Oh, the crippling pain. I am walking as though I were morbidly obese. Or a 90-year-old WWII vet who never got around to getting that hip replaced. I groan when I get up from chairs. I whimper when I gingerly climb
into the car. I am a mess. Why, you ask? A massive allergic reaction to my
progesterone in oil (PIO) shots, that’s all. What the what. At my RE clinic, it
is routine to receive a progesterone shot immediately following your egg
retrieval. I had the shot last time, ended up in a fair amount of pain, and
figured the nurse must have accidentally hit a nerve. It happens. This time
around, I decided that instead of using Endometrin suppositories (white, chalky
progesterone tablets 3 x day up the old hoohah), I would give myself a once
daily PIO shot. With Endometrin (and other types of progesterone
suppositories), you are forced to wear a pantie liner at all times and sit in a
pool of vagi-pharmaceutical byproduct. Yes, I change the liners but unless you
plan to live in the bathroom, you can expect frequent damp, icky moments. I
explained it to J like this: imagine you had to live in tighty-whiteys filled
with pudding. I think that pretty much
sums it up. I am such a lady. You can see why he fell for me. I leave just a
bit to the imagination…
Retrieval went just fine. They got all 8 eggs. We later
learned that of the 8, 7 were mature and 6 fertilized. Much better numbers than
last time. For IVF #1, we got 11 eggs, 7 were mature and 5 fertilized. The
theory of quality over quantity already seemed to be playing out.
Saturday. Thus starts day 1 of crap. After retrieval and my PIO shot, J and I had
brunch with his parents and did a little light strolling. We hit up a farmers
market and toured around Graceland Cemetery. I progressively felt more and more
meh. J took me home and I tried to
sleep off the last breaths of the anesthesia. When I woke up, I felt incredibly
nauseous. TMI starts now, kids. You are more than welcome to shut down your
browser and do something more pleasant than read about my horrid bodily
functions. I took my temperature and
found that it was 100. Also, constipation. Fun. Per my handy-dandy post-op
instructions, I called the doctor on call. She advised that I try to drink a
lot of fluids, take a stool softener, and call her if anything got worse. I
promised to call in the morning to follow up. Begging off of dinner with the
in-laws, I asked J to run and grab me a stool softener and some Gatorade from
the pharmacy. That poor man. I should
have thrown in a tube of Monistat for good measure.
While J was out, I gave myself my second PIO shot.
Uneventful. Later that night, after J
was back from dinner but out walking the dogs, I realized that the time had
come for some long awaited bowel movement. The party was about to start. As I
sat down, I was hit by waves of extreme nausea and broke out in a head to toe
sweat. After I finished my business, shaking with my hair and clothes soaked
with sweat, I staggered out of the bathroom and collapsed on the living room
floor. My thoughts: I’m going to die. We’ve
got to get this carpet professionally cleaned. J came in seconds/hours (not a clue) later –
freaked out for a moment – and then scooped me up and carried me into the
air-conditioned bedroom. I was able to drink some water, calmed down and
insisted there was no need for a trip to the hospital. Freak incidence, all probably
due to a bad reaction to the anesthesia. I slept fitfully that night.
Sunday, day 2 of crap. I speak to the on-call doctor to
follow up as promised. Yes, I’m still nauseous. Yes, I’m drinking fluids and
keeping them down. Yes, I still have a low-grade fever. She was about to let me
off the phone when she asked about the state of my bowels (I am so sorry you
people are reading this literal shit). I told her, with very little detail,
about the rather dramatic movements
of the night before. “You need to come in to see me. I don’t like this. I’m not
sure what’s causing you to be sick but I want to check you out for myself.” J
and I cancelled our plans and hit the road. At the clinic, they ran every test
to confirm that I didn’t have OHSS (ovarian hyper stimulation syndrome). I didn’t.
I didn’t have any signs of it with the exception of the fever. They took blood, did a urinalysis and all
that came up was a slightly elevated white blood cell count. I was told that
this is typical for post retrieval and if you’re fighting off an illness. I
mentioned the severe pain I was developing at my PIO injection sites. She
checked them and noted that they looked ok and that muscle soreness was
unfortunately par for the course. The doctor then scheduled me to come back the
next afternoon so that I didn’t “slip through the cracks.” 3 hours after we
arrived, I got to go home and take a freaking nap. Sick and tired. That night,
I administered my third PIO shot. Afterward I walked around, sat on a heating
pad and massaged the area the best I could given how much it already hurt from
the first shot. As the night wore on,
the last injection site became more and more painful. By 1:30 AM, I was lying
on my stomach crying while J iced my blazing red ass cheek. Whoever told you
that fertility treatments weren’t romantic had no imagination! J ran out to get
Tylenol (no Ibuprofen for the IVFers) and I eventually was able to drift asleep
at about 3 AM while watching Dexter
murder people. I love that show.
