From bad it can only get ... worse

First, forgive me, it seems I've made a blogging style mistake. It should have read:

F*CK, F*CK, F*CK. (asterisks now properly placed)

While not absolute, it seems IVF will be canceled, and converted to IUI. Bumping my meds back up did lead to follicular growth, but now my progesterone is rising, indicating my body entering luteal phase. Apparently this can be a poor prognostic indicator for positive IVF outcome (see this or this BUT this may be ok with PCOS ). So tonight it was more Menop.ur and a dose of Cetrot.ide, Menop.ur again in AM then off to see Dr K. Again they will check E2, progesterone and likely recommend trigger that night for IUI on Friday. I'm not sure just how crappy our chances are even with IUI, so I'll have to ask. We know DH swimmers are top notch and there are no major barricades to entry. This we know thanks to our lovely blighted ovum experience back in December.

Last night I was in tears on the phone with my mom. Its strange, as a teen I despised her. In my twenties I tolerated her. In my thirties, I miss her. I don't know how as a mother of six relatively healthy children (and no miscarriages that I'm aware of), she can achieve such a high level of empathy. Except that perhaps I should have given her more credit in my teens. She sent me a silly ecard this AM about how she wishes she could have given me a hug. It made me cry all over again. Why wasn't she affectionate in my youth? I can remember it from when I was little, but not as much when I was pre-teen and teen. Neither of my parents are very good at overt or public affection. In fact, when DH and I were dating they would tease me mercilessly for always ending every call with "I love you." Now, as they approach their mid 70s, I make a special effort to end calls with them that way. They still stumble over it and don't usually reply in kind, but now I know for certain it is on their tongue, and in their hearts.

As is typical of my life, DH is on-call tonight. For you non-hospital types, that means he has to stay and perform all the emergency surgeries (in his specialty) that come in tonight. Summer=parties=accidents=trauma=surgery. So with my shitty news, he is not hear to commiserate. Although being Prince Positive, he would just repeat his (in)famous 3 lines:
I love you
Everything will be okay
It could still happen

Remarkably, I was more distraught last night. Today just confirmed my fears. And somehow I've felt a bit at peace. I think because now it is officially beyond my control, and at least now we won't spend additional thousands on IVF procedures that are unlikely to work. We can not afford to do any more cycles at this point, and these results seem to indicate that would be unwise (with my eggs) anyway. We won't be living in one state for more than 12 mos for the next 2 yrs, so starting adoption seems questionable. Plus with DH in his final year and doing surgery all the time, I don't know that he could attend the required home study classes. So I'm not sure there is really anything I can do for quite awhile. So maybe I will let the obsession go and enjoy the beautiful son that I have. Maybe.

Maybe not. Today I looked at info on DHEA supplementation in older women or those with premature ovarian failure. Some of you have mentioned this before. I'm not convinced this is a solution. But the few articles I've looked at seem slightly promising, and I think Aurelia mentioned that it may be discussed more at the big upcoming fertility conference in Europe. Okay, get ready for MAJOR TMI. I would love for this to help my eggs, but I'm more interested in whether it would help some other symptoms. Specifically, major discomfort with intercourse (yes, that's right, I said it). I know this is a side-effect of lots of the meds used in ART (evil clomid and even BCP), but in the last few months I've had this problem even when not on meds. I mentioned it to Dr K just before this cycle, and joked that maybe menopause was coming. But he just "tut tut'd" me and said he didn't think so. But now I do. It is bad enough to have your sex life ruined by the battan sex march, but to end up with no eggs, no baby and now maybe no good sex? That WILL kill me. I'm wondering if DHEA supplements might help elevate my basal estrogen and testosterone to make my life better. So, I'm going to bring it up tomorrow. Dr K will want to put it off until after this cycle, but I know he is away the rest of the month (probably at the big conference). So, I'm going to try and be forceful and push for a brief discussion. Have any of you had such problems, that you are willing to share?

Its late and I should end this ung-dly long post. Thanks for listening and trying to bolster my spirits.