Cycle 24

Sometimes you just need a reminder

 Thanks to Kelli at Sugar Blossom for custom making the bracelet for me (https://shopsugarblossom.com).

I’ve been trying to figure out what the odds of actually getting pregnant are now that we’ve hit 24 cycles trying. I figured that it’s pretty low since the clomid + intrauterine insemination + progesterone didn’t work, even when I had TWO eggs and 70 million sperm but directly into my uterus. There’s not really any good data on the odds of getting pregnant at this stage because there are so many stochastic factors that influence the odds of pregnancy. There is a paper published my PLOS One that discusses the odds of conception (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0046544 if you’re interested). From what I can find it seems like the odds of getting pregnant in 1 year is 86-92%, that 95% of people are pregnant by 24 cycles, and that the odds of getting pregnant from 24-36 cycles is 2-4%. I guess I can’t give up hope, but I just can’t seem to find any, especially since the bleeding came back this past cycle and I have no idea why.

What to do for the holidays?

When we started trying to get pregnant, based on my family fertility history I was so sure I’d have a baby by Christmas 2015. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. I wasn’t pregnant and I was diagnosed with infertility by Christmas 2015. Christmas is approaching again and I (obviously) don’t have a baby and am not pregnant, and have no hope that I will be. Based on when our first appointment is with the new fertility doctor, I hope I don’t have a baby for Christmas 2017 because it will be premature, but there is a chance I could (finally!) be pregnant by then.

I love Christmas. I love snow and presents and the decorations and music and Christmas food and drinks (except egg nog). Last Christmas it was too sad and I pretended like it wasn’t happening. I put up my tree to do presents with my husband, cooked Christmas dinner, and that was that. We live far away from our families and my husband’s job makes it impractical to travel for Christmas, so it’s just whatever the two of us want to do at Christmas.

This year I’m incredibly glad that going back to our families is not an option. There were 3 babies born in my family this year and being around them with all the “baby’s first Christmas stuff” sounds like absolute torture – particularly since one of the moms (who knows I’m struggling with infertility, by the way) seems to enjoy saying things like “you don’t have a baby, you don’t understand” to me. Come on. I don’t have a baby because I CAN’T have a baby. So, not having to be around that at Christmas is great for my emotional health.

I wasn’t sure what to do about Christmas this year. I’m still sad that we don’t have a baby and am not pregnant. However, I was at Ikea last week and they had the Christmas decorations out, and that was making me happy. This year I want to decorate for Christmas. I don’t want my infertility to dictate what I can do with my life. I mentioned to my husband that I want to decorate for Christmas and he thinks it’s a bad idea because it will just make me sadder. I honestly don’t know if it will, but I’m excited about decorating right now, and I intend to decorate once I verify with my husband that it’s not going to be too sad for him.