IVF Update

I apologize for not posting more this past week! A lot has happened and I'll try to sum everything up so everyone is up to date.

I started stims on 1/4. Initially I was on a dose of 75iu Menopur/225iu Follistim/5 units of Lupron. After my 3rd day of stims I got some bloodwork done and my levels were a little low, so they doubled my dose of Menopur. That was pretty unexpected and cost us an additional $800, but I'm glad they caught it early. So the rest of my stims were 150iu Menopur/225iu Follistim/5 units of Lupron. I've also been taking a prenatal with DHA, baby aspirin, and 600 mg of CoQ10.

I was trying to do the Avocado diet but honestly I just can't eat Avocado every day. I probably ate it 3 times during stims. But I ate mixed nuts every day and tried to put olive oil on all of my salads so I still had a good intake of monounsaturated fats. If you'd like to learn more about this diet, click here.

Overall this process really hasn't been so bad. The injections burned terribly, which I've been told is the Menopur. But as far as side effects go, I haven't really had any. I mean, besides the bloating of course. I was getting a few mild headaches but nothing that Tylenol couldn't take care of.

I stimmed for a total of 10 days. On my day 10 follicle scan, my RE was on the fence about whether or not I was ready to trigger. It seemed that half of my follicles were just a little too small. He told me that he would wait for my blood work to come back before making a decision. Later that day, I got a call from the IVF Coordinator that I had to take my last dose of stims "right now!" That was at 3:30 in the afternoon, so I had to leave work to go home and give myself the last injection of Follistim and Menopur (no Lupron this time). She said that I also needed to trigger at 7:30 pm that night and that we would do the retrieval as scheduled on Thursday.

So Thursday came around and I was the first patient scheduled for retrieval that day. I talked to my RE right before the procedure and told him I was worried about the Endometrioma interfering, and he told me not to worry and that he had a few tricks up his sleeve. Well apparently he did because he was able to retrieve a total of 30 eggs! I was in shock! Even the Embryologist was surprised. Of course not all of them were mature, but I was happy to have a good starting point.

The rest of the day after retrieval I just relaxed at home with a heating pad and I took a 3 hour nap. I've had some difficulty urinating and was feeling really tender but I've been told that's all normal and should go away after a few days. I was back to work on the next day.

I was anxiously awaiting the call from the Embryologist on Friday to find out how many eggs had been fertilized. I got the call around 1:30, and she told me that 18 of the 30 were mature, 16 had fertilized, and 14 had fertilized normally. I felt so happy and relieved! A part of me was so scared that we wouldn't have very good fertilization rates, so this was a huge relief. I'll get another update tomorrow to see how our embryos are doing. They'll be day 3 so hopefully we have at least half of them still developing normally.

We are scheduled for a 5 day transfer on Tuesday. I'm nervous but extremely excited. I'm really feeling positive and hopeful. I know that there's no guarantee, but I'm just trying to put good intentions into the universe and hopefully get a positive outcome. I've also been doing the Circle + Bloom IVF/IUI Mind-Body Program and that has been helping me immensely. I would highly recommend it (link in sidebar).

Now I'm doing nightly PIO shots and I added the estrogen patches today. I'm hoping my body is ready to host a little miracle in a few days! I'll update again after the transfer.

DIY Castor Oil Pack

Today I put together my first castor oil pack and it didn't feel as strange as I thought it would! It was actually very easy to do and wasn't uncomfortable at all. It was recommended by a friend of mine to try castor oil to attempt to shrink an ovarian cyst that I have. At my follicle scan a couple weeks ago my RE found a large cyst on my left ovary. He seemed concerned and he said that it had the appearance of "shattered glass", which is a key characteristic of an endometrioma (endometriosis in the ovary). The cyst was about 4cm at it's widest and had a volume of about 14 cubic centimeters. So it was definitely something he was concerned about.

 

If it is indeed an endometrioma, then I'll need surgery to remove it. But, if it's another kind of cyst, there's a good chance it will just go away on it's own. And that's what I'm hoping for. So I've been doing some research and I figured it can't hurt to try the castor oil for a couple of weeks.

 

Castor oil, when used topically, can help with a wide range of health issues. It's an ancient form of therapy that can be used for many purposes, but primarily to promote healing, increase circulation, and improve the lymphatic system. It has also been used to shrink ovarian cysts.

So what the heck, it's worth a shot! Here's my step by step instructions on how to create this simple castor oil pack, all for under $20!

The first thing you need to do is order your supplies. I purchased everything from Amazon and it was delivered in just a few days. I had a hard time finding the castor oil in stores. There are 4 things you'll need:

 

1) Hexane free, cold pressed Castor Oil - I purchased a 16 oz size
2) Undyed/unbleached wool flannel
3) Plastic wrap - the same stuff you use to store food
4) Heating pad, warm water bottle, or a microwaveable rice pack

The first step is to soak the wool flannel in the caster oil. The wool flannel I purchased was 12x27 in size, and I ended up cutting it in half and then folding it in half to use on my lower abdomen. I got a bowl from the kitchen, wadded up the wool flannel, and slowly poured the caster oil on top of it. I would pour a little, then rub it in, then pour some more until the flannel was totally saturated. You want the castor oil to soak through the flannel, but not so much that it's dripping.

Next, make sure you are wearing clothing that you aren't worried about staining. I wore some old sweatpants and a sports bra. I placed the castor oil pack on my lower abdomen, over where my ovaries should be, and then my husband started wrapping me up in the plastic wrap. It will definitely be easier if you have someone help you with this step.

Once he wrapped me up a couple of times, we ended up with this result. It's tight enough to keep everything in place, but not too tight where it was cutting off circulation anywhere. You should also make sure to overlap a few inches above and below the flannel to avoid any dripping or staining.

 

The last step is to lay down or recline somewhere comfortable, get your heating pad, rice pack, or whatever you have to keep it warm, and relax for about an hour.

 

Clean up is pretty simple. Just remove the plastic wrap and throw it away. You will want to keep the soaked flannel and reuse it. I placed mine in a Tupperware container and put it in the fridge. You can reuse the castor oil pack up to 30 times if you want! So it should last a month or more, depending on how frequently you use it.

 

After I stored my castor oil pack in the fridge, I jumped in the shower to wash all the grease off of my stomach. I used a little bit of baking soda to help rub off the oil.

 

So that's it! My very first castor oil pack and I think it went very well. I'm going to be doing this every day for the next 2 weeks and hope that the next time I have an ultrasound that my cyst will have disappeared. If not, I'll be on to surgery #3...

 

Have you ever tried a castor oil pack? Has it worked for you?