I Want to Break Free: Tales from Bed Rest

Okay, folks, another medical post is ahead. So it contains, you know, medical information. Be warned!

Six days after my egg retrieval and three days after my embryo transfer, I landed at my doctor's office for an emergency visit. I'd been dealing with some side effects of my progesterone in oil shots on Sunday (day following my embryo transfer), but the on-call doctor had given us some instructions which appeared to have helped. On Monday I'd felt much better and gone to work for a full day.

On Tuesday, I woke up feeling fine, got dressed and headed off to work, where I had two cases in court. As I sat in the courtroom waiting for the judge to come out, I spoke with a few other attorneys on my cases. I could feel the beginnings of discomfort but thought nothing of it; however, by the time I was ready to stand up and leave the courtroom, I was in a tremendous amount of pain. So much so that I actually had to mentally and physically prepare myself to stand. I anticipated that standing would hurt terribly, but I didn't want to draw attention to myself by, for example, screaming in pain. After a few minutes of preparation, I managed to stand up, but the pain only continued to get worse. A coworker spotted me and asked if I was alright. At this point, I was imagining my death in Courtroom 1: it hurt to sit, it hurt to stand, it hurt to walk. Something was seriously wrong and I needed to get out of there immediately.

My coworker offered to stand in for me on my cases and I left the building. Once back at my office, I phoned my doctor who told me to come in right away. Another coworker agreed to drive me, but not before confiscating my heels and forcing me to put on her Birkenstock sandals. In the car I phoned Husband who agreed to meet us there.

The doctor ordered blood work, did an ultrasound and monitored my weight. I've gained nearly five pounds since the retrieval which is a tell-tale sign of ovarian hyperstimulation. The ultrasound confirmed that despite the gallons of Gatorade that I've consumed lately, the modified bed rest that I've been on for the last week, and the use of Lupron as opposed to HCG as my trigger medication, I had a slight case of hyperstimulation.

But why the pain? It turns out that I also had a ruptured ovarian cyst. As I understand it, when an egg is removed from a follicle, it creates a small cyst. Since I'd had 33 eggs removed, that meant I had 33 cysts floating around like little ticking time bombs. These cysts typically dissolve on their own, but since the lining becomes paper thin once an egg is removed, they can also rupture quite easily. This occurs spontaneously and is excruciatingly painful. According to my doctor, it can happen again and if the embryo transfer actually turns out to be successful (i.e. I'm pregnant), the pain will get worse before it gets better.

My doctor ordered a week of bed rest. He basically wants me to be completely sedentary until all the cysts dissolve on their own or else I run the risk of being stranded somewhere else suddenly in undying pain. I figured I'd chronicle my bed rest to (1) demonstrate that it is not as great as it sounded, (2) give other poor unfortunate souls who might find themselves on bed rest ideas on how to occupy themselves, and (3) have something to do while I was on bed rest other than staring mindlessly at the television all day.

Day One (half day): By the time we got home from the doctor's office and from picking up my medication...and about thirty gallons of Gatorade, it was after 1pm. Husband was home on this particular day which means he was enforcing a strict set of rules. He brought me my lunch and dinner on a tray, which is nice in theory, but eating in bed with a tray is really more of a romantic ideal than a practical reality. Particularly when one is attempting to eat soup which sloshes all over the place with every movement of the bed. The dogs were prohibited from being in the room with me since Izzy has a tendency to sit on my stomach, which Husband decided was likely the cause of my ailment necessitating the bed rest in the first place. Luckily by the evening, both Izzy and I had managed to convince him that she was completely capable of snuggling next to, rather than on top of, me.

When I was about ready to lose my mind, the television schedule came to the rescue: Classic Albums: A Night at the Opera followed by a five episode mini-marathon of Star Trek: The Next Generation. I emailed my mother and sister to let them know what was going on and instructed them to devise ways to entertain me over the next week. Five minutes later, they both called me. Hm, clearly they fail to understand that I'm on bed rest for a week, not for twenty minutes.

Day Two: Word of my bed rest traveled fast and I got no less than four phone calls to keep me entertained! Another friend happened to email me first thing in the morning so I relayed my plight and we emailed back and forth all day. Last year a coworker was on bed rest for three weeks after foot surgery and one day she was climbing the walls with boredom so she called me at the office.

Coworker: What's going on at the office?

