Well, it's been a few months since I posted. I go back and forth between wanting to be public with what we're doing and keeping it a more personal journey. But ultimately I think this is a good forum for expressing myself. And maybe if I say it here, Jack won't get so tired of hearing about it at home! lol

So my last post basically said that we were investigating adoption. After that we decided to try the Clomid one more time. Well, I did Clomid that month, and OMG.... it worked! Not worked like I got pregnant worked, but I actually ovulated! Holy cow! I was using the ClearPlan Fertility Monitor just to see if I ever got an elevated or peak signal and I did! I was SOOOO excited that morning! lol Jack truly thought I had lost it!

So in June we did Clomid, I ovulated, and no pregnant.
In July we did Clomid, I ovulated, and no pregnant.

During this time I was charting my temps and watching my cervical mucus (as per the book Taking Charge of Your Fertility). I never did experience the egg white cervical mucus that is described, or anything close to it.

Also during this time, I had been seeing my regular gynocologist. He had an interest in infertility, but wasn't exactly a specialist. And his nurse... geez. I love her to death, she is so sweet, but she knew nothing about what I was looking for from an infertility standpoint.

So with all of this, I made a decision. Well WE made a decision, Jack and me. We decided to go back to where we started.... Dr. Richards. He's not a Reproductive Endocrinologist, but he is a fertility specialist.

I saw Dr. Richards in August, and even though I was a little bit past the standard Clomid window (cycle days 3-7 or 5-9), we went ahead with the prescription and Intrauterine Insemination (IUI). I took the Clomid for five days, then went in for a sonogram five days after the last pill. The sonogram showed one good follicle on my left ovary, which was great! Enough stimulation, but not too much!! It was still a little small, so he wanted to let it grow some more over the weekend (the sonogram was on a Friday), and then I was to go in Monday for a follow up sonogram and then the HSG shot to induce ovulation. The plan was that I would then have the IUI procedure on that Tuesday.

Well of course my body can't cooperate! lol I felt discomfort on my left side that Sunday, indicating that I was ovulating. I took an Ovulation Predictor Kit test and sure enough, it was positive! Monday morning I called Dr. Richards' office to inform them of the change of plans... I'd be needing the IUI a day early! Dr. Richards was actually out that day, but one of his partners, Dr. Bertrand would do the procedure.

I was at work waiting for a call back to tell me when and where to go. The nurse finally called back and told me to go to the ARTS lab at Presbyterian Hospital, that I had an appointment at 10:45 AM. Well it was 10:00 when she called! I called Jack (who had been put on alert!), and he came to pick me up from the office and we headed to the hospital. Thankfully downtown wasn't congested and we got there at 10:50! Jack went in and provided the deposit and we went to have lunch and hang out at Borders until the sample was ready.

We went back at 1:30 PM to pick up the sample.... "the boys!" lol Then headed across the street to see Dr. Bertrand. After a few, um, mishaps (the air conditioning wasn't on in the exam room, the motor on the table wouldn't work, some tools were missing, etc. lol) the boys were safely and successfully deposited! Yay!

Fast forward a week.... I had bloodwork done and my progesterone was 10.2, which is the highest it's ever been! Before I started the metformin, my progesterone would be less than 1.0, which means I did NOT ovulate, so the Clomid wasn't working. June was the first month of Clomid and Metformin, and my progesterone was 8.1, which confirmed that I did actually ovulate. July my progesterone was 5.3, so I ovulated but not really good. In reality, had I gotten pregnant either of those times I most likely would have miscarried because they want it to be over 10 to be able to sustain a pregnancy. So this was good news... it was the highest it had ever been, and was definitely high enough to avoid a miscarriage. Yay!

Fast forward another week.... cramping... not yay.... bleeding... really not yay. So in a nutshell.... all that and it didn't work. Bummer.

So I went in yesterday to see Dr. Richards, for a follow up sonogram before starting another round of Clomid, just to make sure there were no lingering cysts or follicles. Guess what, I still had a follicle hanging around. So we're going to give it a couple of weeks to see if it will go away on it's own.

At the same time, we have a new challenge.... the lab did a report on the quality and quantity of Jack's sperm. When this test/report was done three years ago, before Jack's accident, he had 156 million sperm! Which is awesome! However last month, his sperm count was only 3 million. Quite a drop! So Jack is going to go see a Urologist next week to see if they can figure out why it dropped so considerably.

So that's it! If you're still reading this.... thanks! lol I know it's a lot, but I really do want to chronicle this time and part of our lives, so I had some catching up to do! I won't wait so long for the next one! :o)

~Heather