waiting.

Waiting.

Too much waiting.

So without further ado, just as soon as I accept that my blog is going to sometimes be about infertility, the infertility is put on hold...and we wait.

3 Follicles

Originally wrote May 26, 2011.

It is Day 15 of my cycle and I have not had an LH surge. This is depressing for me. It means I haven't ovulated yet.

So, trip to the Dr. and an ultrasound to confirm what I already know...I haven't ovulated.

BUT, and it's a very big BUT...I'm wrong, very wrong and have 3 mature follicles ready to pop!

I should ovulate in the next few days, SHOULD being the operative word.

The Dr. was very very positive that I would ovulate, in fact he said you WILL ovulate, not you most likely will or you probably will, but you WILL.

He also offered to give me a trigger shot, and if you're unfamiliar with the land of infertility it's just a shot that makes your mature follicles pop out. But since I have 3 ready to pop that means I would be ovulating 3 eggs and thus the chance for all 3 to fertilize.

Not a good thing or anything to strive for in my opinion, triplets are not in the cards for me.

So, no trigger shot, just more waiting to ovulate. And hopefully my body will sort out that only ONE needs to pop out...not all 3.

But I'm so excited about it!!!

For most of you folks you ovulate every month without ever having to do anything and you have a 20-25% chance to conceive each and every cycle. Me, I may have ovulated no more than 2 times over the last year, possibly not at all. So, just the fact that I'm ovulating and KNOW i'm ovulating gives me SO much hope. I officially have the same 20-25% chance to conceive this cycle JUST LIKE EVERY ONE ELSE.

AND

I was only on 50mg of Clomid, which means my ovaries just needed a little push.

Also a complete relief. I was scared I was going to have stubborn ovaries.

Which means if there's no pregnancy this cycle I will be dropped DOWN to only 25mg of Clomid for the next cycle, because less is better in this instance, 3 eggs is more than they actually want in this situation, since all we're trying to do here is make my cycles like everyone else's!

BUT that means another cycle where I may or may not ovulate. The waiting to ovulate sucks people, it sucks.

Wrote today September 7, 2011.

This was honestly more exciting for me than the eventual pregnancy because it meant things were WORKING, I can't even describe how amazing it was to feel just like most of you feel EVERY MONTH.

I suddenly had hope that I had more options than IVF and adoption because this $20 pill was actually working. The real fear over the last year really was that all the treatment options wouldn't work. It was scary to begin the road through the infertility treatments because once you start there's no going back, there's no thinking, "oh but we can see if this works in the future" because you'll have tried whatever "this" is and KNOW it doesn't work. Slowly dwindling down your options until eventually you're left with IVF or adoption...that's scary!

But option #1 was working...and I was happy.

Depressing

I originally wrote this post on May 24, 2011, Cycle Day 13 of my first Clomid Cycle.

I don't know if it's the meds or the fact that I don't think I'm going to ovulate even with the meds.

But I'm feeling very depressed.

My left ovary hurts and I have yet to get a smiley face on an OPK (Ovulation Predictor Kit).

I'm sick of peeing on sticks and never getting a smiley face.

It's depressing.

So is my temperature every morning.

It never goes up.

And I have no confidence that it ever will.

I fear I will be in that lowely 20 percent of people who don't ovulate with the magic of Clomid.

Guess I have months to find out.

That's depressing as well, having to do this all over again, and again.

Wrote today September 3, 2011.

I didn't realize it at the time but a big fear of mine was not that I wouldn't get pregnant on Clomid but that I would continue to not ovulate on Clomid, thus continuing to rob us of the opportunity to even try to get pregnant.

Once you get into the midst of infertility you start reading WAY too much on the internet whether it be PCOS websites or infertility blogs or statistics and you start to convince yourself that you're a hopeless case.

With my endless amounts of "research" I found that women with PCOS have a much lower instance of ovulating on Clomid than the 80% statistic they always give you for the general population.

I kept reading stories from women with PCOS who had been bumped from 50mg up to 100mg to 150mg and even up to 200mg and still didn't ovulate. I just KNEW this would be me too.

I'd spent a year changing EVERYTHING, diet, exercise, herbs, acupuncture and couldn't get my body to ovulate, I was convinced that Clomid would be no different.

This is what infertility does to you. It gets in your head and messes with you.

I was willing to give Clomid 4 months before I moved on to a different ovulation inducer called Femara (which is actually a cancer treatment as well, so weird these meds) and I was already not even through my first cycle and I was busy planning out the next 6 months of treatments.

I was that convinced it wouldn't work. Talk about pessimistic!

Fertility Challenged

I mentioned it took a year for us to get knocked up.

I thought many times maybe I should blog about it...infertility that is.

I wrote many posts about it. I'll probably start posting some of these old posts for posterity sake with the original date that I wrote them. Most are from just a mere 3 months ago when we finally sought help from a specialist and when this all became really...real.

Before that it was just too hard to write about. It was easier to not think about it than to write about it and be constantly surrounded by it.

(Half of this post was written May 16, 2011, 2 weeks shy of our 1 year mark since we'd began our journey, the rest I just finished as my infertility story has just come to a close...or at least a pause until the next kid.)

Infertility is such an ugly word.

It invokes feelings of inadequacy and disease.

I prefer to think of myself as fertility challenged.

As in I think I CAN have a baby, it's just not happening as quickly as I would prefer.

