CD1…

…was yesterday. AF arrived before bed on Wednesday night, not long after I POAS. It is such a strange sense of relief and disappointment. Am I right? I’m suddenly not a crazy person anymore, but I’m obviously upset because I feel like we did everything right and yet we did not get the desired results. Regardless... exiting the TWW is freeing.

Anyway. Moving forward…

I’m trying to be strong mentally and to be optimistic. Visualization and all that jazz. Healthy eggs and healthy sperm catching an egg! I’m drinking tons of water again and have decided to stop drinking even the decaf coffee I was drinking in the morning. I had also been having a small glass of wine here and there and am going to quit that altogether too. Salads every day at lunch. Giant spinach salads, sometimes seaweed and kale too. Healthy smoothies for breakfast + overnight oats and berries. Trying to be diligent about my iron pills (my iron is sooo looww) and still taking my prenatal vitamins + extra folic acid. Had my thyroid levels re-checked yesterday, hope to have results soon just to reassure me that all is well or so we can adjust as necessary. Being nearly 2 months out from the miscarriage now, having what seems like a regular AF, and making sure all my ducks are in a row (so to speak) on the baby making front will help me get into the right frame of mind so I’m not psyching myself out and feeling stressed and making things worse instead of better.

I’m a little type A if you can’t tell. But it’s nice to have a plan, especially one that has been successful in the past. Here’s hoping that my body gets the memo and actually ovulates in a reasonable time frame (I’m still not convinced I actually ovulated last cycle… doesn’t make sense that I would have had such a short luteal phase) and we get a sticky one out of our efforts.

Wish us luck!

The dip (cont’d) – 10DPO

The dip I saw yesterday continued today instead of rising. I temp’d earlier than usual because my son was crying at 5:30 and it was down to 36.46 and then I temp’d again at the usual time (after falling back to sleep) and it was 36.67. Not sure which would be more accurate – different time than normal, or after only 1 hour of constant sleep (noting that I didn’t get out of bed – DH did! Just rolled over and went back to sleep)? Regardless, my temp remains much lower than that I observed in previous pregnancies. Having said that, starting yesterday morning and consistently through to now, I have had incessant AF-like cramps. I’m constantly running to the bathroom to make sure it hasn’t arrived and so far it hasn’t. Usually I get cramps in the afternoon and then by that night, AF arrives and they go away. So, that’s over 24 hrs of cramping. Again, could be due to a change post-miscarriage? I’m not sure. I also checked my cervix yesterday and today and it is higher and softer than it would usually be when AF is on its way… things are also more wet than normal, but there is not nearly as much CM as I had in the past 2 pregnancies.

SO. I’m obsessing over these now and wondering if I’m actually making them worse because I’m thinking about it constantly. I’m considering running to the dollar store to pick up a test at my lunch break. I have some FRERs at home but they’re so expensive and I know it’s probably too early to test anyway, so I’ll feel better to just POAS, a cheap one, even if it’s less likely to give me a positive result right now.

Wish me luck.

***UPDATE***
I picked up a dollarama Medi-Care brand HPT at lunch. BFN. :(
So no I'm scouring the internet to find out their sensitivity vs. other tests because these cramps are so unusual!!

The Dip – 9DPO

My temps dipped below the coverline this morning, to 36.61 celsius. I have no idea what to think about it. While I’m fearing the worst and thinking that perhaps my chart was misinterpreted and AF is already on its way, I can’t help but scour fertility friend for samples of pregnancy charts showing an implantation dip. I guess I just have to wait until tomorrow to see what happens… will my temps rebound or are they tanking? Overall even post ovulation, my temps are much more erratic than they have been in the past… possibly still a result of the miscarriage? My coverline is also higher than I’ve ever seen it (by about .25 degrees celsius!) and my temp on 9DPO is lower than it usually is. It’s amazing how much info I feel like I have, and yet it’s not enough to even venture a guess at the outcome.

Some stats from an informal study done by fertility friend:
-11% of ovulatory charts had dips that did not result in pregnancy
-23% of ovulatory charts that resulted in pregnancy included a dip

Of course, I guess it’s not really a “dip” unless my temps rebound tomorrow…

DH asked me last night if I thought we would get a BFP this cycle to which I responded “I don’t know”. He told me to take a guess and I said I’d be optimistic, and based on how consistently we BD’d and how lucky we’ve been to conceive quickly in the past, I would go with yes. He went with yes too. Now I’m waiting for the disappointment. On the bright side, at least I haven’t burned $10 by unnecessarily POAS… yet.

