bitoffairydust

[bitoffairydust]

Yesterday we came home from the hospital as a family of three.

Things haven’t been super smooth sailing, nor did I expect them to be, but our little one is doing well and I’m healing fine so that’s really all we could ask for.

Wednesday was a bit of a whirlwind. I was scheduled to go into the hospital for my induction at 5, so we spent the morning doing a bit of last minute clean up around the place. Then around 12, someone from L&D called and said if we were available to come in earlier, we could just show up whenever. We still had a few things to finish up so we had lunch, I took a shower while my wife did the dishes, then she took a shower and got the cats set up for a few days home alone before we called an Uber to head to the hospital.

We got there around 3:30-4 so not super early but they got us into the delivery rooms right away and someone came over to go over a few questions (medical stuff and what I was hoping for with the birth). I got hooked up to the contraction and fetal heartbeat monitors, they got my IV line in, and then we went over the induction options for me. Based on my last check up, I was about 1.5 cm dilated, so before anything else they had to get me to about 3 cm, which they offered to do with either the foley balloon or misoprostol. Then the plan was to start me on oxytocin to get contractions going. I requested the miso, cause I figured there would be enough things going in and out of my vagina for the evening without an additional thing thrown in there 😅

It actually took a little while for the induction to start because as it turns out, three people (myself included) showed up for their induction within 5 minutes of each other and I was the last so it was closer to 7 before the resident came to examine me. In doing so they found I had actually progressed to 3 cm on my own since my last appointment so they were able to just get me started up on oxytocin.

Contractions started up pretty much instantly but they were very manageable. I’d say just from the oxy progression, the worst contraction I got was maybe a 5 on the scale from 1 to 10. Then they ran through the dosage and did another exam to see where I was at. They didn’t give an exact number then but I think it was somewhere between 4 and 5 cm. Before starting me up on another dosage of oxytocin, they went ahead and tried to break my water as it hadn’t yet. They didn’t actually manage to fully get it, and honestly, at that point, them trying to get it to break was actually more painful than the contractions I’d experienced that far.

That changed pretty fast once they established they’d gotten enough of the membranes for the time being. I’m fuzzy on the timeline but I think it must have been close to 10 at that point, and the pain level climbed very quickly along with contraction intensity and frequency. I tried to bounce on a ball for a bit and the nurse showed my wife some pressure points to try and help with the pain but it did nothing. Around 10:30 I requested the epidural, which was unfortunate timing on my part as the anesthesiologist had just gone in to assist with a c-section. By the time she was out and got to my room it was about 11:30 and pain was an easy 10 on the scale with contractions maybe a minute and a half apart.

The epidural itself went in pretty smoothly but at first there wasn’t much to be said for relief. Since they mentioned it could take 15 minutes to really be felt I didn’t think much of it, and I did feel like things were getting a bit better as minutes passed. The last contraction I was asked about felt more back down to a 5 on the pain scale so the anesthesiologist left. Unfortunately, that 5 turned out to be a fluke because pain shot back up pretty quickly and I was soon at a 10 again, no matter the dosage boosts.

That part was quite honestly the worst of it all, having expected some sort of relief and finding it to be just as worse as before. To make it worse, baby was not handling those contractions well. His heart beat would drop with the start of each contraction, though it picked up before the end of them so though they wanted to keep an eye on it it wasn’t cause for intervention yet. The nurse monitored his heart rate with me laying flat on my back, on my right side, on my left side and then sitting straight up. The latter was the slightly better option for him, but definitely did nothing to help my pain management. She did get me back on my back to try and relieve me a bit since the difference to the effect on baby wasn’t huge but at that point contractions were relentless. I was dealing with back labor contractions, which were maybe a minute apart, and because they suspected the placenta had detached a bit when they tried to break my water, when a contraction would subside, the pain in my abdomen would become more prominent and almost to the same level. It made it feel like I was contracting non stop with no break for catching my breath or trying to recuperate.

Around 2 in the morning there were a few people in the room examining me and trying to figure out the best course of action. A C-section being needed started being mentioned if things didn’t improve, but I was at a little more than 9 cm by then. The OB and the anesthesiologist had a talk outside the room and decided to re-do my epidural as it had clearly failed (they did an ice test and it was clear I wasn’t frozen anywhere at all), and if I were to end up needing a c-section, I’d have to have it redone anyway.

She took two tries to get everything situated in my back. That second try did the trick. I don’t think I can even describe the amount of relief when my foot started feeling warm and then going numb, and within maybe 5 minutes it was amazingly painless. They did another ice test and this time I felt no cold at all anywhere, and when the nurse pointed out I’d just had a contraction it cemented it because I’d not felt it at all. The only thing I could feel at that point was a bit of abdominal pressure every now and then. And I will say, I did have a great team with me. Everyone was very empathetic and trying their best to get me to feel some form of relief before the second epidural. And they seemed almost as relieved as me when that last one finally worked - especially because after that baby’s heart stabilized.