Me: Not much...Hey, what's that noise?

Coworker: What noise?

Me: It's like music playing...I recognize it...Is that the theme song to Bonanza?

It turns out that in her boredom every day at 2pm she had taken to watching Bonanza. I tried to watch Bonanza but I hadn't been on bed rest long enough for that to be entertaining. It did amuse me greatly to call her at the office while the opening credits were rolling so she'd hear the music in the background.

I will say that on the day I returned to work (the following Tuesday), there was a Star Trek: The Next Generation marathon on SyFy. Seriously, I cannot stress the strength of character that it required for me to turn off the television and go to work that morning, since sadly at that point, I was feeling completely fine and had received clearance from the doctor to return to work. All I can say is, "Star Trek, where were you during the last five days when I was stuck with Bonanza?"

Day Three: Today I decided that daytime television was unwatchable so I decided to crack a book. You may recall that I read and reviewed the first book in Steig Larsson's trilogy, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, on vacation this summer. I never ended up reading the second two books since vacation ended. Well, bed rest isn't exactly vacation, but I was running out of options. I plowed through the second book The Girl Who Played With Fire in one day. It's definitely a fast read. However, because there weren't any characters that remind me of Roger Taylor, I don't have a book review for you. I'd heard that it was a fast read and it absolutely is. I started reading late in Day Two and finished on Day Three. I'd definitely recommend the series and currently have the hardcover version of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest sitting on my bedside table.

Day Four: I'm on the move! Today I had my follow-up doctor's appointment. Husband decided to work from home because he insisted on driving me. An ultrasound revealed that my ovaries were back down to a more manageable size and the blood had cleared out, confirming that I had, in fact, ruptured a cyst. My doctor cleared me to return to work on Monday if I made it through the weekend without issue and allowed me to travel to Boston to visit our good friends and their six week old baby! Things were definitely looking up and in recognition of the positive news from the doctor, Husband allowed me to have bed rest in the living room! That meant access to our DVR'd television shows so I got to enjoy some old Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes that I had taped and never watched. Yay!

But then I started thinking about what the doctor's report really meant. He had specifically told me on Tuesday, at my first appointment, that my ovarian hyperstimulation would get worse if I was pregnant. This is because the HCG hormone used to trigger ovulation, which agitates the ovarian hyperstimulation, is created naturally by the body when it's pregnant. So to hear on Friday that my ovaries were back down to normal size, made me worry that the IVF hadn't worked.

Husband said that we shouldn't read too much into the situation. Our doctor has always been candid, nearly to a fault, and he left the appointment saying, "Good luck on your pregnancy test next week." My history with him suggests that he would have said, "Well, this isn't going to happen," or something equally dismissive if he really had any idea what was going on so I had to trust that Husband was right when he said that it was too soon to tell and I shouldn't get disappointed.

Day Five: Travelling Bed Rest. My poor friend had high hopes that we'd be able to drive into Boston, walk around in the city, and actually give her a chance to get out of the house with her six week old. I delivered the bad news that I was only allowed to come if my bed rest continued and we basically just stared at the baby for the afternoon. She was disappointed but understood. When she suggested a lunch place down the street, she actually offered to drive me around the corner and drop me off. I convinced Husband that a 50 yard walk was probably fine and he agreed on the condition that since the restaurant was BYOB, I would BYOG (Bring Your Own Gatorade) so off he trotted to the corner store to pick up some more Gatorade.

Day Six: Today was technically supposed to be my last day of bed rest. I'd made the permanent move from the bedroom to the living room and was expecting visitors in the form of fellow princesses and mini-princesses that afternoon! Very exciting! Husband was off at a day long firm meeting so I had the house to myself and I discovered something amazing: Soapnet's Breakfast in Bed Sunday morning programming. Four back-to-back episodes of Beverly Hills 90210! Heaven! It's been so long that 90210 went off the air (more than ten years. Yikes!) that I forgot how absolutely ridiculous and completely addicting it can be! The morning flew by and before I knew it, princesses were arriving with minis in tow, along with delicious brownie cheesecake, frosted cupcakes, and How to Train Your Dragon. I can't say I totally followed the movie as while we attempted to watch it, mini princesses were running amok, stealing bites of brownie cheesecake, alternating between playing tug and fetch with Izzy, and trying to avoid being humped by Abbie. So as to not upset the children, we referred to the humping as hugging which lead to the funniest quote of the day, "She always hugs me from behind!" Oh Abbie, you stinker!

