Home insemination (Cyros) diary

[bobbinhead]

Hello. Thought i start a diary as my mind is a big spinny whirlwind at the moment and may help to get some of it out. Ive had a rather long journey so far but it has also been a uneventful one. Im 28 and my DH is 58. we have been together 8 years. Not long after we got together i ended it as i knew there was no future due to him having a vasectomy he turned up 2 days later with an appointment for  a reversal at bupa. A few months later we went to bupa where the surgeon asked us if we were sure as changes were almost zero and me would be better setting fire to our £2k but we wanted to try. He had counts done at 3 months and 6 months both didnt hold a single swimmer. I was very clueless about it and said oh well maybe next time at this point the nurse explained the situation to me. I still felt ok as i was under the impression it was something we could fix and at only 21 i wasnt to worried about becoming pregnant. When i was 25 i felt it was time and we asked to be referred by GP that came with another 2 sperm counts for hubby that came back NOA I found it a lot more upsetting this time as i thought there would be atleast 1! im not sure why. we then went to appointment at hospital and had some blood test then some more a few days later then a week or so later went back to see the fertility doctor. he sad all my test were normal and i wouldnt need anymore. He was vile he made me feel like s**t and no matter how much we explained it wasnt an option for us he kept going on about my hubby having surgical sperm retrieval and me donating eggs to pay for it all. I left really upset and my hubby left with hopes high and thinking i was an evil witch that just didnt want "his" child. When they called us to see if i wanted to make an appointment to come up with a plan and informed the Drs PA that i would rather never have a child than give a penny to that man. Me and hubby then spent some time regrouping and researching options. We decided on Care as a hospital and went to an information evening (it wasnt that helpfull as they only talked about IVF) found it to be nice, with nice staff and was also helpfull seeing other people in the same situation as us. It then all became about getting pregnant and saving the money (this was not easy for us atall barely managing a £100 a month) eating right, stopping smoking, learning my cycle, research, research, eating food i dont even like, exercise, i basically became a woman obsessed, nothing else mattered anymore. Then a situation arose that used all the money we had saved and i went in to meltdown. I got stuck in a spiral of depression and situations going wrong, everytime i picked myself back up something came along to knock me on my ass again. So everything stopped it all became about getting better and getting my life and marriage back on track i shut down all things baby to the point i almost convinced myself i didnt even want one. Till last year my close friend told me she was pregnant, i was so happy for her. I dropped her home drove round the corner and parked up to cry. I then drove home crying and phoned my mum and told her i didnt even know why as was crying she replied "come on my little bobbinhead i think you do" and she was right. But money situation is always going to be our problem so we have spent a year saving and have enough to do a few trys at home insemination with sperm from cyros. I havnt gone nuts this time, ive quit smoking and been doing OPK's for 6 months and thats it. Our delivery came on Thursday and i was so excited that i spent my entire lunch hour driving home just to have a peak at it  we did the insemination yesterday and im finding it hard not to let my mind run away with its self, i keep imagining us with our baby or enjoying pregnancy but then i catch myself and give myself a mental slap round the face. Im worried i did it to soon, im worried it wont work.

Well i defiantly feel a whole lot better, sorry for the mega intro.

[FertilityFriends]

[bobbinhead]

Hello. Well its day 3 since the insemination and my mind is all over the place  this 2 week wait thing is hard. I missed my turn on a round about, missed my junction on motorway and fed the dog twice today  . think ild better stay indoors for the next 11 days. Ive had a lovely day though with friends and their babys today one only 4 weeks and she was just tooo cute.

I keep thinking i have cramps but have decided they are all in my head, i have had quite a bit of discharge today so not sure what thats all about  (Sorry if TMI)

I realised i hadnt posted anything about the process of the insemination so thought i would do that tonight. First was choosing a donor and we really enjoyed it. We looked through a lot of profiles even ones that didnt really match what we wanted just so we could compare. Once we found our donor we know it was him and really enjoyed looking all through his profile, looking at his photos, reading his letter. Its strange that we feel kind of a bond with him and the more we looked at his profile the more we liked him and knew he was for us. I am worried hes going to sell out as his numbers of stock are dropping quite quick so going to try and reserve some more just incase. When it came to ordering i found the whole process quite simple just like online shopping of any kind. We choose an extra large dry ice box as our delivery method that way we would have a couple extra days if my ovulation chose this month to play around. The info sections of website are really helpfull. I was taken back at the end by the 25% vat added on as i hadnt seen anything about that before. Enjoyed following it on the tracking service. It went from Denmark to Sweden to Germany then finally to UK so its well travelled sperm. It did all this in just over 24 hours, a brilliant service.

