So my sweetheart has been back for a few days now (happyhappyhappy) and we still have these beautiful kittens in our home. I am on allergy pills and Shenandoah and I took them to a vet yesterday. The little grey and white one has an eye infection that will take about a week to fully heal. The blond one is just a cute, curious little scaredy cat. They have such sweet rambunctious spirits, it is almost like having two children in the house. We are all falling for them so we will have to find placement soon.
This surprising kitty distraction has temporarily lightened mulberry's and my conversations about our next steps but of course has not eclipsed it. I am doing the acupuncture for egg health and, now that she is back, she will start her regimen. We are still not sure if we should have her do a stimulation cycle since we have only tried one IUI for her. We are concerned about Clomid's possibility of multiples and mulberry seems clear she doesn't wish to try this option. We have seven samples of our donor (the only one of my ethnicity) and there are no more samples from him available. Having her go straight to IVF on her second try seems drastic but it is what we are considering.
We are worried about the effects of the harsh drugs on her body. And since our current plan involves her carrying embryos which are biologically related to me and then those biologically related to her, she would have to go through this process minimally twice. That is only if we are lucky. Sigh.
My own history of quick pregnancy (five tries, four pregnancies), then pregnancy loss doesn't buttress my faith that acupuncture and lovenox (a blood thinning drug) will help me carry a healthy baby to term. It is why we've considered mulberry carrying my embryos. I suppose there is still the possibility of me trying to carry but as I've mentioned, I have very little faith in that.
I'll have to do more reading about the added complications of my hypothyroidism and antiphospholipid antibody condition. Our doctor says I only have "a little" of the clotting issue and that it is not full blown, but I actually don't know what that really means. I probably didn't fully want to know, but now time is upon me.
The kittens have completely tuckered themselves out and are sprawled asleep next to me on the couch. Wish I could do the same but am off to work.
i've moved ;)
16 years ago
4 comments:
One of you asked on another blog why we had decided to go back to IUI after failed attempts at IVF (one w/miscarriage). After we received a diagnosis of alloimmunity, our RE felt that perhaps this was the reason I hadn't been able to get pregnant in the past-- my antibodies were killing off embryos before they had a chance to implant. I felt strongly about not putting myself or Vanessa through another IVF when my body might just kill off the (very hard won) embryos again. So we decided that if the problem was REALLY alloimmunity, an IUI + blood thinner ought to be enough to give us a fair shake at pregnancy. I felt like I could put trying behind me if this didn't work-- because I would have tried every reasonable course of treatment (wasn't willing to do Intraveneous Immunoglobulin-- the very expensive but most common treatment for allo). Otherwise, we were already beginning the adoption process.
It worked for us. Could have knocked me over with a feather. Let me know if you want to talk about it.
Which clotting issue do you have? My sis has Factor Five Leiden (I don't) and the MTHFR gene (I haven't bee tested yet). Trying to read up.
The antiphospholipid antibodies and antithyroid antibodies really depend a lot on which ones and what the numbers are.
Slight clotting issues can often just require an aspirin a day.
As for antibodies make sure you are taking either brazil nuts or just selenium supplemnts as it can help lower them (and has in me quite a lot).
I am sending lots of positive energy your way
Thank you so much for your input. I've got the MTHFR heterozygous gene but don't know my antibody numbers. Am investigating more as well.
Thanks for the tips gentle women.
D
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