I've been "republished" !

that is, I've decided to do it again, and gave the agency the 'go ahead' to put my profile back on the egg donor database as 'available'. I'll let you know when i get chosen by an infertile couple.

to be continued...

normal cycle - finally

i started my period again a couple days ago. my last period, just before all the egg donation stuff started, was on november 8th. so they delayed my cycle almost 2 months. about 7 weeks or so. crazy.

but, uh, yeah. i feel normal.
I'd like to do it again, but i have some plans coming up, like finals, and holiday visits to family and that sort of thing. so i'd have to tell the agency about my 'blackout' dates, as they call them. but i'm not sure yet what they are. the agency wants to hear from me, to find out if i want to be put back on that database as a repeat donor or not. repeat donors get paid 10,000.00! i could sell my eggs to put a down payment on a house!

it would suck to get chosen right away when they put me back on the donor database, cause i wouldn't have enough time to drink alcohol and have sex with my husband before having to stop for a month again. i wouldn't even have time to get back on chemical birth control. that would suck.

so i think i'll wait until december or january to go back on the database. that way i can get all the marital fun and social gatherings out of my system. i dont even drink that much, but being able to have 2 beers with a friend wasn't allowed, so now i can do that.
also, i'd like to do a little cleanse before donating again. all the medication i put in my body has been filtered by my liver and the bonding agents to stabilize medication can be hard on the body sometimes. i'd like to clear any residual medication chemicals out of my temporary energy stores. maybe like a master cleanse for a week. or a liver cleanse. the liver cleanse would be beneficial. maybe i could master cleanse for a couple days, to break down my temporary stores, and then start the liver cleanse to finish. maybe prime my digestive with a water fast and psyllium husk flush or something. really scrub my inner gooies.

wow. i cant believe i got somebody pregnant. i mean, i CAN, it just still trips me out. i feel so powerful. it feels good to make a wanted child. i'm pretty sure i was a mistake. so were all the kids my friends have. i wish more people would actually plan to have a kid instead of accidentally have kids. I wish abortions were free for everybody all around the world. i really do.

tax question answered

i just received an email from my donor coordinator about the tax question. she says i wont get a 1099 form because its not considered income. It is considered pain and suffering payment. so its not taxed. yaaay!

my check came in the mail yesterday

it was for the remainder of the 8000. its 7250. now i just have to figure out what to do about taxes. i've heard conflicting advice. some states dont tax donor reimbursements. some agencies in california claim donor fees, and in that case i'd receive a 1099 come tax time. i've also read donor fees count as 'other income' and that donor fees are compensation and not taxable.

So i wrote an email to my agency to ask how they deal with the tax thing. and I'll ask my mother-in-law, she does taxes for a living.

I've finished the progesterone medicine. did i mention it tasted like minty postage stamps? gross. glad i'm done with that.

I thought i felt some natural menstrual cramping this morning. hopefully i'll have my cycle soon, so i can be back to normal.

the egg donor agency set up a phone interview with me next week to ask me about how the donation went and find out if i want stay listed as a repeat donor on their website.

its been more than 5 days, i'm gonna contact the fertility clinic to see if my eggy weggies are fertile.

i just looked at my youtube instructional videos about preparing the fertility drugs, and most of my 300 views are from china!! thats cool. the egg donor channel i created for that is called squashflowers. but all the videos are in this blog somewhere.

recap

overall i would do it again.

i wouldn't do it during a school semester, cause in the last week and a half i didn't get ANY school work done, and i had to miss 2 weeks of classes for the ultrasound appointments. i'm behind on classwork and a little stressed out about my grades. i'll pass, but i'm not getting the most out of what i signed up for...

the worst part by far was the Menopur injections. the constant shots in the belly for a week with that big needle really bugged me. the stomach is so sensitive, and the pharmaceutical company doesn't recommend that you inject it anywhere else but there. so you have to alternate different sides of the belly button. ouchy. the needle was the largest out of all the shots you have to deal with for the egg donation process. menopur sucks. not at first - it takes a week to feel the full glory of it's suckiness - but it begins to hurt worse towards the end.

the HCG shot was no big deal. i really wanted to fail a pregnancy test, but i didn't get around to it. too late now. maybe next time?

the abstinence thing is hard. if you're not in a close relationship, then you will have it easier than us married folks. i think its making me crazy. i still have to wait until my cycle starts again before resuming a normal, healthy sex life.

i would want to have a child for myself before doing this a third time, because i'd be afraid of the heightened risk of ovarian cancer and health problems down the line with the drugs. but the catch there is, that by the time i'll be able to have kids in my life, i'll just pass the age requirements for egg donation. they only want your eggs when you're in your reproductive prime. thats all well, cause i would have served my time in helping other women.

i understand why they pay more for repeat donors. they probably scare a lot of people off.

