15 dpiui: HCG beta test results today

yeah things really have been pretty quiet this past week, so when i found the above encouragement it made so much sense!  i've been a little quiet myself this past week since my last update, but truth be told i've been trying to find anything i can to distract myself from thinking about the outcome of this iui cycle... while it included making darling baby headbands for some client/friends, and even though making those are fun, they weren't the best method of trying to keep my mind off of the elephant in the room! but, today was the day... i had my HCG beta test, so by the end of today we found out the results  of how our first iui went.  not going to lie, it's pretty nerve-racking sitting around waiting all week to go test, and then more waiting for the call to come back from the bloodwork.  so i'll show you the constructive things i "did" to fill my time this past week...

it included getting my progesterone checked on tuesday 1/29... which i was totally convinced was going to be low and i was going to need suppositories to help.  anything over a 10 confirms that you indeed ovulated {which was the other reason for the progesterone check},  but given my history of low Prog. levels i thought for sure they would be low... but God blew me away with a  level of 18.1!

and talk about a war wound from that blood work!  the newest nurse on staff drew my blood from the inmost vessel in my arm, and i don't know if she missed or what happened but i had this nice bruise just a few hours later, and it's still there a week later.  needless to say today i asked for the stealthy-barely-feel-a-thing nurse and now have no bruises on my left arm from today! yay =)

then, after reading about another blogger doing this after her HCG injection, i thought this would be a totally brillant idea to pass the time....

i stocked up on a bunch of dollar tree tests to "test the HCG out of my system," J just shook his head when i explained what/why i was doing this!  so the logic behind it is this: since the hormone you're injected with is the same hormone for pregnancy, i figured i'd test till the "false positive" went away... so if you look closely at days 6+5 there's a faint line {yeah i know they're out of order}, then days 7+8 there's no second line... i figured once the false positive from the HCG trigger shot was gone, then i could wait a few days then start testing for the real HCG to see if this round worked.

so last friday morning, unbeknownst to J i took this test and saw this faint, faint second line... to which i showed J and asked for his second opinion {while making his breakfast i might add, hey don't judge the kitchen has the best light}!  and he said why aren't you just waiting till monday??

which in a way i agreed with him because i didn't want to get my hopes up that this was the real deal on our first IUI cycle... but because i just couldn't help myself i wanted to check on a digital because let's be honest they either give you a "pregnant" or "not pregnant" option, no fickle and barely there line to scrutinize over like the cheap-o tests.

so last friday evening while i was waiting for J to get home i picked up some digitals, and i had every intension of waiting till the next morning to test again... i just couldn't help myself, as soon as J got home i buckled and took one and it didn't really even think very long,
and it popped up with this word...

it was at that moment that i knew this was really happening, but the true test would come today to see how high my HCG beta levels were.  and before i share that, i just want to share that again after taking this test J asked why i wasted the money on these hpt's because we were going to have to pay money to get blood work done anyway today... i explained to him that i've never in more than a year and a half have had the satisfaction of seeing a positive pregnancy test, to which he kinda understood my logic... or maybe he was just humoring me a little.

soooo... that brings me to today's appointment i told the nurse that i had gotten a few positive hpt's at home over the weekend {yes i took the second one to make sure i hadn't been dreaming}.  and she congratulated me and said that i will need to go back again wednesday + friday to make sure my betas are doubling each time... then if things go the way they should we will have our first ultrasound to finally/hopefully see something other than just the empty uterus we've grown accustomed to seeing for the past year + a half!

so i guess that means we're pregnant {and not quite celebrating yet} i think it will feel a little more real once we get to see a growing tiny baby and hopefully a tiny heartbeat to go along with it!

we certainly aren't out of the woods yet {i know a lot can happen over the coming weeks}, so if you are reading this please include my body + uterus in your prayers, that they cooperate and keep sustaining a healthy environment for this new little life.

i am just blow away and still processing this news {cautiously of course}but i think we're now one step closer to God's "something glorious."

cd 17: a green light and early morning date

let me just preface this post by saying i'm currently sitting here at the Whole Foods killing time before picking up J and heading back to Dr. Mo's for our iui procedure... but i probably won't get to post this till after i'm home again.

