Day 1 egg freezing
I was nervous this morning after being so emotional yesterday and basically dreading another day of tears but so far so good! Luckily for me I’m not scared of needles and don’t feel panicked by pain (so used to it) so thinking about the injections has not been distressing – more so the effect they might have on me, whether they’ll interfere with what I’ve got on every day, how they’ll make me feel, whether the huge doses of hormones will make my Endo worse… Things like that.
This morning I saw Catherine – another lovely nurse who also has Endo she told me. Mum came in with me for support and Catherine really carefully explained to us both what will happen for the next few days. From today (Monday) I’ll have one injection of Gonal F – the FSH (follicle stimulation hormone) every morning. I practiced doing it on myself and was very pleasantly surprised at how chilled it was. No pain, super easy and not scary once you’re shown how to do it. SO fine!
The FSH injection is what’s gonna stimulate my ovaries to produce lots and lots of eggs so my oestrogen will be increasing a lot over the next little while. Despite our lovely nurse, the ‘diary’ or calendar or whatever they call it which is supposed to give you a clear picture of how your week or 2 of injections, blood tests and ultrasounds are going to look is SO CONFUSING!! Even Catherine struggled to decode it. It’s just so unclear and not intuitive to follow – very easy to fuck up I’d imagine! (Which is why I will be calling them every day to make sure I’m doing the right thing probably)
Mum and I really want to Change this. As if the whole process isn’t confusing and daunting and difficult enough already, then you get given these leaflets and diaries and documents full of scientific stuff, written in a totally foreign language of medical/hormoney/letters mixed with numbers jargon that makes you want to bang your head on the desk. The worst part about this is that if you don’t get the right nurse to explain things clearly or you’re feeling so overwhelmed you give up trying or you’re worried you’ll sound stupid for asking questions then you could find yourself saying, “yep cool, I understand, sure, got it” just in an effort to get the fuck outta there so you can cry into your pillow surrounded by Mars bars and bury those weird confusing bits of paper in a shallow grave some place far, far away.
But the time will come like it did for me today where it’s critical to understand what you have to do every day. In my opinion, it is poorly explained, ridiculously confusing and in need of a revamp which I will be encouraging Genea to consider. But until that happens, I urge you to sit down with w nurse who is patient and sweet and great at communication and write your little schedule down in whatever way suits you best. Personally I don’t give a crap what the drugs are called or where I’m at in my cycle – those things just confuse me. I would like:
Day 1 – 5 Injection from the Blue box. Same time every day
Day 5 – 10 Injection from the blue box and the red box. Same time every day.
(As an example) it doesn’t have to be so complicated, we aren’t all scientists!!
So in spite of that I’m feeling pretty confident I know what to do now and I’m totally sweet with administering the injections myself each morning, no sweat. My next appointment is in 3 days for a blood test to make sure everything’s cool – till then just do my shots in the morning and drink 2-3 litres of water a day. (And only take medications that are suitable to take while pregnant aka not more fish oil, turmeric or Nurofen)
I felt fine emotionally and was in no pain after today, however all my plans went out the window. after I came home I felt absolutely wrecked. Like I had jet lag or something… Bit stressful cause I had so much to do today! (Uni work, gym, EndoActive stuff etc etc) I’m so into my routine and don’t want to fall behind but I know it’s important right now for me to listen to my body because I’m putting it under stress. I only want to do this process once so it’s important to treat myself well and get great results. I’m trying not to think about the things I should be doing and just relax. I owe it to future Syl!
I wasn’t warned about this extreme fatigue. side effect but truthfully all I’ve wanted to do today is lay/snooze/just be in my bed with the window open and listen to my meditation and the rain which is now turning into an incredibly powerful tropical thunderstorm. And that is what I have done. This storm on my tin roof is HEAVEN!!! The perfect healing, soothing remedy for my mind, body, spirit right now.