CD19 - OHSS?!

If you have read my yesterday's post I talked about all the pain I've been feeling and listed off my symptoms. I also googled the symptoms of OHSS and decided to make a post about my findings. I'm sure most of you already know all this but for those of you that are like me and always heard of OHSS and know what it stands for but not what all the side effects and symptoms are here they are!

OHSS = Ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome

According tho this website

Mild to moderate OHSS symptoms can include:

- Mild to moderate abdominal pain that may come and go

- Abdominal bloating or increased waist size

- Nausea 

- Vomiting

- Diarrhea 

- Tenderness in the area of your ovaries

Some women who use injectable fertility drugs get a mild form of OHSS, which goes away after about a week. If pregnancy occurs, however, symptoms of OHSS may worsen and last several days to weeks. 

Severe OHSS symptoms can include: 

- Rapid weight gain such as 5 pounds in one day or 10 pounds in three days or more.
- Severe abdominal pain
- Severe persistent nausea and vomiting
- Decreased urination
- Dark urine
- Shortness of breath
- Tight or enlarged abdomen
- Dizziness

I found ALOT of really neat information from this site ---> www.ivf.com/ohss.html
It's all described really well and worth checking out their website as there's just too much good information to relate on here. It tells you all the "Facts about Ovarian Hyperstimulation Syndrome" like the "Signs and Symptoms" - "Why it happens" and "What to do". In each sections they give you examples of what you may be experiencing if you are having Mild OHSS, Moderate OHSS and Severe OHSS.

I then typed in OHSS in google images and oh boy I really do not wish that upon anyone! :S If you haven't yet, have fun googling it! :P

The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White

CD18- 1DP-IUI + D1 Prometrium 200mg 2X/day

Today I slept in, relaxed all day then my hubby, my brother and I went to the pet store to get both dogs more food then we walked around Home Sense a bit and went home. I was so achy even just walking hurts so I would walk funny and slow to compensate. When we got home, I worked on some of my crafts (still working on my nieces princess book). At night we played board games "Settlers of Catan" and "Carcassonne".

ALL day I've been trying to imagine what's going on in my body right now, did it work!?? Did sperm penetrate my eggs?!!! Also wondering if I'm going to feel the implantation.. some women do. Am I going to see spotting from the implantation, will I worry thinking it's AF.. Ahh I just can't wait for this 2WW to get further along!

I still have all these weird symptoms and my body really isn't feeling itself lately.. so I decided to list a few of my symptoms I'm feeling lately.

Trigger Shot Symptoms + 200mg of Prometrium this morning.
- Extremely sore breast
- Sore nipples (Morning after trigger I woke up and my nipples were ROCK HARD and hurt so bad!) ever since the trigger they always seem "cold" and sooo sensitive!
- Emotional (up and down all day but I try to just keep to myself)
- Easily irritable
- Bloated feeling all day long ever since the trigger. Like really bloated.. feels like I have a bunch of air stuck in my lower abdomen area and pushing.
- My uterus hurts, feels like alot of pressure pushing against it and there's no way to relieve it.
- Gassy, more then usual yet I still feel super bloated despite being gassy.
- Craving junk food (prob cause I'm extra emotional and have been taking it easy relaxing on the couch watching movies and netflix series.. also that I've derailed off my clean eating diet and now seem to crave everything bad for me like chicken strips and fries and anything Starbucks related!)

PAIN PAIN PAIN...

