Category Archives: Fertility

The procrastination continues

Posted in Bumpboobs, Canada, Fertility, Finding Home, Life, moving to canada by

Ok – packing has STILL not started, and it’s Monday. Movers are due Thursday, so yeah, time’s getting pinched. It’s just hard to get focused. Between a great party last Saturday, selling the car and furniture, planning a road trip across Europe, dressing for that photoshoot, and visiting the theatre in London. . . those boxes arn’t likely to fill anytime soon.

Even writing this post is munching on time. But what the heck, I’ll skip the picture scribbling today.

Right. Last Thursday I was given the crappy news. Fine. Since then I’ve been struck by waves of sadness – but otherwise I’m just moving forward. Things are so busy I don’t even have time to google ‘egg donation’ and that’s probably for the best at this moment.

Zsolt said that while an AMH measures the level of hormones produced by eggs (thus measuring the amount of eggs –ish) it doesn’t measure the quality. So that could be either good or bad, though honestly at the moment I cannot be asked to investigate further. And my acupuncturist said she knew a lady who had similar AMH results, and then several years after the test was pregnant.

Anyhow – this is clearly a situation of “he said this” and “she said that” and “I once heard about a women who”.  . . a lot of speculation and encouragement to hope.

But honestly, at this moment (and I’m sure this will change) I’m just tired. I feel tired. Not chemo-tired, just emotionally exhausted and ready for a break.

Cue the summer. I keep telling people about lake Balaton and the spas of Hungary. I keep dreaming of floating through hot water and tanning in the sun. And then there’s this new world over in Canada that I’m trying to imagine – but it’s all water colours – I’ve got a sense, but no shape of what will unfold. This is one of those ‘trust the gut’ situations where everything hopefully works out.

Anyhow. Just checking in to say hello. At this very moment the Zsoltster is going through our filing cabinet trying to empty contents for shipping/binning. Considering he stops at every-single-item for a lovely trip down memory lane, I think it’s going to take a while.

Time to stop typing and help un-file that cabinet.

Later Gator.

Fertility AMH results

Posted in After treatment, Bumpboobs, Chemotherapy, Fertility, Life, Love by

Today I received a phone call. The phone call. I’d been expected the used car salesman to ring me up and name his offer on our car. This morning we stopped by the lot, and having checked it over he said, “yes we’re interested in your car, but I need to talk with the boss about pricing. Leave your mobile number with me.” Which we happily did, meaning that today I carried my mobile on my person, whereas normally it’s left in my purse in the back office as I work in the library.

But today it was on me. And when it rang, I nipped into the back to answer it away from the students. Good thing for that because twenty seconds later I was in tears.

Results are in. They’re not great. My eggs are quite depleted with .7 pmol/L (or something like that, I’ve only heard the results, not seen the paper detailing the anti mullerian hormone (AMH) test results). The nurse said she was so sorry to deliver bad news, but the consultant thinks my best option for the future would be egg donation. Meaning, not my eggs.

Good on the .7 for hanging in there, even if that basically classifies me as ‘barren’ – it’s better than zero. “You just need one,” said both my husband and mother.

Anyhow – cue the tears, hang up the phone, start the profanity (a kind of medicine not recommended by professionals, but definitely recommended by me). Quiet utterances of ‘fuck’ interspersed with sobs of disappointment. My poor boss opened the door during the phone conversation and saw that look on my face (the ‘ugly cry’ look of uncontrolled emotion), but he handled things very well. After I sucked up my outburst just long enough to fill him in, again rose the tears and he was a great comfort. Poor fellow! It was my last day working with him, and the Avenue has been such a wonderful experience – leaving on a tearful note really does not represent my time within the library. It’s been all laughs and conversation (plus diligent work habits), even during the chemo months the library has been a place of refuge.

But he responded quite well. Didn’t try to fix anything, just let me go home for a private cry.

And then there was my husband. I called him up thinking ‘can’t share this news over the phone, must relate in person’ so just said: “I don’t feel well and need you to pick me up. Like right now, please.” So he came – but not before running around the flat to change his stained t-shirt and throw on some jeans instead of sweat pants. He thought we were going to the hospital! And when he arrived (I had decided to sit on the ground while waiting, which probably increased his worries), he jumped out of the car, and again I broke into a fit of tears –

“I got the results and they say I can’t have children.”