but let me back up to saturday morning and my early morning date with J to Dr. Mo's for my cd 15 check up.... she came in on saturday to see us and what seemed like about 3 other couples, apparently i have some other cycle buddies, and to my surprise they all seemed to be about our age which i guess seems like we're all younger than i expected people to be with fertility challenges.  so when Dr. Mo came in for our ultrasound, she asked how the estrogen patches went and i told her it felt like there was a lot of action going on since i put them on last thursday.  and low and behold my feelings were right, my dominate follicle was at 18mm and the other was at 16mm!  she said she wished she could give the 16 a few more days to catch up, but at least the dominate one was at the appropriate size for us to get the HCG ovulation trigger shot.  on that note, i was saying my follicle sizes were in cm's but it's actually mm's.  back to the check up, she said that my estrogen patches sure did work because my lining had grown to 8cm {i think that's measured in cm's, i don't know anymore}.  

so we were given the green light to trigger ovulation sunday morning, and before we left we were given the tutorial on how to mix the hcg trigger shot and then we were done.  it was very surreal to know that we were just on the cusp of being able to "try," well with the help of an iui, but still it was a good feeling to know that my cycle progressed {albeit slowly}, but progressed without any issues thus far.  thank you Lord for that, because i know if this wasn't part of His plan the door could've been closed at any point.  

after our appointment we headed off to brunch at one of my favorite brunch places, Plum's and had a little post doc's visit brunch date.  mmm waffles... =)

it really was a great time together, we don't have a lot of time during the week to really talk and enjoy our time together.  it was really nice and very needed especially given all the conversations these days seem to revolve around babies, and trying to start a family... it was nice to just talk and enjoy each other's company like the old days.

we were told at our appointment that sunday morning i could go ahead and remove my estrogen patches and administer my hcg trigger shot.  so that morning J let me sleep in a little bit and came and woke me with the shot all mixed and an ice cube to use to numb the area.  so i sat for a few mins with the ice cub numbing the spot on my tummy chub {yes i said chub} for J to administer the shot.  i will say it did hurt a little, but it really wasn't that bad, however now i'm kinda wishing i would've done the upper thigh injection because anytime i sit down now it feels a little bruised and my waistbands seem to hit right on that spot.  

also, J had planned an early 30th bday celebration for me on sunday with my close girlfriends for a spa day, which couldn't have been any more perfectly timed given that the iui was going to be the next day.  so after getting my shot i hopped in the car with my green smoothie J made me and went to meet the girls at Burke Williams.

 i hadn't been there before, but it was amazing to spend time with 6 of my closest pals to loung around in robes, sit in a whirlpool {my last time doing that for a little while} with cucumber eye treatments, sauna, steam room, and all the amenities.  can i just tell you they have some of the best lemonade i've ever had!  they also had fresh fruits, spa water, tray passed frozen grapes, teas.... can you tell i enjoyed myself? haha, also since it was for my birthday i was given a complimentary enhancement to my massage... it was honestly one of the best massages i've had, i tend to really carry a ton of tension in my back so my firm Swedish/deep tissue massage was just perfect and just what i needed to take my mind off our iui that was coming up today, and it really helped relax me... just what the doctor ordered!

after our spa day we went and got a delightful lunch and headed home where i proceeded to pass out on the couch the rest of the day, what a bum i am!  later that night i realized after taking my last bath for awhile {RIP evening baths per Dr. Mo's orders} that my estrogen patches + my hcg injection site were super red and the injection site was raised and felt a little bruised... no bueno

the bottom red area is from one of my patches the top one is from my injection, yeah, note to self: if we do another injection i want to try it in my thigh.

so that brings us up to today {monday CD 19} IUI day!

as you can see above on my fertility friend chart it looks as though i did in fact ovulate!  temping for ovulation typically follows a pattern of ups + downs in the first 2 weeks of the cycle, then a low temp dip followed by a thermal shift up of at least .5* which it appears happened with my temp on iui day today. 

post iui procedure update to follow...