After my guests left, I started to feel pain which was disturbingly reminiscent of premenstrual cramps. Suddenly the thought of waiting another two days before I was allowed to take my pregnancy test was horrifying and I sat terrified for the rest of the evening that I was about to get my period.

Day Seven: This was Monday and supposedly the day I was authorized to return to work. However, the pain from the previous evening had morphed into something more reminiscent of the pain I experienced a week earlier which had set this whole bed rest business in motion...or rather, in bed. I had two matters scheduled in court that a co-worker agreed to cover and I called my doctor to inform them that I was taking another day of bed rest. I informed my nurse that I imagined that the pain was due to my ovaries becoming enlarged again due to the HCG my body was producing on account of my being pregnant. She didn't laugh at this suggestion so I decided that this was clearly what was happening!

On this day, I made an amazing discovery. It seems Wil Wheaton, the actor who played Wesley Crusher, on Star Trek: The Next Generation, has had quite a prominent online presence for many years. He has a Twitter account and a blog and in addition to acting, has become quite a prolific writer! I stumbled upon his blog which directed me to this webpage.

One of Wil's books was a retrospective about the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The book apparently contains humerous plot descriptions, commentary on the more corny elements of the show, and Wil's own memories from filming. Prior to the book's release, Wil decided to record podcasts discussing the first thirteen episodes. What!!?!??! 

Luckily Husband and I have recently caught up on many of the show's first season's episodes so they were fresh on my mind. And let me just say, Wil's podcasts are so funny! I think I listened to five or six on my last day of bed rest and I was so disappointed that he stopped after the thirteenth episode because I wanted to hear more! Definitely check it out!

On Tuesday, I finally returned to work. Physically, I felt fine, but emotionally, I was a bit of a wreck. On my lunch hour, I ended up crying in my office on the phone with Husband. The stress of waiting for Wednesday had finally gotten to me and unfortunately the odd pseudo-cramps continued to I was constantly in a state of fear that my period was imminent.

I hate to leave you with a cliffhanger again readers (although this time at least I realize I'm doing it!), but check back next Saturday to find out what happened when I went in for my pregnancy test. And while you wait, I promise I'll actually post some outfits to tide you all over since I've actually been wearing pants again now that I've broken free from bed rest! Hurray!

At Last: Embryo Transfer

*DISCLAIMER* So it's come to my attention that it seems I need a disclaimer at the beginning of this post. This post, along with all others that I have clearly labeled and tagged Medical Me, contains medical information. I am undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) and since I was unable to find many honest accounts of the process online, I decided to write about my experience to help others who may undergo the same procedure in the future. I've been vocal about the fact that some may not be comfortable or happy with the direction my blog is taking this year and if it is time that we part ways, let's do so amicably. You do not have to read these posts. There will not be a test. *END DISCLAIMER*

The day after my egg retrieval, I got a call from my doctor's office. Of the 33 eggs they had removed, 26 were mature and 23 had fertilized. This meant we had 23 embryos to monitor for use at either the transfer or to freeze and use later.

My embryo transfer was scheduled for 12:30 on a Saturday. Again we had to arrive about forty-five minutes prior to the procedure because I needed to have blood drawn and they needed to prep me for the procedure. Once in the prep room, the nurse told us about the embryos they were going to transfer. She called them, "beautiful" and showed us a picture. For a transfer, the ideal embryo has either 6 or 8 cells and is rated on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the highest. Our two embryos were both 8 cells and rated a 2. The doctor told us that none of our embryos were ready to be frozen yet and the final decision would be made after they developed for a few more days.

For the transfer, I had to arrive with a full bladder. This was the biggest concern to me. At this point, I was something like 50% Gatorade and I already use the bathroom once an hour so the idea of not being able to go to the bathroom for nearly three hours was a little terrifying!

At my retrieval, the nurse explained that by full, they didn't mean "ready to explode" full so that was reassuring. In the end, I had my regular breakfast of cereal and coffee, went to the bathroom before we left, and that turned out to be fine. I had a prescription for Valium that I decided to take about thirty minutes prior to the procedure. It made me pretty loopy while we were sitting in the waiting room, but I feel like it basically wore off by the time I was in the operating room.