By the time the epidural was done, even though they figured I had likely progressed to 10 cm, they elected to let me rest for a bit, and give baby a chance to keep making his way down, so I got to catch a breather until about 4 am. Then they told me it was time to try and start pushing, with the nurse guiding me since I still couldn’t feel any sort of contraction. I pushed through maybe four or five contractions without huge progress, and the OB came in to assess and established baby needed a bit of help coming out. They set up the forceps and had me push through another couple of contractions, but they were pretty week and hard to catch even for the nurse by then, and baby’s heart rate was starting to struggle again. So they got on the phone to get a room prepped for c-section, and the doctor told me I would get to push through one last contraction, but if nothing happened we’d have to go into surgery.

The nurse tried to wait for a good one (she had already reupped the oxytocin drip at that point) and by some miracle, the next push for his head half out and with the second one it was completely out. The rest of his body followed quickly and before I had even caught up with it all, I had his tiny little body on me.

Even though they’d brought someone in from the NICU just to be safe, he ended up being perfectly okay. I needed a bit more attention because I had more bleeding than normal, and I had to have 4 stitches and another IV line put in to help with the blood loss. Then we stayed in the delivery room until about 6 at which point we were brought over to our postpartum room.

Since then nursing has undoubtedly been the biggest challenge. He did have a tongue tie, but he struggled from the get go. He would latch well but lose it and then get frustrated and cry. He also is a very lazy eater - I’d spend easily 30-45 minutes per side trying to get him to stay aware long enough to take in maybe 15 minutes of proper feeding, but he’d start smacking his lips practically the moment he was done, and he’d wake up hungry again within the hour.

Unfortunately there was no lactation consultant on staff as she was on vacation this week. People commented time and time again about how I had no supply issue, and his latch (when he was latched) was good, but it didn’t seem to help. I also felt I kept getting conflicting information as one moment he’d have crystals in his urine to indicate potential dehydration, and the next they’d be telling me he had barely loss any of his birth weight and was perfectly on target for that.

We did decide to get his tongue tie cut as it seemed to really be frustrating him at feeds and make it harder for my breast to properly fit into his mouth. The feed that followed the cut was easily the best we’ve had to date, but unfortunately it went downhill from there. After we got home and I tried to feed him last night, he did fine on the right side but then only lasted 10 minutes on the left and then lost it, started to scream and wouldn’t latch again. I haven’t been able to make him latch on the left side since, and I only managed to get him latched to the right a couple more times before we ran in the same problem, so we had to go ahead and start giving him bottles. I’ll be trying to work through it with a lactation consultant as soon as possible, and I’ve now started pumping, but in the meantime, him being properly fed was the biggest thing.

He does also have a small fracture on his right clavicle, likely from the forceps, but the pediatrician said that will resolve on its own within the week. In the meantime we just have to be very cautious how we move his right arm, and she prescribed him Tylenol if need be.

In the meantime we’re just trying to settle down to our new sleep deprived routine. But then looking into all the sweet, funny faces he makes both when asleep and awake makes it feel pretty worth it.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Today is induction day. The nerves are finally starting to pop up. It somehow hasn’t felt quite real up until this point, and I’m just crossing my fingers that everything goes well. I was hopeful he would show up on his own because I know inductions can lead to a chain of intervention, but there are also plenty of women who have inductions and perfectly uncomplicated deliveries.

I was kinda hoping to wait and see how things went before committing to an epidural but with an induction I feel it will most likely be required. I don’t have any issues with epidurals as a method of pain relief (or using pain relief at all for that matter), I’m just not big about the whole sticking a needle/catheter into my back. But compared to contractions that come fast and furious, it’ll likely be preferable I imagine.

My wife is now in panic mode though because the hospital just called. It’s quiet over there today, so although I was scheduled for the induction at 5, they said I can show up basically whenever. We still have a few things to get done before we leave (we left a lot of cleaning til the very last minute if I’m honest XD) but we’ll probably be good to head over some time mid afternoon.

Ridiculously enough, through all of this, my current biggest concern (as it always is when we’re about to head out for an overnight or a couple of days away) is the cats 😂 our oldest will be fine, but the youngest we adopted during the pandemic and my wife has been working from home this whole time, so he definitely has separation issues and I’m gonna miss my snuggle buddy. I’m just hoping everything goes smoothly enough that I’m discharged by Friday morning and I can spend that whole day alternating between giving the baby and giving him lots of cuddles.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Yesterday was my last scheduled OB appointment. Today is my official due date based on my IUI date (though they had given me August 1st as a date based on my 12 week scan), and so far baby doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to come out.

