Too busy to read my OCD-induced ramblings? Here's the gist for the rest of you:

For those of you who have been faithful readers, you know I write in GREAT (and often gross) detail about every step and I truly appreciate that my long-winded ramblings haven't driven you away. I'm writing this for the fuckers that haven't taken the time.

Kidding! I'm totally kidding! The truth is, I write faster than I can read, so I understand plowing through my entries may not be for everyone.

That said, here's the synthesized current lowdown:

I secured my URL (lostintaipei.com) with the original intention of rambling about adventures specific to my experience living abroad in Asia.

However, while here, the Universe aligned in such a way that we decided to try IVF since I already had one of the components down pat: sitting around on my ass. Plus, it wouldn't break the bank to quite the degree as doing it in the states. Since doing IVF fell under the category of an especially unusual "experience while living abroad in Asia," I decided to mainly focus my entries on this fun process.

The snags have been: 1) I developed OHSS (my ovaries hyper-stimulated--a condition I find extra scary given my Mom's death from ovarian cancer), and 2) I've had my annual nasty cough on top of everything else for well over 2 weeks.

In fact, while writing this, I had yet another bout where it feels like either my eyeballs are gonna pop out and/or I'm going to burst a blood vessel in my head and die of an aneurysm. Then while I'm in the midst of either coughing over the sink or bowl--whichever is nearest--I suddenly throw up a little of what looks like a crapload of phlegm. The latter being a totally new experience to my normal coughing regimen. I've had about 7 bouts just like the last I described since about 7:00 PM last night.

So I'm off to the hospital again. Except this time I fear it's going to be a bigger deal than just trying to get them to prescribe me cough medicine that ACTUALLY FUCKING WORKS! Which leads to another fear--that they can't really prescribe anything because, for the first time in my life, I could actually be pregnant!

Fingers and toes crossed that: 1) I got pregnant, and 2) I'll get to keep my eyeballs intact.

Cooch and other fun vagina-related terms (click to broaden your vocab.!)

I've been mentally stuck. In a holding pattern much like our embryos in the petri dish. Well, they're not holding, they can't help but multiply, but they're not IN ME so in my mind they're in a holding pattern too.

Dan and I are petri parents!

It's a really weird feeling knowing that after many years, shots, and tears, we actually managed to coax our genetic material into dating. But we wanted them to be sluts. We wanted them to do it on the first date. Do it and get knocked up. And apparently they have.

Here are our stats thus far:

23 eggs were extracted out of my vag. on Monday. Think I covered that one in a previous post. (BTW, very thankful we were able to even do the retrieval b/c upon further research I found out many OHSS patients are cancelled before retrieval and all those shots (expense, pain, and expectations) were for not. Jeeez.)

So... 2 kicked it. They saw the world was a scary place and said F you and jumped off the bridge holding hands. RIP you little boogers.

21 were game to give this world a whirl. They were injected w/ Dan's material (oh LORD why is the TV so bad here?)* and my eggs were all, shut up, No. Way. Why the hell were we being SO coy before *titter, titter*? You guys are hot. Weeeelcome.

3 days pass. They pick 4 of the strongest ones and send the other 17 to Antarctica with a label clearly marked: "Whitey Couple's. Repeat: Whitey Couple's. Don't pull any Abby Normal shit here or we'll be sued—They're Mei-guo-ren (A-mer-i-can)."

And that leaves us with 4 little pookies splitting and multiplying in our (from what I've been reading "souvenir") petri dish.

As of Wednesday night (12/24):

• Blast #1: THREE cells.
• Blast #2: FOUR cells.
• Blast #3: looks up to older sib #2: FOUR cells. (#2 says get a life, stop copying me.)
• Blast #4: bossy, YOU BETTER SIT YOUR ASS DOWN AT MY TEA PARTY AND MIME DRINKING OUT OF AN EMPTY MINI CUP WITH A DELIGHTED SMILE WITH ME: FIVE cells.

Fluid in uterus: kinda minimal. Good.
Ovaries: 7 something? Is it centimeters? Millimeters? Shit. The only numbers that have ever been my strong point is my idiot savant-like predilection for remembering everyfuckingbody's birth date (it's a curse, really). So 7... whatever size they are, 7 being TOO large still. 7 being still pretty darned close to still looking like grapefruits making out. Not so good.

Me: What do you think? Think we can do the fresh transfer on this cycle?

RE: No you crazy bitch get out of my office.

Me: Ok. But before I do, think you can write me an Rx for cough syrup meant for someone over 2 years of age? I swear, I hate the crap. I'm not addicted. Just kind of a touch tired of coughing 24/7 *patiently, gently smiling with molars clamped*.

RE: You went through that WHOLE bottle the ER doc gave you just yesterday. That was supposed to last 3 days.

Me: Yeah, maybe for a 2 year old. And... I. I. Spilled some. Need more. Give it!!!!!!