The whole area below my belly button hurts... the best way to describe the kind of pain is like when you hold in your urine for too long and you get this really achy pressure feeling except I have that feeling all day long and no matter what I do it does not go away. I feel so bloated. I find myself every half hour complaining out loud and bitching about how uncomfortable I'm feeling. I'm really hoping it's not OHSS and I'd have no way of knowing because my Dr never talked to me about the possibilities of OHSS and what the symptoms to watch out for are and so on. I googled it on my own but since my Dr's clinic is so far away it's not like I can just drop in for a quick check up. I'd have to book in and all that jazz and it's all so complicated for nothing, especially if it turns out to be nothing so I went out and bought some G2 Gatorade, some POM Juice and some pineapples slices. I know the core is what's best for implantation but they didn't have any whole pineapples that looked good and then only sold the others in slices. All this to say I'm making sure to stay very hydrated and keeping up with my electrolytes. If I don't feel any better soon though I will start worrying because I never had this kind of pain from an IUI cycle before.

I POAS again today to test out my Trigger Shot and I also just enjoy seeing a BFP even if I know it's a false one. Here is my tracking sheet so far.. nothing special but does the trick to track ;-)

The Crafty Cranky Infertile Mrs.White

CD17 - IUI Day!!

Soo much discomfort this morning before even getting to the clinic! I was sitting all funny in the truck during the 2 hour drive to the clinic, I just couldn't get comfortable and somehow no matter how I was sitting I kept feeling weird pressure on my ovaries.

This was our view on the way up.. cloudy and a windshield full of bug splatter :P

When we got to the clinic, we went to the reception and paid the $250.00 IUI fee, they put a bracelet around my wrist with my name and information and sent my husband to the sperm lab area so he could go produce his sample. They told us it was a very busy procedure day today and the lab would take about 45 minutes so we decided to go walk around the main hospital building and then went back to the clinic and waited the reminder of the time there. Finally they called us in to the procedure room.. it's nothing fancy or different from any of the other rooms.. they just happen to be the rooms at the end of a certain hall. 

I wore my new achor sox! Hoping they bring me some luck and they kept my feet warm :P

The nurse came in to give us the sperm results and went over it with us. She handed me the bag with the sperm and told us a Dr would come in shortly to do the IUI. Lucky for me, it happened to be my new female Dr and she is also the one who happen to do my baseline ultrasound for this cycle. It went well and quick. At first my cervix was being a bit stubborn but it didn't take too long before it was all over and I got to lay there for the usual 10 minutes.  

Don't mind my grumpy face in this pic.. It's more like here we go again... kinda sad/mad that we're here again and really hoping it's the last.. AGAIN! 

Here I am after the IUI was done.. all smiles because the hard part was over.. now the 2WW officially starts!!!

My awesome husband rubbed my feet for the entire 10 minutes! He's so good to me and wanted to make sure I fully relaxed. He's really good at it too and I didn't even have to ask, he just did it on his own. He looked so into it haha.

Just laying there enjoying my foot rubs hihi ;) but also nervous and deep down inside telling those sperms to swim swim swim fast and make it happen!!!!

 When it was all done, we had to walk threw the "Baby Hall of Success" to exit.. They have added 2 huge new boards up full of new pictures since last time we were here (since last Jan). This is me infront of the only board that still has room to be filled.. dreaming that maybe someone will walk by this wall and see my babies sweet little face on there instead of the other way around.

This is the pic I added to my Instagram tonight.

When we were all done we went out for lunch then drove back home. I changed into my comfy around the house clothes and my little miss Nella came instantly and cuddled my stomach...

 then she fell asleep in no time and didn't move for 2 hours. She was glued to my stomach! It was really comforting and made me happy. She's such a cutie and loves to be cuddled and held.

Yuck! Just noticed that weird looking stain on my shirt and quickly realized that's dry craft paint I tried to scrap off a while ago haha. It's not some gross snot or wtv else you think I can assure you!

The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White (who has all fingers and toes crossed!)

CD16 Swollen ovaries & discomfort

First thing I did this morning when I woke up was POAS!!! On both the Opk and the pregnancy test strip.. Just a thing I do the day after the trigger and I test it out of my system so that when I do test I know it's a real answer and not the trigger lingering in my body.

So here it is.. the first POAS of this cycle!

