First PRIDE class is finished!

So we're driving along to our appointment last night, and my husband, the man who has been ready to quit treatment for months now, says he thinks we should pursue the adoption as one path, but keep our other paths open. The loss of the genetic connection is finally starting to hit him. And who can blame him? If it weren't for my fucked up body, he could have a biological child. We discussed the surrogacy and donor eggs. If we did a surrogate, he would like to ask his sister to be the carrier. I think I would prefer someone anonymous, but he feels very strongly that it should be a family member. So I told him he could ask her if he wanted to, but keep in mind this is a huge burden, and she will always feel connected to that child and it could be awkward. I also don't think I could see someone else pregnant with my baby. The egg donor option is very expensive, and the child would be genetically his and not ours. I've always said if it couldn't be both of ours I'd rather adopt, but if it's important to him, I could do that route. But you know, the funny thing is, I can't fathom cycling again right now. If someone offered me a free IVF cycle right now, today, I would have to say NO.

After dealing with a minor traffic accident on I-45 (idiots didn't clear their cars to the shoulder as required by law, and snarled up traffic for a few miles, making us 10 minutes late), we arrived for our pre-adoption counseling appointment with our social worker Cindy. First we did our paper exchange, and turned in our application, marriage certificate, divorce decree from my first marriage, and our vet records. In exchange we received an employment verification form, a health certification, and fingerprint cards. Afterwards we talked about why we were adopting, and infertility. She asked when my last cycle was, and said that since it was still a very raw, fresh wound that there may be some sessions in the class that will be hard on me. She gave me a copy of "The Long Awaited Stork: A Guide to Parenting after Infertility". She seemed concerned that the process may happen too quickly for me, and that we should take this at my own pace. She also seemed rather emphatic that doing a nursery was a bad idea. Hmmmm.

Then we drove over to DePelchin for our first PRIDE class. We signed in, got some food (pork sausage but I had corn and potato salad), and sat with the minister and his wife from Cutnshoot TX who we recognized from orientation. The class was mostly introductory stuff, but the teacher was wonderful and energetic, and had a lot of class discussion. We talked about our respective roles in the process, how we need to work as a team, what would be expected of us in class, a little bit about the history of foster care, and the differences and similarities between foster and foster/adopt. We also watched a movie about a foster family and two of the kids they had taken in, and what the possible resolutions of a foster situation were. We didn't get home until 9:30, so it's going to be a long few weeks. And we have homework! I didn't look at it but will get it done for tomorrow's class.

My vagina

What can I say, IF really wrecks your sex life. First the hormones - they make you fat, the needles leave bruises all over you, and take away your sex drive completely. Then all the restrictions with IVF of no sex after retrieval, but you have to have sex 3 days before retrieval, but you don't want to because you are so bloated and your ovaries hurt from being overfilled with eggs.

My vagina is feeling pretty tired these days, and doesn't want anything inside of her. I normally use the Keeper menstrual cup, and for several months I haven't been able to stand it, and I've been wearing pads. Yes, pads. Ugh. Then there are all those visits being poked and prodded by the dildo-cam. Doctors and other medical personnel constantly looking at your poor vagina. A D&C to suck your poor baby out through your vagina.

David feels the same way, just sapped by all this. We haven't had sex since June 8th, and it hasn't really bothered either of us. I am no longer bleeding, but we just don't feel like it yet. I'm hoping our nice romantic trip to Jamaica will help, and I'll definitely bring some sexy undies.

Familial reactions, part 1

I talked with both my parents this week (they're divorced). They both sound a little lukewarm with regards to the adoption. I think not the adoption per se, but the fact that we're going to do foster, so we may end up with a half-black kid, or a drug-addicted infant. My mom seems like she's fine with adopting, as long as we get a white baby who is healthy. My parents are pretty white bread, and live in a small town in New England where there aren't very many people who are different from them.

My best friend, who is a social worker, realizes there are risks with foster/adoption, but she's very supportive. She's going to be one of our references.

In general, most people have seemed supportive so far. We'll see what happens.

Oh, and I ordered the fish stencil set.

Sudden stabbing reminders of infertility

You never know what is going to trigger one of those agonizing moments of IF pain, what little thing will remind you that you are infertile. I stopped today to pick something up for my husband, and when exiting the parking lot, drove right by the restaurant where we had dinner to celebrate our pregnancy. It didn't even register with me that it was that place, but I just started crying. Then realized why I was crying.

To nursery or not to nursery?

I've been thinking a lot about if we needed to have a nursery ready before a placement. With the foster/adopt system, once we get licensed, we literally could get a placement that day and we need to be ready. So, that leads to the question "should we go ahead and prepare a nursery?"

I remember when I first went off the Pill, thinking surely I'd get pregnant easily. I was unemployed at the time, and I browsed a lot of websites, bookmarking furniture and slings and cloth diaper sites. As time passed and infertility started taking over my life, I had to stop looking at all these sites. But then the miracle happened and I got pregnant, and I went back to all those websites to look at them again. Then miscarriage reared its ugly head, so once again I had to stop browsing.

Now that having a child is once again a reality, and a more certain reality than IVF ever offered, I am thinking about the nursery. We know we want to do an ocean theme, since we met diving, and it's good and gender-neutral. The room as it stands has kind of mustard yellow walls. I want to do this mural on one wall. I was looking around for fish sheets yesterday, and found this bedding that I really like. I hope blue is gender-neutral enough.

I think doing the nursery will be therapeutic. I'm toying with at least ordering the stencils ...

My whirlwind treatment history

Here's a summary of my IF treatment, just for the record.