Prior to starting the IVF drugs, my doctor did a "trial transfer" to take some measurements, the logic being that they wanted everything to go smoothly when there were actually embryos in the catheter. An embryo transfer is very similar to the IUI process except they use an abdominal ultrasound to confirm the positioning of the embryos. The sensation feels very much like a pap smear although it lasts a bit longer since the doctor had to properly position the catheter before inserted the embryos.

Afterwards they wheeled me out to the recovery room where Husband was waiting. I had to lie there for another thirty minutes then I was was permitted to use the bathroom (finally!) and go home. I spent the rest of the afternoon on bed rest and Husband picked up some yummy dinner for me.

Following the transfer, most patients wait approximately two weeks before going back for a pregnancy test. Before then, the body isn't producing enough HCG to confirm whether the transfer worked. However, since I don't do anything the easy way, I ended up back at the doctor's office twice during this two week period. Stay tuned on Friday to read all about what happened there!

Royal Oil: Progesterone in Oil Shots (as administered by Husband)

You might think from all the shots that I've had to give myself during the IVF process (click here and here and here), that no new shot would phase me. Such is not the case: I was actually super terrified of the fourth and final shot of the IVF process.


Subcutaneous needle (top) and intramuscular needle (bottom).

 The progesterone in oil shot is different from other shots for two major reasons. First, rather than an subcutaneous needle, it requires an intramuscular needle. And second, because the shot has to go in my back, I couldn't administer it myself...meaning I had to trust Husband to give me the shot.

I love Husband. Obviously. And I really do trust him, in every single regard. But truthfully Husband has not handled this whole medical situation very well. He had a panic attack at the doctor's office when we found out about the miscarriage. And another in the middle of my HSG procedure.

Despite him having the very best of intentions, I just couldn't shake the mental image of him sticking me with the needle, promptly passing out, and then me having to retrieve a 1.5 inch needle from my own backside before driving him to the hospital.

It wasn't a pretty picture, readers.

Husband assured me that he could get through it and to show him that the shots aren't that painful, he watched me inject some Follistim when we first started the IVF cycle. I purposely neglected to tell him that the shot for which he was responsible involved a needle three times the size of the Follistim needle.

Before the first shot, I did a ton of research online, looking for tips on how to make the shot less painful or reduce the likelihood of bruising. My search did not yield very successful results: most women offered some tips, but still stating that they had bruising and welts all across their backsides. This did nothing to ease my mind.

Luckily the nurse at my retrieval had asked if I wanted her to draw circles where the shot needed to be administered. Brilliant! I agreed right away and when the circles started to fade, we redrew them. Walking around with two huge Sharpie circles on my backside was no small consolation for Husband knowing exactly where to give me my progesterone in oil shot.

On the first day, I used ice to numb the spot. Afterwards I ended up finding it unnecessary, but for anyone else going through these shots, this will help you relax. I climb onto our bed and lean all my weight to the side opposite where I'm getting the shot: we alternate sides and Husband moves around within the circle so that one spot doesn't get too tender.

When Husband pulls the needle out, he immediately takes a wet warm washcloth and massages the area with it. This supposedly helps disperse the medication throughout the body without allowing it to get all clogged up in one area. On the package, it recommends activity following the shot, but that's not been possible since I was on bed rest during this time. I didn't find that the lack of movement led to any significant discomfort; however, the one day that we didn't use the warm towel (we were traveling and had to do the shot at a friend's house), I definitely felt more discomfort than most days.

I joked that my doctor will want to hang Husband's picture on the wall of his office as a Super Star Progesterone in Oil injector since after ten days of injections, I don't have a single welt or bruise.

Unfortunately I did have some side effects with the progesterone in oil, some seriously uncomfortable side effects. The worst being constipation. Husband being the stickler for rules that he is, he refused to allow me to take any medication until we contacted the after hours doctor on call. Thankfully the doctor called right back and gave us a list of "more natural" remedies, including warm prune juice.

I've never had prune juice before but figured it can't be all that bad. After all, there's a recurring storyline on Star Trek: The Next Generation involving prune juice. Worf loves prune juice! It's the only Earth drink that he allows Guinan to serve him! Prune juice! If you had to pick one drink that you enjoyed above all others, wouldn't it have to be a pretty nice tasting drink?

BLAH!!!!!!!

Prune juice is awful. Warm prune juice is even worse.