DEEP THOUGHTS:
egg donation is no career path, but its a really nice thing to do, and it makes sense at an instinctual level. i've already spread my genes. my cavewoman psyche can die in peace when the time comes. i've even given my genes to a family richer than I, therefor practically ensuring the survival of those genes. its modern survival of the fittest. natural selection. if a world-wide catastrophe hits - like a comet, or nuclear war, or famine - its more likely a richer family would escape and survive the disaster because of they have more resources. right?

the retrieval

my appointment for retrieval was this morning.

i love anesthesia. best invention in modern science. besides cloning and all that...

so i checked in, changed into that silly gown thing. they gave me socks to wear, and put my stuff in a bag to set aside.
nurse took my vitals.
anesthesiologist came in, asked me my weight, put an IV saline drip in a vein in my hand, and injected some stuff into the tubing behind me. i started to feel a little buzzed. they took my vitals again. blood pressure, temperature, etc. then they walked me with my IV on a rack into the room with all the cool machines. by this time i was feeling a little disoriented and drunk. they helped me position myself on the table while they prepped the ultrasound machine and all that stuff. the anesthesiologist put more meds into my IV drip. i felt sleepy, they put the oxygen mask over my face, and the pulse and oxygen reader on my finger, and the doctor came in, and sat down, and thats the last thing i remember.

i heard the anesthesiologist's voice call my name a couple times, and i awoke on a bed in the recovery room. there was a big screen television with news. it was 20 - 30 minutes later. i was a little disorientated, but eventually i came to. i still had my IV drip, it was almost empty. i felt good. and then 10 minutes later i became aware of some cramping - like moderate menstrual cramping. the nurse let me know that was normal, and she offered me tylenol. i took it graciously. they took my vitals and went over recovery forms. they made sure i could use the restroom normally before letting me go with my ride home. they said there may be spotting. I havent had any. i feel crampy, though. my belly finally feels normal again. i can push on my ovary areas without pressure again. its nice to have my body back to normal.

the progesterone lozenges are supposed to taste like mint, but after suckin on one of those for 5 minutes, my mouth tasted like i'd been licking envelopes for hours. nasty. i have to take those for 5 days to convince my body to have it's cycle again. once i have my period, i can have sex again. yaaay! happy ending!

the shot made my butt hurt

in the middle of the night i remember rolling over onto the side where the shot was, and waking up cause its too sore to lean on.
this morning was the same. the whole hip and butt were sore.

feels better now. i dont notice it anymore, unless i lean on it.

i had a brief wave of nausea around noon. and i feel a headache coming on too. so i'm drinking lots of water.

i'm all ready to go to the hotel room. we're leaving in a bit. i'm not allowed to eat after midnight. and i have to wear loose fitting clothing, and no scented lotions for the extraction. its early in the morning, so i dont even get to eat breakfast.

if they have free continental breakfast at the hotel, i'm going to grab what i can and eat it after my procedure.

i remembered to pack my progesterone medicine. not an injectable thank god! they help regulate my cycle again. i have to take one tomorrow evening, and for the next 6? days.

TRIGGER SHOT!!!

oh my god i did it! i was so hyped up on adrenaline! you know how scary this thing looked??? heres a picture of the needle with the amount of medication i had to inject - it was so scary! and then the needle went in really easily and it didn't hurt at all.

so now i feel like a big wuss.

but MAN just look at how big that f**ker is!!! i cant believe that hurt less than the belly shots!
must be cause the skin is really tough on the butt-thigh. crazy. man, i was so nervous. i feel fine now. i feel a little adrenaline leaving my body.

so i just put a 1 cc bubble of Human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) into my upper outer thigh muscle. hcg is a hormone made by the embryo and, later, in the placenta to prevent menstruation in a normal pregnancy. most pregnancy tests are actually just HCG pee tests. so in this case, they've just made my body think it just got pregnant. so i'd naturally start producing progesterone. and my uterine lining would thicken and all my womanly parts should be getting ready for that egg to make its way from my ovaries/fallopian tubes to the uterus. its an idea time to retrieve the eggs. cause chemical changes in my body would make the eggs more receptive to pregnancy.

i kinda want to take a pregnancy test now. that would be really funny. i could fool some people. hmmmm.... now i'm ACTUALLY considering it!! that would be an expensive joke, though. those things aren't cheap.

Wiki says hcg has been linked to morning sickness. i hope i dont feel nauseous. that would suck. According to the FDA website, i may suffer side effects of headache, irritability, restlessness, depression, fatigue, pain at site of injection, and, worst case scenario: shortness of breath and ovarian hyper stimulation syndrome. all i have to do now is relax, and wait for tomorrow. I love hotel rooms.

2nd ultrasound

i got an ultrasound print for you guys - its of my left nut. my female left nut. 

the bubble like voids are the egg follicles filled with fluid and 1 egg. this happens every month, but only 1 of the several released gets matured this way. you can see parts of all 7 eggy weggies. arent they cute?

i think its funny that i'm going to get somebody pregnant. i never thought i'd end up getting somebody pregnant. thats usually something guys do.

i also wanted to show you a picture of all the medication i was required to take over the 7 day stimulation period. they're all out on the table. looks like a lot of stuff. lots of waste. filled up the trash can with stupid plastic caps and wrappers.

and the next one is a picture of my bruised and red dotted belly from the stimulation shots. they're going away now, but it looks gross. dont do egg donation during beach season, or everybody will think you got beat in the belly with a pole or something.

anyway, the eggs are all mature and ready now, at 13 - 16 mm. crazy they grew that fast in 2 days. i definitely feel more pressure on my bladder today than i did yesterday. but my belly hasn't grown. 

i've heard a bunch of stories online about how people get all fat in the gut, during egg donation, and their pants dont fit. i think people may have made that up. i know every body is different, but i haven't had any discomfort aside from giving myself the shots (and any diabetic knows thats not a big deal if you're used to it), i really dont understand how your belly could bulge out like you were in early pregnancy. 