Which is too bad for him because he now has an official eviction date - or at least, start of eviction date. The doctor sent induction papers to the hospital yesterday, and L&D called today to schedule me. I’m not even sure what method they’re gonna used but we’ll see when I get there. Monday the 9th I’ll have to go over for a Covid test, and then next Wednesday, the 11th, is my scheduled induction. Which means he has exactly one week to show up on his own.

I’m not sure what kind of Covid test they do on the 9th, but I’m hoping it’s not the one that can take 48 hours to get results, because I believe they also have a rapid test they do at the hospital directly if you just need to show up, and I swear if I go into labor on the 10th and they don’t have my results from the 9th so I have to do a second test, this lil guy and I are gonna have words after he’s out 😂

The doctor did do a membrane sweep yesterday so fingers crossed that leads to something. My wife would rather he wait until after she’s done with work on Friday to come. I actually wouldn’t mind, because tomorrow is my coworker’s birthday and though she’s a nice enough lady, I’m not that interested in him sharing a birthday with her 😅 although she’s been telling me I need to give birth on August 5 ever since she found out I was due first week of August.

I am excited that the end is in sight. Honestly, I have nothing to complain about - this pregnancy has been sooo easy going, it’s a little ridiculous. I’m not feeling nervous or anxious yet (it’ll probably come once I actually go into labor but for now I’m good). I just feel ready and I want him to be out already. I’m just getting impatient for the next stage to start (I’ve always been pretty bad at being in the ‘now’ when something big is coming, so this is no exception).

Fingers crossed he doesn’t wait too much longer.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

We’re getting close to the finish line - 37 weeks done, 3 (hopefully, at most) to go!

I had a prenatal follow up last Friday and there wasn’t much mention made in regards to the ultrasound. The doctor mentioned he’s a bit bigger than average but that was that, and honestly I figured as much.

She did say she wanted to see me again this week (instead of waiting til next week) to make sure my blood pressure doesn’t get any higher. It wasn’t terrible, 110/89, but I’m usually lower than that. At least I think that’s not bad? The nurse didn’t seem to think it was a problem anyhow, but then again neither did she see my 5 kg in 4 weeks weight gain as a problem before and the doctor did, so who knows. Honestly, I’m just glad I’ll get to finish work a couple of hours early on Friday.

We’ve done a good deal of meal prepping over the past couple of weekends. I made some breakfast sandwiches/burritos, which I hope will be edible 😅 the eggs smelt a little questionable (they were baked on a sheet pan instead of cooked on the stove top, so that likely had something to do with that). I also made three batches of sheet pancakes and a double batch of chocolate chip cookies, rolled into balls and frozen so we can easily pop a couple in the oven when we feel like it. Then we made two different chicken Alfredo recipes (regular and Cajun), chicken pot pie, Buffalo chicken casserole, chicken and dumplings, and chicken fried rice (we’re a chicken family clearly 😂) as well as a some beef stew, shepherd’s pie and a lasagna. This weekend I’ll make a pizza casserole, some Mac n cheese and a few batches of muffins, and that’ll be about all our freezer can take.

I’m honestly pretty ready to get this show on the road. My wife is not - the idea of baby coming so soon is freaking her out a bit and she feels there’s still a lot of things to do before he arrives. I’m feeling pretty good with what we’ve accomplished though, and I think I’m as ready as I’ll ever be so might as well get things started. Earlier today I just looked down at my bell and straight up said “Get out” 😂. I keep over analyzing every little cramp I get but I never leads to anything.

I know he’ll get here when he’s ready and I’m not gonna go to crazy lengths trying to push things along. I know most things that are said to ‘induce’ labor naturally only work when your body is already ready to go into labor anyway.

I just hope he’ll be ready sooner than later 🤞🏻

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

So, today was a pretty big day.

I had my ultrasound this morning to check on little one’s growth, and he is measuring just a little under 6 pounds by their estimate. Considering the fact that I’ve still got a little over five weeks to go, I’m pretty hopeful he’s gonna come a little early 😂 of course it’s all estimates so he could be smaller than that. Only time will tell.

He is head down though, which is good news, because I’ve been wondering if he might be transverse based on where I’ve been feeling movements, but I guess with his legs curled up, where I’m feeling kicks makes sense in terms of where his feet would be, and the movements I’m feeling in my lower abdomen must be just his back pressing out a bit because of how he’s laying. The tech said he was sideways, with his back to her as she was doing the scan. His head is apparently right against my cervix too, but that’s still measuring pretty long - 4ish centimeters.

So that was my morning, and then I got to rest my feet for about an hour after getting home before heading back out to get my second Pfizer dose of the covid vaccine. I’m very excited to have been able to get it before baby came, so that I can now pass on even more antibodies to him, and also I didn’t really feel keen on dealing with potential side effects while handling a newborn. Mind you, I didn’t have much side effects from the first shot or the TDAP booster, so I’m crossing my fingers for this shot too. Time will tell.