RE: How about this half sized bottle that's weaker than the shit you're complaining about?

ME: Um. No. TWO please.

RE: Fine.

So he leaves the one bottle on his desk - right in front of me, so I put it in my purse and after receiving my IV albumin drip
(quality pouty-faced self-portrait.)
and my long-needled progesterone shot in my ass, I go up to pay for the visit and to pick up the 2nd bottle the nurses prepared. Guess what? They prepared TWO (insert happy jig). Count 'em, I got THREE altogether! That was Wed. night.

It is now Friday afternoon and I'm down to half of my third itty bitty baby bottle and still coughing. Granted, I shared a little with Dan, but still. Why the fuck didn't he just give me shit that would knock it out BEFORE I possibly have one of my hard-earned embryos implanted? Maybe b/c I'm petite he cannot fathom the kind of coughing I can conjure up. I told him I actually vomited from coughing so hard for God's sake. I mean when I belch, it's so freaking guttural, Dan is always nice enough to apologize as if it came from him. I do things big.

*(It's the Demi Moore-shaving-her-head-to-prove-she's-a-serious-actress movie that actually kicked her off the map. Backfired Demi. But wait, you did do Charlie's Angels. Hmmm. Ok. Wait, you DID marry Ashton. Ok. Now you're golden.)

When DH gets home, we're off to the RE's to find out if my OHSS symptoms are under control enough to warrant going for the transfer. Tomorrow? Sunday? Crap, again, not sure. I'm on a ride I'm not steering here - go easy.

*(Ooh. She just said, "SUCK MY DICK." What am I saying? This movie is brilliant!!!)

On a Christmas note, went to Japanese BBQ w/ Naomi and Drew which is right off ZhongXiao near Fuxing - one of the main drags here. They have one of their major department stores across the street from the restaurant - SOGOS (much like our Macys or Bloomingdales). The Christmas decor in front of that Sogos was DONE UP. At least in comparison to anything else we saw around here. Taxi drops us off around 9:00 PM. People are taking pictures in front of the display, holding up their ubiquitous peace sign, looking snuggly in their winter wear, smiles abound... Cut to 11:15 PM as we're the last guests closing out the restaurant. We look across the street before hailing the cab... THEY WERE ALREADY DISMANTLING THE DISPLAY. It wasn't even boxing day yet! We thought it was nice and telling about what their true perception of Christmas is here: marketing ploy. Annnd that's it. Oh you, America. You and your influence.

HCG shot tonight - egg retrieval Monday morning!

Had a bunch of follicles ready tonight and many more that should grow a bit more so they're good to go come Monday morning. All in all I should have a total of about 30 ready to be injected w/Dan's genetic material via ICSI - a harsh introduction, but they'll finally get to meet each other after all!

So, done w/ Lupron - took last shot this morning.

Done w/ Gonal-F - took last shot last night.

Taking HCG trigger shot tonight at 10:00.


(Can you believe the size of this gut? This is one of my 3 bad bruises after several days passed. Was v. proud of myself for only having 3 during the span of all the injectibles. I gave myself mostly all of my own shots s-l-o-w-l-y, but on this one freaked b/c the needle became dull w/ the mixing, etc. so Dan did the honors - symbollic, being the "trigger" shot and all.)

Then tomorrow I get a day of reprieve from the shots - only need to remember to take the PNV + baby aspirin - just need to lay around like a poor beached mammal.

Gotta stop eating or drinking by 12:00 a.m. to prep for the anesthesia. I think my biggest paranoia here is that this OHSS makes me super thirsty and I tend to need water after one of my crazy bronchial coughing fits (which have escalated to ceaseless at this point - stomach muscles have literally become sore), so abstaining from drinking will be a huge challenge.

So aside from the fear of being utterly parched, I'm actually ready and excited for Monday's procedure. Excited despite having accepted the probability of the transfer/cycle being canceled due to these excitable and hard-working swollen ovaries of mine.

Speaking of the hyper gals, yesterday's ultrasound showed my ovaries "kissing." This evening's ultrasound showed them hot and heavy. Listen ovaries, you two should be NO WHERE NEAR EACH OTHER. YOU'RE NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO KNOW THE OTHER ONE EXISTS. No exaggeration, when he got them both within the same frame, they looked like a fucked up rendition of how it feels my lungs are looking right about now. Yeah, seriously - they formed that kind of butterfly shape, but with all the vacant pockets where the follicles have formed... where the eggs inside will start to hop to after I inject this HCG.

Under different circumstances I'd be wise to be scared by what I saw tonight, but I can't go there. I know this is a common side effect and I'll get through it. But I think it's safe to say the next week or so is pretty much going to be lost to all but me going through the surgery and recuperating from the escalated OSHH. Apparently, what I've experienced thus far is nothing compared to how bad it's going to get; should the various symptoms present themselves, we have been instructed we'll need to go to the hospital no matter the time. These are the moments during IVFing where we keep the end result in mind - you know, changing explosive diapers and having a child who grows up to despise you in their adolescence. No wait, the nurturing, cuddly, helping raise a good person part; hopefully someone who adds something to society. Yeah, that.

