39+1

I'm now not just more pregnant than I've ever been in my life, I'm a whole week more pregnant than I've ever been. At this point with Bat Girl, gestationally speaking, we were already home from the hospital. So I figured I should probably update one more time before the big day.

We're still on for Tuesday, and at my last OB appointment on Wednesday, my doctor was pretty confident that I'd make it until then. I've been having tons of contractions, as is my tendency--long and hard ones too--but they're still erratic and the baby is still high and my cervix still long, though I'm fingertip dilated. I had thought I would work all the way up until the end, but the week before last I threw up my hands and just couldn't do the commute anymore (and frankly, couldn't muster up the energy to give a shit about work anymore), so I started my maternity leave a week early and was glad to be hiding out in the air conditioning during last week's heat wave instead of dragging myself on the subway.

And it turned out I needed the week to do a bunch of nesting. So now the crib is made up with cute new sheets, onesies are folded in the dresser, stash of baby carriers is organized, bottles are washed and formula stocked (and pump parts sterilized and nursing pillow covers washed too, I've got all my bases covered), diapers and wipes all set. I've even packed my hospital bag and stocked up on oatmeal. I did NOT realize my ambition to finally finish Bat Girl's baby book (really just a photo album of her first year; I'm so not a baby book person) before this baby is born, but oh well.

I feel fairly crappy physically but am doing OK mentally, other than being rather more irritable than usual. I'm ready to meet this baby and become a family of four, though I tried to spend this last weekend really concentrating on Bat Girl and enjoying our time together, hard as it was yesterday when she was being a real asshole, frankly. When she's not being an asshole I'm just constantly marveling at what an amazing kid she is, and I hope we're half as lucky with Baby Brother.

I am feeling a sort of vague freeform dread about the c-section. You'd think that I'd be less scared of it knowing exactly what to expect, but it's just the opposite. I keep going to these terrifying worst-case scenarios in my head, and I have to remind myself that the odds of any of those things happening are incredibly low, and that I'm going to be getting top-notch medical care in one of the best hospitals in the world.

Wish me luck. I can't promise I'll post right after the delivery but you will hear from me on the other side.

37+1

That's right--full term, baby! And somehow still going, despite 100+ degree heat and a move AND the fact that I'm still working full-time. Most of the living room is still in boxes and I don't know where half my stuff is, but yesterday my husband painted the baby's room (zero-VOC paint, come on people, you know me) and set up the crib. I sorted through the glass baby bottles I saved and ordered new nipples and collars. We have a car seat, though I haven't taken it out of the box yet. I bought some gigantic maxi pads for the aftermath of the birth. I just have to wash the crib bedding and a bunch of little onesies and buy diapers and wipes and formula, and we're pretty much set.

I feel like total hell but I only have two more weeks to go. July 24 is the official date, unless of course I go into labor before then.

32 weeks

Not much new to report on the pregnancy front, thank goodness. After much agonizing, I realized that the fact that I was hoping Baby Brother would remain breech, thus taking the to-VBAC-or-not-to-VBAC decision out of my hands, was telling in and of itself. So at my 30-week appointment, I told my OB that I wanted an elective c-section...and she said that given the baby's still-breech position, chances are it would have been out of my hands anyway. We can't actually schedule the surgery yet, since the hospital doesn't open up the OR schedule until 6 weeks in advance, but it's looking like July 24 is the day. (My doctor does scheduled surgeries on Tuesdays, and wants to get me to 39 weeks but not past 40.)

Sometime in the last week, I hit a wall. Between the sudden heat here in Big City, and my increasing size (I'm already at the weight I was when Bat Girl was born, and based on photographic evidence have a much bigger belly), I'm suddenly exhausted, achy, short of breath, slow-moving, waddling...just physically spent. I remember feeling DONE in the last month or two of pregnancy with BG, but the one advantage of being on bed rest was that I didn't have to haul my ass to work, or try to bathe a 5-year-old, or ever stand up for more than a minute. Luckily the contractions are still erratic, though I do have a lot of pelvic pressure, so I'm trying to hydrate and stay off my feet as much as possible.