The top green test is the ovulation test and the blue one below is a pregnancy test. I took the picture when they were still wet and pretty fresh so as they dried they became quite dark. These tests are just my cheapies so I don't feel bad using them to test out trigger.


In the afternoon, my ovaries started to really ache. I was doing the groceries with my little brother and out of the blue my ovaries started to really ache, enough that I just wanted to go straight home the minute we were done and lay down a bit. Man is there ever action going on in there today!

Sitting or laying down isn't comfortable, I keep feeling this weird ache.. standing up is a bit better but I've been trying to relax and enjoy my time off work so I watched a movie on netflix, did some crafts for my niece/goddaughter's belated birthday (making this really awesome interactive princess castle album). I'll post some pictures of the finish product in the next couple days when I'm all done :) I just have to remember to make a post about it!! Been working really hard on it and so far I love it!

I'm getting nervous for tomorrow (IUI day) and I have no idea why. I mean this is my 4th time, I know exactly what to expect and what the procedure will be like but for some reason all day I've had this anxious feeling inside. I really hate not knowing what size my follicles actually grew to before triggering.. I also don't like not knowing how many follicles actually grew to size.. maybe I have 2, maybe 4.. maybe only 1 and the others shrunk to make room for that 1 big one?! Who knows but all these questions rolling around in my mind is exhausting ugh. I wish I could be super happy and excited about 2 big follicles that are between 20-22, instead I'm nervous of the unknown. I know they def grew because I upped the dosage and really felt my ovaries grow and ache but that might have been the 12-13 ones growing... once again I hate the unknown.. especially when your this far in the game and you paid alot to get there. 

It's already CD16 and I have to say time sure has flown by. I had the week off from work since my brother flew down to stay with us and visite for almost 3 weeks, and taking that week off ended up working really good since I had 3 follow ups and injections to take and it allowed me to take my mind off everything since we took that time off to go out and have fun. We drove all over and visited many places with my brother and showed him around. As awesome and fun as that was, I really haven't had much time to myself and a break really. I feel like I'm gonna need a vacation from my vacation haha. I'm a home body and I love my alone time and for the past 2 weeks I haven't had much time to myself but I am SOO happy to spend all this time with my brother so it works out.

The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White

CD15 HCG Trigger Shot Time!!

It's that time again...

TRIGGER TIME!!!!!!!!!!

The scary large mixing needle.. 

Pic I posted on Instagram.

 Done & Done!

I started to feel movement a good hour after taking the trigger shot. I made sure to take it easy and snuggled on the couch and watched movies on Netflix with my brother till bedtime. 

One step closer!!!

The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White

CD14 Follow Up ultrasound #3

Still pitch black out when we left the house...


Really foggy out a good part of the drive.



Alarm goes off at 3:30am hop in the shower and get ready. While getting ready hubby went out and filled my car with gas and got himself some Tim Horton's. Left the house at 4:43am. 

Arrive at clinic at 6:44am and that's with a quick pee stop on the way and more Tim Horton's lol.
We did it... We're #1 in line finally!

Threw that door is the reception desk.. they only open at 7:45 yet by that time the waiting area is already 3/4 full so we have to get there real early like today.. 7:00am and #1!! Usually the elevator that brings us up to this floor is locked till 7:15 and women start lining up down there it's kinda funny to see.. but a nice nurse was going up and asked up if wanted to go up.. score! Beats waiting 15 more mins in front of a locked elevator! 

 Then we notice on the board what Dr is doing the ultrasounds today.. it's yet again Dr.M. WHY!!!!! I am really hoping this is my last follow up and that i get to trigger tonight. Now I'm sitting here all anxious. I told my husband that this time I don't care how awkward or hard it is to tell him to do his job... measure ALL my follicles or at least the top 3 in each ovary!!

 Nice and empty.. for a whole 5-10 minutes.. I really REALLY hope I don't have to see this waiting room again unless it's to confirm my pregnancy!! FINGERS CROSSED!!!

