Queer Conceptions: November 2012 - Page 12

[fmorris28]

Angie, You've got a great game plan! Good luck with it and you'll find so much help and support here!

Scorp,

Happy Birthday! Sorry im a bit late, havent been on in a couple days! Lesbian baby shower sounds like even more fun than a straight one lol! Good luck with the insem!

Sphinxy,

Glad you had a good trip. I believe http://shop.inseminationsupplies.com/ was the first place we ordered from when we were going to do at home. Came pretty quickly and was very reasonable..probably around 20 + shipping.

Fille,

Glad you're here and not still lurking! Best of luck with everything! And our little one will have DP's last name, i considered both, but our last names are the exact same except for the last 3 letters..that'd be a lot of M's. Who' knows though..

Joy, Thanks for the kind words! The odd thing is, the last time we talked (well i brought it up) I just said, i won't bring it up again. This morning, we were lying in bed and i thought I was dreaming when she said "baby, i want to try for a baby again." Mind you i was half asleep, so hours later when I got to work I realised it and called her to be sure! She confirmed, so i'm back on the temping, and shooting for the first of the year! I did wait atleast a year and a half before the ball actually got rolling, so i know what you mean! I sure wish you the best of luck into this wait! FX for you!

AFM, well i thought I would need more time to get DP back on the TTC train, but she surprised meeh this morning. I swore I was dreaming bc she said to meeh when I was half asleep..baby, i want to try for a baby again, nd i just said ok nd rolled over! So when I called her hours later after i got to work she told meeh i wasnt dreaming and she was ready again. If that didnt make mye whole heart smile. Im so ready to have a little one with her! Ordering mye tea from amazon today! I wanna do @ home, now i've just got to convince her that she'll be able to do it, bc last time she fell asleep in the comfy chair in mye OB's office right before the insem! lol.

Side-note: I was just about to order mye fertilitea from amazon when i found it at fairhavenhealth.com with free shipping! Every little bit helps...especially when you're a lesbian TTC!

Edited by fmorris28 - 11/27/12 at 3:45pm

[easttowest]

fille - Your queer pregnancy survival kit should arrive tomorrow, so you'll be able to test at will!  I hope that's all you need.  (But if you don't end up needing the ovulation kits - and I hope you don't - pass them along to the next queer who needs them!)  :)

Good luck.  But do try to take all pregnancy signs with a grain of salt, as if that's possible.

[Sphinxy]

Well, I'm back in the game. Laugh if you want, I certainly do. I thought I needed a month off to get some perspective, but apparently I only needed a week and a good Thanksgiving. I mean, really, how much perspective is even possible on this merry-go-round, anyway?

Scorpio, please move me to Waiting to O. We should be inseminating around Dec 7-9. Now excuse me while I go play "Crazy Train" on repeat...

[DarcySD]

So I tested this morning and it was negative. I also had a feeling because my temp dropped significantly this morning and I woke up with a lot of cramps. Nothing yet but I am guessing AF will be here tomorrow or Thursday. Our plan moving forward is that I will go back to Kaiser this month and do the trigger shot to help with timing. If this falls on a Sunday when Kaiser isn't open I will drive to Pasadena and do the insemination there. I am in a training the week I usually ovulate so things will be challenging to coordinate at work. Last time I went to Kaiser they had me come in on day 13 for my mid cycle ultrasound and my follicle was only 9mm. I have to pay out of pocket for the ultrasound so any advice on which day I should go in for the mid cycle this month? I usually surge on day 19 and ovulate on day 20 or 21. I just don't want to have to keep going back to get the follicles checked because the ultrasound costs add up! 

To answer the question on why we chose this route, it was because we don't have a good known donor option. I would love to do this with fresh sperm! It lives so much longer. We decided to go with Pacific Reproductive because they have a lot of WTBK donors and a lower family limit. We also found a few donors that we like in case they run out of our number 1 guy. I liked that they were semi local and that I could drive up there if needed. I also decided to go through Kaiser as well because they have 50% coverage and I am 34 so I can use the monitoring and more aggressive options if need be. 

