Mr. Stinky Breath

The Mr. has become the most recent casualty of my super sniffer. About a week ago, I woke up in the middle of the night (as is my wont, or rather, my bladder's), inhaled deeply, and gagged.

The offender? My husband's breath.

I figured maybe it was the Taco Bell we had for dinner that night, tilted his head to the other side, and fell back asleep.

Every night since then, it's struck again. And it's not just in the middle of the night -- sometimes I catch a whiff when we're watching TV, or he's giving me a hug, or certainly during more, um, private times. I ask him to brush his teeth, and it doesn't help. And I know he's got good dental hygiene -- gets his teeth cleaned regularly, brushes and flosses and all that good stuff.

Certainly other things continue to offend my nose to a heightened degree (hello, public transportation and work refrigerator), but this particular case is ever so slightly more inconvenient. I mean, how are we supposed to take care of business during these last weeks of relative peace and quiet? It's not like the belly hurdle isn't already making things a bit challenging in that department.

Which shall likely be a topic for a whole 'nother post.....

A Retrieval Story

Since I don't have a Baby Story to tell (yet?), I hereby give you A Retrieval Story. Warning: it's not very exciting, but I want to have it down for posterity in case I have to go through this whole rigamarole again and need to remind myself that it wasn't that bad.

So. We arrived at 8:15 and immediately got whisked away to the operating suite. Apparently they had 5 retrievals scheduled this morning, so things were hopping. We were led to a pre-op "room" (really just a bed with a curtain around it, flanked by two other beds with curtains around them). I got a sexy gown, set of booties and hair cap, and was told to get undressed and lie down on the bed. They got me this comfy warm blanket that kind of rocked.

We got some instructions from the nurse, and chatted a bit about what would be happening. I didn't expect to be nervous today, but I guess the whole environment was a little more antiseptic and hospital-y than I was expecting, and that kind of threw me for a loop. Just as I was starting to get a little jittery, they wheeled out someone from the OR who was basically freaking out. Crying, moaning in pain, saying all kinds of crazy anesthesia stuff. I was trying not to pay attention, but then I heard her say something just heartbreaking: "It's just that I've never been pregnant before."

Oof. At this point the Mr. started talking baseball to me.

The nurse came back and put in my IV. Not super-fun, but not too bad. The doctor came in to explain the procedure (does he not think I read IF blogs obsessively?), and then we were left alone again for a bit. They wheeled out another patient -- this was one of the couples who were in our IVF class a couple of weeks ago -- and she said through the curtain: "Good luck guys -- I loooooove you." We've met them once.

At this point, I made a mental note to just try and keep my mouth shut after the procedure. :)

Then the anethesiologist came in and we immediately determined that we both went to Cornell (the Mr. was wearing a hat). Things were looking up! She talked a bit about the drugs, and mentioned that I wouldn't be under that deeply so might wake up during the procedure -- WTF? -- but that she'd be there to ease me back under. Great!

Then we got left alone for another few minutes. I started thinking about how we were going to be making embryos and started to tear up a little bit. The Mr. kissed me with his horrible coffee breath, and then we were off to the OR.

I walked in, got on the table, they strapped me down and put a mask on my face, and then skjhfakjhfahzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...................

I did have a dream that I pulled my blackberry out from under the table and e-mailed the Mr. about the procedure, which just goes to show you what a crackberry workaholic addict I am, but whatever. I woke up in the same pre-op "room", and felt great. I also didn't talk. The Mr. came back from his duties of the day, we hung out for a bit, I drank some Gatorade, they tattoed my ass for the PIO shots tonight, we heard we got 8 eggs and would get a call in the morning, and that was it.

I still feel pretty great -- a little cramping and spotting, and a little grogginess, but that's it. I'm going to hang out today, work from home tomorrow, and just try to stay calm and collected until we figure out what's going on with the embies.

Now I'm off to watch my shiny new "Twilight" DVD. Mmmm, vampires.

Baa! (and a Day 10 update)

Thanks to everyone who's been leaving encouraging comments -- it's so great to know that there are people out there rooting for my follies! I'm incubating away today, and waiting to hear back after my ultrasound and bloodwork this morning whether we're triggering tonight or tomorrow. Curiously, the Mr. opted to join me again for the wanding today. I can't figure him out sometimes. Maybe he's done reading all of the magazines in the waiting room.

Anyhoo, the acupuncture doctor tells us that the Mr. is supposed to eat lots of lamb this week before he gives his, um, specimen. Why? I don't know. I made a batch of lamb meatballs on Sunday (yum!) and we're planning on grilling up some lamb chops tonight. I'd actually never cooked lamb before this week, and I'm not entirely sure what I think. I always feel a little queasy about lamb -- it tastes good and all, but I can't ever seem to get this Simpsons episode out of my mind. ("Liiisssa, I thought you loooooved me. Looooved me!")

Sigh. Something tells me I'm eating vegetarian tonight.

Day 9 Update

Sorry for not coming up with more entertaining titles for my posts.....all of my energy seems to be focused on managing the big round bloat-o-rama that is my belly. And studded with a couple of nice injection bruises....SEXY! Convenient that this IVF thing doesn't actually involve having sex.

So, another morning with the wand. Lead follie is at 22, but there are a bunch clustered at 14 and 15, so I think they're going to wait for those at the possible expense of the big one.

The most entertaining part of the morning was that the Mr. decided that he wanted to come in for the ultrasound (since apparently I've made the whole process sound so alluring and fun). First of all, I'm not sure he'd ever seen a table with stirrups before, which elicited a gasp. Gasp number two came when the tech did the double-gel-and-con.dom routine over the wand. I lost track of the gasps after that, but he was all blushing and sheepish when it was over. I don't think he'll be joining me tomorrow. What a wuss -- it wasn't even that bad today.

I'm totally getting flowers tonight, though. Or at least the dishwasher emptied. You've got to work it when you can!

Amateur Hour

So, we started stims last night. I have to admit, I didn't really go into it with the best attitude -- I'd attended a family baby shower earlier in the day, and sat across from someone who basically spent the whole party complaining about how hard it is to have a newborn. I know, I know -- it IS hard (as I hope to find out someday), but it was a little difficult in the moment to see past the Lu.pron and the pre-stims anxiety. On the plus side, there was really good cake.

Anyway, back to the stims. My pre-game thinking: "Wow, those Lu.pron shots have been kind of a breeze, this should be no big deal." Um, yeah. I started with the Lu.pron, just to get things rolling, and managed to hit a blood vessel and bleed all over the place. Not so smooth. Then, a little rattled, we spent 20 minutes trying to figure out if we were mixing the Re.pronex correctly. I'm still not entirely sure, but it seemed to work out. And finally, I came within about a 1/2 inch of impaling myself in the eye with the Go.nal-F pen while trying to "prime" it for its first usage. I'm really not very good with this stuff, apparently.

And now I've had a raging headache for the last 24 hours. Ah, Tylenol, how I love you.

On the bright side, the wonderful Mr. surprised me with this little gift yesterday:

Probably my favorite TV series ever. Definitely my favorite series finale ever. It's nice to have 63 hours of distraction on tap for the next few weeks. Although who am I kidding, I'll probably be done before we get to retrieval.

(Thinking good thoughts here for Carrie, who had her retrieval this morning. Hope all went well!)

In Praise of the Mr.

I don't know if I can blame it on the drugs, but I had a bad attitude yesterday. And unfortunately, rather than taking it out on the people at work who put me there (never a good idea in an imploding economy, I guess), I took it out on Mr. Barefoot.

And then he brought me these:



I'm such an a-hole. But an a-hole with good taste in men, apparently.