Either way, exciting day, and we have a nice weekend coming up - doing a little staycation tomorrow night at a nearby hotel (with a pool 🥰) and Sunday we’ll be going over to my parents’ for a small kinda baby shower. And once that’s done I can finally get the go ahead to start buying a few more of the things left on our registry 😂

Either way, it’ll be a nice long weekend to look back on. And by the end of it, I’ll be 35 weeks with a short countdown ahead. I can’t wait to meet the little guy 💙

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

I can’t believe there’s less than two months left to this pregnancy journey, or how smooth sailing it’s all been. Obviously there’s some parts that are a bit less fun than others, like sleeping being a bit trickier and the swelling feet, but I feel very lucky about how well it’s gone so far.

I have one more ultrasound coming up as my weight gain has been a bit more than my doctor would want and my abdomen was measuring a bit ahead at my last appointment, so she wants to make sure baby isn’t growing too big. I’m not too worried as from what I can tell, my abdomen measurements were about average for the week I was at (maybe just on the brink of going from average to above average), and I’m pretty sure the weight gain is due to the cravings I’ve given into since I got to third trimester, but I’m still looking forward to seeing little man on screen one more time before he pops out. Plus, it’ll hopefully confirm that he is head down, which from the strength of the movements I feel above my belly button vs closer to my pelvis, I think he is, but I honestly can’t really tell a kick from a punch.

Today was a day we’d been looking forward to for a while too, as our best friends put together a virtual baby shower for us which was incredibly sweet. A lot of pregnancy experiences have been different with the pandemic, but the fact that they wanted to make sure we got to have that experience, even if it wasn’t in person, was great. Honestly I felt so blessed that they made time for us at all in spite of their super busy lives (and in some case huge time difference, including one out of friend who popped in from South Korea where it was 4 am at the time).

Next week we get to have a small gathering with my family, which won’t be so much a baby shower but will still be a nice little celebration of the upcoming baby. It’ll be small of course, as some restrictions are still in place, but things have been going really great over here on the vaccination front, which of course also impacts the improvement in new cases. Still, other than my parents, we’ve not seen the people who’ll be there since Christmas 2019 / February 2020, so I can’t wait.

Next step is to get through with will be making it to the start of my mat leave without being totally over it at work, but there’s only six weeks of that left, and none of them will be full weeks at this point as the next two weeks include a statutory holiday, and then every week in July should involve a half day for a prenatal appointment.

Undoubtedly though, unless baby shows up a little early, those will be six very, very long weeks.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

This may be a controversial topic (what isn’t in parenting anyway 😂) but I’ve got my first dose of the Covid vaccine scheduled for next Thursday evening and I can’t wait!

My province does not yet see pregnant women as a priority group, although three or four do now so maybe it’ll be coming anyway. But although BMI is an outdated (if it can be called that since it was never meant to be used in the ways it has been) unit of measurement, I’m gonna use it to my advantage as I fall under the obese category and so am considered at a high risk 👌🏻

Although I know pregnant women were not officially included in the original studies, there’s been so much recent reliable data about not only the safety of the vaccine on pregnant women, but the possibility of passing antibodies to the fetus, and I’m happy for the chance to offer him a bit of that protection during the first few months of his life when he’ll be so vulnerable. And although I’m working from home and so at a lower risk of exposure, I still have to go out every now and then, and when I do I have to take public transit. Knowing that soon entering my third trimester puts me at a high risk of hospitalization due to severe symptoms, I’ve been feeling pretty antsy about the whole thing. Not to mention, my wife will likely be attending a conference in Texas in early June, and since we live in a 1 bedroom apartment, it’s not like she could isolate from me upon her return, so it makes me feel safer on that front also.

In unrelated news, today was my second (and last) blood draw for gestational diabetes. Fingers crossed the results come through as good as they did in the first trimester. I’ve also got my TDAP booster scheduled for May 14 (was originally May 11 but I moved it up a bit to allow for two weeks between the covid shot and that one)

It’s so wild how time seems to drag on and yet it’s getting closer and closer. In just a little over a month I’ll be preparing my hospital bag (two months early, but right before the weekend my wife will be gone so if something happens while I’m alone I don’t want to be scrambling for stuff). From that point on I should also have increasing OB appointments, and it’ll be so close to the finish line. I can’t believe how fast time has flown since November, considering how slow it’s also been dragging since the start of the pandemic.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Quick update just to say everything is still going well on my end, knocking on wood that the last few months of this pregnancy keep going as smoothly as the first six have gone.