seems like if that happened, you might have hyper-stimulation of the ovaries, or one of those other disorders that could go wrong with the medication, or parasites or something. 

maybe these people are already fat, and need something to blame for the chub? or maybe they have really really weak stomach muscles, and they're pushing out further than natural because of the bladder or something?

 if i have 16 eggs each at about 13 millimeters, thats a combinedsurface area increase of 21 centimeters squared. is that right? so my ovaries are estimated to be about the size of small avocados. and i can tell they're taking up  surface area of my bladder... you really cant see any difference in my belly size. and i've got 16 huge eggs inside my abdomen! seems like if you have a skinny belly to begin with you should be able to tell a difference more than a chubby one...  I notice that i cannot suck in  past my hip bones anymore. i used to be able to suck in so my abdomen was concave (it looked gross, i could also push out my abdomen so i looked pregnant. i've used that one as a party trick), and now when i try to suck in the gut, it only goes as far as the hip bones, and cannot contract any further. but aside from that - you wouldn't be able to tell. i look normal. 

i no longer have to take the lupron, follistim, or menopur. tonight, in an hour, i have to take a gonadotropin shot. its intramuscular, in the outer butt muscle. 1 cc.  This shot has to be done at exactly 730 or else the timing wont be right for the extraction. i'm counting down the time anxiously. my last shot. sounds wonderful. 

I have to check in for my appointment at 7am, and the extraction has to start at 730, 48 hours after the gonadotropin shot.  so this is what all the fuss was about. this is the money shot.

7am is too early to catch a train, so i have a couple options: take a midnight bus, take a early plane, rent a car and drive, or take a train up the night before and spend the night by the fertility center in a hotel, and go from there. all options would be reimbursed. i decided to go up early and relax in the hotel, so i'm not rushing or losing sleep. its like an 8 hr commute each day i have an appointment. i need some sleep. and i'm not very hungry (medication side effect), so its a lot easier to eat well when i'm not on a train, subway, bus or whatever.

its almost over

and i'm glad. i'm sick of this abstinence nonsense. and all the injections are so annoying. and not being able to enjoy a glass of wine is also annoying. a friend gave us a bottle of wine, and i cant even drink it with dinner.

i have my last ultrasound tomorrow. and my extraction the day after the day after tomorrow.

i wonder how much the last shot will hurt? its a bigger needle, and a muscular shot. 

somebody is supposed to come with me for the extraction - to take me home cause i'll be groggy from the anesthesia. 

ultrasound results

i had my ultrasound this morning

the eggs are in a bubble of fluid in each follicle of my ovaries. i had 17 potential follicles. at my last ultrasound, the doctor looked at each of my ovaries and counted 17. out of the 17 potential follicles, 16 eggs had grown.

 7 on my left, 9 on my right. the sizes of the egg fluid bubbles varied a lot, between 6 and 13 millimeters in diameter.

the first thing the doctor saw with the ultrasound machine was my full bladder. i had gone pee just before walking into the office. that happened at the last ultrasound also. i think i just always have a full bladder.

the egg follicles looked pretty cool on the screen. my ovaries are about the size of small avocados right now. that explains the heaviness i feel down there. its a new feeling. i wouldn't dare do jumping jacks right now, cause id be afraid to hurt my ovaries or something. that would feel uncomfortable. like having huge mammaries and jumping up and down. thats the only side effect to report. i feel good. DA da DA da DA da DA like i knew that i would now DA da DA da DA da DA i feeeeeeeeeel nice

anyway, it took me longer to get undressed from the waist down than it did for the doctor to come in, take ultrasound pictures, count and measure eggs, let me know everything was running smoothly and my body was reacting well to the meds, and leave the room. i was like, whoa, that was fast. 

its monday today. the nurse told me i'd come in for another ultrasound on wednesday, and i'm to keep taking the same injections for the next couple days, and my extraction date would be friday, saturday at the latest.

i had to do my shot at work today

it felt very awkward. i brought my meds and syringes in an insulated lunch box thing with a cold pack, and did my shots in the bathroom a few minutes ago. it felt kinda naughty to be giving myself injections in a bathroom. its not the most sanitary place. 

I sanitized a surface with alcohol and lay down a couple paper towels, and prepped my needles on that. 

i'm finally getting the hang of it i think. i'm getting the hang of using the Q-cap to get the liquid to the menopur powder vial. and i'm now a master bubble flicker. no bubbles survive in my syringes. i flick 'em out like a pro.

the injections themselves were easy, mostly painless (except for the lupron - i wiggled the needle a little on that one on accident while it was in the skin), and bloodless. so overall i think i did good. the agency gave me bandages to use, but i dont really need them. except i needed them for the shots the other day... was that yesterday? yeah.

the follistim pen functioned smoothly also. you dont even have to press that hard, i dont know why i couldn't get it to work before. i think i was just terrified to press at all.

side effects report: i feel bloated. and things keep happening in my ovarian area. its like a party down there. theres movement that sometimes feels like cramping without the pain. just like i said yesterday - awareness of something happening down there. crazy. the doctor said that each follicle would swell with fluid about the size of a grape. so if all 17 of my follicles are working, then i'll have 2 small bunches on each side of my uterus. 2 bunches with 8 or 9 grapes on each side filling up space. that would explain the bloating. 