Then was the wait for the smiley, it arrived Friday lunch so we planned on doing it Saturday lunch. When it was time we gathered our bits (scissors, ruler, gloves) and went upstairs. Cut the tape on the box and took the lid of, this was a bit of an anti-climax as i was expecting loads of smoke/fog and just got a few wisps. Got on my gloves and had a rummage around till i found my packages. Its alot colder than i expected and even with gloves it took my fingers a while to warm up again.  We then set the sperm aside with the timer running for 10 mins and got the bed ready and made sure we had all our stuff ready. When it was time hubby wiped the straws with the alcohol wipe and cut them as instructed and i handled the syringe. Once we were set i got comfy in bed with hubbys pillow under my bottom  (i wasnt daft enough to use my own  ; ) then i took a minute to calm my self down as ild gotten a little hyper by this point  . I put the syringe in as far as it would go and then pulled it back a tini bit then pushed the plunger very slowly waited 30 seconds and removed the syringe. This is when it got awkward as we had read online that having an orgasm at this point helps but not to have sex or penetration of any kind so i asked hubby to leave and walk the dog as he didnt want the pressure and i wasnt "flying solo" with him there  . He took the box outside as they said to put it outside till the dryice is gone, we only have a residents car park so not sure what the neighbours thought was going on then he walked the dog. When he got back he got in bed and we had a snooze for an hour or so then got on with our day as normal as we could.

We kind of enjoyed it and im glad we didnt go straight for clinic help as we liked the fact we were in control and it was personal and private but i do understand its not for everybody.

Thankyou for giving me a place to vent and thankyou to those of you that have read my diary.

[bobbinhead]

Wow i cant believe how many people have read this.

Well its test day tomorrow so im really  . Ive had a really busy week so that has helped to stop me going nutty. I have stupid periods that come with a lot of common pregnancy symptoms so my body is winding me up a little as i can smell everything but thats quite normal for me this time of the month. When at my brothers on tuesday i was feeding my nephew a fromage frais and i was adamant it smelt of sour milk but everybody else said i was nuts and it smelt of mango, it was making me gag. Only symptom im missing are the sore and swollen boobs as that usually starts a few days before my period. Im just bouncing from being positive and thinking its worked to being really down that is hasnt worked. I didnt expect the 2ww to be this hard. Bought the test today in boots and didnt really know what i was looking for so just went with boots own. Hubby has also got himself prepared with a cigar in case its positive and wine chocolate and alton towers tickets in case negative. keep getting a pain like growing pains in my arm aswell that is annoying me. The wind  is getting annoying aswell. Hubby keeps joking hes going to ride me to the moon but im not normally a windy person so im not impressed at all with that but sure its just me being nervous. Im sure im just noticing all this stuff as im hyper aware of what my body is doing where as normally i probably wouldn't notice.  Well i will know tomorrow one way or another.

[bobbinhead]

BFN.  i keep bouncing from sad to mad today its all just so cruel. All the horrid people that have children without a problem and we have to go through this its just not fair. My hubby doesnt want to try home insemination again due to chances being so low so looks like were going to clinic. I was hoping to try this a few more times before we moved on to clinic, we may well be doing as not sure the clinic will let me use the sperm i already have paid for. The treatment at clinic is so expensive i dont know how were going to pay for it i already have 3 jobs so other than robbing a bank or turning in to a drug dealer i dont know how were going to raise the money any time soon. Already maxed out the credit card on the sperm at Cyros. Ive told my hubby im going to sell my car and get a banger but hes having none of it.

AF hasnt arrived yet and then my mum told me she was 7 weeks pregnant with me before she got a positive test and that kind of gave me a little hope so wish she hadnt told me. Ill test again Monday if AF hasnt arrived but im sure she will.

[bobbinhead]

Well i have a strange weekend with emotions running high as AF didnt arrive, i then had what i thought was AF but just some brown watery stuff (STMI) so went to bed feeling very confused. AF arrived this morning so atleast the madness has ended. Odd being late for me this must be my first 30 day cycle ever. Talking to my brother today was also quite depressing as he said he was adamant it would work first time as all 4 of his children were conceived first time and thought ild be the same, he was trying to cheer me up but it didnt really work. Registration forms for clinic arrived today was fun trying to fill them out as i dont even know what half the stuff they asked is. Still not decided about weather we want to try home insem again or go wait till we go clinic. For this month we have decided to track my LH surge a little longer than the first smiley to see how long it last as that could maybe help us time things a little better next time. I think we will be able to start treatment before christmas as 2 of my jobs are seasonal so my income doubles in summer so the plan is to not save for winter so save for treatment and worry about winter when it gets here i could maybe get a different job over winter as the 2 seasonal jobs provide hardly anything and my 3rd job is so casual it cant relied on. The joys of being self employed, how ive ended up with 2 seasonal jobs i dont know. I drove for UPS last winter so hopefully be able to do that again as it was a nice little earner.

[bobbinhead]

Well not much to report to be honest. Just my mind a big mess as i should have ovulated 2 days ago but this is now late. Because its late ive ran out of opk's so now worried im going to miss the first smiley as wanted to track the surge this month so have peed in to a bottle and saving it to do tomorrow when ive grabbed some opk's will also have to pee in a bottle in the morning aswell so i can test that. Ive been tracking my cycle and doing opk's since January and not one month have i had a late period or late positive opk. So im mad and confused. Had a letter back from the clinic saying thankyou for sending my forms back and i shall hear from them within a week but so far havent heard anything. Hubby is adamant he doesnt want to do home insem again so if the clinic wont let us use the sperm we have paid for i will have to look in to Cyros policy on refunds. Cant help feeling im back to square one which was basically 5 years of doing nothing but unlike before im not willing to stop now and will do what ever it takes to get us there and get the money we need.

[bobbinhead]

Starting a new diary over the IVF page. Only day 1 and im a bit nuts already so should turn in to a fun read