I had my follow up ultrasound yesterday to check that everything is indeed fine with the aortic arch, and the spine since it looks like all they had to go from from the last appointment was the tech’s notes saying she couldn’t see either, not the doctor’s notes after she said she managed to see the spine just fine but wanted to double check the heart. No photo this time cause although the tech did print a fairly cute profile of the head, it’s not super clear, and the other three pictures she decided I needed to have were that of a single leg, a single foot, and his boy parts again.

The doctor I saw yesterday was very business like, didn’t say much, but she ended it with saying everything was good so that should hopefully be the last time I have to go to the hospital til it’s actually labor time. Which I’m not mad about since they noted again that I’m hard to image so it took a while, even though there were just the two main concerns, because the tech decided to do more of a full exam again. I swear she must have spent a good 20 minutes just trying to see one hand, because baby was sleeping on it and would not move. And like, I get it if it’s the first limb check, but he had two hands at 20 weeks, what did they think might have happened between then and 24 weeks? That he got snacky in there?

Anyway, from now on it’s mostly gonna be the OB appointments (next of which is first week of May for me if I remember correctly). I also have to do the glucose test for GD next week, which will be the third time I’ve had to do it, so that’s fun. And I still need to schedule my TDAP shot but I’m still a bit early for that, so probably within the next couple of weeks I’ll be able to get it scheduled.

I do have a 3D ultrasound schedule for in a couple of hours which I’m excited about. The hospital I do my ultrasounds at hasn’t been allowing a guest to come along because of Covid, so my wife has only been able to catch a glimpse of my 8 week and 20 week ultrasound through video chatting, which is obviously not the same. This one is a private clinic though, and it’s for the sole purpose of imaging/keepsake, not medical check up and diagnosis, so they are allowing one guest to come in, meaning she’ll finally be able to be there with me for an ultrasound. At first she was reluctant cause it costs money, but I convinced her, and now that it’s happening she’s very excited. I think they might also have us listen to the heart beat, which is something else she hadn’t gotten to experience, but I’m not 100% sure so we’ll see when we get there. Either way, I’m looking forward to it.

I can’t believe we’re already a little halfway past April. Just a little over three months now til we can start expecting this little nugget to make his big appearance. Time has been going so fast on that front it’s crazy. I can’t wait 💙

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Today was my 20 week ultrasound and I got to see the little nugget again. We also got to find out the gender, and we now know we will be having a little boy! (My wife gets to brag a little cause that was her guess)

I’m a little anxious about raising a boy, but as my wife reminded me, we were gonna raise our child the same way regardless of gender, and I feel pretty good about us being good mamas.

Everything else was pretty normal. They do want to see me again in 3-4 weeks because the ultrasound tech couldn’t see the aortic arch, and when the doctor came in to have a look at it, she felt she could see it but not to her satisfaction, and she would rather be certain that’s what she saw and not just guessing at lines. She said she wasn’t too worried though so I’m gonna try not to worry either.

They saw everything else they needed to, and baby is measuring at 20w4d, so that about tracks with the revised due date of August 1 they had given me at the 12 week ultrasound.

Time does seem to be flying by and at the same time dragging on. August seems so far away, but then I think of how I’m already 5 months in and that’s a bit crazy. Most days it still doesn’t feel real. I haven’t really felt him moving around yet, so other than being tired a lot, and the fact that my belly is definitely starting to look like a pregnancy belly, sometimes I have to remind myself he’s in there.

I’ll probably be training my replacement at work soon. My boss wanted to get on in sooner than later which is fine by me, because I’ve finally been sent to work from home (thanks to my doctor’s note re: my being high risk due to pregnancy), but I will have to go into the office to do the training and I’d rather do it now than when I’m dragging a third trimester body around. Plus, it gives me plenty of time to get the new person accustomed to procedures and clients. For now I’ll be monitoring what cases they take, but as we get closer to the end of my pregnancy it’ll switch to her being in charge of most everything and that’s fine by me. By July at the latest I only want to be handling the day to day, none of the things that require a few days’ worth of follow up.

My next OB appointment is in two weeks, and then I’ll have my next ultrasound. Then probably nothing until the first week of May since my OB has been spacing out my appointments by 5 weeks. I did schedule a 3D ultrasound at a private clinic downtown because they’re one of the rare places that currently allow another person to come, and although I’ve FaceTimed Amber for a couple of the ultrasound appointments, I want her to be able to be there with me for at least one of them. I’ll also have to do the glucose test at some point around there (maybe I can schedule it the same day as my next ultrasound if I have to go back to the hospital anyway), and then my TDAP booster shot. Then it should just be more OB appointments throughout the summer, and hopefully it’ll be August before we know it.

I’m hopeful that as the COVID vaccine roll out increases (although Quebec doesn’t seem inclined to making pregnant women eligible so I’ll likely wait til after I give birth) we’ll have much lower restrictions in the summer and maybe I’ll be able to have a very small baby shower, possibly outdoors if need be. Either way, things are looking up and if all goes well most people around me will be vaccinated by the time the baby is born so we won’t have to worry about delaying first visits too much, which is very exciting.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Well, it’s been a minute, but honestly there hasn’t been much to report on thus far.