I finally came to the conclusion that Worf must like prune juice because he considers himself a warrior. And to be a proper warrior, one must deal with horrible, terrible, unthinkable things...like prune juice. I swear he must drink it as part of a pain regime designed to strengthen and/or deaden his taste buds.

After choking down two full glasses of warm prune juice, I waved the white flag. The doctor had listed out a few other safe remedies that I could use, including Colace and Miralax. Once Husband saw my prune juice-related misery, he ventured out to the store to get a few of the recommended real and thankfully tasteless medications.

Progesterone injections are really important during the IVF cycle: so much so that after a week, my doctor increased my dose from 1 cc to 1.5 cc. For some reason my body doesn't generate enough progesterone on its own so I'll likely have to continue the shots well past the pregnancy test, which is scheduled for two weeks following the retrieval (assuming it's positive, that is).

I'm so glad that Husband has managed to be such a great shot giver. It turns out that when I really need him, as expected, he rises to the challenge!

Again, I'd emphasize that, like most of the IVF process, the anticipation of the progesterone in oil shots is much worse than the actual shots. Surprisingly, I don't even find that they hurt much beyond a small prick when Husband first puntures my skin. I mentioned to the nurse at my embryo transfer that I should be thankful for my "extra padding", but she says that when someone is super thin, they use a shorter needle so these shots will be relatively pain free for most everyone! Good to know!

We started the progesterone in oil shots the night after my retrieval and then two days later, I went in for the final stage of IVF: the embryo transfer. Check back on Tuesday to read about that!

Going Under: IVF Retrieval Process

Once I gave myself my HCG/Lupron trigger, I ventured into uncharted IVF territory. From that point on, everything I was about to experience was brand new to me and unlike anything I'd gone through with my three IUI cycles. I have to admit I was a little nervous about those next three steps: retrieval, progesterone in oil shots, and transfer.

Retrieval is the process of removing the follicles which (hopefully) contain eggs. My biggest fear regarding retrieval was that it requires general anesthesia so I was going to be out cold.

Luckily I've been under general anesthesia before. When I was 11, I had oral surgery and the doctor only used a topical anesthesia. I talked through the entire surgery, "What's that?" "What are you doing now?" So when I returned 8 years later to get my wisdom teeth out, the doctor basically said that he wouldn't do the surgery unless I was completely unconscious.

Seriously.

I remember feeling a cold tingly feeling in my arm, then the next thing I knew, the nurse was trying to get me to stand up to walk to another room. My first thought was, "Why the heck didn't they put me under in the room where they were going to do the surgery?" Just as I was about to vocalize this very complaint, I realized I had a mouth full of gauze and that the surgery was apparently over. Oh.

Another concern is that I my veins are very thin and tend to float around. The medical term for this is, and I'm seriously not kidding, princess veins. This causes quite a bit of anxiety while the anesthesiologist is poking around trying to find a usable vein and I'm already panicked about the surgery in the first place.

My doctor had given me a full page of instructions for the day of my surgery. I wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything after midnight (Husband joked that I was like a Gremlin.) and I couldn't wear jewelry or anything scented. Even contacts were prohibited so I had to bust out my brand new glasses. We were told to arrive 45 minutes early so they could prep me for my 8:30 am appointment. I said goodbye to Husband, who wasn't allowed into the surgical suite, and hoped that I would wake up at some point later that morning!

This particular anesthesiologist was great. She introduced herself and told me that she had Pandora radio on her iPhone and said I could choose whatever band or type of music I wanted to listen to while she administered the anesthetic.

Any guesses as to what band I picked?

It sounds so stupid, but seriously sitting there, listening to Somebody to Love while the anesthesiologist tried three different spots to inject the IV calmed me so much! Unfortunately with Pandora, the play list tends to deviate a bit so by the time we were in the procedure room, Hotel California was playing. My anesthesiologist asked if there was a second band I liked and I requested Neil Diamond so I got to drift off to sleep to the sounds of a live version of Sweet Caroline. Very nice!

The next thing I remember was lying in the recovery room with a nurse standing over me. I asked for Husband and they brought him in right away. Later we heard a woman next to me waking up. Several minutes went by and finally the nurse asked, "Do you want me to get your husband?" I told Husband that I had specifically asked for him and he felt very special!

