Sex Life

An anonymous person responded to the last post and asked about sex life with donation. That's a great question, so I thought I'd do a post on it.

Basically, during a cycle you need to use a condom because you're on stimulating medications that make you VERY likely to get pregnant. My husband had a vasectomy, so we're both lucky that we don't need to worry about it. As for comfort, I generally don't like having sex in the week surrounding the retrieval because your ovaries are big and it's kind of uncomfortable. We have done it, and if it's very slow it's not too bad. Once things get vigorous, I feel my puffy ovaries getting banged around a lot more than I feel anything else, so we generally pass for that week. I guess it depends on you and how you feel. The important thing is that (according to my doctor) it's totally fine to have sex at any time as long as you use a condom from the time you start the cycle, until your first period AFTER the cycle - about 6 weeks.

Please post other questions if you have them. I'm happy to share my knowledge!

Leftovers

Earlier in the week, I went into the clinic for the sonogram that was following up my last donation and clearing me to begin the 6th donation cycle. Unfortunately, my ovaries are still big, and I have three cysts on the left side. That means 2-3 more weeks of birth control before starting the next cycle.

Frankly, I think this is because we had to go to 10 days of stims on the last cycle. If I had take my shots a few hours earlier, I would have gone the 9 days that I'd had on every previous cycle, and I would have responded better. I'll be shooting up at 6pm this time, so I don't have to deal with this again.

A different perspective on IVF

I have been reading a lot of comments on people's blogs. Women state that they are in their 2nd, 3rd, and sometimes even 4th IVF cycle. They talk about the pain, the discomfort, etc. I am on my 6th IVF cycle, doing most of the things that they do, and I am looking forward to it. Of course, mine are always successful, since they always get lots of eggs. I'm healthy, and respond to the medications in the textbook manner. The real difference is the hope and disappointment and emotional issues that go along with having IVF to have a baby. It's not that the process is so bad by itself. Mildly annoying, certainly, but not life alteringly painful. I can only imagine how emotionally difficult it must be, though, when you are trying to have a child and it is not working. That would compound the discomfort into a major problem.

In any case, I keep it to myself. "Hi, I'm Egg Donor and I'm *totally* looking forward to my 6th IVF cycle!" That's probably not the wisest comment to make in a room full of infertile women.

Flowers

I passed my dissertation defense last Friday (with flying colors). The upcoming event had been a frequent topic of discussion during my sonograms last cycle, so I emailed them to share the good news. I woke up to a congratulatory email on monday morning, and came home from work to find a flower delivery sitting on my doorstep. From the clinic. How amazingly nice that my fertility clinic sends me flowers to celebrate my Ph.D.

Another order of eggs, coming up!

Well, I stayed in bed Wednesday of my retrieval basically until Sunday. I got up on Saturday to go get lunch and was exhausted after being out only a couple hours. I came home and just slept.

I'm not sure at this point how much of this had to do with the retrieval and how much was other stuff. As I've mentioned, I had my dissertation defense this week. Most people talk about how they fall sick and basically crash for a month after their defense. I think I may have had a poor reaction to the anesthetic, and that triggered a pre-dissertation defense crash. I haven't slept regularly for almost 3 months as I wrote my dissertation, and honestly I think the 5 straight days of sleep did me well. I honestly did sleep almost the entire time I was down. When I finally got up and around on Monday, I felt great. The discomfort from the retrieval was gone (though really, it wasn't any worse or longer than usual) and I felt very refreshed.

I also passed my dissertation defense, so I'm now Dr. Egg Donor.

The day before my defense, the clinic called to let me know I had been picked for a 6th donation cycle. I'll continue with the birth control pack I started after the last retrieval, have a sonogram on day 2 of my period, and then go into the pills and shots for the next retrieval that will be about June 1st.