The big news is that we are moving! A larger (3-bedroom) apartment opened up in our building, and with a little cash passed to the building super to grease the wheels, it looks like it's ours. The only hitch is that we won't be able to move in until June 30...3 weeks before this baby comes. My husband is basically handling the entire move solo, since I will be next to useless. The good thing about moving one floor down is that we don't even really need to pack--just pile things into carts and dollies and wheel them into the elevator, though we'll have to get some help with the larger pieces of furniture. We're using part of our tax refund to buy a sofabed--the first new couch I've ever owned in my adult life. I slipped down the rabbit hole for a little while researching flame retardants etc. but since I don't have $7000 to spend I'm just throwing up my hands and buying something from a chain store and will maybe throw an organic cotton slipcover on it to make myself feel better (and to protect the couch from baby fluids, in case you were wondering about the wisdom of acquiring a new couch and a new baby at the same time).

Last week I took my old breast pump in to be inspected at the local embarrassingly-named everything-lactation store. (Side note: Why must all things breastfeeding-related be so terribly named?) For $10, they examine all the parts, tell you what needs to be replaced, and even use a little pressure gauge to make sure your pump is still sucking adequately. Despite its history of hard use, my pump was deemed to be in excellent working condition, and all the parts ready for action, down to the little teensy membranes. I had some PTBD(TM) flashbacks when I heard the wheeze of the motor, I must admit. The milk lady recommended that if I needed help establishing supply, I should rent a hospital-grade pump to start with...not sure if I will, but I'll consider it.

I'm going into the whole breastfeeding thing with no expectations, basically. I'd like to give Baby Brother some breastmilk, but I'm not willing to kill myself over it. No domperidone, probably no herbs, and definitely no pumping around the clock. I'll pump to help establish supply, but if baby won't take it straight from the tap I really don't want to be attached to the pump all day long. So I'm pricing out formula too, and we'll have it on hand before we even head to the hospital. No torturing myself, that's my vow.

28 weeks

I used to get so annoyed when IF bloggers would get pregnant and then drop off the face of the planet. And here I am doing the same thing. The truth is, this whole "normal pregnancy" thing is almost a little boring even to me, so I'm having a hard time finding anything interesting to say about it.

But to bring you all up to speed...at the end of March I had another ultrasound to double check the baby's spine (they couldn't get a good view of it at the anatomy scan), and all looked good. Growth was on track and the tech double checked the sex for me (definitely a boy). Bonus cootercam u/s to check cervical length, which was something like 4.9 cm, so still looking great. I got a mild warning about weight gain (I had gained 6 lbs instead of the recommended 4 in 4 weeks) but everything looked good.

With the confirmation that this baby is, indeed, a boy (and I have the picture to prove it), I've been sorting through and giving away all of Bat Girl's girly clothes from the last 5 years. It's been hard--I now understand why my mom still has some of my Florence Eisemann dresses from the '70s tucked away in the attic. Even a little flimsy cheap Old Navy outfit brings back memories of BG wearing it, and I have to admit that I still cling to a vision of that second little girl that I thought I would have. Honestly, if I could guarantee another girl I would almost go for a third child--but I can say that another kid is 99% not going to happen for us, especially given our ages and financial situation AND the fact that I never want to go through fertility treatment again.

Anyway, luckily we have several little girls in our lives ranging in age from 6 weeks to 4 years old, so I know all the hand-me-downs are going to people who appreciate them. And we're getting boatloads of boy hand-me-downs in return, sweet little onesies with sailboats and dinosaurs on them and striped rompers that almost make up for the lack of little flowered dresses.

A week and a half ago (27 weeks) I had my 1-hour glucose test, which I passed, but it was discovered that I'm mildly anemic, so I'm taking iron supplements and eating hamburgers. That was also my first-ever OB appointment with NO ultrasound whatsoever--so bizarre! Never fear, next week I'm getting another scan to check growth (with the unicornuate uterus, we need to make sure there's no IUGR or other growth issues) and one more cervical measurement.

I'm firmly convinced that Baby Brother (as we've been calling him; turns out we are having a lot of trouble coming up with a boy's name) is and has consistently been breech, based on the movement I've been feeling. But my OB says it's still too early to tell, and she won't make the official call as to whether a repeat c-section is required until 33 or 34 weeks.

I'm torn about whether or not I actually want to attempt a VBAC, if that ends up being an option. The planner in me likes the idea of just having it all scheduled. And although the recovery from a vaginal birth is probably a lot easier, a c-section is a known quantity for me at this point. I'm not particularly wedded to the idea of having a "natural" birth experience--I made my peace with that long ago and I don't feel like I've missed out on something magical and important by not having had a vaginal birth.

