Canceled

I always like to spell the word "cancelled" but blogger yells at me and tells me it should be "canceled". Potato, po-tah-toe, the result is the same, my IVF has been cancel(l)ed.

To recap, on Sunday morning the ultrasound showed 3 nice follies after 5 days of stim (so, very early) and my E2 was a happy 298. Then on Tuesday, I had lost one of the follies to ovulation and my LH and Progesterone were elevated. My RE had hoped that there was still a chance that we could rescue those last 2 follies, but the O train was leaving the station. On Wednesday's u/s, those last 2 follies were gone, having O'ed sometime between 8am on Tues and 8am on Wed. Probably on the earlier side because there were not fluid-filled cysts visible on Wed's u/s which you'd see for several hours after ovulation. We had "relations" on Saturday pm, Tuesday pm and Wednesday pm, but I'm afraid even the Tues pm may have been too late, assuming that the 12-24 hour life of most eggs is more on the 12 hour side for my old, crusty eggs -- if I ovulated those last 2 eggs shortly after they were seen on the Tuesday u/s, maybe at 10am -- then our 8pm Tuesday sexytime was pushing it.

So, I'm bummed to say the least. I was expecting a BFN out of this cycle, but at least the opportunity to complete the cycle. I was so excited after Sunday's u/s when we saw those three follies. I'm like a starving orphan who is happy for a crust of bread these days, but I would happily taken that crust of bread and thought it was better than filet mignon. But then even that crust of bread is taken away, so I'm left without food and a salivating mouth to boot.

I could handle a lost cycle and just pick myself and move into a December IVF if this had not counted with my insurance company as one of my precious covered cycles. But yes, my particular corner of the evil empire considers it an IVF cycle from the moment the meds prescription is filled. Part of me understands this, on the doses that I am on, I probably took over $6,000 worth of stims already. But they get out of continued monitoring and especially the ER and ET. I wish we had an option to pay off the meds out-of-pocket (not like we have that money sitting around) and still retain this covered cycle.

One thing I did get lucky on: my RE, Dr. Awesome, had a cancellation for an appointment yesterday, so I snatched it up. He was thoroughly perplexed by my cycle, especially compared to the previous cycle. In IVF #1, I stimmed for 15 days, had almost no response and went into ER with 1 follie with no sign of surging on my own. With IVF #2 after only 5 days of stims, I had those 3 follies and they were very big for only 5 days (16/15/13) and then, of course, surged on what was probably day 6. Total flip-flop and he can't figure it out. Yes, I increased the Meno.pur for this cycle (thus increasing LH) but the change shouldn't be this drastic. He did say it gives him hope that maybe the ovarian reserve on Rightie isn't as bad as we thought (I'm not holding my breath). The plan for the next maybe-cycle is to add in Gani.relix, which suppresses the surge, super early, like Day 3. I'm sure it'll be a disaster in its own new and spectacular way, but I appreciate his creativity.

So, the plan is to start EPP (estrogen patches + gani.relix shots) next Tuesday as a lead-in to a December IVF. If, somehow, one of those 3 eggs that were flying out of my ovary on Tues/Wed happens to take, the estrogen and LH-suppression will not hurt it. So yes, friends, I'm back on board for stressing out about travelling and Christmas-time and ER. Someone in the IF universe sure loves to play with me.