Nope.

The first and most important thing to tell everyone today is how much I appreciate all of your kind words, good thoughts, prayers and wishes.  I was a little shy about documenting this journey and opening my wounds to the world, but ultimately I hoped it would help others as well as me.  I can’t express how much finding my new bloggidy friends who are experiencing the same roller coaster of frustrations and hopes and joys means to me.  Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

I woke up this morning at the godawful early hour of 6:40 am (I went to sleep at 1:40 am), grabbed a pregnancy test and used it.  After counting the required seconds in the stream, I placed it on a washcloth on the bathroom counter, covered it with tissue so I couldn’t read it, then left the room to get dressed.   Next I headed to the RE office for my 2nd beta/blood test.  I took along a container of strawberries freshly picked from my garden the evening before.  I wanted to give a little thanks to everyone at the office who have been so absolutely kind to me, they all kept telling us how much they were rooting for a positive and I know that they are all sincere and really care.  That also means so much during these delicate times.

One of the RE nurses, Katie stopped me as I came out of phlebotomy.  We talked in a room and I let her know that I didn’t think it worked since my pee test was negative the day before, but I wanted to make her aware of a few pains in my left side (near ovary/tubes area).  She told me that they would keep an eye on these beta numbers, and to not give up hope yet.  She did mention to call them any time day or night, even the emergency line if I had questions, but if I found I was in extreme pain, to head straight to the emergency room.  We talked a little about this IVF cycle, I mentioned I was ready to do another one if the doctors said it was OK.  She said that things overall looked pretty good.  I did stimulate well, we got to both egg retrieval and transfer, so the outlook was still overall pretty good.

I drove home and as soon as I got into the house went to check the results of the pee stick.  NOT PREGNANT was blazing up at me.  I wasn’t surprised.  I was back early enough to enjoy a snuggle with MrBeep.  I climbed in bed and told him the POAS results.  He held me tight, gave me lots of kisses and we talked. I started to cry and told him “I just didn’t do good enough for our monsters. They needed a better home with the best material possible, but I didn’t have it this time.  They are picky little monsters and I don’t blame them.”  MrBeep reminded me that this was something we had to work on and we knew it may take some rounds to hopefully reach success.  He said we’d work to find the best way to keep a monster or two.  I really hope he is right. 

I miss my monsters already.

MrBeep offered to stay home from work today, but I told him I had a ton of preparation for our short film shoot this weekend.  I told him I would call him with the news from the RE’s office and I asked him to try to come home early if the news was negative.  The call came around 2:15 p.m.  The nurse said she had spoke with Katie about our chat and she knew that I was perhaps expecting this news…”I’m sorry but the number has gone down today, it’s now at 10.4” she said.  I told her that I had checked the pee stick from this morning and knew.  The nurse was really sweet and supportive.  She told me to stop my meds.  She explained that they usually require a cycle off to let your hormones get back to normal, but that she would talk with my doctor and we may use this next cycle for the prep (some take birth control pills, my protocol is estrace/antagonist the couple of weeks before stimming).  We scheduled a cycle review meeting with DocO on Monday morning at 9:30 a.m.  So I will get my WTF meeting early next week.  I called MrBeep and gave him all of the news and plans.  He made me feel better and will be coming home early.  I love and appreciate him so much, it makes my heart ache.

I know this may sound trite or hokey, but I still feel really lucky.  I did not have some of the unbearable stress that many folks have had to endure due to the assvice of others, doctors who could give a shit, clinics that treat them as a number instead of a person, problems at work trying to juggle a challenging IVF schedule, or even medical complications along the way that would indicate really dire problems during a future IVF try.  The truth is, we all want to be that miracle IVFer, to be the “it worked on the first try girl” but given my age, the chances were in a room of 3 people, 2 wouldn’t come out with baby in their arms.  I was one of those two who didn’t and perhaps that’s OK.  I can afford another round, my spirit is not broken, time is ticking…but it has not run out.  In the end I will get the monster of my dreams.  In the end, I am still IF Optimist.