Everything’s been going well. I’ve not had very strong symptoms that have made things difficult for me - no throwing up, very light nausea (most often really just queasiness) that was only present for maybe a couple of weeks. I have been feeling more tired, so we get into bed earlier than before but I don’t necessarily fall asleep that much sooner. And then there’s been the few emotional outbursts, but thankfully they’ve been far and few in between. The most recent involve sobbing over the fact that a take out restaurant messed up my burrito order, and bursting into tears after my wife, being asked if she had brought something back from the store for me, said she had not (which, mind you, I had not asked her to).

Yesterday was my 12 week ultrasound and the nugget was proving to be obstinate with its placement. It was like he was sort of sitting/laying on its side, so the techs had to press down hard, a lot, to try and get good images to have proper measurements. So, for the past 24 hours, I've been feeling as though I should have bruises all over my lower abdomen. Fortunately, I do not.

And they did manage to get a couple of good pictures to print for me.

Then today was my first OB appointment. I was a bit apprehensive because I made the mistake of looking up the doctor and she was maybe 50/50 on good vs bad reviews. Some of the bad reviews were about her being too abbrasive and blunt and the likes, but most of them were about her being late a lot.

I can confirm the lateness, but thankfully she was pretty nice, and honestly, being late is a pretty common issues with doctors around here - most of the time because they’re overbooked. She did probably the most thorough physical exam on me I’ve had since I was a child, and everything seemed to be good. I got to listen to the heart beat for a bit, though it wasn’t super clear, and unfortunately the recording attempt I tried did not go well so my wife didn’t get to hear, but hopefully next time will work out. Now I’ve got a blood draw to do next Wednesday and my next prenatal appointment is scheduled for February 23rd. They’ll be seeing me every four weeks until I’m 35 weeks, and at that point it’ll be every week.

I’m debating telling my boss just yet. Initially I was planning on waiting to see that everything was fine after the 12 week scan, but I don’t know, I feel like it’s still early. It’s not like I’m showing yet but we’ll see.

A little over 6 months to go now!

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Today was the dating ultrasound, so here’s a picture of the little nugget!

The tech didn’t give me the exact heart rate details, but she pointed it out flickering and said it looked like a very good heartbeat (which is great cause I honestly didn’t know what to look for in terms of a heartbeat and I was a little concerned that I could discern nothing until she pointed out the flicker).

She said everything was looking perfect and as it should be which was a huge relief. Honestly, I’ve not felt or experienced anything that might be seen as concerning, like pains or spotting, but I also really haven’t had that many symptoms so it’s been hard viewing it as real. I have super mild nausea every now and again, and I have been feeling more tired, but not to the point where I’m falling asleep in the middle of the day (although I start looking at the clock around 7-7:30 at night to see if it’s time to go to bed yet 😂).

The baby is measuring at 6w5d and I’m technically 6w6d today, but she said that was nothing to be worried about because for one thing, it’s a negligible difference, and for another, there’s always a slight margin of error with ultrasounds.

I did get annoyed at the clinic but that was after the ultrasound. Last month I had a control ultrasound done to check if I still had a cyst, and the way the clinic does those is you have to pay upfront, and if the cycle doesn’t have to be cancelled, they do a refund. Well, I realized recently I had yet to see the refund come through, and it’s been six weeks now, so I figured I’d bring it up at the clinic. The receptionist had an attitude and there was some waiting involved before she even looked into it, and she called accounting and they were insisting that they had done the refund.

At that point I was like, okay, can I get an email address where I could send my card statement, cause I have not had a refund. So she told me to take a seat again and altogether I must have waited an extra hour, without an official resolution cause now their invoicing department is supposed to call me, but they’re supposed to call me to arrange the refund so it should hopefully be settled soon. Right before she called me back to the desk, I’m 99% sure I heard her tell her coworker (who was the one who did the refund that day) that she refunded the wrong patient, but she must have thought I didn’t hear her cause she then just said she thought she had figured out what happened but they couldn’t fix it today and I’d get a call to settle it. So that was fun. Good thing I had taken the rest of the afternoon off.

Anyway, I do also have my next few appointments set up so there’s that to look forward to. The clinic partners with one specific hospital in the city so that’s the only one they can arrange things with, and although it’s not my top pick, it’s in the top three and worth not having to deal with the hassle. My main concern would be if none of the nurses and doctor on staff when I go into labor speak English because of the area it’s in, which would make it hard for my wife to communicate with them, but I’m hopeful that by August, they’ll allow doulas again to accompany women in labor and she can help out if there’s a language barrier and I’m too annoyed to be dealing with translation.