The 2WW of a dreadfully long cycle

I think I’m about 8DPO, at least that’s my best guess based on my chart. But at CD33 when I usually have 27 or 28 day cycles, I’m going a little crazy. The thought of waiting 39 days to find out if we were successful this cycle is absurd. There is absolutely nothing pointing to the fact that I may be pregnant but I am still fighting the urge, minute by minute, to run to the store to buy up a pile of tests. I’m even considering going to the dollar store to create a stash of them so I can test every day. Sometimes I feel like there’s no reason why I wouldn’t get pregnant, as long as I actually did ovulate (which my temperature definitely seems to indicate I did - I have a sustained temp shift), it’s realistic that I could conceive based on how often we did the dance. In both of my previous pregnancies, I think implantation occurred closer to CD10… with my first I had implantation spotting on CD 10 so assume it happened around that time… with the second I was nauseous and vomiting around 10DPO so figure it had something to do with implantation. So, if I expect it would happen around the same time, and if I ovulated on CD25, then it hasn’t happened yet and wouldn’t show up on an HPT. On the other hand… I’m at CD33… what if I’m misinterpreting the data in my chart, or if because of the miscarriage my temps aren’t reliable… then potentially I could have had a “regular” cycle for me and maybe AF hasn’t arrived because I am pregnant?

See – I’m going crazy.

I started reading a book on the weekend to try to keep my mind busy. I’m almost done reading it and I don’t know how, once I finish it, I’m going to fill every minute I’m awake so that I don’t break down and start peeing on very expensive tests every day. Any book recommendations?

I wasn’t THIS nuts the last time we tried… I think because I am just SO READY to be pregnant already that it’s all-consuming. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Frustration & looking forward

It’s been an emotional month. The week after the miscarriage, a close family member passed away unexpectedly. Then, 18 days after the original miscarriage, I started bleeding again. Much like a period but apparently not a period, since it was less than 20 days after the miscarriage. I think this was worse than the original miscarriage – I had finally wrapped my head around it, and was looking forward instead of back and then wham… that constant reminder was back and I was needing to be patient again.

I follow a number of blogs written by women with fertility issues or same sex couples trying to conceive a baby and I realize that my wait is NOTHING compared to what they go through… but in a way, it’s all relative? My expectation was that I would get pregnant and have a healthy baby… even if I wouldn’t actually say that out loud for fear of jinxing it. So it’s been a bit of up and down. I didn’t expect to get pregnant during the cycle because I was SO sick - nay, then I did – yay! Then I lost it – nay! Then I had a “gentle” miscarriage and was looking forward to trying again, surely my body would bounce back quickly because it was so early – yay! My doctor told me because it was so early and I am healthy that I could try again right away – yay! Then I started bleeding again – nay!!! To be honest, I’ve felt a lot frustrated since then. I’ve been charting and my BBT has been all over the place, nothing like any of my charts pre-miscarriage. Now on CD27 I think that I have ovulated because my temps are higher than they usually are pre-O, but I’m really not sure when it happened because my chart just isn’t as black and white as it usually is, and I’ve found that my cervix and CM have been all over the place… I don’t think I even had any EWCM.

We have covered our bases by BD every other day... which I might add is exhausting! I’m hopeful that I might get lucky and see a BFP, and get a sticky one this time… but I’m not holding my breath. Having said that, I’m really fighting the urge to test this week. We’re going away for the weekend and I’d like to have a few drinks if it’s just not happening this cycle… even though that would only be 9DPO in the best case scenario and therefore would just be a waste.

I’m trying to stay positive and keep this in perspective… it’s really (hopefully) just a bump in the road… so my kids won’t be exactly 2 years apart like I always wanted… is it really that big of a deal if they are 2 ½ years apart instead? You can probably tell that I’ve given up on the make a baby girl plan too… I just want to be pregnant and add to our family and I’ll take what I get.

So… a question for anyone who might stop in here – post-miscarriage, did you try to conceive right away? Were you successful? Was your first cycle post-miscarriage all over the place or did it go right back to normal?