Update

Well, this cycle resulted in nothing but a big fat negative. I even have to use the horrid progesterone again. I am really disappointed. On the upside, the progesterone is now on Walmart's $4 prescription list, so the entire cycle will only cost $21 between the clomid, progesterone and metformin!

In other news, I have a job doing private care for an elderly lady in Salt Lake. I am not sure how long this position will last in that I am having an extremely difficult time getting homework completed and I am a little nervous about driving so far in the dark and snow! So far it has worked out well, so we will just have to see.

Mark is still looking for a job and taking classes. His history class has a very intense amount of reading, something that he definitely does not enjoy. He has been really great since I started working in doing little projects around the house.

I will post again later because I have great news about engagements, birthdays and the like, but those posts really do deserve pictures!

Things I learned ....

from this year's vegetable garden.

1. Raised beds are awesome! So sometimes it is better to think within the box.
2. Roasted beets are the best...but for the quantity we will eat, I would rather not grow beets. Somethings truly are false economies.
3. No one really wants to eat nasturiums and marigolds, but they are pretty to have in the garden, and sometimes pretty needs to win over function.
4. The Glanville kids will eat green beans and green tomatoes straight of the vine, proving the good things sometimes come to those that do not wait.
5. Carrots are so not worth growing....they're cheap and don't taste any different.
6. We need to plant winter squash next year. Mmmmm, butternut squash, proving that new experiences enrich our lives!
7. More lettice and sugar snap peas, we never got enough!
8. More green beans are needed...see #4.
9. Zucchini and yellow squash are good in everything. Tacos, lasagna (instead of the noodles!), sloppy joes, soup, cake, cookies, mashed potatoes, meatloaf and so much more. However, even with all that variety, you still get sick of it and begging only makes your neighbors take so much off your hands.
10. Brussel sprouts are like people. We have grown them year after year and some years we have beautiful plants and some years the plants are small and scraggley, but that is not an indication of which will reproduce. This year we got exactly zero sprouts off of eight plants. Poor barren brussel sprouts.
11. Sometimes life surprises you. Like when your rhubarb plant comes with a hitch hiker in the form of a pumpkin plant that completely takes over your strawberry bed and driveway.

What did you learn from your garden this year?

BBT charting

As most infertiles do, we are now charting Basal Body temperatures! Yay! Fun! No more sleeping in, no more staying up all night and no more avoiding waking up to a foreign object in my mouth. Mark Has been wonderful in the charting in that the alarm goes off, and he turns off the alarm, pops the thermometer in my mouth, waits for it and charts the results. I rarely even fully wake up during the process. However, this morning, Mark forgot to turn the thermometer on and as he reached to turn it on, I thought, in my mostly asleep state, that he was taking it away. So I let go, and so did he. I had no idea that I could almost swallow a thermometer whole! Anyone else have charting snafus?

And time marches on......

I have finished my first progesterone prescription and also finished off the clomid. I had all the labs completed and time is marching on. I also now have an "official" diagnosis of insulin resistant PCOS. Truthfully this gave me a scare as we were reaching this conclusion. Dr. Get me Pregnant accidentally ordered the wrong glucose test which made it appear as though I was a full blown diabetic when the results came back in. Luckily Nurse Fabulousity caught it, reversed the charges and got the Dr. to order the correct test. Which means that I had to drink that disgusting glucose stuff a second time. The second lab came back only slightly abnormal, and hopefully the metformin will be enough to put it to rights. The other labs showed low estrogen, high androgen and left me with baseball sized bruises up and down my arms.
Mark's labs also came back slightly abnormal but the Dr. thinks that there is a good chance it was a fluke. He is supposed to see a Urologist to be retested in a few months, so we will see how things go. Want to know a secret? A small, and I do mean small, teeny weeny, part of me hopes that Mark's test results were not a fluke. Part of me wants to not be the only one with issues, wants to not be our only impediment towards parenthood. I'm awful. However, a much larger part of me hopes that the results really were just a fluke.
Surprisingly, the side effects of the clomid have been none existent for the most part (so far). The progesterone was another story. Two days after finishing the treatment, I honestly was wishing for death I was in SO MUCH PAIN! I have never experienced muscle aches,cramping and emotional loss of control like that in my entire life. I am really hoping that I will not have to go through that again next month!
I can't seem to function except in terms of fertility treatments. It has invaded every aspect of my life. Activities are planned around when meds need to be taken, or when ovulation might occur. I can't focus on school and my grades are suffering from it. I really need to buckle down. I know I should be realistic and accept that this will most likely not be a successful month, but that fragile, paper thin hope is there. Terrifying. Exciting. Exhilarating. Horrifying.

So.....I saw my drug dealer today...

.....err, I mean I saw my fertility specialist today. As of today we are officially undergoing fertility treatments. So far its relatively painless. I take a few pills on a complicated schedule of progesterone here, clomid there and a little metformin thrown in in for good measure. Tomorrow I go in for a fasting blood draw and a glucose test (which I am already dreading!). Wish us luck!

I agonized over whether or not to reveal our treatments and what we are going through but a few things made me decide to blog about it. First, Dr. Get me Pregnant urged me to find a way to vent and connect with other people in the same situation and I'll admit I have been known to search out blogs about infertility. Secondly, DR. Get me Pregnant encouraged me to be open with friends ad family so that when I am in a hormone induced rage over who didn't put the cups on the table exactly three inches above the plate, they would forgive me. Lastly, I wanted, no, needed a place where I could vent, cry, rage and express my fears. Sometimes I tend to overwhelm Mark with the strength of my emotions, so having a place to work through them will be good for me.

So here is the breakdown of the good, the bad and the ugly of fertility treatments.
*the cost of fertility treatments has been surprisingly low so far. The prescriptions were only $70 or so and the appointment was about the same. This was even without insurance. Mark and I still have labs to do however.
*Dr. Get me Pregnant and his wife struggled with infertility for several years so he understands where I am coming from
*So far I have taken my first dose of progesterone and metformin and no hormone induced rages have occurred.
*I'm terrified of not getting pregnant
*I'm terrified of getting pregnant
*I have school to distract me

Swimming at Payson Lakes

We had a blast swimming at Payson Lakes with the Glanville family, despite being burned to a crisp by the glaring summer sun! We had the most fun feeding the baby groundhogs and ducklings!

The Scottish Festival

We may not be Scottish, but that doesn't mean that we can't enjoy the sound of some wee bag pipes and watching a few highland games!