No title I can come up with seems adequate, so I won’t even try.
As I wrote a few weeks ago, we’ve been on vacation - one of those indulgent, generous, long French holidays I couldn’t even fathom when I was living in the US. That is the main reason I haven’t been writing recently (I had very difficult internet access for 3 weeks) but it’s not the only reason.
I’ve tried to keep this blog focused mainly on my weight - I’d like to say on my weight-loss, but it would be more accurate to say my weight-maintenance. As such, when other parts of my life become more important than my weight I’m conflicted on whether or not to share that here. Well, right now the major thing going on in my life is not about my weight but as it’s a stressful situation, I could easily turn to my sure-fire comfort, food, at any moment, so I feel the need to return to blogging right now.
I’ve mentioned a few times that we are trying to have a baby and that it’s been a struggle — I had a miscarriage last Fall and this year has been full of many medical procedures that haven’t worked yet. In June we finally moved into the ‘big guns’ stage and started IVF. I spent a few weeks on medication that made me bitchy and itchy, then went on to stimulation medications, ultimately getting 6 fertilized embryos, of which 3 were transferred (3 are frozen). All the intensive medical procedures happened in the week before vacation, and the vacation itself was full of waiting to see if it worked or not… At least I couldn’t obsess about every twinge and minor symptom on the internet.
At the official test day I didn’t feel pregnant the way I did last Fall, and I wasn’t surprised to see the blood test come back negative (although that didn’t stop me from crying because I was extremely disappointed). I stopped taking the medication that helps an embryo implant, and 2 days later my period came as expected. End of Chapter One.
Begin Chapter Two — my period was on the light side of normal, but normal it was. Except the end, in which it just seemed to have the end of the period drag on and on and on. A week later I was really tired of the irregular bleeding and occasional severe cramps, and decided to call my doctor. Since it’s August in France everyone is on vacation, so to save some headache on a lark I took a home pregnancy test on Sunday and it was positive. This was 10 days after my period started, and took me a bit by shock - I really took it to be able to tell the doctor that I’d ruled that out.
The next day I took another blood test - positive, but low (75, for those who know about these kinds of things). Yesterday I saw a gynecologist who is covering for my doctor who did an ultrasound and was able to rule out an ectopic pregnancy (at least one that would date from the IVF) and he was also able to confirm that my uterus is not empty, there is something in there. He actually thinks that it’s likely to have happened naturally from a secondary ovulation and not from the IVF embryos, but in any event it is a super-rare situation.
In all likelihood this is another miscarriage - I’ve been spotting since August 1st, and my hormone level is well below that of a healthy pregnancy. Today I took a second test and the number was 92, which is nowhere close to doubling (healthy pregnancies double the hormone every 48 hours) and yet it’s also not decreasing (as would be expected in a miscarriage).
Obviously, this situation is my major preoccupation every hour of every day. I am trying to maintain a tiny degree of hope while preparing myself for the most likely situation of a non-viable pregnancy. Meanwhile I am trying to live normally, and I am eating well and exercising fairly regularly, and we are still leaving tomorrow for the last part of our vacation in Lorraine, France. Monday it’s back to work.
If anyone can include me & this struggling little potential life inside me in your good thoughts, wishes or prayers I’d be most appreciative.
Chocolate? In cereal? For breakfast? Not just any chocolate either - it’s real dark chocolate (also available in milk chocolate, in fact). Not ‘chocolatey’ like in the US either. Real shavings of chocolate. Of course, the calorie-saving aspect is in the fact that the pieces of chocolate are shavings and not chips, and of course the ratio of chocolate-to-flakes. But after my initial hesitation I spent a few minutes examining the nutrition info on the boxes and since the calories for the flavored cereals are about the same as the plain Special K, I figured what the heck.