I called the hospital last week to open my file, and then they set me up for both the 12 week and 20 week ultrasound - January 20 and March 17, respectively. I also have my first prenatal appointment with an OBGYN at the clinic on January 21, so there won’t be much going on for the next month (which is fine, I’d much rather it be very uneventful).

Still, I really hope the next few weeks will fly by. I can’t wait to check in on the little bean again.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

So, I know in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t necessarily mean anything, and it’s certainly not an accurate method of measurement, but since I’m not getting any blood tests I’ve been testing pretty steadily since last week. I was testing every day at first, and then I switched to every other day.

I think so far the line progression is looking pretty good though, so fingers crossed it’s a good sign

[bitoffairydust]

Quick update as I got the call from the clinic. They are not sending me to do any blood testing, but I wasn’t actually expecting them to. It would have been nice to see the numbers rise, but I believe in Canada only a select few provinces do that.

I did however get an appointment for my dating ultrasound, which will be December 17, so if all goes well with that one, I will tell my parents at Christmas. So long as we can go anyhow - our provincial government keeps going back and forth with Christmas guidelines. Honestly we shouldn’t even get to celebrate it with how bad things are, and part of me feels very selfish for wanting to, but on the other hand, I’ve not seen my parents since June, and before that I hadn’t seen them since February, save a quick glimpse in April when they came by to drop off masks and spaghetti sauce. We were gonna visit after we went to Ottawa over Labor Day, we just wanted to give it a couple of weeks first, and then of course the second wave started, and we’re not supposed to travel between regions. I miss them and I’m just looking forward to the possibility of seeing them. Especially if I can bring them the news that they will be grandparents for the first time.

So all of this to say there will likely not be any news on the baby front for another three weeks. That feels forever away right now, but since they usually do that between week 7 and 9, I’m glad they went for week 7.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Well, here we go!

Today was 14DPIUI. Technically I tested yesterday also with a cheap test and got a very faint line, but I decided to wait until today to take a First Response test, and it was a clear enough line to satisfy even my wife.

I’m trying to keep my head level. I know it’s still very early at this point, and statistics being what they are, a lot could happen over the next month. Still, I’d be lying to say I haven’t already started a couple of registries and looked around for some freebies 😂

Actually, the craziest part in all of that is that my wife has helped with it a bit. She’s a lot more cautious than I am about managing expectations, and I think knowing I won’t be able to do much of it for myself she’s taken on the role of the reasonable adult.

I’ve already told our three best friends because of course I’ve been keeping them up to date with our fertility journey. If I’m to have a dating ultrasound around week 8 (so barely just before Christmas), and everything goes well, I’ll probably tell my parents over the holidays, so long as we’re actually able to make it to their place for that with COVID and all.

I emailed the clinic today to inform of the positive test and haven’t heard back yet. I’m unsure how they do things around here to be honest, other than that the dating ultrasound should be between week 7 and 9, but I don’t know if they’ll want me to do a blood test. I guess we’ll find out over the next couple of days

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Yesterday was my second IUI and all in all it went well (I mean, short of dropping the vial, I don’t imagine there’s many ways for the procedure itself to go badly).

Getting there was a bit more of an adventure, as we had an unfortunate mishap on Monday night. I was scheduled to take the Ovidrel injection at 11 PM, so when the time came we started prepping everything. My pharmacy gives the Ovidrel prescription in a pen like syringe, so it involves a bit of prep, and while my wife was cranking what needs to be cranked and such, there was some accidental pushing of things that should not have been pushed, and out came all the medication.

Obviously, that in itself was enough to cause a pretty major stressor, but not the end of the world. Our pharmacy is open until midnight, so I decided to just call them and see if they could have it ready for us to pick up shortly. That would have been easy enough, except it just happened to be the night they were doing some kind of computer updates and they couldn’t access anything. The only option was to come in when they opened at 8 the following morning, and by the time we’d have had everything set up, it’d be 10 hours late for the injection, which I was pretty sure was a no go.

There was a bit of crying involved as I scrambled to find a 24 hour pharmacy in the city and tried to decide if it was reasonable to make the trek there late at night for a non life saving medication. As it turns out, there’s only one 24 hour pharmacy on the island, and upon calling them, they informed me that they unfortunately did not have any Ovidrel on hand. That seemed like the end of it for me, and I wallowed for a bit longer before giving it another look to see if I hadn’t maybe missed something.

Now, we live in the north of the island, and as it turned out, there was another 24 hour pharmacy located in the city on the north shore, about a 15 minute drive away. After a bit more debating on the logistics of getting there and if I even should, I called that pharmacy, and thankfully they had some of the medicine in stock. The pharmacist was very helpful - since it’s the same company as the one we usually go to, he was able to get my prescription transferred over and open my file while on the phone, before advising it would be ready in 15 minutes. By that point it was about midnight, so we got dressed back up and ordered an Uber since we don’t have a car. By 12:20 we were at the pharmacy, and within 3 minutes we were back out, Ovidrel in hand. We made it back home quickly since the Uber we’d taken over hadn’t left the area or gotten new riders since, so he pulled right back up, and at 12:45, the injection was finally done.

