Update

So far, so good. My beta numbers have been going up very nicely and everything looks good. Right on schedule I've gotten exhausted, bad cramps, and nausea. It's like I'm pregnant or something! Oh, and my sense of smell is in overdrive. Teddy has gone to doggy play group twice in the last week, and I can smell her from five feet away. Which is really bad because she wants to spend all her time with her head in my lap. That is when she's not throwing up in the basement. That was awesome. I tried to help Matt clean it up, and he wouldn't let me. He said that he'll clean up the dog puke because I'll have to clean up all the baby puke. I don't remember making that deal, and I refuse to honor it. Babies throw up way more than Teddy does.

Yesterday I also had the interesting experience of reading that I was pregnant on Facebook. I haven't gone that public with it yet, so it was funny to see my brother in law put it up. Thankfully the only friend I have in common with him is Matt, so none of the people I haven't told yet are going to find out via Facebook.

The Results Are In...

And they are positive! I am officially pregnant. I will go in on Monday and Wednesday for blood tests and then we'll schedule an ultrasound. Patients who've been through IVF, IUI, and the like, are monitored about every two days to make sure the pregnancy is progressing well. I'll let everyone know how things keeps going, but now I need a nap.

Diary of an IVF Cycle - One Day More

And now for the longest 24 hours of my life. I'm trying very hard to keep myself busy and my mind off the test, but I'm failing pretty spectacularly. I took Matt to the airport this morning and we did manage to talk about some other things during the drive. I'll pick him up on Sunday night and I'm pretty sure whatever the outcome it will be all we talk about on the ride home.

That might be a bit of a lie. Matt's instructions for this weekend are to have a good time, try not to stress out about this, don't get alcohol poisoning, and don't get poison ivy while peeing in the woods. We will be talking about if he followed the rules.

I've managed to schedule about 80% of my work day for the next two days with meetings where I have to be paying attention, so I'm hopefully that will keep my mind occupied. My office got an interim President/CEO who started yesterday and we're having all sorts of "get the new guy up to speed" meetings. All staff members also have to have a 2 hour meeting with the President explaining what we do, what our background is, and what our goals are. My meeting is scheduled for 1-3 tomorrow afternoon. My goal for the meeting is not to look like a complete hormonal nut case that has something more important on her mind. Also not to start crying.

It's hard to tell if Teddy is being more protective than usual or if she's just needy. She goes through periods where she definitely prefers Matt or me, and right now it's all about me. She has seemed a little more pouty than normal, but I'm going to blame that on the fact that she feels like we don't treat her as well as Matt's mom did. And we don't. She is a princess and has no qualms about telling us when we are not paying her enough attention and demanding more petting.

Diary of an IVF Cycle - Reading Tea Leaves

The wait till the blood test on Friday is making my hyper-conscious of anything happening to my body. Cramps - is that a good thing and a sign of a growing uterus or my body trying to get me to stop taking the hormones? Breast tenderness and swelling - sign of pregnancy or PMS? Related - are you serious that I did not fill out the top of that bridesmaid dress? Well, there's a first time for everything. Nausea - food poisoning, morning/afternoon sickness, or the worst case of nerves ever? Pain in my toe - Teddy get off my foot. And my least favorite and cause for some panic, spotting. It was very little blood and stopped within 24 hours, but still added to the stress. If spotting doesn't freak you out you're either male or lying, or maybe both.

I've been told that all of these are normal and don't indicate anything one way or the other.

Two Things

1) If I have a tomato and mozzarella sandwich for lunch and then bruschetta with tomato and mozzarella for dinner that's totally not eating the same thing for lunch and dinner.

2) The hormones are to blame for the following:
-Crying at the Harry Potter movie
-Finding deep wisdom in pop songs - especially Whitney Houston and Bette Midler
-Very detailed dreams that have involved me staring in movies
-Going to bed at 8:30

Five days till the test. Not that I'm counting the seconds or anything.

Summer On Sourdough

There's nothing like to me a tomato, mozzarella, and basil sandwich. I could eat it every day in the summer. Tonight I made it and thought I would walk you through the steps to make any that you make even better.

First, slice the bread (I really like sourdough, but any white bread would do depending on your preference) and drizzle the side you want the inside of the sandwich to be with olive oil. Sprinkle with a little salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Broil for a few minutes until light brown. Flip over, drizzle with olive oil only. Broil again. Try not to get distracted and burn and have to repeat.
While bread is toasting, slice tomatoes and sprinkle with salt. This will draw out some of the water and give them a stronger tomato flavor. Slice fresh mozzarella and salt as well (same reason.) Cut fresh basil with chiffonade and set aside.

Place first slice of bread with seasoned side up. Layer tomato, mozzarella, and then basil. If desired, add a drizzle of olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
Enjoy! I just had my second on of the week. I used tomatoes and basil from the garden and mozzarella from the crazy cheese guy at the farmer's market. Now I just need another tomato to ripen to do it again.

Diary of an IVF Cycle - The Waiting Game

Today is the halfway mark till the pregnancy test. The nurse who discharged me after the transfer had written that my follow up blood work should be on the 21st, but that didn't make sense based on other things I'd read, so I double checked with my nurse and I have to wait till the 24th. I'm trying to figure out if I should have the nurse call me with the results on my cell phone and just leave the message there so I can check it after work. That would save any tears at work, which would probably come no matter what the outcome. But it also involves a level of discipline that I'm not sure I have. I'm not allowed to use a home test (the shots can give a false positive) and I had one around the house that I asked Matt's mom to hide while she was here last week. I realized that I couldn't be trusted with it once I made up a massive rationalization about how I would only trust the test if it was negative, and it would only be to help me slowly deal with the idea that it didn't work instead of it all coming at once. I couldn't even bring myself to try that one on Matt.

In the end I think I'm going to have to leave my phone at home that day. I don't know how to check my messages away from my phone, so that might be the only way. We're going to have a new interim boss at work who will be on his third day in the office next Friday, so I'm thinking tears and obsessive checking of personal phone messages will be looked down on. Also, I'm sure it will be written all over my face and I know my boss will ask, and while I really like my boss, I don't want him to be the first person I talk to about it.

Now that I'm looking at the rationalization, it really makes sense to me. Anyone else?? Dammit, how am I going to make it another 9 days? Where's Michael J. Fox and his time machine when I need it?