Mixing Pot

As usual my post will be about this and that today.

I have been thinking about this post for a while now and couldn't think of a way to word it without it coming out wrong. Let me say first and foremost, I love my husband and I am truly blessed and thankful to have him in my life. 

As you know we are a little over 3 1/2 years of fertility treatments. Most of you have been with my blog and that and vice-verse. Over this time I have noticed that so many husbands have been very pro-active with your blogs. Such as doing guest posts etc. Al is very aware of my blog and has never asked to read it or ever become involved in it. He doesn't speak about our infertility issues, our losses, the fact he wants to become a father, our treatments. Of course I talk about all of it frequently and he listens to me, he comforts me, but I can never see his feelings on everything that has happened or what we are currently going through. I am not sure if he feels he has to be strong for me? Throughout all of our miscarriages he was there to hold me while I cried and asked why this kept happening to us. He has always went along with treatment, he is my support and rock. I guess since we really got into treatments, I decided at that moment I was going to throw myself 100% into awareness and support for couples going through this. I have dedicated the majority of my time with my facebook group of amazing woman, blogging, quilts etc. This is something I felt that I needed to do and will continue to do regardless. So maybe he feels like this is my passion and he will just let me do what helps me get through? Regardless I know how blessed I am to have Al in my life and I won't ever thank that for granted. I love my husband so much. I do want to give him a baby so much, but more than that, I want to be the best wife I can to him. I want us to grow old together and love each more 20 years later than we do now. 

Okay on to something more up beat. Guess what I have to share today?? Remember the quilt pictures I said I was going to share? Well some of my moms had their babies and sent me pictures of the little ones with their quilts I made. I still have a few moms that are very close to labor and I will do another post showing off the babies and quilts. As for now,  please enjoy all the sweet babies. Each and everyone of them hold a special piece of my heart. 

This is little Eleanor & Evelyn

 This is little "J"

 This is little Elliana "Ellie"

 This is little Max & Harper

 This is little Elaina

MTV (True Life)

Yesterday MTV aired the episode " I am desperate to have a baby". Months ago I was very uncertain about how this program would turn out. They were asking for woman in between the ages of 18-29. When I saw this my first initial thought was, " Who has infertility at 18 years old"? So I kinda blew off the whole thing and actually forgot about it until yesterday. I was having a nice relaxing Sunday watching old Lifetime movies and while flipping channels came across this. I thought what the heck and gave it a shot. Now I have to say I was pretty impressed with the episode. I know there has been a lot of negative feedback that they didn't mention all the medications etc. Well going through ivf, I knew exactly what meds they were using and the whole procedure. To be very honest, anyone watching this show that hasn't suffered through infertility could probably give two shits less about what medications these woman were using. If you didn't watch, they had two couples.

1st couple- Had suffered through infertility for over two years and they got pregnant on their first ivf.

Now the couple that truly impressed me and stole a piece of my heart was the 2nd couple

2nd couple- Had been trying for six years and had 5 failed ivfs under their belts. This time she was going in for their last attempt and doing a FET. Before her FET I noticed the doctor put her on heparin and she was also doing infusions to stop her body from attacking the embryos. Well two days before beta she couldn't take it anymore and tested. It was negative. I think at that moment she knew in her heart that it was over. They tried to stay positive and wait on beta, it was negative. She was absolutely devastated. I almost cried watching this. Knowing the feeling of years and years of failed cycles. They had already spent over $60,000 on treatments. Well they decided not to move forward with anymore ivfs and to instead find a surrogate to carry her last two frozen embryos. This will cost them $40,000. At the end they both said no matter what they would have their family. I loved this couple!

I did have a hard time trying to relate to the first couple. But, I do know there are many people out there that have been successful with their first ivf procedure.

All and all I was very impressed with this special and I hope it opens the door for more information on infertility in the future.

 Quick update on anxiety meds:
Effexor is not working. I have a call in to see where to go from here.

Funny Infertility Friday

This & That, Episode (Alot)

Well we just finished up cycle #40 for our long awaited baby. I don't want to say it was a failure because I don't feel like it was, but it was a bfn. I did ovulate and produced numerous follicles this cycle so I do know my body is working as hard as it can with what we have to work with. These conditions can be hazardous :) As I said before, Al and I decided to take this next cycle off before seeing Dr. Kim so I can mentally and physically prepare my body for this visit. I am not sure how exactly my bladder is suppose to hold 30 ounces of water. All of my previous treatments my RE had me empty my bladder because it was to full and that was only with about 24 ounces. I just don't want to pee on anyone and I am sure they feel the same way. I guess if I do, it is something I can always remember with this trip. 

