Thursday, January 3, 2008

Back to work

... and not necessarily happy to be here! Way too many emails were waiting for me when I returned. We had a pretty hectic holiday, spending 5 days in north Florida with my family and 4 days skiing in Wisconsin. This meant more hours than I can count in the car listening to 7 different NFL channels thanks to Sirius radio. Oy!

We decided to try IUI (aka the turkey baster) this cycle. B refuses to call it anything other than the turkey baster – as in “when do we go in for the turkey baster?” and “how long will the turkey basting take?” He thinks it’s hilarious, but I am pretty sure he is going to have a heart attack when they actually perform said turkey basting. That’s when I will giggle. :)

This is my fourth month on Femara. The last three months I ovulated around day 14-15. B was asking me last night how many days of no sex before the turkey basting. I have a call into my RE to get all of the details. I know many of you ladies have done IUI’s before – can you shed some light? With the semen analysis he was supposed to have 2 days stored up in the boys. But if I won’t know when I am going to ovulate until the day before, how do we make sure the amount of days that are stored up? I read somewhere that if there are too many days stored up, it can have bad results – low motility and morphology.

Oy! I never imagined that these would be questions I had to ask complete strangers (nurse, RE, etc) with a straight face. I definitely checked my dignity at the door of the RE office on my first visit!

Today is CD 12 which means I may be ovulating over the weekend. From what I understand, at my RE clinic you have to arrive at 7:45am bright eyed, bushy tailed, and ready to be inseminated. It is somewhat first come, first serve and there are no set hours – once the last couple is complete they close up shop. B was not happy to hear that he may have to be up early on a weekend morning – even more irked when he realized what he would have to do prior to us leaving for the clinic!

Oh, and before I forget, congrats to Katie and Geohde on their wonderful news!

8 comments:

A'Dell said...

My RE prefers two days of abstinence but we have found that, for my husband, it doesn't matter.

He puts up high numbers every time, often going higher on day 2 which makes the nurses giggle and make comments to no end and really amuses the husband.

So, if I were you I'd just have sex when you want and see what the numbers give you. No sense "saving it up."

Also, make sure you have a rather full bladder when you go - it makes the IUI go a lot smoother and it's easier to insert the catheter.

That's weird that there is no appointment system though! I have heard from my nurses that some women have a really hard time with their IUIs and they can take a while. For me though it's always a 30 second procedure - quick and simple.

Good luck!!!

In Search of Morning Sickness said...

I'm glad you'll get an IUI in for this month!!! Whoo-hoo!!! Here's to hoping it'll be your ONLY one!

Also... for all our IUIs and for the IVF they ask you to obstain between 48 and 72 hours. That's a good estimator.

I hate the early morning IUIs... as if our husbands don't have enough trouble making their contribution in a sterile room without compounding it by the early hour!

Keep us updated. BTW, it's funny your husband calls it the turkey baster but whenever someone says that I always wanna slap them! :)

Anonymous said...

I've got no IUI advice, but I'm wishing you lots and lots of luck this month, hopefully it's the only one you'll need! :)

Anonymous said...

p.s. It's good to hear from you - I was "furminating" Zoe this weekend and thinking of you and wondering how things were going this month. :) Please know that my dog reminding me of you isn't a bad thing. ;)

Katie said...

I also did three months of Femara before moving to IUI.

I will share with you that the first time we did IUI, we had 72 hours of abstinence and hubby's numbers were great!

The second time, we had less than 24 and his numbers were all right, but not the greatest.

I think for the sake of your peace of mind, as well as his ego, you should hold off for 48, or whatever your RE recommends!

Woo hoo for IUI!

Geohde said...

:) Thank you.

I think the official line is 2 days abstinence, the other ladies have got the IUI spermie technical considerations well covered.

J

Meghan said...

Will you be getting a trigger shot? That is when they tell us to get busy, so we typically abstain for about 36 hours prior to the iui

very wierd that they don't have appointments or anything. I think that would drive me crazy, the whole process is stressful enough without having to wait in line!

Rebecca said...

I'm with Meghan...we did it the same night as our trigger...about 48 hours ahead of the "basting." Good luck with everything!