Because I still had the IV port in my arm, they were able to administer pain medication directly into my system. I was experiencing a significant amount of pain so they increased the medication and ultimately gave me a narcotic-based pain medication, which helped. The pain was similar to really bad premenstrual cramps and lasted for about a day.

As I rested, the nurse came out to tell us that they had managed to retrieve 33 eggs! The norm is 8-10 so I'm definitely an overachiever!

I went home and was on bed rest for the rest of the day. Husband stayed home from work because I wasn't allowed to be alone after being under anesthesia. Most of the day I spent sleeping, but I did watch some television and play on our netbook computer.

The next day I was back at work though still feeling a bit of pain. I was allowed to take Extra Strength Tylenol which helped tremendously. Ultimately I ended up having a complication from my retrieval that landed me in bed rest for nearly a week, but since that happened six days after the retrieval, I'll write about that then.

Overall the retrieval was not as scary as I imagined it would be. About a week before I went in, I saw another couple in for their retrieval and just seeing them made me so nervous and panicky. The whole procedure went very smoothly (once they got the IV in) and I didn't feel or remember a thing about the actual procedure itself. Anyone who has a retrieval in their future should definitely relax: the unknown of it is a thousand times worse than the actual experience!

I Want a New Drug, Part III

I promised that I'd run my next fertility post on Thursday since four days after I started Ganirelix, I injected two separate medications to trigger ovulation. According to the notches I've been scratching into my bedpost, today is Thursday (bed rest, remember?) so here we go!

The doctor gave me a specific time at which I had to give myself a trigger shot. They time it exactly so that when it's time to go in for the egg retrieval (or alternatively for IUI as this stage is the same process), the body is ready. When you consider that there are really only a few hours every month that even a regularly ovulating woman can get pregnant, it seriously isn't a wonder that the human race didn't die out hundreds of years ago!

As comic Tommy Johnagin, a finalist in last season's Last Comic Standing, points out, nobody ever goes out one night, gets drunk and accidentally builds a shed. If you want to build a shed, you have to reeeeaaaaally want to build a shed. But yet somehow it's possible to go out one night, get drunk and accidentally create another human being! Amazing!

So with IUI, I triggered myself three times with 10,000 iu of HCG. Of all the shots I've had to give myself during this entire process, I think HCG is my least favorite because it requires actually mixing the medication prior to injecting it. Maybe it's just me, but I'm a nervous enough person during this process to also be worrying about properly concocting probably the most important medication! I mean, no HCG = no ovulation = no babies.

No pressure, right?

It's also a little tricky to draw the medication out of the vial since the needle is so long, but there's so little liquid in the vial. My nurse actually told me that some women have actually injected themselves with air because they didn't realize that the liquid wasn't drawing up into the syringe.

Okay ladies, I realize that you might be nervous while mixing your HCG, but if there's still liquid in the vial, you might want to retrace your steps and try again. I mean the last time I checked, air doesn't trigger ovulation otherwise we'd all be walking around in a constant state of having ovulated. Just sayin'...

There's also a lot more liquid in this shot than I was used to from prior IUI medications so that was difficult to deal with as the medication slowly made it's way into my body. I found that injecting the HCG into my stomach was much easier than my leg so after coming to that conclusion, I struggled much less with this shot. The two times that I did inject into my leg, I ended up with a bit of pain and tenderness at the injection site which while not completely miserable was rather uncomfortable.

For my IVF cycle, I triggered myself with two medications: HCG and Lupron. My doctor decided to use smaller doses of both medications because he was so worried about my ovaries becoming hyperstimulated. Supposedly, the Lupron helps combat that concern.

Lupron wasn't terribly difficult to deal with either. It comes with box full of syringes with needles already attached. The Lupron is held in a small vial that you use to fill the syringe and you're ready to inject. Pretty simple and no side effects that I can recall.

Because the Lupron decreases my estrogen, I have to use Vivelle-Dot to replace that estrogen (since that seems to be rather important for baby-hatching purposes). These are stick-on patches that I replace every two days. They stay on really well and I haven't noticed any horrible side effects (although by the time I started using them, I was on so many other medications, who knows what medication was causing what!) I use two at a time and move them across my stomach as I replace them.

Exactly 35 hours after I gave myself triggering doses of HCG and Lupron, I went in for my retrieval, which was one of the things about which I was most scared. Luckily my doctor's office went to extreme measures to make sure I was comfortable for come back on Saturday to read all about that!