We went back and forth on last names for the last couple of years. We finally decided on DW last name because her family is the one who is supportive and will be around while we raise our family. 

Good luck to everyone who is waiting to test and also good luck to everyone who is starting up in January. Thanks again for all of your support. 

[Twomommyfamily]

Hi all,
Esenbee- your hsg payment situation sounds awful! Insurances can be so shady. We knew ahead of time that ours would be $400, kaiser sent us a list of fees back over the summer when we first contacted the RE office there. We kind of planned on the whole first month of meeting with the RE, the hormone testing, hsg, ultrasound, etc to cost $1000. And that's before even starting to insem. And with kaiser's 50% coverage. Ended up everything cost $650 so we were happy. Wish it could be 100% covered though.

Darcy-I'm so sorry about your bfn. That sucks. What do you think so far about Pac Repro? You are doing your IUIs in their office or at home? We were going to go with them for donor sperm but ended up going with CA cryobank. Also you and I can compare Kaiser experiences.

Fmorris & sphinxy- back in the game! Exciting!

Fille- test soon! The scent thing is a big indicator!

[DarcySD]

Twomommyfamily - Thanks - I am pleased with Pac Repro so far. It was so cheap to get inseminated in their office vs getting the sperm shipped to my home, going to kaiser and all the ultrasounds and insemination costs. I am not looking forward to the bill this month but I hope the trigger shot will help me with the timing. So you are starting in January? How exciting! Are you planning on being monitored by ultrasound or will you go based on OPK? I grew up in San Pedro not too far from you and spent a lot of time in your neck of the woods. Are you from there originally?

[fmorris28]

Darcy, Sorry for the BFN. The great thing about having all the ladies around is the support. Its nothing less than amazing. Keep your head up, and if it gets hard...we're all here!

Twomommy, Its exciting everytime we commit to a cycle! Hopefully 3rd time will be mye charm! More than likely we'll be starting around the same time. New year, new babies hopefully! FX and good luck to you!

[pokeyAC]

twomommyfamily-I would suggest calling member services and double checking on that price.  I have Kaiser and 50% coverage and my bill was $1600 which is a lot more than anyone else seems to have paid. I got that sheet from the fertility office too, and that price was not on there.  Maybe if they are doing the HSG in the RE's office it's $400.  MIne was done in radiology, and there was a charge for radiology and a charge for the doctor who did it.  I don't mean to scare you but I wouldn't want you to get the huge bill I got.  

[mrsandmrs]

sphinxy & fmorris  - oh, yay! I hope this month is it! 

darcy - I'm sorry to hear about the bfn. It is really annoying that pre-menstrual and early pregnancy symptoms are virtually identical. Are you holding out hope? Take care of yourself.

fille - How's everything smelling today? 

AFM fertility friend changed my crosshairs again! http://www.fertilityfriend.com/home/214491/ This is a lesson in temping and skipping other signs. If ff is right, I'm 15 dpo today (that seems impossible??). If ff was right before, then I'm 12 dpo. I definitely have pms and my temps dropped, so hopefully we can get this show on the road soon. This might be the first time I've confirmed ovulation with temps in years. It's probably the metformin! 

[lisedea]

mrs--According to your temps (although it is difficult to tell with the open circles), I think FF is right and you o'd on cd18. Just my opinion though.