To me, infertility means you CANNOT have children, ie. you have no uterus, or no sperm, or some other condition that means you CANNOT.

I feel there should be another word that means...you need help.

Subfertility is what many people have come up with. I like Fertility Challenged.

That's me. I'm Fertility Challenged.

My fertility history in a nutshell. Ok, it's a really big nutshell, put on your seatbelts, here's my story.

I was on birth control for 10 years. If there were breaks they were few and far between and they never lasted very long. My hormone of choice was the pill, but I was also on the Depo shot for a year somewhere in my early 20's.

I came off the pill in December of 2009, with the thought being in my pretty little unknowing unwordly head that if we wanted to start "trying" in June 2010 (this was the master plan!) it might be smart to let my body adjust and get back to it's own normal hormones for a bit.

If I could rewind my life and do it over again this is the one thing I would change.

I would either not go off my pills until we were ready to "try" (I'm sorry but that will always be in ""...it's a stupid term, I'm sorry I'm using it but there's no better way to say...having sex for procreation purposes, so "trying" it will be) or we would just go with it and start "trying" in December when I went off the pill.

If you are ever in a similar position, here is my advice, come off your pills and IMMEDIATELY start "trying", do not wait, do not let your body adjust. Because...

I had a few normal periods. I will forever be plagued with the thought that had I not waited I could have gotten pregnant there in those few months that I was getting a period. It felt like things were adjusting, cycles were somewhere in the 30-50 day range...irregular but they were coming and relatively normal. And it's not abnormal to have irregular periods after coming off the pill. And then June comes along, we're ready to start...one more time..."trying", that cycle I had an amazingly normal cycle, 29 days and I was convinced my body had finally done it, she had regulated herself and I was going to have normal easy to track, thus easy to tell if I was pregnant or not cycles.

We weren't pregnant that cycle but we thought nothing of it at this point, WHO GETS PREGNANT THE FIRST TIME? Oh right, just half the couples I know. But really, they're the freaks, not the ones that it takes a few months, right? So, onto the next month, and here, ladies and gen...I mean ladies, is why I've taken a million pregnancy tests, I quit getting my period. The damn thing just stopped.

I would like to blame the move to Australia, seeing as how the periods stopped in Australia...but I had that normal normal cycle right at the beginning...which when I think about it THAT is the period that should have been screwed up by the move, the crazy time difference and the ridiculous flight and all that jazz, but no, that was a normal cycle.

At the 3 month-ish mark with no period (and several pregnancy tests later, seriously guys what would you have done?!) I finally went and saw a Dr. as well as a naturopath, they both came up with the same thing.

PCOS.

Go ahead and google PCOS if you don't know what it is. It stands for Polycycstic Ovarian Syndrome. It means you don't ovulate, have irregular periods, have cysts on your ovaries, have acne, are fat, have facial hair, etc etc. and there's an underlying insulin resistance. I do not have any of these physical symptoms. I am not overweight, I don't have acne, I don't have facial hair BUT diabetes is prevalent in my family, the majority of relatives on one side of my family have diabetes THUS it made a certain amount of sense that maybe, just maybe I had this disorder that was stopping me from ovulating. I will dive into this in another post, but I do not believe I have PCOS. I do have cystics ovaries that clog the damn things up and don't allow me to ovulate, but I believe this is some leftover aftermath of being on the pill for so long.

So, here we are in Australia, no ovulation, no periods and a diagnosis of PCOS. Because I was unwilling to go the Clomid or Metformin route that the GP recommended at this point...mostly because I was only there for a short time, Metformin is a long term remedy that requires a certain amount of monitoring and Clomid...I just wasn't ready for the Clomid yet, but I ended up seeing a naturopath that specialized in fertility.

You may remember a few posts where I mentioned her here and here and she's also the reason I was going to the gym. I cut out carbs and started hitting the gym, all in an effort to help my body rid itself of extra glucose which in turn would let me ovulate (if I had PCOS anyway). I was also on what felt like a hundred different supplements and herbs. I lost 10 lbs almost immediately (just one of many reasons I do not believe I have PCOS, PCOSers DO NOT lose weight easily) but did not ovulate. I had a 94 day cycle and a 105 day cycle back to back with no ovulation just breakthrough bleeding. I had 2 periods the whole time I was in Australia. It sucked.

Fast forward to finally back in the good ole U S of A in January 2011. My period tricked me again, I got 2 in a row in the 30 day range. Unfortunately I was temping at this point and I knew I hadn't ovulated during either of these seemingly normal cycles, BUT my period made me think that maybe it was just all the moving and traveling and now that we were back things would regulate themselves again.

This is called denial people. I did not want to admit we needed help.

BUT as soon as we had a move to San Francisco date, regardless of my denial, I made an appt to see an RE (that's Reproductive Endocrinologist for all those folks who aren't versed in infertility speak) I knew we needed help at this point (and not help from a GP or GYN, I'd seen 3 of those at this point, they weren't helpful) and that I couldn't fix my body on my own. Or if I could it was going to take A LOT longer than I was willing to give it before I sought medical help.

The RE appt was just shy of 1 year of "trying". And if I ovulated at all in that time it was that very first month when I had a 29 day cycle, the rest of the year was a bust.

But just 2 Clomid cycles later, I'm pregnant.

Not infertile...

...just fertility challenged.