Aftermath

We had our "sorry your cycle failed" consult with Dr. Generous today. She was fantastic as usual. She said with such sincereness, "I am so sorry that you're not pregnant". It resonated in me that she truly meant this, it wasn't just words for her. I wonder, sometimes, if some of these female RE's have gone thru infertility themselves? Of course some of them have. I just wonder if any of the docs that I've met have. Dr. Generous has the compassion of a woman that has experienced this firsthand. I wonder...?

So, yes, I brought up my concerns about being overmedicated with lupron, undermedicated with progesterone, and she was fully on-board with trying my suggestions in the next cycle. In my core I feared that she'd fire us as Dr. Moustache had done, especially after I offered up my own SWAG (scientific wild ass guess) as to what we could do. But, no, she was happy to adjust my lupron down and switch me from the progesterone capsules to PIO in ethyl oleate.

She also asked how long we planned on trying before making other plans. It was a painfully honest question. How much more CAN we do this? The answer is: I'm really not sure. Our decision, now, is largely based on finances, so it'll depend on where things lay in three month's time. We are being placed on the embryo donation list. She said that "L" would call me to talk about what sort of races were acceptable to us. It felt so odd. My initial feeling was, "Gosh, someone is kind enough to offer me their embryos. How could race even be a factor?!" I'm pretty much color blind when it comes to this. Of course if we find the are literally swimming with a multitude of embryos, a veritable candy store of them, then sure, I'll be happy to be choosy. But gosh, I would just be so grateful to be the recipient of such a generous gift. Like I'm going to turn down an embryo because it doesn't look like me? Like us? Not a chance. Okay, that was one heck of a digression into embryo donation...back to the next cycle.

For now the plan is to finish this AF, and the next. The next will be the first "real bleed". After this, we wait one more AF, then for my LH surge. 11 days after the surge we'll add in antagon to stop my FSH levels dead in their tracks so that they won't induce a dominant follicle from starting. No BCPs or estrace for me. It simply doesn't work. When AF starts, once again, we'll start stims as we did in this cycle.

So we're about three months out from starting our next cycle and the timing feels right to me. 3 months is plenty of time for the enbrel to work it's magic but, you know, I might just stretch it to 4 months as I think that's what Dr. B might have suggested.

On the emotional side of things, I feel a bit deadened...like the only thing that is keeping me from really being sad about this failed cycle is that there is still hope that the next one might work. My manager asked me the other day, "When do you know it's time to quit? To give up?" I don't know how to answer that. I think IVF is like childbirth. In childbirth you have oxytocin and all those hormones that help you forget how f*cking painful childbirth was. What do we have in IVF to help us forget? There's nothing really, except the hope of the next cycle being "it", the cycle that works.

Isn't it amazing that hope can deaden so much of our pain?