For anyone who has seen Dr. Kim or could give me advice in general, what questions should I be prepared with? It seems like the past three years I have asked every question under the moon and now I am just drawing a blank. Even though this is a new appointment I still have been here many times (if that makes any sense). I know all the basics and the real questions I have is "why can't we get pregnant with all our test being normal"? well no one has an answer for that. So any advice on that would be awesome. Also, did you drink 30 ounces of water before your appointment? Did you have to wait for all the blood work to come back before she decided on treatment? I noticed on many people who have seen her, they go on to do TI, has she ever told you to go ahead with IUI verses TI? Oh and if you are wondering, I have :

1 month, 1 week & 2 days ladies!! 

I have posted this on my infertility blog, but wanted to post here also. If you are one of the woman who I made a quilt for and had your baby or babies, can you please send me a picture of them on the quilt? I want to do a very special blog post with all the of the quilts and their new little owners:

 You can email me at tonisharapp@yahoo.com with the picture if you will allow me to share with my blog followers.

As you know I am still on a break from making quilts. I am still searching for that sparkle I had that disappeared. I know it is around here somewhere and I just need to locate it again. Please know that even though I am not making the quilts right now, you ladies that are pregnant hold a very special place in my heart.

 

We are back!

We survived One Direction ladies! Here are some pictures from Cierras 16th birthday party and our trip to Dallas. It was HOT, HOT,  HOT. 

 Cierra was beyond embarrassed that I got up on red carpet and had Al take my pic

 Not our vehicle but someone else with teenagers staying at our hotel. Wish I would have thought of this!

 I also have a video of the girl mob after the concert running down the road after the tour buses. I need to figure out how to upload it though.

I have one happy daughter :) Her sweet sixteen was very sweet indeed.

When I came back to work this morning, this was sitting in my chair. I did laugh (just a little).

 

Happy 16th my daughter

I am not sure I will have time to get on tomorrow and blog. Sixteen years ago on July 21, 1997, I gave birth to my amazing daughter. The past sixteen years have been filled with ups and downs, but I would never take back one second of it for anything.

My sweet daughter, you will always be my baby girl even when you are a mother yourself. I am so proud that you can me mom and I had the opportunity to have you in my life. Soon you will be driving, graduating high school, starting college and starting your own life. Thank you for letting me be your mom.

Love you!


Tomorrow we are taking Cierra out to hibachi for her birthday and then off to Dallas on Monday for the One Direction concert. I will take lots of pictures  .

If I never am able to have another child, I know how blessed I am in life.

Funny Infertility Friday

Downward Spiral

These last few weeks have been hell. I don't know of any other way to put it, but I am just not me. I have been filled with so much outward anger, irritability, and just plain pissed off 24/7. I am having problems at work because of trying to deal with co-workers and its not going well. Frankly, I am so fucking tired of being the person responsible for everything. Whenever a question is asked, guess who should automatically know or deal with even if it isn't in my department. As much as I loved this job in the past, it has many flaws also. Since we only have three, actually two employees plus one that comes to work every once in a while, there are no set guidelines at our job. We don't have anything in place for vacation or sick leave. We don't have any type of job manual for what is our job description and what isn't. There isn't anyone that is above another employee (even though some think so). This fills up my work time with many  problems. I was hired on as a Landman and executive assistant for my boss. I don't do accounting or never signed on for anything accounting based, so why is it that I should know other peoples jobs and they get a fucking hissy when I call them out and they have to do their own job? Well I could go on and on about my job right now, but I am sure no one really wants to hear about it. This attitude is also flowing over into my personal life. Al was driving us into work this morning and I wanted to slap the shit out of him because his driving sucks! It annoys to me to every end of my being!

See what I mean? I have so much negative energy going through me and I don't know what to do to stop it..............................

I really hope this gets better because I can't keep going on like this for much longer.

3DPO

Well I woke up this morning to cross hairs on my Fertility Friend. For the most part I think this chart is pretty accurate. Although for the past two months my date of ovulation has been off by a day. For some reason it keeps adding day of ovulation on the day of my trigger. I know for a fact that I haven't ovulated on those days. I do like obsessing over my temps during the 2ww, it gives me something to do so that the time doesn't go so slowly. If this cycle doesn't work I should start around July 27th and that cycle following, I am taking a break. I will still temp, but I have decided not to have intercourse while I am ovulating. This way I know for sure my next cycle will be on time and I don't add any additional stress or anxiety to my already anxiety filled body. From everything I have read about Dr. Kim, she likes for woman to come in before ovulation and after there monthly. I looks if all goes according to schedule that I should be seeing her a week after my cycle starts. So about CD 10 and I don't think it gets any better on timing than that.