have you ever cut open a frog in biology class and seen the fatty deposits on either side of the stomach? thats how i think i'm going to feel by next week.

i feel good and energetic. i'm not emotional or depressed or any of that. i feel emotionally totally normal. maybe even more energetic than normal? 

i'm not allowed to exercise too much. so i walk up hills instead of the usual biking them.

i talked to my case coordinator, she said if my ultrasounds on monday and wednesday look normal, then my expected extraction date would be the following friday, saturday, or sunday. i'll know for sure when they see my ultrasounds and check my blood. but thats less than a week from now, so i'm excited and kinda surprised this is coming up so fast.

that would mean i'd have to give myself the 'trigger shot' on thursday or around there. the trigger shot is a hormone that tells my body to ovulate at a specific time. i'd have to give myself the shot exactly within a certain time away from the extraction procedure. that needle is bigger. and somebody else has to give it to me, and its in my butt, if i remember correctly. so, to recap, 

"somebody else has to give it to me in my butt". yeah. THATS what i meant to say.

tonight was easy

the nurse was right about the follistim pen. i pushed harder on the button-plunger, and it slowly clicked down. i was just too scared to put that much pressure on the thing while the needle was in my skin. 

i paid attention to the position of the needle before the shot, the pointy end of the slanted needle cuts the skin better, so i aimed that part.

no side effects. i feel like im in a perpetual state of pre-ovulation. i felt something going on with my ovaries several times today. it was like that feeling when your body releases the egg during ovulation - that sudden awareness of the egg getting released, not cramping, but movement in that area. 

these shots bled a lot.

i managed to do all 3 shots in 4 minutes. they're fast and i pre-primed them (i made sure there was a bead of medication at the tip of the needle) i prepared the menopur prior to recording. see previous post about how i did that. this time it went much more smoothly.

and yeah, you can see it

you can tell by watching that i wiggled the follistim pen around too much. i bet there'll be a bruise there tomorrow. theres a bruise on my belly where the follistim pen injection was yesterday. its cause i'm trying to twist down the plunger and i'm moving it too much. i contacted a nurse about that. they're going to get back to me.

the needles had 'issues' with breaking the skin. i think it might have to do with my slow entry and less than 90 degree angle. the sharp angle of the tip of the needle has a lot to do with the efficiency of the cut. i'm going to make sure i have the needle tip turned to the place it would most quickly break skin. like pointy tip in first. i hadn't paid any attention to that before.

this one is so bloody its almost comical. 

side effects to report -- aside from the physical reminders of multiple subcutaneous injections. there are a few red dots that are in the healing process. a couple small dime sized bruises at the injection sites.  my breasts haven't swollen to an uncomfortable size. they're kinda half sensitive. its not as bad as i thought it'd get.

and i do feel sexually neglected. this is the longest i think i've been abstinent with my husband. we usually have a very healthy sex life. Its strange not to do "it" for so long. thats the only thing that would make me think i might not want to do this again. 

i value the intimacy i have in my relationship, and i have to temporarily sacrifice my sex life for what? my fascination with fertility technology? my desire to be part of this new high tech world of tissue transfer? my drive to experience a real life application of the TDNA technology it takes to even synthesize these hormones that i'm taking? my respect and sympathy for an infertile rich woman who wants a baby so bad, she'd accept somebody else's ovum to make it work? is it the potential to make one of the MOST WANTED CHILDREN in the world? how badly must you want a child to go through this process that the 'intended parents' are going through?

is it altruism? 8 or 10 grand? the fact that this process is so easy? this experience is definitely making me re-evaluate how much i appreciate my own healthy sex life and how much i value intimacy with my husband... however temporary the delay. i mean, its only like a couple months. that is about 62 days. *sigh*

overall, though, i feel good and energetic. we CAN still be intimate. we just have to regress to our pre-sexin' times of more creative sexual expressions. 

i've been doing a lot of research about anti-egg donation organizations. there are people who think paying egg donors for this process is exploitation. it really fascinates me that people would feel so strongly about the process - and not even have any obvious religious bias towards the whole thing. theres a lot of misinformation at the core of these anti-egg donation people's philosophies, and thats that 'egg donors are not informed of all the risks involved' and therefor 'unable to make informed consent'

  i signed 3 legal forms disclosing every worst case scenario. i'm going to have to give routine blood tests and ultrasounds to make sure i'm doing okay and things are going as planned. 

they even go as far as to take out an insurance policy in my name in case of any complications with the process. the policy covers problems that might come up after the extraction. I signed up with 3 different agencies before getting chosen by an infertile couple. and each one disclosed the same risks that i hear about all over the internet and elsewhere. 

the funny thing i learned looking into anti-egg donation people's sites, though, was some crazy woman who donated like 11 times (which i hear most places wont let you) she wrote a book called 'confessions of a serial egg donor' i kind of want to hear what happened to her. 

tonights shots

hurt a little. i think its cause my belly is still sore from yesterday's shots. i think i'll do the lupron in the leg from now on. 3 shots in the same place every night is a bad idea. my belly feels strange. like theres foreign pockets of liquid under my skin -- oh wait, there ARE foreign pockets of liquid under my skin!! it all makes sense now.

i've been watching videos on youtube with the follistim pen injection, and they seem to go very smoothly. but i cant get my follistim pen to push down on the trigger like its supposed to, so i have to twist the button down until it stops clicking - instead of pushing the button down until it stops clicking. its like it needs to be oiled or something.