So in my mind, I will have gone through the hardest part of IVF - the stimming and retrieval.

We're prepared to do the FET for the next cycle and feel optimistic that doing FET could work fine. We've reset our thinking to: if we CAN do the transfer on the 27th, it'll just icing at this point.

Holy fuck. My Ovaries are behaving like spastic children with ADD

I have officially overstimulated my poor ovaries. The dreaded OHSS. Ovarian Hyperstimulation Syndrome. I had a nagging feeling I would be susceptible to achieving this wondrous state due to my previous follie response back in '02 when I did 3 rounds of Clomid.*

(Back when I received the Rx from my [extremely reputable, UCLA faculty] OB/GYN whom in hindsight I believe unthinkingly participated in the brotherhood of misogynistic OB/GYNS [hyperbole much?] by prescribing this AWFUL infertility drug for me to take PRIOR to testing Dan in order to rule out any misbehaving sperm on his end. Male factor infertility. Are their egos SO fragile they project that every male couldn't bare that "burden" that their swimmers might be fucked up? I mean, what the fuck?! Jerking off into a cup is far easier than living with a raging moody bitch where the means to the end is doomed from the start. Dan would have gladly gone that route [what's more exciting than wanking {AKA Polishing the Pink Pope} off in a small room at a doctor's office staring at worn out porn?] had we more knowledge of the big picture. I think it should be mandatory protocol for the SA to be STEP #1 when a couple embarks on fertility treatments. Least invasive approach first. Doesn't that make sense? Ladies, never forget business is business. Doctors ARE running a business. Yes, we're called patients, but we're also called paying customers. Agenda: pharmaceutical companies in bed with doctors, perhaps?

If infertility has taught me one thing it is this: Doctors are NOT Gods. I have since rescinded the unwarranted Daddy Authority I had bestowed on them prior to my rude awakening.

They are very fallible.

And egotistical, arrogant, and successful business men/women - if you're seeing one of the good ones.

There's the rub.

Play God much? (Use that much writing device much?)

We hope so.

That's the point isn't it? That the very aforementioned "negative" qualities they possess are also the qualities they employ in helping us achieve PREGNANCY. Nevertheless, do not hesitate to ask questions, be your own advocate, and hold them accountable for the utmost in customer service and care. Squeaky wheel gets the grease. (Case in point, I JUST received a call from my RE here confirming I know to keep taking the Lupron and if I'm feeling too bloated and awful tomorrow to call/come in for an adjusted dose of Gonal-F. I am liking this Dr. Li!)

*So based on those wasted and trying 3 months, I knew I had solid follicular response.

(Dan is grossed out by that term. He'd rather me call them puppies. Fine. My puppies are kennel-yapping.) In the litter vein, I have oh, around 32 follies. You read that right. 32. While staring at the ultrasound monitor, I was fondly picturing the eggs inside those not-quite-fully-developed-follicles bouncing up and down in excitement adorably yelling over each other, "Pick me! I'm the one! Will you be dis herez baby mama?!" (Kinda like how I used to picture the Cheerio Os scrambling to be the ones to go first. I think some '70s advertising execs thought it'd be good salesmanship to animate those Os into darling little characters. [Or maybe not. I may have just made them into characters in my head. I can't recall. Remember, I have that pesky overactive imagination.] I got over my guilt about consuming the cutie pies by sparing them the sad and soggy drowning death-by-milk-puddle - achieving a proud record of never leaving a single O in the bowl.)

Off topic. Right.

Annyway. Chances are fairly good we'll stop this cycle after oocyte retrieval. Or at least I'm prepping myself for that outcome.

So, outcome #1 (preferred):
Keep going, get incredibly bloated as I grow my symmetrical grapefruits, retrieve eggs, pull decent sperm from Dan's fun-time-with-a-cup and inject viable eggs with viable sperm (ICSI), wait 5 days as my OHSS calms down and the zygotes evolve into blastocysts, then transfer said blasties and keep fingers crossed during the ever dreaded 2ww.

Outcome #2 (waaah-ish):
Same as above minus the transfer. They'll freeze the litter and we do another IVF as FET (frozen embryo transfer). Or I guess in our case it would be a FBT. Bad news: Lose our fresh chance and have to wait a month or so. Good news: We should have plenty of top quality little frozens to choose from.

Imagination running wild night time soap outcome: Either Dan or I kick it. We move on with our lives, but we can't go on without the other in some form or another. So we hire a surrogate uterus and have them bake the frozen embryo then write a bad screenplay about it. Then there's a bidding war for either Dan's or my genius and we sock the money away for the kid's formative years therapy fund b/c they'd be in serious need of therapy very early on by not only the above scenario, but by being the recipient of our lovely combined genetics.