And I don't want to try a VBAC and then end up with a c-section anyway, which is of course a significant possibility. If I'm really truly honest, deep down, I also don't want to fail at this. I've had enough breeding-related failures already. I feel vaguely guilty about not wanting a VBAC, or being chicken, or whatever this is. But I bet I'll get over it.

Pros and cons

Negatives to NOT being on bedrest while pregnant:
• Taking the subway with the masses every day to and from work, and sometimes even (gasp!) having to stand.
• Spending money on new maternity clothes, despite the fact that this is my second and most likely final pregnancy. I was so smug last time around about how I "didn't get very big" and "barely bought any maternity clothes." Well, it turns out that when you actually leave the house and interact with other human beings every day instead of lying on the couch in yoga pants and a hoodie, you do need to purchase tops that cover your belly so you can look professional (on weekdays) or at least presentable (on weekends).

Positives to not being on bedrest:
• Pretty much everything else.

It's hard to believe that I'm almost 21 weeks pregnant. At this point with Bat Girl, I was already on severe activity restrictions and just a couple weeks away from being grounded for good. I was seeing my OB every 2 weeks, getting cervical measurements every time, and I just looked back at my entries from October 2006 and saw she started doing fetal fibronectin swabs around this time too. I was counting contractions every hour of every day.

Now, I'm just going about my days. I work, I take care of BG, I run errands. I walk places. I take stairs, unless I'm feeling out of breath. I feel the baby move every day. Sometimes I notice a contraction--they happen pretty much every day--but often they barely even register. I've even attempted to have sex with my husband, though the logistics of pregnant sex have proved very confounding. (We weren't allowed last time around, so this is all new.)

It is so new, so miraculous to me, this interacting with the world while gestating another human being. I can go to Target and the farmer's market! I can walk up hills and go out to dinner! When someone says, "Do you want to sit?" I sometimes say, "No, that's okay, I'm fine standing"! (Not always; come on, I'm lazy and sitting is nice.) I'm planning an IKEA trip to get a new bed and dresser for Bat Girl, and decided that the best time for us to make the trip and do all the furniture shuffling would be early June. June! Less than 2 months before my due date!

Eventually I'll get tired of writing these posts about how great it is to be normal, but that sure hasn't happened yet.

It's a...

Boy! Just as I thought.

Anatomy scan went well yesterday. Everything looked completely normal and on track for 18w2d. Baby is currently breech, placenta is anterior. They weren't able to fully visualize all of the spine (baby was lying on his back) so when I have my next appointment in a month I'll have another scan (yay! says u/s-addicted me) to check it out. My doc also had my blood drawn for an AFP test just to be on the safe side and if there's anything concerning about those results they'll have me back for a scan sooner.

I also got the cootercam for a cervix check. Cervix measured a whopping 5.37 cm, so doc is pretty unconcerned about preterm labor at this point, though I will get another cervix check at the next appointment. They even had me bear down during the scan to see if there was any change in my cervix, and everything held firm, so all looks good.

I'm a little freaked out by the prospect of having a boy, to be honest, even though I kind of knew it all along. I know girls! I love girls! Boys have penises and totally unfun clothes! But I know I'll get to know and love my son just like I did my daughter.

Now the challenge: to come up with a boy's name. Bat Girl is voting to name the baby Poopiehead or Peepeehead (yes, we are at the delightful potty humor stage), but I don't think that's going to work.

17 weeks

Actually, 16w6d, but close enough.

The problem with having a relatively uneventful pregnancy so far is that it leaves me with little to blog about. I did start having contractions right around 14 weeks, the same time I started when I was pregnant with Bat Girl, but they've been much less intense and much less frequent than in my first pregnancy--one every few hours, as opposed to a few every hour.

I started leaking colostrum around the same time, which is much earlier than I started with Bat Girl (I think I noticed it late in the third trimester last time). I doubt this says anything about my ability to breastfeed this time around--as I now know, I just have really fast letdown and leaky boobs--but it's nice to know that the girls kind of remember what they're doing.

Oh, and there were the sharp stabbing pains in my abdomen a few days ago. I got all panicked and called my doctor and readied myself to have to go in for an ultrasound. She diagnosed me over the phone with...constipation. Yeah.

So, again, normal. A week from Monday is the big anatomy scan. We hope to find out the sex then, especially because it seems like being all NORMAL and all might mean I don't get very many more ultrasounds this pregnancy. Also, Bat Girl's baby hand-me-downs are overwhelmingly pink and girly and I am not quite modern enough to put my baby boy in a pink frilly dress. (Onesies and receiving blankets, sure, but I do draw the line at a certain point.)