and it kinda hurts when i do that. its not so much the stabbing myself with a needle that hurts as it is accidentally wiggling the needle around in my skin that hurts. its difficult to hold the needle still while pushing in the meds. i'll get better at it. but what the hell?? not fair that i get a crappy follistim pen.  

the lupron was fine. no big thing 10 units - tiny. the follistim was 125 units, and the menopur 75.

i tried to record with the photobooth program, all the shots. but it only recorded for 4 minutes, so i got to show you how to prepare the menopur. menopur is a powder that you have to mix with a liquid before injecting. theres a tool called a 'q cap' that allows you to pull the liquid into the syringe and put it into the vial with the powder, mix in the vial, and suck it back up into the syringe to inject. 

thats what i'm doing here. i intended to show you how to do the other injections, sorry it didn't work out. i'll start recording tomorrow with the lupron and follistim pen.

Note: i call it "monopur" a couple times. thats me being stupid. its Menopur.

i also found this rad commercial for menopur! its in another language, and they have different tools to get the liquid into the menopur powder vial, but its the same process. though, this woman was prescribed 3 vials. she does everything really slowly, like she's on downers or something. and watching her give the shot so slowly looks really painful. its way better to jab it into the skin much faster than she does. but still, its so optimistic. notice how the color in the background changes after she gives herself the shot. and she starts smiling. and the music is really funny. i just had to share this find.

its the next day

since my menopur and follistim injections.

I can already feel my breasts begin to swell. they're gonna get sensitive and swollen again, i know it. its okay, i dont mind the enhancement. i just really like sleeping on my stomach :(

no other side effects. i'm tired. but i slept from midnight to noon and ran out of the house without eating breakfast. so i think that's to blame. i'm gonna pig out now.

all the crazy shots all at once!

I got the 'go ahead' from the nurse after my estradiol level check and FDA blood work. so tonight i injected for the first time: lupron 10, follistim 125, and menopur 75. 

although the follistim injection had the most medication, i liked it the best because the needle is hidden in a pen thing, so you cant actually see how much medication you are putting inside yourself. that part really really tripped me out with the menopur. 

and yes i recorded myself again. i hope i dont normally look like that when i talk, cause i make some goofy expressions! i'll blame those on stage fright. 

so here's attempt 1

and then after fumbling with my paper instructions and rereading the menopur part and contemplating calling the fertility doctor to ask him if that really was the amount i needed to inject, and then deciding i was being a big wuss - i continued and injected the three. 

i did a couple things wrong with this injection: 

i didn't pinch the fat - which risks putting the medication too deep. 

i didn't look for a prime droplet at the tip of the needle - which risks injecting an air bubble.

other than that, i think i looked goofy as hell. so you dont get to see it. ha ha.

i'll show it when i do everything right. like tomorrow night. i promise

side effects for these drugs includes stomach aches, pelvic pain, etc. it has been a few hours since the injection and i feel perfectly normal.

got my blood work done today

they ran the estradiol level check, and did some more STD tests or 'FDA blood work' as they called it. it was really hot in L.A. today.

the shot hurt this time. and a little of the lupron liquid looked like it came out with a drop of blood. i should have cooled off my skin first. i think that helps.  i did it really fast and squeezed the plunger fast. i dont think that was a good idea. i'm gonna start pushing the plunger slowly again. bla bla bla

belly shot this time

all the youtube videos i found with donors giving themselves shots, are in the belly. that kinda freaked me out, so i had to experience it myself. the nurse told me i could do it in my belly or thigh. i just chose thigh naturally cause theres more tissue to work with and more surface area to chose from.

 i'm not sure if it hurt more or less or not, cause i didn't puncture the skin like i was supposed to. when you watch you will see how slowly the needle went in. the skin is softer on the stomach, and it did hurt more than usual. but i cant compare this shot to the others i did in my thigh. I'll try it again tomorrow and do it quicker. 

i had slight headaches today. and my pee smells bad lately. i dont know if those things are lupron related or not. otherwise i feel fine.

it was rainy this afternoon, I got drenched biking home from work. soaked to the core.

so when i went to do my shot, before my shower, my skin was cold. and when the needle went in i didn't feel anything. and it occurred to me that, hey, i could ice the skin before cleaning with alcohol to numb the skin for the bigger needles later on in the cycle. i wasn't even that cold.  and it really changed the sensation. good to know. 

side effects: some nausea today. random unprovoked nausea. it was icky. it went away quickly after a few deep breaths. my appetite felt more normal today. still lots of energy. my bowel movements aren't normal. they've been changing density all week from thick to thin. i blame the lupron, cause i haven't changed my diet. its easy to blame the lupron. 

lupron shot

i was watching somebody else's video on how to do a lupron shot, and they let the alcohol dry on their skin before giving themselves the shot. they said its so it doesn't sting going in.

so i did that this time, and it was like the good ol days of itch free shots. it was the alcohol on the skin that irritated my skin more than the needle. i think the wet alcohol on the skin got into the shot hole and made it bleed more also.

this time: after waiting until after i knew it was completely dry, i loaded the needle and i jabbed at the skin quickly poking through. didn't hurt more than a flea bite. shot the lupron cold. held the needle in the skin for 5 long seconds after deploying payload. pulled it out quickly. i thought it would be bloodless, nothing showed up for a while. then a slowly growing dot of blood expanded to the size of a neighboring freckle. no itch, no bump, just a strange sensation that theres something under my skin.