I am also starting up my new anxiety medications so that will give them a little while to start fully working before my appointment with her. I am still not happy with the fact that I had to start up medications again. I wish that I had a choice in this. My anxiety is affecting my work, I can't concentrate or remember anything. It is not easy to come up with excuses on stupid mistakes. I know my bp is very high again today because my face is burning up. I have been practicing breathing etc. Although I have a dental appointment later today for a implant and I know that is not helping my nerves at all. Regardless what happens from this point forward, I think that starting back on medications was a "must".

Oh and before I forget, the dreaded time has come! Yes ladies in a few short days I will be driving my 16 year old daughter and her cousin to Dallas for a One Direction concert. All the screaming girls you can imagine and probably some screaming boys as well. Al and I had to take next Monday and Tuesday off work because the concert in on a Monday night and we live about 4 1/2 hours from Dallas. My daughter is so excited and I am happy she loves her birthday gift, but I am seriously dreading this..... One good thing. We got a beautiful hotel 3 blocks from concert so Al and I can walk girls down there and pick them back up and don't have to sit there the whole time. I will definitely post pics of her most memorable moment as a 16 year old girl :)

Doctors Appointment Update

I knew for the last few days that my blood pressure was high. My face has been red and very hot. This morning it was 149/84 at the doctors office. I really liked him. We talked for a little over an hour and he actually looked me in the eyes and asked me questions. He seemed interested in what I had to say. After our long talk, he has decided to start me on Effexor for my anxiety and Trazodone for sleep as needed. I go back in a month for a follow up to see how things are going.

Has anyone ever been on this drug?

Important Day

Well today is an important day for me, and not related to infertility. I have an appointment at 11:00 am this morning to see a new psychiatrist that specializes in anxiety and panic disorders. This is a huge step for me and I hope that I won't be disappointed like I was a few years ago with the last one. Not sure if I ever told you the story. I started seeing a PCP for symptoms I was having at the time. He kept telling me it was only anxiety and I needed to get some mental help. Not sure if any of you have ever dealt with this, but there is no worse feeling in the world than being told by your doctor that things are in your head. I knew I had anxiety, but my resting heart rate at that time never went below 115. I was scared. I took his advice and went to see a psychologist for a while and finally went to see a psychiatrist. I was in the waiting room for well over two hours after my scheduled appointment. 

After the two hour wait I was called back into her office. She was very cold and very disconnected. She looked at me and said " fill out this questionnaire"  it had basic questions on physical symptoms I was having etc. She looked at it for a brief minute, asked what medications I was on and gave me three boxes of Abilify.  That was it. Yes that was the whole appointment. I was freaking pissed to say the least. I went back to my pcp at the time and told him what she said. He then told me that I was suffering from depression. Really? I am a lot of things, but depressed is not one of them. After that point I pretty well gave up on getting help for my anxiety. I figured that no doctor is taking me seriously and I am doing everything they have suggested without any relief. At this point we started on our fertility treatments full speed. I won't lie, while going through treatments with all the fertility medications, it kept my mind busy on other things. My panic attacks were less frequent, but the anxiety was always there.

For anyone who has never went through this, you can't truly understand how debilitating it is to a person. If it all is in my head, I wish I could find someone to help me. Over all the therapist I have seen in the last ten years, I have accepted all the childhood abuse and I have learned to deal with it and move on etc. I am not sure what else can be done at this point besides being medicated.

I will update on how this appointment goes. Keep your fingers crossed for me that I get the help I deserve and need.

CD 11 U/S & Funny Infertility Friday Comeback!

Today is CD11. My lining is 8.5. Right ovary has 17 mm & 12.5 mm follicle. Left ovary has 17.5 mm & 13 mm follicle. I trigger tomorrow night. Hopefully the two smaller ones will be mature by ovulation time in few days.

I do at least Femara is giving me better quality eggs, so that is definitely something!

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Planning our Chicago Trip

Well I think that everything is officially in place for our upcoming trip to Chicago. We booked our flights about a week ago and last night Al booked our hotel. It is a very nice hotel in Chicago and we got a great rate through his job. I am not sure what I am more excited about at this moment, the fact of seeing Dr. Kim or the fact of visiting a new place.