*****

The bigger news around here is that last week Bat Girl turned 5. My baby is FIVE. I guess it really deserved a post of its own but I can barely muster up the energy to post once a month so this is what happens.

She is overflowing with imagination, creating elaborate lives for her hordes of imaginary siblings and friends, "writing" a new picture book practically every day (currently dragons, T.rex, princesses, and her planned future farm figure heavily in these stories, not necessarily all at once). She intends to marry one of the boys in her pre-K class and together have a farm where she will care for the animals and he will drive the tractor. She puts together insanely colorful outfits, generally featuring a patterned shirt, patterned skirt, and patterned leggings, ideally paired with mismatched patterned socks. She is cautious but rarely shy, making new friends on the playground or at the farmer's market in a heartbeat.

She complained to me the other day about how a friend of hers wanted to play with her all the time and kept following her around all day at school. I have to tell you, I am so not equipped to assist my child through the problems of being popular.

She takes violin lessons and just started piano (because we're THOSE parents and also insane, yes, I know). She loves to sing, and she loves making up plays and performing them. Sometimes she ropes us into one of her plays or some of her imaginative play; thank goodness she's going to get a sibling soon because I really can't stand playing the stupid prince in one of her fairy tale reenactments. She never met a stick she didn't want to bring home. She can write all her letters and is starting to read. "Pizza" is one of her sight words.

We complain to each other sometimes about her stubbornness or her distractibility but the truth is that she's an incredibly easygoing, responsible, charming kid. We got super lucky with this one.

Lately every morning when my alarm goes off she's been coming into our bedroom and crawling into bed on my side for a snuggle. I should get my ass up and get our day started but the truth is those 15 minutes are the best part of my day, and I'd rather be late for work than give them up. I hope there's always room for her to come in and snuggle, even when my belly gets huge and later when she gets even huger.

Still boring

The most exciting thing that happened at my OB appointment today (13w5d) is that the bathroom light, apparently on a timer of some sort, shut off just as I started, uh, providing my urine sample. Trying to catch the stream with one hand while frantically groping for the light switch with my other hand provided a nice little adrenaline jolt for the day.

Otherwise, the appointment was totally unremarkable in every way. The doctor (guess I have to come up with a nickname for her, I'll think about it) went over my NT results in a little more detail, and rattled off the long list of things they'd tested me for at my last appointment that were all clear--no syphilis, whoo! Then she whipped out the doppler and, after some searching, found the heartbeat. And yes, this was another fully clothed appointment. Because absolutely nothing has happened in the past month that would warrant me taking my pants off.

I'm finding all this normality confusing but perfectly delightful.

Quick hits

• Thanks for the thoughts on FB pregnancy announcements. Not sure yet how I'll do it but since I'll likely wait until I've had a chance to tell a bunch more people in person, I have a month or so to ponder. I realized that I never had to deal with this before because the last time I was pregnant THERE WAS NO FACEBOOK.

• First trimester screening results came back (am a little miffed that I had to finally call my doctor's office 10 days later and bug them to get the results, but that's another story). All normal, risk level calculated at 1/3321. Exhale.

• Maternity sweatpants. Is there a greater invention? I don't think so.

Coming out

Luckily the past couple of weeks have been pretty busy at work (deadlines) and at home (planning BG's FIFTH birthday party, OMG), so I've had things to take my mind off the fact that it's been a whole week since my NT scan. Not that I'm concerned about the results (which I still haven't gotten called about, BTW)--no, I'm worried about the fact that it's been a whole week since that ultrasound and I've got another week and a half until my next OB appointment. That's TWO AND A HALF WEEKS without a Live Baby Check, people. This may be the longest I've gone without an ultrasound, like, ever.

I was tempted to rent a Doppler--I didn't last time around because I was at the OB's office practically every week, but if I'm going to be all boring and normal this time it might be nice to have some reassurance in these long gaps between appointments before I can actually feel the baby move. But I discovered those things are surprisingly expensive ($40-$50 a month?) and I can't really justify the expense. That's like a month of formula, yo.

So while I bide my time, a question for you all: Is there a way to announce a pregnancy on Facebook that is NOT awful?

