An ending is really just another beginning.

I'm writing this without an official response to my blood test today...

But I'm pretty sure when she calls tomorrow, she will tell me it was negative.

I've been taking tests since Tuesday, and they've all been negative.

I have been praying with all of my heart, as much as I know how, trusting that the Holy Spirit would intervene for me, and groan for me, and cry for me, and let God know my anguish, my desires, my dreams, and my hopes. But above all, I've been begging for his help. To trust in him. With my whole entire being. I KNOW that God is good. I KNOW that his plans are good, and will exceed my every expectation. I know he keeps  his promises, and that he is faithful. I know that he is never ending, all-knowing, and that he is constant, and forever beside me.

I have been praying that God would prepare my heart for any outcome. And I really think he has.

Am I disappointed to find out that my answer to this prayer is "No?"  Sure. I think that's fair, and expected. But I dont even find myself angry about it. I dont find myself blaming God for it. He's given me peace with the answer.

Once upon a time, I believed the lie... that I had done something horrible in my past, that I wasnt forgiven fully in Christ, and that God was punishing me. Friends, God does not punish those who are hidden in Jesus. He loves us. And everything he does is good for us, whether we understand that or not.

I dont know why I wasnt able to give my husband the precious gift of fatherhood. I couldnt give him that blood line. He has been such a blessing to me, and my daughter, who isnt even his own. But he's loved her all the same. He's been a good dad to her. A supporter, a nurturer, a provider. He's given her much more than her own father could.

I dont know why my body doesnt work the way it did 17 years ago, when I was able to get pregnant with Jade. I wish I had the answers. But sometimes, we dont get the answers to those questions. Those very hard questions. I just want to know. Why?!  And it all comes down to God asking, "Do you trust me?"

"yes, Lord. I want to. I think I do."  That's all I can give right at this moment, but I think it's enough.

And now what?

I am sad, yes. But I am also relieved. I'm happy that the struggle is over. I'm happy that I dont have to take drugs anymore! Haha. I'm happy that I wont have the "fail" hanging over me every time I start my period. I'm happy that I wont have to drag my husband to the bedroom and tell him it's "Time to try to make a baby, just one more night, honey."  Sex wont be a job anymore.

I will be able to move on. I will be able to focus on God, on my family, my husband, my daughter, my job, and not have to worry about anything else!

I am free. I am mostly free from the inwardness of it all. Losing my church right at the moment I was really getting into the thick of it made me turn into myself. I have been so self centered lately. So selfish. My prayer life, my faith, my husband, all have suffered my looking inward.

I am free to feel joy again. The cloud will be lifted.

I am free to be the Sarah that God has intended. I am sure, that this trial was important. That it brought me to a trust in God that I was lacking. A peace, and understanding. A hope. I needed this. And maybe so did someone else.

I am free to be a comfort to someone else now! To encourage. to support. To hold and hug and pray for people. And really mean it!

My BFF has been this for me. I am truly grateful for her. She's been there, every step. Every detail, down to the science of organs and fallopian tubes and cycle days. She probably knows my body as well as I do by now. She's cried for me, prayed for me, hoped and supported me. She's listened to me, helped me to understand myself, helped me to process the emotions. She's poured truth into me. All the while, she's struggled with her own trust issues, and I only hope I've been able to pour truth into her as well, during our struggles over the last 6 months.

And so I find myself at the end of a season. And the beginning of a new one. God's mercies are new every day. Isnt that amazing?!!  I hope that I can wait, in joyful anticipation of whatever God has for me next.

Because whatever he's got, friends, it's good.

Love,
Sarah

Clomid, take two.

Hey, hey! It's ovulation week, already!

Last week, I took my 100mg clomid daily, Monday through Friday. This week, I've actually felt like a real human being, with normal emotions and what not. I felt good. Happy. Me.

The doubled clomid bummed me out. I just wanted to stay in bed all day. Didnt wanna cook dinner, didnt wanna do anything. I slugged it up on the couch all week. Felt depressed. I think I drank quite a bit over the weekend. But, what the hell.

Then on Tuesday, I had my second ultrasound. Thanks to the holiday weekend, my doctor was actually able to do the ultrasound himself, instead of the stone-cold tech I had last month. Hehe. I was able to see on the screen and he showed me everything, and I got results right away. I was also able to tell him how I'd been feeling on all of the meds, and what my feelings were about trying again if round two doesnt take.

He told me next time that he'd put me on a different medicine. Not clomid, but something else that isnt so harsh. I told him that the progesterone makes me an angry person. He laughed and said I wasnt alone. Unfortunately, my levels werent high enough when they blood tested me for my pregnancy test last month, so he doubled the dose. Aaaah!!!! He also prescribed me some Xanax, to help "take the edge off." So we'll see how that goes.