I Want a New Drug, Part II

So this is Part II of my writing about the steps involved in IVF. The entire process takes about two weeks and I intend to run these posts in real time (i.e. following the treatment schedule and length of time on each medication).

The second phase of the stimulation stage of IVF is taking medication to suppress my own reproductive system. This whole process is such a science, the doctors don't want to risk my body stepping in and inevitably doing something that will mess up our plan.

After a few days of injecting Follistim, my doctors added Ganirelix to my medication regime. There are two possibilities for this suppression medication: Lupron or Ganirelix. Patients must start injecting Lupron several days prior to getting their period. Ganirelix, on the other hand, can be injected five days into the patient's cycle. Since my cycle is so unpredictable, that option made more sense for me.

The Ganirelix shots aren't too bad. They come in a pre-filled syringe so to give myself the injection, I just wipe my skin with an alcohol swab, pop the needle guard off the syringe and clear out the air bubbles. Quite simple, which is nice, particularly considering at this point, I was giving myself two injections of medication a day.

Ganirelix shots go in the abdomen and the only real side effect I've experienced is itchiness across my stomach. On the first day in particular it was really bad. I don't think it helped that after giving myself the shots, I put on a pair of tights and drove 30 minutes to work. I was seriously ready to claw off the skin on my stomach that day! The second day, the itching was far less, though it picked back up again on the third day. Ultimately I only took Ganirelix four times.

During the stimulation process, I went to my doctor's office for blood work and ultrasounds every 2-3 days. The first day I was set to take my Ganirelix, the nurse called to remind me to bring it with me to my appointment. I assumed that she'd show me how to do the injection or have some other tips. However, once I got there, she explained that I should take the Ganirelix only after I've done my blood work.

Me: Okay.

Nurse: Do you want me to write it down?

Me: Um, no I think I can remember that.

Nurse: Are you sure? It's really important because we want to measure your blood levels...

Me (cutting her off): Yeah, yeah, my pre-suppression blood levels.

She seemed uber-impressed that (a) I managed to come up with a fancy $5 word like "suppression" and (b) that I was capable of remembering such basic instructions without her writing it down.

Again, I swear, there should be intelligence tests prior to procreation. I can only imagine some of the meat heads she encounters on a day to day basis.

Of all the medications I had to take for my IVF cycle, I'd classify the Ganirelix as the least troublesome: no real pain, no real side effects, and easy to administer. Ultimately I took Ganirelix for four days and the evening of my last Ganirelix injection, I took a "trigger" shot of HCG and Lupron so stay tuned Thursday evening to read about that.

Queen Song of the Week: We Will Rock You & We are the Champions

The next song in the set list of Queen's 1982 concert at the Milton Keynes Bowl is Sheer Heart Attack. Read my review of that song here.

Following Sheer Heart Attack, the band launched into the two songs which ended their concerts for nearly thirty years: We Will Rock You and We are the Champions. These songs are played together, not only in concert, but on most radio stations as well!

We Will Rock You was written by Dr. May and appeared on the band's 1977 album News of the World. The song was the B-side to the We are the Champions single in the U.K. and released as a double A-side in the U.S.. I've already written about the fast version of the song here and, of course, all of the details about the song's inspiration and recording remain the same.

Video courtesy of queenofficial.

Perhaps one of the most recognizable songs in history, and a stadium favorite to this day, We Will Rock You has certainly taken on a life of it's own, both within Queen fandom and with the general public.

We are the Champions was written by Freddie Mercury. It also appeared on the band's 1977 album News of the World. It was released as a single in the U.K. and the U.S., charting at #2 and #4, respectively.

Video courtesy of queenofficial.

Freddie also was looking to write an anthem-type song, though he specifically had football in mind. Despite the slightly ego-centric theme, the song became the band's third biggest hit (after Bohemian Rhapsody and Another One Bites the Dust). Though I've personally never been a huge fan of this song, being able to sing it on Rock Band 3 has brought me newfound appreciation for this song, particularly Freddie's vocals.

Ironically though the songs became staples at the end of the band's set lists, the songs actually lead off the News of the World album.

So with that, we end the set list of the 1982 Milton Keynes concert. I've just acquired the second (and hardest to find) CD by The Cross, RT's side project, so perhaps we'll spend some time on solo CDs next.

Happy Listening!