Monday, day 3 of crap. Holy mother of pain. Monday is when
shit got comical. I could barely walk. My ass had a hot, red, raised pad the
size of my palm on the upper left cheek (lucky 2 injection side) and a small,
hot patch on the right side. I was more nauseous than ever and decently dizzy.
My skin hurt. I took off my jeans and t-shirt because they hurt. I changed in to my
most muumuu-like maxi dress only because nudity wasn’t an option. I took my
temp. Still at 100. I went back to the clinic and this time was greeted than
none other than Dr. Robot. She is the shining star that told me, after
revealing that there was no heartbeat, that there was “still stuff in my
uterus.” In her defense, Dr. Robot was very thorough. She ran all of my tests
again. Same results. Nothing obviously wrong. Once again, I mentioned to her
and the nurse how incredibly painful my injection sites were. This time they
told me to stop the PIO shots and to switch to suppositories. I’m sure they were just trying to give me one
less discomfort but that allowance saved the day. Before I left, I told Dr.
Robot that I was concerned about doing a transfer (scheduled for the next day)
while I was feeling so sick. She agreed and said that she would recommend
freezing all of the embryos and doing a frozen transfer on a later
cycle. OH HELLS NO. No. It’s not that I
assume that cycle would undoubtedly work. It’s that I at least need a shot. I
need to know that we’re at least trying – you know, how other couples do when
they have unprotected sex. Like that. Here’s the other piece of that shitcake:
my clinic has very good success rates with fresh embryo transfer. Not so much
with frozen. Dismal. I’m sure that says unfortunate things about the lab.
Regardless, for now I’ll go for the good rates with the fresh transfer. I’d
rather transfer 2 fresh embryos into my sick body than frozen ones with little
to no chance. Seeing the horror on my face (really, I meant could we push to a
5-day transfer?), she suggested I come back tomorrow an hour before my
scheduled transfer and see the doctor to make a game day decision. Fine.
While waiting for my test results to come in, I took the
time to Google side effects of the PIO shots. Nausea? Check. Dizziness? Check.
Fever? Check. Severe pain, swelling and redness at injection site? Check.
Difficulty sleeping? Well yes, due to constant pain. Gradually, I became more
convinced that the stupid shots were the source of all my troubles. After I
left the clinic, I went to the pharmacy and picked up some Benadryl. When I got
home, I took 2 Benadryl and took a nap. When I woke up the nausea and dizziness
had significantly subsided. I ate a real meal for the first time since Saturday
morning. No PIO shot and another dose of
Benadryl before bed, and I woke up this morning feeling much, much better. No
more nausea or dizziness, no more fever.
Tuesday, not so crappy. I saw yet another doctor this
morning who quickly ascribed my symptoms to the PIO shots. After checking my
temperature and my blood pressure he pronounced me “just fine.” I told him that Dr. Robot had been concerned
enough to suggest that I freeze all the embryos and abort mission. “We’d only
do that if you had OHSS which you clearly don’t.” Right, clearly. He assured me
that my freak allergic reaction would not affect the success of my
transfer. I’d like to believe that. I
don’t think he knows that for sure. Cleared for transfer, I went in where Dr.
M, my primary RE performed the procedure. He too seemed very familiar with
adverse reactions to PIO like the one I had. Why don’t they warn about these
things? The reaction, I should clarify, is to the sesame oil that the
progesterone is suspended in, not the progesterone itself. He said that some
patients still have swelling months after stopping the injections. Shoot me.
We transferred two embryos. One was a fabulous 8-cell
(ideal) with no fragmentation and good symmetry. The other was a 6-cell with no
fragmentation and decent symmetry. Another B student. I was very excited to
have an 8-cell embryo. Last time, not a single one was at 8-cell by day 3.
Again, quality over quantity. Of the remaining embryos, 3 were 6-cell and 1 was
a 5-cell. Dr. M predicted none of these would make it to freeze. For some
reason I think he’s wrong. I’ll find out on Friday.
So to summarize this incredibly long, rambling, whiney post: I am a medical mystery. I can't walk and am crazy sick. Nobody knows why. I figure out that it's an allergic reaction. Medical professionals agree. Day 3 embryo transfer.
TTFN. Off to lie on the couch and watch bad television. Also, long live the royal he-baby. Whatever his name is.