I know that ideally, you email or call everyone important personally, and obviously close friends and relatives either will get or have already gotten their own heads-up. But the reality is that there are people in my life who I'd like to share the news with but don't quite merit their own announcement, and Facebook is the logical way to make that happen. Besides, I do generally share photos of BG on FB, and would do so for a new baby too, and to me the only thing that delivers a worse sucker-punch than the unexpected FB pregnancy announcement is the unexpected birth announcement.

So how do you do it without being an asshole? Obviously, NOT like my crunchy home-birthing friend who capped off the announcement of her third pregnancy with the line, "12 weeks and our first midwife appointment tomorrow--can't wait to hear that heartbeat for the first time!" Like, OMG, you announce your pregnancy to everyone you know before you've had a single prenatal appointment? BEFORE YOU HAVE EVEN A SHRED OF CONFIRMATION FROM A MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL THAT YOU'RE ACTUALLY PREGNANT?

I tend to think that something simple, with a minimum of gushing and NO belly pictures, is best. Maybe even with a nod (explicit or implied) to what it took to get there. I'm not sure exactly how this paragon of a post would be worded.

I'm fussing over this because, well, to occupy myself for one, but also because I know I have (non-blog) FB friends who are dealing with or have dealt with IF. I have two very close friends, one of whom went through an IVF cycle (her umpteenth, after having a miscarriage last year and losing her first baby a few days after birth the year before) a month or two before I did, and the other had an FET (again, after many, many cycles) a few weeks after I got my positive. Both ended in chemical pregnancies. I told both of them about my pregnancy right away, so they wouldn't be shocked by the news, but I know it will still hurt for them to see the news out in public. I have another FB friend, a work colleague whom I'm not super close with (not close enough to email her personally with the news), who I'm 99% sure did an IVF cycle last fall--we were talking about some work scheduling and she had two "procedures" five days apart, bed rest after the second one, and has made frequent references to her acupuncturist. And another, a single-mom-by-choice who spent a long, heartbreaking time trying, unsuccessfully, to conceive a second child.

I don't want to hurt these people, and the countless others who may be struggling in silence. But I don't want to deprive myself of some well-deserved joy and celebration, either.

Have you ever seen a FB pregnancy announcement that was handled well? What made it not painful and/or not-assholish?

Boring

Today was my first-trimester screening. My husband came along, both for support and because he hasn't had a chance to be at any of the ultrasounds I've had so far. The NT scan was uneventful, though I will seriously never get over the sight of that baby bobbing and bouncing on the screen, its little heart pumping away. NT measurement was 0.96 mm, which Dr. Google assures me is excellent for 11w2d. We won't get the full screening results for a week or so, after they get the blood test results back, but I feel pretty good after that ultrasound.

By the way, the blood test? It was a finger prick, and I can confidently say that it was the single most painful bloodletting I've ever experienced. And that's as someone who has had approximately 84,792 vials of blood taken in the last year alone. My fingertip is still throbbing. And they don't just prick the finger (with what feels like a blunt letter opener), they PUMP it five separate times to get five little blotches of blood! Couldn't I just roll up my sleeve instead?

*****

We told Bat Girl about the baby at Christmas. It took her a little while to absorb the news, but she's super excited now. She loves reading the "I'm Going to Be a Big Sister" book we got her, and she's been telling everyone about the new baby, including her whole class, the office staff at her school, and the lady who assessed her for next year's kindergarten gifted & talented program this weekend.

This is going to sound really crass, but my husband and I had really been hoping for another girl. BG, too, wanted a baby sister. But a week or two ago, I started getting a really strong feeling that this baby might be a boy--and feeling that that would be OK. I happened to ask BG last week if she thought the baby was a boy or a girl, and she said immediately, "I think it's a boy." And today after the ultrasound, my husband turned to me and said, "That's a boy. I know it."

We've got another 7 weeks until the big anatomy scan when we (hopefully) find out for sure. BTW, when I was pregnant with BG, I had a very strong feeling very early on that she was a girl. I don't claim to be particularly intuitive, but I was very, very sure, so this should be interesting.

*****

I'm also pretty sure this is a super boring blog post. But I'm enjoying being very boring in this pregnancy so far, especially given that by this point in my pregnancy with Bat Girl, I'd already had half a dozen bleeding episodes, including a bright red scary one resulting in an emergency trip to L&D. Today, I even got to keep my pants on for the ENTIRE APPOINTMENT. I KNOW!!!! I haven't had a doctor's appointment where I got to keep my pants on for over a year!