[mrsandmrs]

lise! those open circles are the bane of my existence. i take my temp at the same time almost every single day, between 330 and 4am when my wife gets up for work. rarely, i sleep through her morning routine and i take my temp at 630 when the kiddo is making noise around the house. so fertility friend thinks that my 630 temps are closed circle, and my 330 temps are open circle. it must be something i set when i first started charting, but clearly it's inaccurate. anyway, all my temps are after at least 3 hours of sleep, so i think the data integrity is fine. it just makes me look like a bad temper. (temp-er? temp-ist? )

[Sphinxy]

darcy - Ugh, I hate the feeling of AF looming, as the hope slowly starts to slip away. So sorry. I don't know anything about trigger and ultrasound timing, but I wish you lots of luck as you prep for your next cycle!

fmorris - Yay!! So excited for you. Let's get ourselves graduated! 

m&m - Thanks, I would love for a little Christmas miracle. About those annoying open circles - I think (for me at least) FF is basing it off the first temp of the cycle. I started my last chart right before the daylight savings change. I don't wake to an alarm, so even though my body woke naturally at the same "time" after the change, the clock recognized it as one hour earlier. For my whole chart I kept getting open circles. Now that I think of it, I probably could have manually adjusted the time on the first entry to fix that problem... Oh well, it was still annoying.

Afm, I'm trying to be so diligent about my chart this month so that I have good data to look back on. I usually wake around 6:30, but I've set a back-up alarm for 7 just in case. So, if I wake naturally before 7, I temp. Sometimes I doze a little, so if I fall back asleep I take my temp again at 7 and record that one in the notes. I'm seeing a good predictable pattern of about .2 degrees from the first to second temp if I doze, so that way if in the future I do toss and turn a little before temping I can guess what it would have been. So that's reassuring. Now I'm trying to plan for sleeping around O and insemination. My last two cycles I've had so much anticipatory anxiety that I've slept horribly and not gotten good temps. I will poke around online and in my book, but can I ask - does anyone here have information on the safety/side effects of using melatonin while TTC? I don't use it often, but DW swears by it, and I need to find a way to set myself up for some successful sleep those nights. I'm assuming Xanax is out of the question...

[scorpioma]

Sphinxy: You are now in Waiting to O. I am so glad you will try again this month... And guess what? My DP and I are inseminating on Dec.7-9, thereabouts!

I know we have a special FF/Mothering bond, eh? 

Darcy: Keep us informed. This is the worst feeling, I know. We are here for you and will cheer you on no matter what the result!

Fmorris: What is the expected O date this month? Are you trying this month? Excited!

esenbee: it is really great to have fellow trans/genderqueer partners on this board. great how diverse our queer community is on here! I agree with you about the joy of sharing the last name of DP/DSp, even though we did hyphenate ours, it's fun to have a family name :)

[DarcySD]

fmorris - Thank you very much for the kind words!

MrsandMrs - very little hope because of the dive my temps took! I should know by tonight or tomorrow when AF is due to arrive.

sphinxy - yes, it's definitely looming! I am so excited for you trying again this month! I struggle so much with temping so I have been setting my alarm for 4:30 - it's crazy and I am exhausted!! I don't know much about melatonin but have heard it works really well.

scorpioma - I thought I would be a lot more upset. Maybe it just hasn't hit me yet.. Thank you for the support

[fmorris28]

M&M, Thank you! I've got high hopes as well!! Glad your temping is going good..i'm trying to be more diligent with mine!

sphinxy, I'm super excited! I'd love to see us graduate asap!!! Hopefully your anxiety will die down and let you get some good rest and temps. Try not to stress about it (much easier said than done). Not sure about  the meds/effects tho.

Scorp, Looks like the O date will be 7Dec..i'll be doing some temping to see what i can, then jumping right in. So insem will be probably around jan. 4th or 5th! We're planning to try at home this time (we've only done IUI's) and im pretty psyched about it. DP insists she doesn't want to touch anything lol, but i told her you just gotta push the syringe love! Couldn't be on this journey with a better person :)

Darcy, Anytime, i've been in your shoes and know how it feels..but i do know it gets better as well.

AFM, I'm doing such a bad job temping i think lol. I told DP to not let meeh out of the bed before temping! Then she said ok i'll cut your feet off lol. I've got such a goofball for a love, but shes wonderful! Looks like i'll be getting mye clomid filled for this cycle at home..and am in the process of transferring my RX for the Novarel to somewhere WAY more reasonable *claps*!

