Last week was pretty crazy. Emotionally I felt that I was doing okay. As good as could be expected I guess you could say. I was feeling pretty good that the facility had agreed to changing the protocol for our next cycle. Physically I was not doing so well... The allergic reaction to the progesterone in cottonseed oil compound was getting much worse. By Saturday night (I think it would have been the 7th) it was so bad that I started taking what was left of the meds from my last reaction. Not only was the reaction localized to my rump, but I was also having a lot of upper respiratory issues. I didn't go to Iowa to meet Dolcey because I wasn't sure if I was getting a cold or if it was part of the reaction. On Monday a retired nurse told me that my throat was swollen and that the cough was my body trying to assure that the airway stayed open. She told me to call right away. I went down to the school nurse (FABULOUS lady!) and she began looking up info for me. At that point I called and left a message on the triage line at my doctor's office. After lunch I got a call from their office telling me to go to Urgent Care. :/ BOO!! We don't have Urgent Care in Monmouth. We have an ER and we have a "same day appointment" clinic. Unfortunately same day appointments are hard to come by there. It was time for an RTI group, so I decided to take them and call when I was finished. I have NO idea what made me do that, but I just felt like I needed to. Once I was done with that group they I called. Of course they said that they did not have any appointments available. Then as they were trying to help me figure out what to do a CANCELLATION came through. WOW!!! What perfect timing!!!! So, there was an opening right after school and they were able to get me in. At that point my choice to wait made perfect sense!!! :)
So, I went to the appointment and they were great. They were able to give me a steroid shot to get the process started. They were also able to give me a couple prescriptions to help me to get over the reaction. Within a few hours I could tell that the throat was less swollen. I was coughing less and I was starting to feel some of the trapped fluid draining. I was also given meds to help the itching and pain.
The week went on and I continued taking the meds. Things were looking much better. My rump had gone from red welts to black and blue. Then the black and blue started to go away. My throat was less and less swollen. Then Thursday night while we were eating dinner Mike started to have severe back pain and (TMI) pain in his left testicle. That was when the week got REALLY crazy!! The situation quickly became worse. He was struggling when sitting so we got him into bed with a heating pad. That was not helping a ton, but at least he was not in excruciating pain when in bed. I gave him Motrin and then we alternated heat and ice. In the morning he was still not feeling the best. He went to work for a little bit on Friday, but his back pain was so bad that he could not stay. Driving made it excruciating. When I got home from school on Friday afternoon he was in pretty bad shape. We continued Motrin, heat, ice, rest. But, it was not helping. So, when he was still feeling just as bad on Saturday I called the "same day appointment" clinic. They said that their next appointment would be Sunday at 1:00. After talking to a couple different nurses about the situation they said that due to the involvement of the testicle we would need to immediately go to the ER instead of keeping the appoinment. This seemed a little crazy to us, but we both showered and headed to the ER in Monmouth. They did a urine test, took 7 vials of blood, did an x-ray on his back and planned for an ultrasound on the testicle. Then, the doctor came in and told us that there was not anyone on call to do ultrasounds in Monmouth or Galesburg. We would have to go to Peoria. Mike was in SO much pain and riding in the car was the worst position for him. We did not want to go to Peoria at that point, but they told us that "seconds and minutes counted" when the testicles are involved and that waiting until Monday could make him LOSE the testicle! Okay... we were headed to Peoria. Once we were in Peoria the whole process started over again. They asked the same questions, started to order the same tests, etc... Mike tried to be calm and let them know that we had already done all of this in Monmouth. The third person in Peoria finally got the point loud and clear. :/ Mike was as patient as he could have been under the circumstances! After a couple hours they took us up for the ultrasound and Mike was on the stretcher in a hallway for over 30 minutes while we waited for them to be ready for us. This was making both of us even more irritable. The waiting was getting crazy. We initially went to the ER at 1:00 and it was now about 7:00. They completed the ultrasound and I watched, taking note of some things that looked familiar. When we went back to the room I told Mike what I thought I saw (I have had SO many ultrasounds/sonograms that I am getting pretty good at reading them!!!). When they came to give us the results it was almost 9:00 p.m. They said the back issues were most likely due to pulled muscles and that the other situation had to do with some fluid around the testicles (it happens, but can be painful... this was the first thing I noticed on the ultrasound) and 2 cysts on the line that carries sperm fromthe testicles. (Those are the other things I had spotted on the ultasound! I definitely know what cysts look like on an ultrasound!!!) At that point I looked up and realized that I had not taken ANY of my meds nor eaten or drank anything the entire day. Poor Mike hadn't had anything to eat or drink either. They got me a small glass of water so that I could take the pill that should have been taken at 7:30 (to prevent bleeding and ovulation) and I decided that the rest of the meds would have to wait until I had food in my system (the meds for my allergic reaction). We then waited for them to come back to give Mike shots of medication and his prescription scripts. We finally got back to Monmouth after 11:30 p.m. Luckily, Taco Bell saved the day by being open still! We enjoyed a romantic inhaling of food just before Valentine's Day ended!!!!