i still feel very energetic. I started my period last night. it was kinda thick and weak. the nurse says that unless i'm at "full flow" they'll still need to do the estradiol level FDA blood work. I'm glad because i want to go up to L.A. my best buds live up there. 

forgot to mention

i received my first check in the mail. they processed it after i began taking the medications. 

its for $750.

they break the $8000 up into a few checks throughout the cycle.

end of 1st week on lupron

the past few days i've felt really energetic. giggly silly energetic. the kind that makes my husband roll his eyes and dart embarrassed glances at me. maybe the testosterone surge is over.

i recorded todays shot with my laptop's photo booth program. it has a video capture mode. you can watch this short clip at "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO0QjUFL754"

see if that worked. if not, watch it on the youtube page.

that shot was cold lupron. i didn't let it warm up. its an itchy red bump again, just like yesterday. it goes away soon enough... but damn. i wonder if my skin is just getting more sensitive to the shots? i've only stuck myself 7 times. what happened to the good 'ol days with pain-free itch-free blood-free shots? was i doing it differently? i think i pushed the plunger in quicker the first few times.  maybe i'll try that tomorrow.

as for any side effects... not really. i feel mostly normal today. i feel good and really energetic. i'm not as hungry as i usually am.

i'm really excited to be part of this egg donation process. just the idea that they're going to take my eggs out of my body, fertilize them, put them into another woman's uterus, and finally when the baby comes out, give it to the infertile couple? its frickin amazing! and the fact that out of all the donors on the database, they chose me. makes me feel kinda warm and fuzzy inside. 

in 18 years i hope the kid tries to find me. that would be pretty cool to meet and share life stories. I told them that they could have any of my contact information at any time. all they had to do was go to the agency to find me. they dont want to know at this stage. but someday if they ever do, they'll be able to know. I think its kind of the kid's birthright to know where his X genes came from. because of that, I wouldn't feel right donating anonymously. 

and in the future, out of curiosity's sake, i think it'd be neat to see pictures of their child, to see how my genes would express. Genetics and Biology fascinate me. 

i'm weird like that. i'm actually look forward to giving myself the shots.

 my first ultrasound was at the fertility doctor's office. ultrasounds are crazy! you can see your uterus and fallopian tubes and ovum and all the meaty tissues in between. the doctor counted my follicles in my ovaries. i wonder what the screen would look like if i put the ultrasound machine in my mouth? i'd see my esophagus and the surrounding bones probably. i wonder if they'd let me play with that thing? probably not.

wow, is this really shot 6?

last night's shot location got a little pink and puffed up a bit like a mosquito bite. i didn't scratch it, and it went away in an hour or so.

today's shot kinda itched, but didn't swell up.

the past couple shots i've been taking the vial of lupron out of the fridge and warming it in my hands for a couple minutes before giving myself the medication. i wonder if thats why it itches? tomorrow i'll shoot it cold like i did the first few days. 

something else i noticed, too, was that when i put the syringe into the bottle to pull up some lupron, every time i push or pull from that bottle, i'm adjusting a pressure in that bottle. the rubber cap is very strong and only a needle can push through, so the pressure doesn't get to escape unless i let it.  The nurse told me to pull the plunger back before inserting the needle into the vial of lupron. Once the tip of the needle is inside, then push the air back into the vial as far as the plunger will go. Then take out the dosage needed. So i had been doing that. Pulling the plunger back all the way, and pushing that much air into the vial. but last night and tonight, when i  had the vial upside down to fill the syringe with the proper amount of medication, i pulled the needle out of the vial while it was still upside down, and a tiny bit of lupron shot out at me from the rubber seal top! the pressure had built up so much in there that it was able to project out the liquid. not much came out, but now i realize that pushing an entire plunger-full of air into the vial when i'm only pulling out 15 units, is a bad idea. 

tomorrow i'm only pulling the plunger back to the 15 and pushing 15 units of air into the vial to replace the medication i'll pull out. or even not put any air in there. i dont know what the pressure in there is, but i bet its higher than it should be. 

I should really call this the TMI (too much information) Blog. i think i'll make that a subhead.

what else... side effects? maybe? 

speaking of TMI, i've noticed that my sexual arousal level has gone down. but then when stimulated, the sensations i feel are different. instead of the pleasure concentrating on the place of the stimulation, i feel it in the entire vulva. And its really intense. thats not normal for me. I'm not complaining. but then again, i'm currently abstinent by contract, not by choice. so i kinda AM complaining. i wonder if that sexual reaction will stay when i'm not on crazy egg donation drugs? i hope so.

Since i stopped taking the femcon fe birth control pills on the 29th i'm supposed to have my period by friday. they say i may or may not, but if i do, i wont have to get my estradiol levels checked at the doctor's office on the 6th. 