Haha... bored waiting so we play games on our new phones.

 

Here we go... follow up #3!!! Hopefully the last before the IUI!! 

Haha trying to look pretty with my white sheet :P 

This was the famous white board in change room #4 haha.. not quite as epic as the other day.

 The ultrasound room.. nothing too exciting.

It was Dr M. again today and I was gearing myself up to speak my mind with him and tell him to measure more then 1 fregan follicle in each ovary!!! My husband was laughing at me cause I was stressing out over it all morning. The minute I saw his name again on the board when you walk in and take a number my heart sunk and I was mad.. 3 times in a row c'mon.. usually I get a diff Dr every visit, in this case I think I would have rather that this time around.

So... the Dr came in and he was in a really jolly good mood haha. He is usually really cheery, full of smiles and jokes and today was no different BUT he actually measured my follicles and I didn't have to say a word! Fiouf! He was like let's have a look, he measured my lining then went over to the right ovary and said: "Woah! Tell me again that you guys want kids" and starts laughing.. I had MANY large follicles.. then he was like: "Okay, let's count them together" and went on measuring 3 of them. That made me feel so much better. He actually looked around a bit.. well this time he didn't really have a choice because they were all pretty large and to get a good measurement he had to try and get different angles. My hubby took another video with his phone and you can really see well just how much my follicles grew! He then went over to the left side, measured one and yanked out the probe. Wished he would have measured at least one more on that side but once again before I could say anything it was over. So.............. The Verdict is.... drum roll.....  

(This is the pic I posted on my instagram)

I was REALLY hoping that my follicles would be around 20 and that I would have 2-3 considering the amount of pain I have but instead I have a shit ton of medium ones and 2 contenders. (I desperately want twins more then anything) but more sure if the 15 will grown enough today and tomorrow to make the cut.. or even the 13 for that matter. C'mon follies GROW!!!

I was hoping not to need to anymore injections but here we are... after the Apt we drove to the pharmacy, picked up 3 more vials of Menopur, picked up the trigger shot as well as 2 boxes of Prometrium (progesterone capsules). Picked them all up at the same time to save us anymore trips to the Pharmacy. 

I know Dr said to keep same dosage so 187.5iu.. but I am not taking ANY chances that they don't grow big enough to fertilize. So once again I upped my dosage to 3 lines past the 1ml line. I don't think I ended up ever doing the recommended dosage after all. Heck if my biggest is still only a 16 then maybe I should have been at a higher dosage to start with! So here goes nothing. 

This is my "lucky" bracelet my mom bought me when she was down for a couple days in July. I call it lucky because it's 1st of all from the store called "Lucky Brand" haha, 2nd.. my mom bought it for me and 3rd it has elephants and I'm obsessed with elephants and it's just really pretty :P Been wearing it at every apt but the baseline and plan on wearing it for the IUI.





The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White

CD13 - relaxing day

Today we slept in till noon and it felt sooo good! That's what vacations are all about :)
We then relaxed and watched a bit of the food network then we went to the gym and I put my little brother threw a pretty great chest/shoulder/back/quads workout. He was a trooper.

Haha I look a little hard core here.. I usually wear much brighter funky clothes.. but this was the only gym outfit that was clean :P

Being back in the gym lifting heavy, working hard and sweating made me feel alot better. I did feel some tugging when I was doing bench press.. I lifted 95lbs and felt some tugging in my ovaries so stopped and had to adjust all my workouts to make sure I wasn't stretching my hip area. It was nice to be sore somewhere else then my ovaries that's for sure. I felt really good when we were done and glad that I decided to push threw in the gym.

When we got home, my brother and I brought the dogs to the off leash dog park for a good 45 mins while hubby stayed home and started cooking a BBQ supper for all of us. So when we got home we showered and eat really filling and healthy ground beef balls with corn on the cob, asparagus and peppers/onions. We don't eat our burgers in a bun, we break them up into pieces and eat them with the veggies.