Right now my biggest worries are trying to find enough food that doesn't nauseate me and trying to find clothing that fits yet doesn't make me look hugely pregnant. I'm waiting until 14 weeks to tell at work, which is when we'll have just passed a major round of deadlines. And that waiting, too, feels like a luxury (though I'm totally eager to spill), since last time around I ended up telling my boss at 11 weeks because I had to go on bedrest for a week.

If I end up being one of those tedious bloggers who logs in once every 4 or 5 weeks to share some dull minutiae of my totally normal pregnancy and has nothing important or meaningful to say about fear, letting go of infertility, or coming to grips with anxiety...well, I'll consider that a blessing.

Delightfully normal

Everything went smoothly at the OB this morning, other than the fact that I arrived at 8:30 and didn't leave until 11. (And it wasn't even because I had to wait--I was with either a nurse or a doctor the entire time. It was a very thorough appointment.)

First I had an ultrasound scheduled. The nice thing about seeing a high risk OB is that she sees patients right in the maternal-fetal medicine department at the hospital. It's a little...hospital-ish (not too luxurious), but it means all the high-tech ultrasound equipment is right down the hall. I had a 20-minute u/s session with both abdominal imaging and the most extensive wanding I've ever been at the receiving end of--I swear I felt that thing behind my tonsils. Baby looked great, measured exactly perfect for dates (9w4d), and I even got a little choked up when the tech zoomed in on my little sea monkey/hamster/squirmy thingy and I could clearly see the heartbeat flickering away.

Then I met with the doctor, whom I totally LOVED. She had reviewed my history thoroughly but had a few more questions. And the great thing is that, while she said my previous OB was obviously playing it safe, in retrospect I was probably not in imminent danger of preterm delivery and that if the same circumstances happen this time she would NOT put me on bedrest. Yahoo!

I had about seventy bazillion tubes of blood taken (the nurse said, "Have you had blood drawn recently? This vein is really beat up"), then physical exam, then more office chat with the doctor, where she went over the prenatal testing options, talked about the usual pregnancy stuff (don't eat xyz, get more calcium, yadda yadda), and answered my random questions. She asked whether I wanted to try for a VBAC and said that if baby was breech again obviously it wasn't on the table, but otherwise it was totally up to me. (I don't really care, honestly.) If I do have a scheduled cesarean, she doesn't want to do it before 39 weeks, which is exactly what I would prefer too. (Bat Girl was delivered at 38 weeks, and I'd like to go longer this time.)

All in all, a really good appointment. NT screen scheduled in 2 weeks. I'll have my first cervical measurement at 18 weeks, unless there's a reason to have it sooner.

Graduation day

As of Monday (two days ago), I am officially no longer an infertility patient. My "graduation day" was pretty anticlimactic. I got the usual bloodwork and ultrasound Monday morning. Dr. SF printed out yet another blobby picture for me and let me hear the heartbeat (135 or so, down from 176 last week but I think that's normal), then told me that if my bloodwork looked good I could stop the progesterone and didn't have to come back anymore.

He asked me if I was "done," meaning done with babies, and I said, "I am SO done. And I hope you won't be offended if I say that as much as I appreciate everything, I hope I never see you again." He laughed and said, "It's sort of like sending kids off to college--there's always some sadness but you know it's time for them to move on." He expressed pleasure again at how I managed to get pregnant with a single embryo transfer at my age, and told me I make "great" embryos.

I unloaded all my sharps containers and handed the nurse a massive amount of unused drugs that hopefully some other patient can use. I picked up a copy of my records and paid my $1,400 account balance. And then I walked out.

I guess there are some people who might feel sentimental at a time like this, given all that I've gone through at this clinic over the last five and a half years. Having spent far too many early mornings in that waiting room over the last year of my life, all I feel right now is relief.

Oh, and yesterday was the first totally needle-free day I've had since the end of OCTOBER. That's a huge relief too.

Today I'm 8w4d if you count from retrieval day, or 8w6d if you count from trigger day (which is how my clinic counts it). First OB appointment next week.

*****

My cycle records had a more complete accounting of the embryos than the report I got a few weeks ago. So now I know: From 22 eggs, 15 of which fertilized, we had a whopping 10 blasts on day 5, 9 expanded and 1 cavitating. No wonder the doctor who did my transfer wanted to be certain we didn't want to freeze.