Anyway, back to the ultrasound. It was so nice to just be able to talk to him, he answered all of my questions and I felt very reassured about things. Excited, even.

As I'm looking up at the screen, he measures out an egg follicle. Apparently, my body responded very well (vigorously, as he put it!!) to the clomid, and my follicles were nice and big. They aim for about a 10, and mine were measuring at 14! He said, "You're going to feel ovulation this time, for sure." I usually do anyway.

One more thing he mentioned. "If you dont want to chance having triplets, you might want to skip this month."  What?! I have one follicle on the left, and two follicles on the right. Yikes. Hopefully at least one of them will take!

So I've been ov testing the last couple of days, and only have one thing planned for the weekend... wink, wink. I've had to take some ibuprofen to help with the ovulation pains, it's pretty bad this time. And I get to start my double dose of progesterone tonight. It makes me cringe thinking about it. I hope the xanax helps. I already took one of those... ;)

The last month, I've just been trying to put my trust in God. Like, really trusting him. I'm trying. My faith isnt perfect, but he carries me. He's got me. Not the drugs, not the doctor, not my husband. God. Some days, it's difficult to find that peace there. Knowing that he already knows the outcome, how I feel, when I'm sad, or angry or disappointed, none of those things surprise him. My reactions and emotions have already been mapped out. And he loves me.

Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness

Oh, that deep-down, soul shattering anguish. Where your very atoms are crying out. Every fiber of your being reaches out to something bigger than itself, seeking, yearning, craving.

That's how I felt for a few days early this week.

On Sunday, I hadn't even taken a pregnancy test yet, and I was in a state of panic. I was on the verge of tears from the moment I woke up. I tried not to cry in church. I cried in the car going home from church. I tried not to think about taking a test. But it was in every corner of my mind, the entire day.

I was scared. What-ifs bombarded me. Oh, those what-ifs. They're terrible. They steal all joy, hope, and expectation.

Flash back a bit to earlier this month. I'd taken clomid on days 3 through 7. Thankfully, the only side effects from that was just a constant headache. Not anything too bad, but it was there. Then I went on day 12 to have a transvaginal ultrasound, to see my ovaries response to the medicine. After waiting forever, they finally told me that my response was "adequate."  Also, the clomid made me ovulate on time, at day 14 or 15, instead of day 16 or later. I was getting positive OPKs for three days!

Then, I started taking the progesterone. This is required for sustainable viability of a pregnancy. And it. Is. HORRIBLE!!! Talk about mood swings. Flashes of violent thoughts out of nowhere. I even yelled at a friend to "shut up" at dinner one night (he had it coming) and contemplated gouging his eyes out with the crayons one of the kiddos was coloring with... uh... yikes? I freaking hate progesterone!!!

So. Back to this week. Monday, I took a pregnancy test. It showed as negative. I looked and looked at that stupid stick, hoping to see a faint second line. A shadow. Anything. Then I screamed "I hate you!" at it (in my head, it was 6am and everyone else was still sleeping) and threw the dumb stick on the floor. And cried into my sink, and tried to apply eyeliner and mascara between sobs.

Went to work and cried some more.

Went to the bathroom at work, and had a little teeny smear of blood show up. Implantation bleeding?! My mind raced. My bff and I scrutinized and picked over every single detail regarding implantation. We obsessed over it all day, to the point where we decided we were insane and had a pretty good chuckle at ourselves.  But still... what if I'd implanted late? Maybe Tuesday I'd get a positive. I was due for a blood test also, maybe the hormones weren't high enough to show up Monday.

Tuesday morning. Also negative. But I was okay with it. Slowly, I was feeling peace. My mind had gotten over it's initial fit, and I was becoming okay with the idea that maybe my answer to prayer is No.

I was okay with that. And I also felt like I was done. But that's not really fair. I feel too selfish just quitting after one try on meds. It's so hard!! The emotions are hard! Feeling like a failure again and again, hating your body because it's broken, and that transitions into other body issues, where you hate even your appearance....

I told Matt that if I wasn't pregnant by Thanksgiving, I wanted to be finished. I want to get whatever done to take care of the girl stuff downstairs, to quit having periods, and just be finished. He agreed that that was a fair goal.

This morning, I received the absolute negative result from the doctor. I am okay. I'm at peace.

We'll be trying a higher dose of clomid this time. I just hope to God they leave the progesterone where it is. :)

all the drugs

If you saw the amount of pills that I gulped down around 7am this morning, you would have gagged. Ok, it was only 3 different things... 2 Lysteda, 4 ibuprofens and 1 clomid. Then at lunch, I took 2 more Lysteda and one prednisone. One prednisone that is so tiny, in fact, that it got stuck to my tongue, and stayed there til I gulped another glass of water after running to the fridge, tripping on the dog, and dropping the f-bomb.