Not sure if I have told you guys this, but I have a few fears and the top two is snakes and heights. What is the best way to overcome a fear? Look that sucker in the eyes! As you know I held a huge snake while we were in Mexico last year. I was freaking out on the inside. Al couldn't believe I did it, but I knew that this was a once in a lifetime chance and did it! Here I am "Tonisha the snake Goddess" not really, but I did do it.

Which brings me to my biggest fear and that is heights! Well look what I found in Chicago, the ledge at the skydeck....................

I told Al that I am doing this. He laughed and said there is no way I will go out in that room. Hmm I love when people tell me I can't do something. I do it just to prove them wrong. Although looking at this picture is already making me nervous and nauseous, but I am going to do it while we are there.

I think after that action, the rest of the trip will be lay back casual fun and nothing to excited. We are going to shop the magnificent mile, going to see the bean, hopefully visiting the zoo or aquarium and a few other things. Honestly as much as we can get packed into Saturday, Sunday & Monday. Tuesday is our appointment and we are flying back home Tuesday evening.

I was driving into work this morning thinking about my appointment and all the other woman going through unexplained infertility. A sudden feeling of fear came over me and I thought "what if all my test come back normal"? Is that even possible? Can a person really have no explainable reason for infertility? Okay then I came back to reality and I know there has to be something wrong with me and I am almost confident that my ANA will come back positive again for the third time.

So here is my question for you today. What is your biggest fear in life?

This and That

Not a whole lot going on so this may be a pretty boring post today.

My bosses finally decided we needed to move out of downtown OKC and find an office closer to where they live! I am so happy that I won't have to deal with drug addicts sleeping in front of our door or stepping over poop and/or needles/condoms etc. The space they are looking at has room for me to finally have an office again. When I came to work for this company, they had their office totally customized and it is totally weird layout.  There are only three employees where I work and we have two bosses. I was hired on to do all the land work and executive assistant to my boss, another lady is our accountant, and the other part time person is an assistant to our other boss. She only works about 20 hours a week do to all of her illnesses. Yesterday my boss told me if they went ahead and bought this building they would be putting our part time girl out in reception area and giving me an office. That is going to burn her ass. I guess when they hired me she found out I was making more money than her and through a fit. She even told me about it. I told her it wasn't my business and she needed to talk to bosses about it and not me. To be fair she was on salary at the time and gone sick at least two days a week. So I think it was a very fair call. Just as I feel this is a fair call. I am always in early every day while the other two come in late, leave early etc. I have worked my ass off for my boss and I deserve to finally get an office again.  Yesterday they both called in to work after a 4 day holiday. Of course one ended coming into work that afternoon. I am not sure where people get their work ethic anymore, I really don't.

In better news, my facebook group is having so many pregnancies lately. I have been totally blown away by the amount of ladies who are finally getting their miracles. Gosh that makes a girl feel so amazing. I guess my wish of having all the ladies in my group graduate to pregnancy is coming true. I almost feel like this group is a full time job on top of my job, but it is way more rewarding then my real job :).... One of our members had her twins last night and they were absolutely beautiful! Since she is a fellow blogger, I don't want to state her name, instead I will let her share the news. 

I am still working on my attitude and trying to deal in better ways with negative people and comments. This is always going to be a thorn in my side and I need to accept that. But, the good news is I have kept my thoughts to myself on this matter and just let it go. Baby steps...... Although I did have to delete a few blogs I followed because of the constant negativity and that was a hard decision to make. I am a true believer that your attitude closely follows those who you choose to put yourself near. So as of right now I feel I am in the absolute right place and still happy.

I did call yesterday and make an appointment with a psychiatrist that specializes in anxiety and panic disorders. I am almost on 20 years of dealing with this and it is time I put my foot down and say ENOUGH! Hoping so much that he is able to help me get control of things and live a normal life without constant attacks. 

The countdown is on for Dr. Kim, about 1 1/2 months now! 

I go in this Friday for u/s and hopefully trigger shot after with TI. I decided to go ahead with Femara 7.5 mg this cycle. Another cycle to add to the ttc resume :)

Well that was my "this and that" for the day. Hope all of you have a wonderful week!

4th of July Weekend

Hi everyone! I am going to work on getting caught up on blogs within next few days. I hope all of you had a wonderful 4th of July weekend. Mine definitely had its up's and downs, but more up's!

I will share my funny story with you first. 