We then played a board game called Carcassonne, really love that game!

Then a little blogging then bed time and we have to wake up soooo early again tomorrow for follow up ultrasound #3!!!! Keeping fingers crossed that the med increase did the job!

G'night!

The Crafty Infertile Mrs.White

CD12 On Vacation!! Banff & Lake Louise

Since my brother came down for a good part of August I booked some vacation time for this week to spend two weekends with him and the whole week. My IUI cycle ended up kinda happening riiiight around that time we had planned to go do all these great outings instead we ended up having to drive to Edmonton for the follow up's and since that's 4 hours round trip and really early in the morning we were pooped after and just ended up going home playing board games and relaxing. Since our 2nd follow up was yesterday, today we have the whole day to ourselves to go have fun, enjoy the outdoors, relax and feel on Vacation!! Soooo we decided to venture out to Banff National Park and to Lake Louise.

The following are the pictures I took with my LG G3 phone, we have soo many better ones with the professional camera, and I'm in alot more of them too since hubby was the one taking pics.. but these show alot of the activities too.. just not as pretty haha...

Here we go!!!
It was a gloomy foggy grey day but we made the best of it!

Quick pit stop on the way to Banff to take some Selfies with the mountains haha! This is my brother and yes we are blood related.. just different dad's.

I made my brother pose for many pictures haha and they all turned out really great! I have like 4 other ones like this taken in different angles and they all looks so neat! Wish I was photogenic :P

Here we are entering Banff National Park.. there's a fee to enter so we're lined up to pay. Def worth every penny!

There's a little story behind this one hahha.. we took like 10 pictures and we were making a bunch of different funny pictures and in most my brother who was sitting in the back poked his head with funny faces. This was the only one where I looked somewhat normal :P

Once in Banff, we parked the car and walk along the main strip riiiight to the "Fudgury" store. They make all sorts of mouth watering AMAZING chocolates, fudges, caramels and much much more. These two just couldn't wait to munch down on them. I made them stop eating for a sec and take this pic and my husband was eyeing his next bite hahaha that's just how amazing it is! I somehow managed to keep my portion till tomorrow. My stomach was upset and watching these two chow down so much sugar made me feel ill. They each eat like a bag full. They were on a sugar high and made this day trip hilarious. Sooo many pictures I am not posting but their hilarious and one of us always seemed to ruin the picture with some weird face.  

Then we decided to drive to Lake Louise witch is in the Banff National Park but about.. I think it was a 45 min drive, I forget I was too busy taking pics out my window and looking at the pics we had already taken and laughing. I so needed this vacation. Pics below was at a rest stop on the way to  Lake Louise, we figured why not stretch out legs and take more funny pics!

See what I mean... hahaha

Back in the car and still on our way.. this is our.. we're almost there faces hahaha

Bam!!! There it is... the beauty of Lake Louise!!! Check out that water, it's unreal!

I put my feet in and told hubby he should try too... Forgot to mention to him it was ICE COLD! ;) hahhaha.

We sat on these rocks for a bit and soaked it all in. It was a real foggy day but still beautiful.

baahahhaha we tried to take a "nice" pic.. didn't turn out so good. This pic made me realized I need a new haircut and hair dye ASAP! (haven't done anything to my hair since last Nov!!)

We just couldn't help it !

Finally a good one!!!

This was on the way back to the city of Banff.. a nice little pit stop. Real gloomy day but still cool.

Aww I love this man!

Can't forget the shot shot shot shot! It's injection time!!! Did this in the truck while we were driving. Prob not the safest but I got it done.

Sunset over the mountains leaving Banff.

We have much better pictures of the mountains and the size of them with the other camera.. I'll have to get hubby to load them on my laptop as I'm not sure where he put the camera memory card.

The Happy Crafty Infertile Mrs.White