After I ate I assessed the situation with my allergic reaction... My rump took a MAJOR turn for the worse and I was completely clogged up again in my upper respiratory area. My rump was back to black and blue and in a lot of pain. Mike was feeling pretty good because of his shots. I started trying to get my meds figured out and got Mike set up for bed. I spent the day yesterday trying to set up a pain meds schedule for him and getting my meds back on track. I then went to the Quad Cities for a much necessary shopping trip for household stuff and groceries. By the time I got home in the evening my meds had started to work and the black and blue look was starting to improve. Hopefully the discoloration and the pain continue to improve. Mike continues to be in pain, but I have been waking him up to take some sort of meds every couple hours.
Hopefully this week is better and we are able to get things under control! I am thankful for this day off so that I can continue to help him to stay on top of the pain and so that I can get my rump under control!! ;) Oh... and so that I can try to get this mess of a house under control!! Let's face it, a messy house is the least of concerns when things like this come up... until things calm down and you actually SEE the mess agiain! Then it is super overwhelming!!
So, that is the latest update from Team McVey. Hot Mess express at the McVey house!! ;)
As for our next steps in the IVF process, we have to make decisions and call the facility tomorrow. I was thinking that it might be important to take some time off to catch up on the costs that we have incured. It gets so expensive, so quickly. Mike said that he doesn't think that is a good reason to wait, but he thinks that it is important to decide if my body needs time to heal. My thoughts on that are as follows:
1. My body isn't getting a break from this process even when we are not in cycle because I always have to be on some sort of medication to keep my cysts away, my lining normal, my cycles regular, etc.
2. My body probably won't recover until we decide to stop all together... meaning that not only do we stop, but I have a hysterectomy and remove all of the endometriosis and messed up organs. Until that happens I will continue to have the pain and issues.
3. The hardest part of the last two weeks has been knowing that we lost two more babies because we had to switch specialists and therefore we lost over a year in progress. We are just now getting to the point that we are starting protocols that we were supposed to do last spring. It is terrifying to me to think that their change in protocol might not be enough and that we will lose more of our babies. Terrifying!
4. I am not ready to give up. We have 3 babies that are frozen in Rockford, waiting for me to continue to fight for them!
So, that leads me to tomorrow's decision... I don't feel like we can give up yet. I feel like we have to fight for these babies or we will always wonder what could have been. I know it will be hard. I know that I will have to continue to pray for strength. I know that I will have to continue to pray that my pain doesn't affect my marriage. I know that I will want to continue to retreat into myself and watch Netflix rather than attempt to function in this state I am in. BUT, I know that if I give up and say that I am not strong enough or that my body can't take it, I will always wonder what could have been if I WAS strong enough to push myself. And that is a pain I don't know that I could live with.
Tomorrow I will tell them that we will move forward. That we are ready to hear their plan. We will set up my injections. We will set up my protocol and time frame. We will pray that this time is better. We will pray that I can be strong enough to do this again. And I will pray that I can continue to be happy for the people around me who are growing their families. I will pray that through being open about our journey others will be helped. I will pray that through this journey there will be people who will not feel so alone. That will see things in our journey that give them answers to their own journeys.
Thank you for your continued support of our journey! Your prayers and thoughts are always felt and appreciated!
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