Believe it or not, despite my cursing right after church, is that I haven't had any ill side effects from the clomid. Yet. Just a little headache, which may or may not be part of menstrual cycle issues and being a tad dehydrated.

I'm only on day two. Three more to go!

Thursday was day one of this cycle. I went in, got blood drawn, just so they could tell me I was negative for pregnancy. No kidding? I'm bleeding over here. I think I've got that figured out. I'd also taken an at home last Sunday. No big surprise there. Blah blah, they have to have a blood test to make sure I'm not... lying? Standard procedure before they put me on fertility drugs. I know. ;)

Day 2. Start prednisone. It's a very low dose. No big deal

Day 3. Start clomid. Take until day 7.

Day 12. Get ultrasound to make sure my egg follicles are developing properly. I'm trying for a bigger, better, stronger egg. No twinning!!! My BFF still wants me to have twin girls. *Sigh*  I love that girl.

Ovulation day and until new cycle starts. Take progesterone to thicken lining of uterus. I know it makes a comfy spot for an egg to stay, but I get worried about a heavier period.. and hopefully my worries are silly.

My nurse lady also mentioned IUI. That sounds fun. An IUI is where they separate the best, healthiest sperms out of all the rest of the gunk, making a super concentrated dose, and then artificially inseminate me with it. So the husband and I would both have to be there, and it sounds expensive, but I guess you can do it at home also? My doctor hadn't mentioned trying that, but she's talking to him and I should know this week if he really wants me to do it.

Not really sure how I'm feeling about all of this at the moment other than we're giving it 3 months. So, in 3 months, I'll either be pregnant, or we'll be done trying. That makes me feel less stressed out, at the moment anyway. The end of this season is in sight.

The same old song and dance.

I realize that it's been awhile since my last post. About two months, actually. I just don't feel like I've got much to say. Not much has been happening. So, this might be a short one.

Let's see. Two weeks ago, I had a doctor's appointment. We've been trying for about three months now, and nothing's happening so I asked my doctor all sorts of questions.

Should I do a blood test to see if my eggs are still good? No, it'd be a waste of money. I'm healthy and my eggs would probably be exactly what they'd expect from a healthy 35 year old woman.

Do we know for sure that I'm ovulating? My opks are on track, and so are the rest of my symptoms, so it's a good assumption that I am.

Is my body rejecting the sperm? He said probably not.

Is my body a hostile environment? Am I too inflamed from the endo? Is there something I can do to help it? Now, there's something. He actually got his laptop online and did a little research while I was there. He determined that trying out a low dose of prednisone during the first couple of weeks of each cycle may help keep the inflammation under control.

We'd also been thinking about trying Clomid. He had originally told me that clomid may speed up the endo coming back. Endometriosis comes back eventually. I asked him if it was enough that we'd blame the regrowth of my endo on the actual use of the drug, and he said no. So, we're going to try a low dose of that along with prednisone for three months.

I called this week to tell my nurse that I wanted to do it. She listed a bunch of other things we may have to do in addition to the drugs. Ugh. Blood tests and ultrasounds. to make sure the clomid is stimulating my eggs enough. My initial thought is, "I was only doing this because those two drugs are fairly cheap. I cant afford an ultrasound every month." So as soon as she calls me back next week to set things up, I'm going to ask first if the ultrasounds are going to be filed under an office visit, or what. Then maybe see if they only need to do it once.

You know, I was about ready to give up. Actually I'm really only doing the drug option because my husband said that three months wasn't long enough, and we needed to keep trying.

I don't know. This week has been very hard. I've been a complete mess. I had ovulation bleeding this month, which hasn't happened for about a year. The day I got my laparoscopy done, in fact. It's not a bad thing, just annoying. It's actually a very good sign. I should have been excited. I guess I sort of am. But I think the hormones have been a bit amped up this week. I've been really emotional and stressed out, it's a little bit ridiculous.

I think I'm giving this three more months. I have to mentally prepare myself for being on hormone drugs again. Hooray... I already feel like cussing. I've already warned my poor daughter. And I hope Matt can handle it. Or maybe I'm just blowing it out of proportion like always and it wont be all that bad.

Ha.

Testing time... Again

So, not pregnant. Again.

I started my last period the day before I was going to take a pregnancy test. That made my cycle 28 days long, which is okay, I'm anywhere from 28 to 30 normally. And looking back, it seems that I probably ovulated on day 15 ish, which is right where it needs to be.

My period was... meh. More painful this time. Bleeding was as expected. I was supposed to have a prescription for Lysteda that got messed up somewhere. I'm not sure who's fault that was, but it was really inconvenient and frustrating. I had to go back to the pharmacy THREE times before they got it right, and it was 2 days too late for me to use it correctly. They gave me an "emergency" supply on Friday, so I only took a third of the dose over a day and a half. It didnt help. Let me tell you, I was not happy. Like, I'm gonna punch someone in the face. It was bad. I havent felt that upset since I was a Lupron Monster.

