What a Week!

This week was the most obnoxious week on record. I started the week with an inkling that I might have gotten pregnant (let me tell you now, I'm not, so don't get your hopes up). I had all sorts of symptoms...metallic taste in my mouth, nausea, exhaustion, clumsiness, the works. I started using OPKs because I like them better than HPTs. I only had two left of my ancient internet cheapies, so I used those up. Each one looked darker than I would expect for my luteal phase, so I bought some at CVS to keep testing. The CVS brand turned positive. WHAT?? I would've sworn in a court of law that I had ovulated over a week prior, so they had to mean pregnant, right? Wrong. I had no signs of pending ovulation at this point, and all of my HPTs were clearly negative. So I checked my cervix. I know that it's usually high when I'm pregnant, and I also wanted to see if I had any fertile mucous. Instead what I found was a polyp. There was something there that I had never felt before, and I was terrified. So I called the OB/Gyn in the morning (this was yesterday), and she saw me only a few hours later. I know the nurse, who I had spoken with on the phone, thought I was just being a hypochondriac, but I knew what I had felt. And I was right...there was a polyp. The OB asked me if I wanted it removed, and I was like "umm of course..." And now they have to test it to make sure it's nothing weird and "just a polyp". The strange thing is that she found it in a bizarre place. Most polyps originate from the cervical opening, mine was nowhere near the opening... Anyhoo, she also took the full panel of blood tests to help me figure out what on earth was going wrong with my cycle. Here's what they found:

TSH: 1.54 uIU/ml
FSH: 2.5 mIU/ml
LH: 3.3 mIU/ml
Prolactin: 12.2 ng/ml
Progesterone: 12.14 ng/ml
Hemoglobin: 13.2 gm/dl
Hematocrit: 38.8%
hCG: 1.1 mIU/ml

This means, TSH is normal, FSH is normal, LH means I SHOULD NOT HAVE GOTTEN A + ON MY STUPID OPKS!!! Prolactin is normal (yay), progesterone means I ovulated most likely when I thought I did (ahhh so I was right!), hemoglobin & hematocrit are normal, although the hematocrit is juuuust barely on the lower side of normal (which means I'm still not anemic). hCG confirms that I am not pregnant at all...so my OPK REALLY SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN POSITIVE. I am really furious at CVS at getting my hopes up for no reason and you can be sure I'm sticking to internet cheapies from here on out. I called CVS and they want me to send them the rest of the OPKs for testing, and of course they're going to reimburse me for the purchase. Now everyone just needs to pray that they don't find anything weird from the polyp they removed...

Follies

So, I have 13 small follicles (under 10mm) on the left and 10 small ones (under 10mm) on the right side. Now what I'm wondering is if this is normal... I've been stimulating at 125IU of Follistim for 4 days and I don't have any larger follicles yet?!?! My endometrium is already at 8mm, so that's fine. My estradiol was around 200 pg/ml, LH around 3 mIU/ml and Progesterone around .3 ng/ml--so those are all normal. Has anyone else had this??? Am I going nuts? I go back on Friday for another follie check, so I hope that I have a bunch of big ones by then...but I'm kinda nervous...
:-(

Trigger Time!

This is the absolute earliest I have ever ovulated in my life. The problem with this? I can't go to the mikvah yet! 😟 So that means no condom collection for IUI. Thank goodness we got the ok from the rabbi to forego condom collection and do it the "usual" collection way for these sorts of things. No need for details. lol

Anyway, I've got now two follicles looking good for ovulation - 16mm on the right and 18.5mm on the left. So I have a chance for twins! Now wouldn't that be cool? (Or terrifying...) My endometrium is at 11.7mm, so right about what it was yesterday, and my estradiol has soared to 1335 pg/mL, LH is down to 3.59 mIU/mL (probably because of the Ganirelix), and my progesterone is nice at low at 0.565 ng/mL. So it's looking good for trigger tonight. All told, I've done 9 injections this cycle - add one trigger from my first Clomid cycle, and I've given myself 10 total shots. Not too bad! Hopefully I won't have to do any more... IUI in 2 days!

First Monitoring

Well, things are looking pretty good for this first IUI cycle. I have a bunch of little follicles and one big one on the left side - 17.5mm. My estrogen is SUPER high at 795 pg/mL and my LH is hanging in at 10.2 mIU/mL. Because my estrogen is so high, Dr Glatstein had a bit of a freak out and I have to start Ganirelix to prevent myself from ovulating. Yay, another injection. Can you feel the excitement? (Not!) I have to go back in tomorrow to check in on my follicles and estrogen, and it will probably be time to trigger. Yay!

Almost Ovulation Time!

That 14mm follicle from the other day has now blossomed into a 19mm follicle that's getting ready to go! My estradiol is now up to 263 pg/mL and my LH at 11.8 mIU/mL. My endometrium is over-achieving and is up to 13.7mm. Whew! Looks like a great environment for a baby to grow in, so hopefully this will be our month! I'm going to be doing ovulation predictors for the next few days, and then start progesterone a few days after ovulation. No more monitoring needed for this cycle. Yay! Fingers crossed!

Cycle Day 11

Things are growing! I've got a 14mm follicle on the left side, my endometrium is up to 8.3, and my estradiol is holding steady at 126 pg/mL. My LH is also holding at 13 mIU/mL and my progesterone is still low at 0.319 ng/mL - that's to be expected, since I haven't ovulated  yet. Next monitoring visit is in 2 days, and we'll see how things are going then. Hopefully ovulate within a few days after that visit.

Monitoring Day

I got my results back from day 8 monitoring and things are looking good. My estradiol is at 110 pg/mL and my LH is at 18.4 mIU/mL. No huge follicles yet, which is to be expected. But I have a bunch ready to go on either side, and my endometrium is starting to grow and is now at 6.4mm. I'll go back in for more monitoring in a few days and will update then!

Even More Bloowork

So, here are our CD 14 results:

1 follicle on the left ovary at 22.5mm
endometrium at 12.9mm
Estradiol at 392 pg/ml
LH at 18.1 mIU/ml

These are all normal and it shows that I'm at the beginning of the LH surge!! This means that I do the hCG trigger shot tonight and then we just wait...