My daughter and I are driving to the camping site about an hour and fifteen minutes from our house. We are on the turnpike and a light comes on stating I have low tire pressure. This is really weird because we just bought brand new tires for the Lincoln less than a week ago and it cost us upwards of $1,000. So we hit a construction site and it closes from two lanes to one lane and no shoulder room. All of a sudden I hear bump bump bump bump and knew it was my tire. Debating on stopping or trying to make it through the construction zone, I knew I had to stop. Since there was no room on shoulder I had to pull off in grass at about 40 degree angle. I call my husband (which is hour away) and tell him what happened. Okay I might have been yelling and cussing just a little, or maybe alot. Either way he tells me he is going to call AAA and have them tow me to nearest tire place. Well I call him back a few minutes later and AAA won't come help me unless my husband is there because he is card holder. My sister called and suggested I call the highway patrol. My husband was going to head down but I told him there was no sense and I would call highway patrol to help me. I called and apologized for bugging them with a flat tire, but I was in construction zone and had no way to change my tire where I was. My husband told me not to drive any further because I would ruin the rim. They said they were going to dispatch a trooper to come help me. Well less than two minutes, this big buff state trooper pulls up. He looks like this except he was a white guy and maybe not as muscular. Even my daughter said " Mom his face is red and I think its because his shirt is to tight" LMAO!

He gets out and I explain that I do know how to change a tire but can't do it where I was. He shook his head and said " yeah you are right, you definitely can't change it on this surface" Thanks Mr. Intelligent! I asked him how far the construction went on and he replied at least another two miles or so and we didn't have any choice but to drive down the road a little bit. I got in and slowed traffic down to about 10mph on the turnpike! We got on other side of bridge and I stopped on shoulder. There was only about 1 foot between my vehicle and the others in the construction, but we didn't have any other choice if the tire was going to be changed. Okay here comes the FUN part!!!

He pulls out his jack and lug wretch and I pull out my spare tire. He starts to loosen the lug nuts and then looks and me and said " I have problems bending over" Confused I looked at him and said I can help you" He then went on to tell me about a year ago doing the exact same thing, he pulled two disks in his back and now he can't bend or do much else. I was saying to myself, are you freaking kidding me? Mr. Muscles can't change a tire. I got the first jack under my Lincoln and jacked it up enough to get my tire off. I pulled it off and threw it on the side of the road and went to put the spare on. The vehicle wasn't high enough and the jack was all the way up. I said " Oh crap" and then he looked at me and said " yeah I was thinking the same thing". I started looking around for wood or anything else I could put under the jack to get some more lift. I had another jack in back of vehicle so I got that one out and put under disk of tire and jacked it up some more to get the spare on. About this time my knees are scraped up and I feel like I am going to puke. Those 20 inch tires are freaking heavy and the asphalt is HOT! He is just sitting there watching the whole damn time. I get the tire on and removed the jacks and just then my BIL and his nephew pull up. I told the trooper it was my BIL because he kind of bowed up because they looked like serious rednecks with no shirt, shorts and boots (they were noodling) when my sister called them to come help. So my BIL walks up and I told him I had it all done and then the trooper had the freaking balls to ask my BIL to finish tightening the lug nuts and for me to come back to his car and fill out a form stating he helped me! At this point I am hot sick and tired. It was freaking humorous though! This big muscle guy sits there and watches me change a tire on side of road. I know the people passing by had to think there was a problem with this whole picture. 

At that moment I realized that I did learn a valuable skill growing up. My dad did in fact teach me how to change my own tire and it has come in handy many times in my life and especially this weekend in the conditions I had to change one in. 

I have it again.............

For the second time in a few months I have come across something in our yard that my face hates!

 Yesterday while Al was out grocery shopping I decided to cut our huge side yard which we refer to as the field. I think it is about 3/4 of acre. When I am on riding mower near fence line, we have tree branches that hang down. I was slapped in the face a few times. Thinking nothing of it until I woke up this morning to this hideous creature, LOL. Is it possible for a person to be allergic to a flipping tree? This never happened to me until I moved in to my husbands house. I know that I am allergic to bees and wasps etc. but trees? For the last few years this happens once a year and now this year twice. I keep thinking about what I am coming into contact with and I just don't know. I will wait and see if my eyes are swollen closed tomorrow and go to the urgent care for another steroid shot. Hopefully there will be a young kid there and I can scare the hell out of them with my puffy face :)


TTC News:

Nothing :)
Looks like I am 12DPO and no sign of AF but no sign of pregnancy. I am honestly thinking that the clomid lengthened my 10 day luteal phase. Hoping she will show her face within next few days. My temps are still up.