• 2/03: Quit BCP
  
• 2/04: HSG - right tube inconclusive, left tube clear
  
• 12/03 - 3/04: 4 Clomid cycles, last with IUI
  
• 5/04: IUI #2 - Femara + Bravelle boosting + Ovidrel (107M, 55M / 90%mot)
  
• 6/04: IUI #3 - Bravelle + Pregnyl (81M / 95%mot)
  
• 7/04: Laparoscopy and hysteroscopy - cleaned mucus from right tube and a bunch of endo
  
• 7/04: Passed Clomid Challenge Test! IUI #4 - Clomid + Pregnyl + 2x mini-dose HCG
  (80M, 74M / 95%mot)
  
• 8/04: IVF #1 w/ microdose Lupron overlap protocol
  - Retrieved 15, 11 mature, 7 fertilized. Transferred 3, nothing to freeze.
  
• 12/04: IVF #2 with Lupron flare protocol
  - Retrieved 11, 6 mature, 5 fertilized. Transferred all 5.
  
• 1/05: Endometrial biopsy shows endometritis - one month of antibiotics
  
• 3/05: Repeat hysteroscopy, HSG, and EMB - all clear!
  
• 4/05: IUI #5 with microdose Lupron and Gonal-F (114M / 95% mot)
  
• 5/05: Final IVF with Cetrotide/microdose HCG/Gonal-F protocol
  - Retrieved 16, 12 mature, 8 fertilized. Transferred 7.
  
• 14dp3dt: Beta = 176
  
• 18dp3dt: Beta = 908
  
• 7/11/05: First ultrasound - saw one gestational sac, yolk sac, and probable fetal pole. No h/b yet.
  
• 7/19/05: Second ultrasound - h/b at 95 BPM, measuring about a week behind.
  
• 7/26/05: Third ultrasound – h/b at 68 BMP, measuring 3 weeks behind. Bubba didn’t make it.
  
• 7/29/05: D&C
  
  Sadly, I am still technically in the "unexplained infertility" category. We know now that I can get pregnant. The doctor thinks the m/c was likely genetic - there were changes in the yolk sac at my last ultrasound that indicate genetic abnormalities. We had ourselves karyotyped, and the fetal tissue is being analyzed. You'll have to stay tuned for those results, because I don't have any of them yet. They say it can take up to 3 months to analyze the fetal tissue.
  
  "Unexplained" infertility has got to be the worst diagnosis. Left to my own devices, I am a late ovulator, have a short luteal phase, and minimal cervical mucus due to a cone biopsy in 1990 and a LEEP in 2001. David has great sperm, my tubes are open, and we fixed the uterine infection (likely caused by past exposure to chlamydia, which I never knew I had). I have a decent egg response even though I need high doses of Gonal-F to get them. It's hard to give up on pregnancy when you still have a good chance of getting pregnant. But I can't ride on the IF rollercoaster any more.

We're oriented and heading in the right direction

We had our orientation with Homes of St. Mark (HSM for short) on Friday. It was wonderful. They really made us feel like we're going to be in good hands with them. Several things I liked:

• They specialize in infants and young children
• They specialize in children that have a high likelihood of being adopted
• They understand that the infertiles need to have a child with a high likelihood of adoption, given that we've already been through a lot of loss
• They are more than willing to help ease the bureaucracy and red tape as much as possible

Did you know there are 900 children in the Houston area who need homes? Yup, 900.

There were about 10 other couples at the orientation. Some were infertiles, some were just people who had grown children and wanted more. They basically went over the whole process with us and answered questions. The process is relatively fast. Next week we will have our pre-adoption counseling session, where the social worker meets with just the two of us. Then we will begin our PRIDE classes, which will last for a month. We'll learn all about parenting special needs children and take infant CPR and first aid. And they feed us dinner! After all the classes are complete they will finish our homestudy. We can go ahead and take care of some of it, like collecting our pet vaccination records, getting a TB test, getting fingerprinted, having a fire inspection of our home, and making a little photo album/scrapbook that has photos of our house, our pets, and us and what activities we like to do. Then we'll have them come to the house a few times to make sure it's all safe and we'll have more interviews. After all that is done, then we will be licensed to be foster parents!

The child has to reside with us for at least 6 months in Texas before they are eligible for adoption. And the birth parents have to get their rights terminated, either voluntarily or involuntarily by the judge. So once you have TPR (termination of parental rights) and they've been with you for 6 months, they are legally free for adoption. So we could have our baby early next year!

It's so wonderful to feel hopeful again. I left there feeling like we were in really good hands, and that we're with the right agency, and that WE ARE GOING TO HAVE OUR BABY.

My Big Bag of Needles

I've been carrying around this huge shopping bag full of syringes (unused) and a jar full of used needle tips in the back seat of my car for several days now. You see, I had my final RE appointment on Tuesday, and I meant to give the Big Bag of Needles to them. But I forgot, and left them in the car. So now I have this dilemma of what to do with them. They are symbolic of ending my infertility treatment, and they deserve a special ending. Maybe I should go downtown and leave them under a freeway overpass for the junkies. Or I could leave them anonymously on the RE's doorstep, with a note that the RE should take good care of them for me. Maybe I could make some kind of effigy from them and burn them.

I have spent the last two and a half years trying to have a baby. We tried the old-fashioned way for several months, then moved on to a few cycles of Clomid. Then I started with the RE and the fun of injectible IUI cycles, five of them. Then three rounds of IVF. Hence all the needles. I finally got pregnant on my last IVF cycle, and miscarried at 9 weeks. But that's all a story for another day.

We have decided it's time to get off the infertility rollercoaster, and onto a new ride. So today we are going to have our foster adoption orientation. I was wondering yesterday what I should wear. I don't want to look like I dressed up for it, but not like a total slouch either. This morning when I got up, my husband David said "what do you think we should wear to this thing?". I guess great minds think alike.