Now it's day 11 in my cycle. I went and got myself some cheap "Answer" brand pregnancy tests. 20 tests for $20 with an $8 online rebate (that I filled out and probably wont get for 2 months) so I dont think that's too bad. It looks like they're made for girls who test every day of the month, but I wont be doing that! Instead, I'm going with the 2 a day. One in the AM, one before bed.

I'd better not miss those damned lines this time.

Just a couple of weekends ago, I drank a few, er maybe a lot of margaritas (the day I started my period) and had a pretty intimate conversation with a good friend of mine about making babies. She said "Ditch those stupid OPKs. You know what your body feels like when you ovulate." She suggests lots and lots of sex, days 12 thru 16 or so. Hahaha. Um.. Well, I guess if I want to cover all of my bases the best I can... Ha! It just makes me giggle thinking about her telling me. The plan might be both. OPK and lots of sex. Hahah.

Lemme tell you. You think "Oh, lots of sex, how bad can that be?" or "At least it's fun to try!" Think about taking one of the things you like the most and turning it into a job. Not so fun. It's hard to say "C'mon, let's do this again." I feel bad for my poor husband, well, a little bit. Demanding that he comes in and performs. You know? Maybe I should call to him from the bedroom and meet him at the door wrapped in cellophane like Evelyn does in "Fried Green Tomatoes."  Hahahaha!!  Spice things up a bit! Oh my gosh, I'm cracking myself up. I'm sure the neighbors can hear me cackling.

And I'll leave you all with that. Thinking about what a weirdo I am. Or me in a cellophane dress. Hehehe!!

Time to pee on a stick!

OPK "Fun"

A few weeks ago, I had a visit with my doctor. There were no exams or any of that stuff. Just a simple sit-down and follow-up. I told him when I thought I had ovulated last, and that I had started my period (on Easter weekend.. lovely). That although it was a lot more manageable pain-wise, I still had that awful bleed-to-death first and second day, that kept me running to the bathroom every half hour, using Ultras, no less. I had hoped that that part of it would have changed. I think I'd take pain over a super heavy flow any day. But, he is prescribing me Lysteda again, for the flow. It doesn't interfere with hormones at all. It will be nice to have on hand.

We talked about expectations, and I asked him a few things about my body. So he went over his notes from my laparoscopy and said he believed I should be able to ovulate fine; that my fallopian tubes looked unobstructed, despite them being adhered slightly to my uterus. He told me that he didn't want to put me on any fertility drugs, as most of them bump up estrogen, which is the exact hormone that feeds endometriosis. He didn't want to take the chance of making that worse. He pretty much told me to try to conceive naturally for three months and then we could decide further steps. He instructed me to get an ovulation predictor kit. And then... he prayed for me. It blew me away, and I cant even tell you how good it made me feel.

I bought myself an OPK, and on day 12, I started testing. I tested for 6 days, without any test looking like the pictures in the instructions were supposed to look like.

Let me tell you something: EFF ALL OF THE PINK LINES!

I. Hate. It. Pink lines, you suck.

Using an OPK is almost as bad as, if not worse than taking a pregnancy test. They are very hard to read! You're supposed to get two lines, the reference line always shows up, the test line gets darker. If the two lines are the same pigment, or the test line is darker, then ovulation should occur 24 to 36hrs after your LH surge. How does that sound, for a good time?

I did see where my test line got darker for two days, but it was never dark enough to be a certain positive. Then it started fading away again.

And THEN I read that testing twice a day was better. In a kit, they tell you to test once a day, the same time, every day until you get a positive. Well, if your LH surge happens somewhere between those 24 hours, you can miss it! That would have been nice to know, beforehand!

I started testing on day 12, which was a Wednesday. My boobs started getting sore, and I started cramping that day, and it got progressively worse until Friday (which was one of the darker lines) where my sex drive felt sky high. So uh, heh... Ya know... Then on Saturday, my test line was the same as Friday. After that, it started fading away. I suspect that my LH surge was somewhere between testing Friday and Saturday. Next month, I'm going to buy cheap tests and use them twice a day. That is, if we didn't manage to get pregnant by chance this month!

It's so hard to take this one day at a time. I have to tell you, that whole week I was using the OPK, I was a wreck. It really does a number on your emotions. My brain was constantly going through what-ifs. I wasn't being nice to myself, and was hating my brokenness.  I'm always in between a state of being hopeful, and wanting to give up.

Now, I'm thinking I may take a pregnancy test next Sunday. That would be about three or four days before I start my period.

I don't really know how to feel about it.

One day at a time.