In general, I don’t see myself as a superstitious person. I do sometimes wonder if things happen for a reason though, so I did have the shake up the feeling that maybe this all happened because this month wasn’t meant to be. I started out the month feeling really good about this cycle though, so I didn’t want to let one badly timed accident ruin it.

So yesterday I went in at the same time as originally scheduled (I did call the clinic on Tuesday and they assured me that the two hours difference wouldn’t affect anything), and everything happened accordingly to how it should have. I did have some mild spotting afterward, and I’ve been having very mild cramping on and off since, but nothing too bad and I know it’ll pass before long.

The numbers were not as good as last time, which is a bummer. The total sperm count was 8 million, and the motility was pretty low in my non expert opinion at 40%, though my understanding is that the total count factors in motility so I suppose if 8M is decent I shouldn’t worry too much about the motility.

And now we wait. My wife and I are off of work in a couple of weeks, and the morning of 14DPO we’re not gonna be home, so I’ll see if I test then or what. Keeping my fingers crossed this is the one. If not, we have one more vial of sperm and then we’ll have to look for a different donor. There’s also some potential change coming in Quebec in regards to coverage of fertility treatment - covered IUI cycles are planned to drop from 9 to 6, which is a bummer but not dramatic since the chances of success usually drop after 6 tries. However, there’s rumors the coverage would now include sperm vials, which would be great. And then the biggest thing is they are planning on reinstating one free IVF cycle per couple, so if after 6 IUIs nothing has taken, I might have that opportunity to look forward to.

Even so, I’m just gonna keep hoping it doesn’t get to that point. 2020 has been a year of much uncertainty, but I’m hoping the one thing that we’d planned which will still happen before the year end is my getting pregnant.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

So, last Monday I had an appointment on CD3 to determine if the cyst was gone and I could go ahead with the IUI this month. There seemed to be a little something still there, but it wasn’t enough to cancel the cycle, so they scheduled me for a monitoring ultrasound this morning.

Of course, that was also the consensus last month, and it was still canceled because another cyst popped up, so I wasn’t a hundred percent confident. And although I haven’t had an appointment with an OBGYN yet, I decided to make my own decision for my own body and I skipped the letrozole.

Obviously, I’ll never know if it was the right or wrong decision in terms of getting pregnant, because there’s never a clear cut reason as to why it does or doesn’t take. But the first thing the doctor said this morning as he started the ultrasound was that the lining of my uterus was beautiful and seemed perfect. There weren’t a ton of follicles, but at least one measuring at 17mm.

So tomorrow night, I’ll be taking the Ovidrel, and Wednesday I finally get to do my second IUI. It’s been since July and I am beyond thrilled. I don’t want to jinx it but I feel very good about this month. I feel like I trusted my body (although I know I’m still giving it an extra boost with the trigger shot).

I also feel a lot more at peace, in view of yesterday’s news, with attempting to bring a child into the world. Obviously, there are still a lot of uncertainties for the future, but it’s such an incredible step in the right direction that I feel excited to go ahead instead of anxious. We live in Canada, and we’ll likely never move to the States, but my wife is American and we want to give our children dual citizenship. Our baby will be half American and could get to spend the first four years of its life in a world with the very first Madam Vice President, and with a leader that can be respected. And that feels good. Very good.

- Marie

[bitoffairydust]

Quick update after today’s ultrasound. My cycle was cancelled again. The doctor said she didn’t see any growth in my follicles, and she also mentioned that cycles with cysts are not usually good for inseminations anyway. So I guess that’s that for this month. I’m glad I had taken today off of work because I would certainly not have been very productive after that appointment.

We’re gonna do same scenario as last time with an ultrasound on cycle day three to see if the cyst is still there. I’m starting to think that maybe I should forego the letrozole, although of course there’s no saying that’s what is causing the cysts, but that two cycles out of three now that I’ve developed cysts after taking it so I feel maybe it’d be good to try a few cycles without it. The problem is, technically I’m not supposed to make that decision myself, I have to speak to the doctor first, and the first appointment they could get me was mid November, which will definitely be after the start of my next cycle even if I get another abnormally long one.

I’m trying not to feel too discouraged and frustrated but it just comes back down to, I just want to be able to even get to the point of doing the damn IUI. And it may be silly, but knowing that the odds are usually lower on the first one, I can’t help but wonder if the fact that there’s gonna now have been a large gap of time between my first and second will basically put my second try at the same odds as if it were the first again.

Definitely thankful to be having a long weekend ahead.

- Marie