I asked my husband if he wanted to know, and he said no, which was a wise move on his part. I think he would have had a really hard time knowing we discarded 9 potentially viable embryos.

I guess it all worked out for the best in the end. Even if only half of those had made it to freeze, I have no idea what we would have done with 4 or 5 frozen embryos. Maybe two years from now I'll get baby fever again (HAHAHAHAHAHA) and regret not having the option for #3, but we can only work with what's in front of us right now.

Nearly there

"So this is the point where we start kicking you out," Dr. SF told me this morning. If he thought I'd be sad, he must have been disappointed.

The blobby thing that Dr. SF keeps calling my "baby" keeps looking bigger on u/s, and today he turned on the sound so we could hear the heartbeat--176 bpm. HCG was 67,699 (was somewhere around 30,000 last week, but as I said the numbers are essentially meaningless to me at this point). Since my progesterone levels are looking good, I'm being tapered off the PIO--1/2 cc for the next week, and then if all looks good next Monday (at which point I'll be 8w2d, counting from retrieval day), I'm done with injections and they're cutting me loose.

Annoyingly, I have about 2 cc left in the vial now, which means I have to refill my prescription one last time, paying $60 for 2 more vials, of which I will use less than half of one vial. I suppose I'll donate the last vial to my clinic, along with my leftover Menopur and Ganirelix and two pens of Gonal-F and did I mention that I'm looking forward to NEVER, EVER, EVER doing any form of fertility treatment ever again?

I have my first appointment with my new high-risk OB on the 28th. When I called to make the appointment, the appointment lady told me, "Doctor X is only taking new patients if they're currently pregnant or trying to conceive." And I was like, "I'm, um, I'm pregnant!" Smooth. My limited interactions with the office so far have been good--she had to call me back to confirm the appointment date because she needed to make sure she could book an ultrasound at the same time, and when she did she told me that the doctor had already looked at the limited information I had given when I first called and had a bunch more questions. Then they sent me a detailed medical history form for me to fill out and send back, along with any records I have from my first pregnancy. Imagine that--a doctor who wants to be up to speed on your history BEFORE you walk in the door, so they can actually have an informed discussion with you about your medical needs!

Anyway, this particular doctor is part of the maternal-fetal medicine group at one of the top university hospitals in the city (not the same hospital where I delivered before). I had heard that a drawback of a big group practice is that you may end up seeing a different doctor every time, but I'm actually OK with that. I'm OK with being sort of forgettable. In fact, my goal this pregnancy is to be the most boring patient in the entire practice; to be in the office so infrequently that everyone from the receptionist to the nurses to the doctors have to look at my chart to remember my name. (As opposed to last time around, where everyone knew me so well that I actually had a nurse recognize me and say hello on the street three months after I delivered.)

I've been super tired and experiencing a vague low-level queasiness pretty much all the time, but I finally figured out that I need to eat something every two hours or I get a headache and feel nauseated. I can't get my skinny jeans on but I'm nowhere near as bloated or uncomfortable as I was at this stage with Bat Girl, so I count myself lucky. I want to eat protein all. the. time. Meat, mostly, though I went through a brief stage where I wanted eggs everyday and now I can't even look at an egg. And peanut butter toast. Mmm, peanut butter...

The fatigue, though...I don't know how anyone does this with a toddler, because all I want to do is lie down in a dark room by myself. Bat Girl keeps wanting me to pick her up but I just have to tell her she's such a big girl, Mommy isn't strong enough to lift her anymore. We haven't told her yet, though I have a feeling she suspects something. I'm going to wrap an "I'm going to be a big sister" book and put it under the Christmas tree for her. I figure by the time she goes back to school and starts blabbing to everyone in sight, I'll be 10 weeks and willing for the outside world to know--though I'm waiting until the end of January to tell at work.

I guess I'm feeling pretty optimistic overall. It's a nice feeling.

My own heart stopped

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a yolk sac, a fetal blob thingy, and...a heartbeat!

Dr. SF says that normally they keep patients through 9 weeks (I'm 6w2d) but that he would consider discharging me early if I got in to see my OB right away. "At this point my job is to get you to a heartbeat and to get you off the progesterone," he said. If levels continue to look good next week, I'll drop to 1/2 cc a day, and then they'll check the level one more time and then boot me.

Uh, now I guess I need to figure out my new OB. And (gulp) call to make an appointment.

