November!!

Today was the follow-up appointment for my surgery. Since it was in the middle of the morning, I actually got to sleep in and take my time, a luxury I don't get on a normal business day. I got down there with time to spare. They office wasn't busy because she was on OB call with the ER so they can't fill her schedule just in case there's an emergency downstairs.

So anyway, I don't have to wait more than 10 minutes before she comes to get me. I really really like her. She's young, hip and has such a great bedside manner. And a fun sense of humour. I had brought a really cool MP3 player with me that has the ability (besides doing video) to record sound as well. So V. showed me how to work it so I could tape the appointment since he couldn't be there. When she calls me in she's looking at me with this big silly grin. She's genuinely happy to see me and when I ask why the big grin she says "have you lost weight?" God I love this woman. :) In actuality, I probably have lost 3 or 4 pounds since she saw me July 12th but it's always nice to have someone say something.

I pulled out the U10 and set it recording telling her that I'm going to tape our conversation since V. can't be there. She calls out to the device "hello, hi there, hello" just to him. :) I then hop up on the table and she takes a look at the scars, pokes around a bit and deems me in great shape. Asked how things were as well. For the most part, I'm doing really well. I've got no pain at the incision sites, but sometimes get little pains. Since I had my appendix out about 6 years ago, I'm fairly sure that these pains are just little things that will go away - nothing to be concerned about. The only thing I do have that is a bit of a pain is that when my bladder is full (and that's fairly often since I drink 2 litres of water a day minimum). It's pretty painful and of course once my bladder is empty, it still hurts as it returns to its regular size. I mentioned this. She asked if it was like that before the surgery (nope) and I said it showed up about 2-3 weeks ago which correlates with when I went back to work and resumed my water intake. She said keep an eye on it and let her know if it gets worse. My own personal diagnosis says that this is because a) I've got further to walk to the bathroom now that our office area moved so it's full longer b) the main fibroid's location was posterior in my uterus and was distorting it's shape. I'm pretty sure that she told me at an earlier appointment that the fibroids were pushing my uterus up and back so now that it's settled back down to where it belongs; it's just above my bladder. So when my bladder is full, it's pushing into the uterus. Who knows if I'm right, but it sounds good to me.

She asked us when we wanted to start trying again. I told her that was one of V.'s questions. It's not like we haven't been practicing or anything, but we obviously can't do anything that will risk me getting pregnant until she gives us the okay. I went in armed with the knowledge that when we start the protocol with the clinic that it will take about 6 weeks before we reach embryo transfer, so I was hoping she would say November. That is about midway of her original 3-6 months. Sure enough, I didn't even have to say anything, she said November. That means after my November period, we can start to try. I'm happy with that.

She goes through the reports that she's got and says that the pathology report for the fibroids says that they were benign which is also great news. It's rare for them to be malignant but always a relieve when she confirms all is well. She gave me a copy of the reports for my records and one for my family doctor and sends me on my way. Her parting words were essentially that we better let her know when we're expecting. I told her not to worry, that we'd be back as we had every intention of having her be my OB. :) And with that I was on my way.

So knowing that V. wants to try again I let him know when I got to the office what she'd said. He's a bit disappointed because he sees that as three months. However, I reminded him that my cycles are only 28 days and that my November cycle will be right at the beginning of the month. In fact, I checked the calendar. I will actually be getting 2 cycles in October, one at the beginning and one at the end, so as soon as he gets back from Vegas we're good to go.

I told her that V. wants us to try to see if we can conceive naturally before we move to the donor scenario. I'd love for us to have a child that was biologically ours but there is so much going against us for that and I know V. would too (as evidenced in his post below).

1. I'm going to be 46 next month. There is a less than 5% chance that we will conceive naturally. I know it's possible, but it's so much harder.
2. Also, being 46 means that there is a greater chance of birth defects and disability. "The risk of having a child with Down syndrome increases in a gradual, linear fashion until about age 30 and increases exponentially thereafter (Figure 1).8 The risk of having a child with Down syndrome is 1/1,300 for a 25-year-old woman; at age 35, the risk increases to 1/365. At age 45, the risk of a having a child with Down syndrome increases to 1/30." If you look at the chart associated with that link, that is a greater than 3.5% chance of having a Downs child. This scares the hell out of me.


Now don't get me wrong, if V. wants to try we will, but I want him to be realistic. It's taken so long to get to where we are I don't want to take much time trying to conceive naturally, especially once we've managed to secure the funds necessary to move forward with the donor. Now, don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that having a child with our donor means absolute success. I'm being realistic here. However, it greatly increases our chances of success, while bringing down the percentage to less than 0.5% to having a Downs baby.

Anyway, we'll wait and see how things go. In the meantime, everything is looking positive and we're moving forward. Always a good thing.