Another trip to the starting line.

Now that I’ve snapped out of my infertile-pity-party, I guess I should update on all the craziness that is my life and start the new month off with a cycle update.

Femara cycle number 2 officially starts today. My usual nurse, who I just adore, is on vacation this week. I’m glad that she gets to get out of that office, but it bugs me that I’m at the start of a new cycle and have a ton of questions and my usual person isn’t there. Still, I cannot blame her. So, I’ll blame the new nurse, who is NOT doing a good job of setting my mind at ease. Need an example? I called yesterday to book my baseline, knowing that today was going to be CD3 and that I needed a baseline before getting authorization for the next cycle. The pills start on CD3 and the RE won’t approve a new cycle until he’s seen that there are no leftover cysts hanging out on my ovaries. So, I call to ask her to call in the prescription and to book the baseline. She asks me what meds I’m taking and I explain that the RE wanted me to repeat the same protocol as last month, but since it wasn’t a success, he was going to think about treating my thin lining issue. She started rambling on, saying that if I didn’t get my period then they would start me on prometrium, blah, blah, blah. Prometrium is progesterone; my progesterone has never been the issue. My estrogen is the issue. Plus, I'm on CD2 and that would mean I'm on the second day of my period. What do you mean 'if I don't get my period?' I just semi-ignored her and booked the appointment. Last night, when I went to pick up the meds, she had called in the wrong amount of pills: I only had half my dosage. Thank god I pay so much attention to all this stuff. Thank GOD I know what my protocol is each month. Imagine if I only took half the dosage and had no response? Doesn’t this woman understand what it’s like to waste another month after having failed for 17 months already? Every month is brutal. It isn’t like “Oh, what’s one more month?”. It’s torture. Every month that passes, every month that is a failure is just plain torture.

Anyways, I didn’t freak about it because I knew that I was going into the office this morning and I’d be able to sort it out there. When I realized the problem, I called the pharmacy to report the problem and work out how to get the extra pills without it causing a premature-refill problem with the insurance company. Luckily, they have the pills in stock, so I’ll pick up the rest of them tonight. When I went into the RE’s office this morning, a different nurse did my ultrasound and I explained to her the problem with the meds. She called the pharmacy right then and there to clear it up and order the new pills. She also went over my chart to make sure that all my other concerns were addressed and left a note in the file for the RE to call me about how to treat the thin lining this month. She said, as I thought, that he would probably give me some sort of estrogen, either an oral pill, a patch, or a vaginal pill. Not progesterone. The nurse also told me that it probably wouldn’t be prescribed until after I’d finished the Femara, so at least I have a few days to figure it out.

The ultrasound went well except that my right ovary decided to play hide-and-seek. The nurse had to dig around in there to get the brat to come out, but it finally peeked out right when we were about to give up. I had multiple antral follicles under 10mm on the left side and five antral follicles under 10mm on the right side. (Antral follicles are basically the follicles that are getting lined up for the next cycle. They are very immature and just waiting for the signal to start growing an egg.) So, no leftover cysts or any other issues from last cycle. Oh, except that I didn’t get pregnant. I would have to guess that’s an issue, right?

Of course, it just wouldn’t be the humiliating experience that infertility truly is without having some embarrassing moments to remember, right? Wouldn’t you know that one of the lovely side effects of the Femara is a heavier period. Joy, oh joy. I haven’t had a heavy period in probably 12 months. They’ve always been spotting, one day of medium and then five more days of spotting. Mostly brown spotting, but nothing really to speak of. This first post-Femara cycle has been heavy flow. And I’m talking HEAVY. Yuck. The nurse said it was one of the side effects but after the ultrasound, I had to lay there, legs in the air while she cleaned up the equipment and gave me a pad and wet-wipes to clean myself off. “I can see you still have a pretty heavy period right now, so I’ll let you clean up,” she told me. Isn’t that grand? It’s so much fun to have to lay there, bleeding, while a nurse pokes and prods you. And then the leaking all over the place while trying to maintain some dignity is just the best part of the whole experience.

Infertility is so much fun! I’m SO glad I get to do this!