All is well

Uneventful blood and scan this morning. Dr. SF raved about my bloodwork results from last week and was delighted that I was pregnant after just one transfer, thrilled that it happened on such a low stim cycle. He pointed out that my ovaries were still pretty swollen so they were dwarfing everything else on the ultrasound, then finally found the little smudgy blur of a sac, implanted right in the middle of my uterus. Yay!

Beta hcg this morning was 4341--the numbers are meaningless to me at this point but apparently my clinic now has a policy (which they didn't have 5 years ago) of just giving you the number whether you ask or not. Back when I was pregnant with Bat Girl I would have to ask before they would give up the hard data, but I guess enough people have asked over time that they decided it was just easier to tell us up front.

Back next Monday for another ultrasound. Might see the heartbeat next week or the week after. Dr. SF recommended that I make an OB appointment sooner rather than later--"within the next 4 weeks"--given my high-risk situation. I'm looking at a high-risk group this time rather than the OB I used for BG and he said the practice I'm considering has an excellent reputation. At this point I'm looking at probably only a couple more RE visits and then I hope to be done with the place FOREVER.

Oh, and one really really nice note from this morning: During my stims phase I would always see this one couple at morning monitoring. Really nice-looking folks, the kind of people I could see befriending (sadly, there are many people I see in the waiting room about whom I do not feel the same). On retrieval day, we passed the husband in the hallway down by the OR. And this morning, I saw them in the waiting room again, which can only mean that she's pregnant too. I smiled at them and said, "We're on exactly the same schedule!" They both smiled back and the husband said, "It's good to see you." And it really was.

I wore a pencil skirt to my IUI

because if past experience is any indication, by tomorrow I will have blown up like a flabby water balloon and won't be able to wear anything remotely fitted for weeks.

Yesterday my nipples were ridiculous. (And how's that for an enticing first sentence?) Like, very very very sore, very very very hard marbles sitting on my chest, screaming when grazed by, you know, air. I was nauseous half the day too. And then I finally realized, oh yeah, I shot myself up with hCG last night, that's why my body is acting like it's pregnant even though I haven't ovulated yet.

My nipples are still ridiculous today. I'm wearing one of my super-armored padded bras to try to protect them. But I actually haven't started bloating yet, and the weird sensation of being able to feel my right ovary (and jostling it whenever I move) that I remember from last time is much less pronounced this time around. I do expect that to change in the next few days, but still, I guess that's the difference between one egg and three.

IUI this morning was uneventful. Husband had to get up very very early to go to the clinic and produce his sample; I followed an hour and a half later (which is how long they schedule between sample delivery and IUI, to allow for washing and processing). I had a teensy smidge of cramping from the catheter, but it was barely noticeable. They didn't tell us the count like they did last time, so we don't know what the quality was like. I lay on the table for 5 minutes afterward and then went to work.

I've been reviewing my blog entries from the month or so after my IUI last time, to remind myself of the symptoms I should expect (bloating, shortness of breath, etc). What it really reminded me of was how much I hated being pregnant. Of course I was happy to be pregnant, but the actual experience of pregnancy really was miserable from start to finish. When I think back on it now, I tend to focus on those last few terrible months of bedrest, but I forget that from the day of my IUI, I was in extreme discomfort almost every day. I had a pretty good attitude about it at first, because as far as I knew, the bloating would get better (it did), the bleeding would stop (it did), the contractions would...well, we know how that ended. But my point is, I always thought things would get better. Even in the darkest, most depressed days, I assumed that by 35 weeks I'd have my bedrest restrictions lifted and I'd get to have some sort of normal pregnant life.

But I didn't. As fearful as I was going into pregnancy, not knowing whether my uterus would be able to handle it, I don't think I ever truly comprehended that barely a week would go by for 9 months where I wasn't in pain, exhausted, terrified, or all three. That before I'd even achieved implantation, I wouldn't be able to cross the street without gasping for breath and feeling like I'd been socked in the gut.

So now, staring down the barrel of what could be a very long 9 months, I am really, really, really not looking forward to the prospect of being pregnant. Even though this time I have the advantage of knowing that I should be able to make it until at least 38 weeks (when Bat Girl was born). And then the whole newborn phase, which I am definitely not good at. (Toddler, now, that I'm good at.) And that's if this whole thing actually works, the chances of which are slim, and if not, there's a whole new level of treatment hell we move on to.

Can't I just please skip this whole thing and cut directly to having a 1-year-old?