[Sphinxy]

darcy - 4:30?!? Oh my.... 

fmorris - I am laughing over here because DW was the same way initially! The first time I brought up doing it at home she was not having it. But then she got to see the midwife do the first IUI in the office which probably made it a little less scary, and then she saw how stressful it was on me to time the IUI appt, so I think she just realized it was up to her to make it happen, lol! In the end she did great. So, I hope your DP has a similar experience and takes charge with that syringe!

[Twomommyfamily]

Darcy- yes, I'm planning to do all the ultrasound monitoring at kaiser. It will add up. The price at pac repro is good, but we didn't find a donor we liked there and now I feel all set up with this awesome female RE at kaiser. So you trigger at home then go up to Pasadena for insem? Are you taking clomid? Also, since you asked, I'm from the LA area originally, not Long Beach. We love the relatively large lesbian community here, but if finding work wasn't an issue, we would probably rather be in SD (it's beautiful and my dad lives there) where you are or in New England near DP's family. Anyways, you'retotally sure about the bfn? I'm so sorry.

Sphinxy, m&m, fmorris- temping is no fun. In the ff gallery and in the tcoyf book i see these lovely biphasic charts. Mine has always had a major temp rise around cd7 and 8 then a fall around 10 or 11 and sometimes a minimal rise at ovulation that progressively rises and sometimes wouldn't even fall for AF. Sometime ff gave me many open circles and I was religious about temping as soon as the alarm goes off at 5:50. Without opk, my chart might not even look ovulatory. Hence the decision to let the RE figure out my timing.

Pokey- I'm shocked at your kaiser hsg billing situation. I'm definitely calling member services tomorrow just to verify. It's going to be done in the radiation dept, not even at the same facility as the infertility dept. The hsg is on my fee chart- $430 at 50% coverage, $1620 at the nonmember amount. I don't anticipate a bill because I prepaid when I left the infertility office. Your charge was at the nonmember amount. Not good!!

[fmorris28]

Sphinxy, lol isn't that hilarious. I was like...hunny..its a syringe its not like its fresh and you're gonna have to get all personal with it lol! I just want a good atmosphere and just the two of us might be what we need. I sure hope she does as well!

Twomommy, The hardest thing for meeh is the consitency. I'm so used to waking up and heading to the bathroom. I even put the thermometer under the pillow..didnt work...on the dresser right next to meeh..didnt work. I'm thinking of getting mye dry erase board out the kitchen and putting it on mye dresser and writing "TEMP" in big letters lol! We'll see how the rest of mye cycle goes lol

[DarcySD]

Sphinxy - I shoot for 4:30 but usually temp around 3ish. I am up a lot after 2am and I know I am supposed to temp after 3 hours of sleep so I just temp whenever I wake up. It's really annoying and inconsistent but I don't know what else I can do...any ideas?

Twomommy - I will inseminate at Kaiser unless it falls on a Sunday and they are closed. If so, I will drive up to Pasadena. Not taking clomid yet but that might come up if the next few tries don't work. I grew up in LA also and miss it a lot. We started out at USC where my dad went to school, moved to Los Feliz and also lived in Pasadena. I am originally from New England and would love to move back there someday.

I got my period tonight so it's official. Scorpioma can you please move me to waiting to O. Thanks!

[scorpioma]

Darn it, Darcy! I'm sorry! I am moving you now. For what it's worth, you are super calm and I am thinking you are amazing and strong! In other news, my DSp and I just got married in August of 2012- great year to get hitched, huh? Belated Congrats...

Fmorris: you, me, and Sphinxy are all going to O around December 7! Too funny. Anyone else?!

Joyseattle and Fillefantome: How are you feeling?! I was stalking Joy's chart and checking it out- looks promising!