Cycle Underway!

I took my first birth control pill this morning. Seemed kind of strange to start an IVF cycle with a BCP. I know that it's to calm down your ovaries in preparation for stimulation, but it's sill kind of odd that in order to get pregnant, I'm required to take something that is typically used to prevent pregnancy.

It was also kind of anti-climatic in a way. I've been waiting and waiting for this cycle to begin and I just got up as usual, gave W his Prevacid and took my BCP at the same time. Just the same old, same old. No big deal. It wasn't even until I sat down to write this post that I realized that I started this cycle with no fanfare. It was just, "Here, W. Take your medicine. Oh, I should take mine too." I popped the pill through the foil, put it in my mouth and chased it down with some water and that was the end of it.

In other news, I got approved for about 2/3 of the amount of financing that it will take to pay for this cycle. I called the underwriting department of the financing company to request a larger loan and should hear back from them on Monday. Even if I don't get approved for more money, it won't be that much of a problem. We can put the balance on the credit card if we have to. I'd just really like to have the option of paying it off at the lower interest rate instead of the credit card interest rate. But it is what it is.

Whew!

Oh the drama!

I started my period on Monday which meant I was to call the nurse and tell her so that she could get my treatment schedule. I did and then I called DH to fill him in on the dates. He wanted to talk to the RE to get statistics on breastfeeding while doing IVF. I told him that there really isn't that much information out there, but to go ahead and call if it would make him feel better about dropping all that money.

Tuesday I get a call from the RE saying that she talked to her colleagues and the IVF director of the clinic and said that she could not do an IVF cycle on me while I was breastfeeding, saying that breastfeeding can cause poor ovarian stimulation as well as uterine contractions during embryo transfer. She also said that if I did happen to have a successful cycle, that my chances of miscarriage would be increase as well if I continued to nurse during the pregnancy. When I asked her about specific statistics and research showing this, she was unable to give any. I told her that I was fully aware of those risks, but felt that my chances were better now than they would be later when my son, W, weans as I have no plans of forcing the issue with him since I have strong family history of early menopause. I believe very strongly in respecting his needs and allowing him to wean as he is ready, and while he could surprise me and wean next week, I doubt very seriously that he will wean before another year has passed. After I told her this, she came right out and told me that if I was comfortable with the risks, that I could *lie* to them and tell them that I weaned and that I could go ahead and cycle. Yes. She told me to lie. Not just once either. She told me that numerous times in the course of the conversation.

I talked to DH later that evening and we decided to wait until my next cycle so that I could work on "weaning." Needless to say, I was distraught. I wanted to cycle NOW! I wanted to be pregnant NOW! I was acting very much like my nursing 2 year old.

After discussing my dilemma with the best group of online friends that I could ever ask for, DH and I decided to go on and call the nurse this morning and tell her that I was ready to wean. My message to the nurse was something like this:

Hi Nurse. This is Breastfeeding Mama. I talked to Dr.-Told-Me-To-Lie on Tuesday and she said that as long as I weaned that I could go ahead with this IVF cycle. I am ready to continue with this cycle and just wanted to make sure that all my appointments were still scheduled.

I felt pretty good about that message because I didn't come out and say that I had weaned, just that I was ready to continue with IVF. Ironically, when the nurse returned my call, I was breastfeeding DS. Everything is a go!

I start birth control pills tomorrow and will take them through November 21. I have my trial transfer on November 12 and the injection class on the 19th. My baseline blood work and ultrasound are on the 25th with an estimated week of ER of December 7. ET would be 3-5 days after that.

Protocol

I got my protocol today. I will be doing an antagonist protocol again, the same one that I was on when I got pregnant with W and L. I forgot that I had to be on BCP for a while before starting stimlation, so the dates in my previous post are a little off. I should start my next period sometime during the last week of October and then I can begin BCP. It always amazes me that when doing IVF, you start with birth control. I thought the purpose of IVF was to get pregnant and the purpose of BCP was to keep from getting pregnant. I know what the real reason is, it just seems ironic to me, that's all.

It's a Go!

When your laptop breaks, blogging gets neglected. I'm so, so happy to have my computer back!

So I was finally able to get my CD 3 blood work and ultrasound done. Everything looked great and the IVF team from my clinic met yesterday to discuss a protocol for me. I should be hearing from the nurse on either Monday or Tuesday to get my treatment calendar and should be able to start my IVF cycle with the beginning of my next period which should be around the end of October. That puts ER/ET towards the beginning of December. A successful cycle would mean an EDD of the end of August/beginning of September.

I'll update with my specific protocol and estimated dates once I get them.