5th lupron shot

i still cant just quickly stab my thigh like that. i always slow down as i reach my skin cause i think it'll hurt! it never really does! aaahh! why cant i do it!?

it just looks scary. needle filled with medicine flying through the air. 

well i didn't slow too much, cause it poked right into the skin. held down the plunger for a quick 5 seconds, when it should have been a slow patient 5 seconds.

i'm learning. by the end of these couple weeks i'll be a pro.

still feel fine. no side effects to report. no sleepiness today.

though, my injection site feels like it got bit by a mosquito. i wanna scratch it.  i just have to wait until the medication spreads out into my body. i feel like i'm made of play-dough. 

or a jelly donut. and i just injected the jelly. is that weird?

my 4th lupron shot kinda stung because i hesitated, and instead of quickly jabbing the skin - like they tell you to do - i slowly pushed it in and the skin bent inward until the needle broke through. so dont do that, cause it hurts a little.

no blood this time. i injected this one a lot higher up on my thigh, where there was more fat, so there would be more cushion.  

i think i can feel the muscles around the shot twitch a little bit. i think that happened yesterday with my right thigh too. not sure, maybe it was psychological. after i read that lupron causes 'bone pain' i noticed a slight aching in my wrist bones and shin. not sure if i was imagining it or not. it almost wasn't there. i could have convinced myself it was going to happen. hard to say. the mind is very powerful and persuasive like that.

i feel more tired today. i dont know if its the medication. last night I slept 10 hours, woke up refreshed, and then i felt sleepy starting around 5. my eyes are heavy and its only 9:30. i guess i'll go to bed. it was funny last night, I literally fell asleep over my book. i woke up with my face smashed into the pages and a drool stain in the middle of the paragraph i was reading. its the kite runner by khaled hosseini. good book. 

i finished it today. only took me 4 days to read it. i snuck chapters in while walking running errands, in class, early morning waiting for my husband to wake up, while in the bathroom, while waiting for the onions to turn translucent cooking myself dinner. i was like Belle, the book reading main character, in beauty and the beast. maybe its not the lupron, maybe i'm tired cause i've been reading a lot the last couple days. 

i think finally

my breasts are no longer swollen. they feel normal. i just realized this morning. i can squish them or bump them and it's not all crazy sensitive. must be the lupron.

i take my last femcon fe pill tonight. then its only the lupron injections for another week, and then i get my estradiol levels checked.

3rd lupron shot

didn't even hurt. i dont know why i still expect it to. 

still no side effects. i feel completely normal.

this time, though, there was a drop of blood when i pulled out the needle. that was gross.

my 2nd night on lupron

i feel fine

my first injection was last night just before dinner. i took out the little vial of liquid, wiped the top with an alcohol pad, used the tiny syringe to take out 15 units (about 0.15 mls), wiped  a spot on my thigh, stabbed quickly into the fat and pushed the plunger in slowly held it there for 5 seconds, and pulled it out clean. no blood or anything. it hardly hurt. maybe a tiny prick at first. when putting the needle in all the way, i didn't feel anything. it hurt way less than a flea bite. this needle is tiny tiny.

my thigh felt kinda strange for a few minutes. not achy, not painful, but like something was there. i mean - something WAS there. a bubble of medication that my body hadn't taken into the bloodstream yet, but it was a really strange feeling.  I did it on my right last night. 

tonight i did it on my left. the right thigh feels fine. no soreness or anything. just a tiny pink dot where the injection site was.

i dont feel any different.

lupron is a synthetic version of a naturally occurring gonadotropin releasing hormone that suppressing the shedding of the endometrium (lining in the uterus) during menstruation, its used to treat endometriosis, prostate cancer, premature puberty in children, and fibroids. its pretty much delaying my period until i sync up with the surrogate's cycle. we were opposite each other in our cycles - when she was bleeding, i was ovulating. we need to be at the same place for this to work. so i'm syncing up with her, cause since shes going to be the pregnant one, we dont want to mess with her cycle!

according to the FDAs trials of the drug, during the first week on lupron, my testosterone levels are supposed to raise above normal, temporarily increasing the likely hood of uncomfortable side effects - like headaches, anxiety, appetite changes, etc. the usual culprits of medications. Its supposed to block the hormonal signals from the brain to the ovaries, so estrogen production is suppressed. so they're turning me into a man temporarily. or a female eunuch.

for a couple weeks, till they check my estrogen levels to make sure i'm where i want to be before starting the normal IVF medicines.

I read that the spike in testosterone can take away some calcium from the body. "Achy bones" is a side effect i saw on one website. kind of like growing pains. did you ever have those as a kid? just achy limbs for no apparent reason. that sucked.

I've been taking my vitamins and eating foods high in quickly absorbable calcium (collards, mustard greens, chard, lentils, etc)

crazy how you can manipulate the body like this. 

injection training

i start the medication on friday. lupron. one shot a day

the nurse went over how to give myself the shot. its using little insulin syringes. 

almost there.

still taking the birth control pills, will be taking those for another week still.  they dont bug me as much lately.

femcon fe

this femcon fe birth control pill makes my boobs sore. and it makes me carsick.

good thing i usually bike everywhere

it feels like they're growing bigger, but they're not. and i cant lay on my stomach or squish them anymore. lame.

I set up a time to review the injection training. it will be the 23rd. my medications will start the 26th.  Turns out i dont have to go all the way up to L.A. for my ultrasound and estradiol checks, they work with a clinic in la jolla. so that'll save me time. All travel expenses are reimbursed. i think i'll take the bus. do some reading on the way.

we're entering the abstinence only phase. so this is gonna be a fun few weeks. my husband will be grumpy, and want oral and hand jobs. i actually signed a contract that said i would remain abstinent during the cycle! and that, once i begin taking the medications, the eggs i'm developing are no longer my eggs, so if i impregnate them i'm in breech of contract and risk a lawsuit! not really worth it. I'd have like 17 embryos also, and i'd have to abort all of them. its pretty crazy.

i cant wait to start the injections, they give 750 dollars upon starting.

the calendar

i received my 'calendar' its a set schedule of dates i will be taking hormones, when i need to go in for an ultrasound, etc.

