Silence

It amazes me how central London can be more silent at 3 am than our suburban NJ bolthole.

Consequently, that leaves much time to think. More precisely, more time to become nervous about the surgery on the 12th, but if there's something wrong and my fallopian tubes really don't...fallope...then I'd rather it were fixed now.

I started cinnamon instead of Metformin and Soy instead of the carefully hoarded Clomid. We shall see if I ovulate this month. The cinnamon doesn't upset my stomach so I'm taking a higher dose than the Met, and also it makes my burps taste nice.

Should probably call the fertility clinic and tell them I'm away, but it can wait.

Merry Xmas

..or, as it is known now, CD1.

Hate. So much for holiday miracles.

On the 12th DPO my true love gave to me...

...nothing -- I've had my Christmas prezzie already, so there we go.

Seriously, though, my tits are killing me. I've never experienced aches like this before! Ow!

Waiting

The thing about the two week wait...

...is that it is filled with waiting. Which is exactly what I am doing now.

In that, I've been lucky (?) to have so much excess stress to distract me and here we are at 5 days post ovulation. I haven't had time to exercise in over a week and there's no foreseeable relief in sight before going on holiday. I definitely didn't want to approach this holiday as a lard ass, but seems I'll be doing just that.

Given that this is the case, this means that I cannot have the consult at the hospital in London as I'm too far outside of their "acceptable weight" guidelines. I'm not too disappointed, since not exercising is my fault, not theirs. I've been eating healthy -- whole grain bread and peanut butter for most meals -- I can get back on track easily enough after things settle down a bit. It's not just exercise which has slid; I'm two days behind in my writing, I haven't ridden in almost two weeks, and I haven't done any housework so the dust bunnies are forming a union -- I think the dirty dishes are organising it.

Apart from that, no conception news other than my progesterone was low and I had to have another shot of Ovidrel last night. Woo.

Cervix.

F0r some reason, the usually painless IUI hurt today and there was some spotting. Now I'm crampy.

The nurse mentioned something about the speculum being the wrong size. All I noticed was that it was freezing cold, particularly for an object that had just come out of a warming tray...

Early.

IUI today and tomorrow. I don't feel positive about this cycle, but at least I don't feel so negative as I did last time. I was positive that it wouldn't work.

I wish I didn't have so many stress factors right now, but unfortunately life is dealing me quite a bit right now outside of the whole TTC thing! Moving country will do that to you, I suppose. We seem to have gotten it sorted to a reasonable degree, so that by Tuesday it should be behind us.

I don't feel like I've been very healthy this week, despite making more meals at home and eating out less (out of necessity since we're broke!). I had several days off from working out and riding due to air time out of the saddle. I rode Sunday and Monday, did barn work on Friday, and went to the gym on Thursday. I suppose if I go to the gym tomorrow that will mean I did something active four out of eight days, not too shabby. I am doing poorly at losing weight, which is not ideal, and it is actually coming in spite of being a "vegetablist" for most of the week! For some reason meat is not tasty this week and I've only had it three times. I really need to find some vegetablist recipes that are not full of soy. I don't want to eat something that is shaped/textured like meat, I want purely veggie stuff!

Meh. I just feel a bit of a lard ass because all I had to eat today was McDonalds. No more feeling sorry for myself, though!

Finally!

Progress!

I've discovered that going to the RE at 6.30 am gets me in at the same time as going at 5.30 am, and the wait isn't as bad. Go figure. I barely had time to read any of my book.

There is finally an 18mm follicle hanging around. I can finally stop the nasty Follistim injections and move on to the nasty Ovidrel injections, which of course is the Big Effing Needle Of Death. I never thought I'd say this, but thank God!

I felt very positive about this cycle earlier; maybe "slow & steady" will be what wins the race? Who knows? I'm still going to get a second opinion over the holiday, and have to take some time off from this and regroup, maybe come back to it in early Spring. The peaks and valleys of elation and depression are becoming too varied and I need some balance.

So no sleeping in for myself or The Stoat this weekend, it's andrology and IUI for us. At least my arms can start healing up soon.