Appointment and new plan

I don't remember if I mentioned last week that I had an appointment with my fertility specialist? If I forget then I'm sorry because this appointment changed everything. We (I say we because my husband went with me) were going there to ask that I be put on birth control pills or metformin to help with the symptoms of PCOS. As you may have guessed, the doctor didn't think putting me on the pill would help much as our goal was still to have another child. He asked me a bunch of questions about how my cycle is now and said that I am basically fixing myself by losing the weight. Only problem is that I still do not ovulate and I am stuck, 15 pounds away from the goal we set in February.

As we were discussing options, I did something I had promised myself I would never do... I broke down and cried in a doctor's office. I think this may have been what changed the tone of the conversation (not that the doctor wasn't great even before that). He asked if we would be willing to keep trying to lose weight until October and if by then I was still stuck with pounds to lose, we would start the treatment anyway.

In the span of two weeks we went from, getting rid of all things baby to having a new plan to conceive our second child. By October we will be on fertility medications with ultrasounds to monitor progress and ensure that I ovulate and therefore time our "encounters" (haha) properly.

For the first time in months, I feel like I have hope again, like maybe it's still possible for us, that the dream is not quite dead yet. There's a light at the end of the tunnel and for once, it's not the train coming to hit us.

In the coming weeks, you will be hearing a lot about my weight loss adventure and probably about my cycle as well.

Have a good week everyone and see you all next week!

Decisions and feelings

I have to admit that I have not been very positive about the outcome of our "quest for baby" for a while now. While on vacation, I had what you would call a mini meldown and decided to sell all of my baby items so I wouldn't inadvertantly see them every time I am looking for something. I went through everything and realized I couldn't sell everything so, we have decided to sell only what we wouldn't mind getting "newer models" of. I've advertized said items on numerous bulletin boards, made posters and everything and so far... nobody's interested. I tried to sell baby clothes but that didn't work out the way I wanted it to, I just opened one of the plastic bins with my son's clothes in it and they still smelled like he did as a baby so I was not able to put any of the clothes up for sale.

We have also decided to take a break from trying to conceive. My PCOS is out of control right now and I have pain from the time I should be ovulating until the time I get my period, not fun let me tell you. I put in a call to my RE's office, asking to be put on the pill or metformin or something that can make this less painful. I also remember that I became pregnant with Nathan exactly one month after stopping the pill in 2005, guess I'm hoping it will do the same this time around.

How do I feel about these decisions... They were not easy decisions to make, I cried a lot and my husband didn't know what do to with me but now, I am at peace with them. Taking some time off trying to conceive will be great for my mental health, and we know it doesn't mean we are giving up. My dream is still to have another baby, unfortunately, it is not happening as soon as we wanted so what's another few months?

The story of the two years

So we started trying to conceive a second child in July 2007, just as our son was then turning one year old. We figured it could take a couple months but I would be pregnant by fall and our kids would have a two year age difference, which was exactly what we wanted. By September, I knew something was very wrong as I hadn't had a period since June. I made an appointment to see my OBGYN who was wonderful and said that the only issue with not having a cycle is trying to get pregnant so he prescribed Provera to induce a period and Clomid to make me ovulate. We tried Clomid at 50mg for two cycles, both were major failures since I did not ovulate on it.

On a side note, you will probably find it interesting to know that since my son was born, I have had a period at Christmas. That year was no exception, on December 24, my period came after 10 days of Provera and it was a bitch, I even considered going to the ER to get emergency care for my bleeding. That cycle, my OB wanted me to try Clomid at 100mg so we did. I had all the symptoms of ovulation but I didn't ovulate. The magic number for me on Clomid is 150mg, which we tried in the spring of 2008 and it worked perfectly but we timed it wrong so we didn't get pregnant.

We decided not to try the summer of 2008 but not prevent, we had a wonderful summer. Then in the fall we started trying again and in October I got a positive pregnancy test only to have my period 3 days later, I had a chemical pregnancy. Made another appointment with the OB who then decided it was time to send me to a fertility specialist. My OB also had a suspicion that I may have PCOS.

January 2009, first meeting with fertility specialist, he is absolutely wonderful! He agrees with the OB that I do have PCOS (based on numerous symptoms), orders blood tests and ultrasounds. Everything "looks" normal but I'm still not ovulating on my own consistently. We decide on a plan for me to start losing weight and to meet again in April. After our meeting in April, I had lost 20 pounds but trying to conceive was taking it's toll on me and in May I quit the weight loss program I was on.

We are now in August 2009, I have another 20 pounds to lose because of the 20 I'd lost then, I gained about 8 back. We will be getting back to the weight loss program in September, after our anniversary and my birthday have passed.

Next post, our decision and how I feel about the situation we are in.

Oh great, I suck at blogging

Seems like I posted the same message twice. First time I got an error message, figured it hadn't worked and this morning I come on here and what do I see... Double posts, darn! I promise I'll get better at this.

I'll be back later and keep telling my story... have a great day everyone who is reading!

Quick history

As the title says, my husband and I have been trying to conceive our second child for a little over two years with no success. For you to understand my story I have to go back a few years to when we first started trying for our first child. It was 1998 and I was turning 21 that summer. I had just started taking the birth control pill at the urging of my family who thought that having a child that early in our relationship would be a mistake. The pill made me sick and I had to stop after one cycle but my period never came back on its own after that. Fast forward a few months after our August wedding and our doctor prescribed Clomid to induce ovulation, it worked and I became pregnant only to miscarry at six weeks. Then everything went to hell, I started bleeding and never stopped. Doctors tried everything from the Depo shot to pills given to women during menopause, nothing worked. In 2004 I was fed up with my doctor's attitude toward my bleeding problem and decided to look for a new one, I then found my current family doctor who referred me to the most wonderful and competent OBGYN I had ever met. She had a suspicion that my problem was not only in my uterus and she was right, after tests and meeting with a hematologist, I was diagnosed with Von Willebran'd disease, a bleeding disorder. A few months later, she retired and referred me to her colleague who is equally as wonderful and competent as she was. By then I had been on birth control pills for six years straight. It was discovered that I had a uterine fibroid that was pressing on a blood vessel and it needed to be removed. I was taken off birth control, had surgery and a month later I was pregnant with my now three year old son. You would think that it would be easy to get pregnant now... Wrong!