I'll be taking the pre-natal birth control pills for 2 weeks before beginning to give myself daily subcutaneous injections of lupron. after a week of that, i'll have a period and go into the doctor's office to check my estradiol levels, to make sure the drugs are working correctly. Then i begin injecting 2 other medications daily for a week. then I go in for an ultrasound to monitor the progress and check that everything is okay. The final medication I will take is a big ugly shot in the butt called a trigger shot. it has to happen at a certain time before the extraction procedure. 

My fertility doctor faxed my medication to the MDR pharmacy, they specialize in fertility drugs and such. They called me to verify the address, and the next day i received an entire foam refrigerated BOX of hormones and needles and stuff. It filled up half a refrigerator shelf at first, then i organized it all to fit in one of the door shelves.

I wont be needing any of that until the 26th. Now i just have to remember to take a pill at 9pm every day.

step 1

when i called to let them know i'd gotten my period, they told me to begin birth control on day 2, while the fertility doctor planned out a calendar.

The nurses faxed down a prescription for femcon fe, a birth control with iron. I took my first birth control pill ever tonight. somehow i'd managed to avoid that type of birth control. i've been on the patch, lunelle, depo, and nuvaring. its crazy that in all my years as a sexually active adult this is my first birth control pill. they're chewable and mint flavored! i'm  glad i waited for the birth control pill industry to evolve into chewable, mint flavored medicine.

well it was delicious. tasted like a mint flavored necco wafer. even brought back nostalgic childhood memories of necco goodness. I dont eat much candy anymore, just chocolate and salty snacks.

It was weird too, cause the pharmacist who rang me up was about to go through the egg donation process for her sister. crazy, huh? I told her this was my first time. i'm supposed to update her on how its going. but i probably wont, cause i rarely go to that part of town anymore, and i'll be getting the fertility drugs from a clinic in L.A.

begin process

so this is my first donation. I signed up with a couple of companies a few years back. nothing happened. in february i signed up with an L.A. based egg donation agency who advertise that they sell eggs from extraordinary donors. so they pay 8000 the first donation instead of the standard 5000. They want donors who are somewhat attractive and college educated. I got IQ tested and everything. they recorded a video of me answering questions like "My talents include...." and "something unique about me is..." and "my hobbies include..." That was horrifying. i was nervous and kept smiling funny while i was talking throughout the video. i wanna redo it now. 

I also did a ridiculous personality test designed to catch people with mental disorders. it had agree/disagree questions like, "sometimes i want to hurt people for no reason" and "sometimes i hear voices that other people dont hear" it was hilarious.

this egg donation agency targets the gay community, so when i signed up i was crossing my fingers and hoping i would get to give a sweet gay couple my eggy weggies.

I got chosen in march by a heterosexual couple who resides outside of the united states. I was bummed that they werent gay. I hope sometime in my life a gay couple wants my ovum...*sigh*

The 'intended parents' as the agency calls them probably chose me because my genetic heritage is similar to theirs.  so we began with the screening process. I worked with a lawyer to sign my egg donation agreement. The intended parents needed a surrogate, and they were looking for one. so i waited for a couple months. they found one, so we continued and I went through with the medical screening with the fertility doctor. apparently i have about 17 follicles in my ovum? cool. They took 6 or 7 of those large tubes full of blood. they even took a bunch of my husband's blood too.

Then the surrogate backed out for whatever reason. they said they have to wait to find another surrogate. Then my blood tests came back and my thyroid levels were off. My fertility doctor said it was off so slightly that it was probably subclinical - probably normal for me, but still i had to get a doctor's note saying i could go on with the egg donation process. so that delayed us yet another couple months.

I made an appointment with the gaslamp clinic in downtown san diego. I'm a naturally hyperactive person. I always have been. So when the nurse at the clinic asked me if i feel like i'm on crack all the time, i laughed. They ran thyroid panel, and the doctor there gave me a box of pills to begin taking to bring my levels back to normal. I faxed the information back to the fertility doctor and took my first pill. the next morning at 8 o'clock on the dot my fertility doctor called me enraged, that stupid doctor at the clinic had misdiagnosed me and given me the opposite medication. so i called the clinic to yell at the doctor and demand my money back, i went and got my money back, and my thyroid panel test results. My t3s were off but everything else was normal.

I made an appointment with a 'real' doctor at a normal primary care facility. the doctor there looked at my test results and felt my throat and asked me a million questions and concluded that i had a slight hypothyroidism, but because she didn't know the cause she couldn't prescribe medication, and she referred me to an endocrinologist. She said the specialist would want to run another thyroid panel, because they run their thyroid panels differently, so i gave more blood, reluctantly.

That thyroid panel came back normal. the doctor wrote me a clearance stating that my levels were normal, and the previous levels were subclinical.

By the time that nonsense was over, they had found a surrogate. It took a while for her to finish her legal contract. I waited patiently for another month. and then got an email that the surrogate had just gotten her period, and to let them know when i get mine. They're going to manipulate my menstrual cycle to sync it up with the surrogate's cycle. and then the process will begin

I started my period on 9/8