You should have seen his relief! Relief. I wasn’t sick, we didn’t need to go to the hospital. Considering the panic situations that’d been running through his mind, things were okay.

“That’s fine, we’ll be fine.” And he let me cry a little more.

And we will be fine. Today I’m grieving the loss of those eggs. Ever since flipping through Zsolt’s baby album I imagined having my own little big-headed baby, and now – well, we’ll see. Unlike a cancer diagnosis, I am not filled with fear. Sadness, yes, because there has been a loss. This is a loss. But no fear – instead there’s hope. There are options, there are possibilities, there are opportunities. And when we’re ready, we’ll see what can be done.

For now, I’m grieving. For today. Maybe again a little later. But Zsolt and I both feel that things will be okay. We want a family, so we’ll get a family (Hello! We already are a family, but children would be a wonderful gift).

And until then, there will be adventures. Moving to Canada, trips around the world, chasing careers, getting involved, making a difference, enjoying life. With every year – every bloom of the roses – I’m reminded that things are always beginning, always full of opportunity.

In time we’ll grow our family. For now, we’ll grow ourselves.

Playing catch-up

Posted in After treatment, Bumpboobs, Fertility by

In my head I’ve written about two blog posts this week, keeping things nicely up-to-date and chronlicalized. Chronicalized doesn’t seem to be a word (according to spell check, which I trust in this case), but in my head it makes sense. And, in my head, this apartment has been packed, furniture sold, and we’re already soaking in the hot baths of Budapest.

Clearly I’m living in a dream land, but, as you may know, sometimes we all need to visit our ‘happy place’ in order to get through the day. So now I’m posting, and next week we’ll be packing, and eventually I’ll soak in those baths.

This weekend Zsolt and I had each ‘secretly booked’ ourselves a get-away night at a fancy hotel (Sunday is a very good day to book if you’re looking to get away). Upon discovery of this double booking, there was laughter and decision making. I cancelled the room at Chilworth Manor, and we went to Lymington instead (lastminute.co.uk has this £20 administration charge for cancellations, which is obvious garbage considering a cancellation means clicking ‘update’ on the computer, but there you go, we didn’t want to lose the £20). It was a lovely boutique hotel, and we had a nice time.

The one problem neither of us had considered when booking on the Sunday (Sunday savings!) was that I also had a hospital appointment the following morning. So, what can you do? We woke bright and early at the luxury ‘relax your ass off’ hotel, and headed over to the hospital. There is a fertility clinic within the hospital that offers privately funded care. For £50 (not bad) I can take a test to determine how many eggs are left in my ovaries. This doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll start ovulating again, but it will let me know my fertility options and give me a number to work with in the future.

Anyhow, we arrived at the clinic promptly and were struck by how it felt ‘spa-like’. When it comes to private health care offices, there is a significant hotel/holiday feel to the places. Last time I visited a private clinic was in Canada, and that was quite fancy, and before that it was with Zsolt in England (for his chest exam a la Canadian Residency Permit) and that felt like a proper hotel. Yesterday’s clinic had wood panelling everywhere, fancy seats, a nice smell – it was like an island oasis in the middle of a sterile hospital dessert.

The test (at least my contribution) was straight forward. A nurse took me into her treatment room, and had me roll up my sleeve. I was wearing my LuluLemon jumper (gorgeous) and rolled up the sleeve. Then I proceeded to tell her where it’s best to draw the blood, and maybe she should use a smaller needle because often people miss. However, she disagreed about the needle size: “let’s try this one, and if it doesn’t work I’ll get another” – to which I said, “alright” – but what I really thought was: Damn. Because no one likes to be a human pin cushion.

However, first try and this lady scored! “Sharp scratch” she says as the needle goes in. Meanwhile I’m looking away and clinging to the table with my free hand, waiting for this moment to be over and wondering whether she got it right. But then she says, “all done”, so she did  get it right. Happy days. The nurse had commented that the vein felt quite hard, which I really do think is a result of all the chemotherapy. However, it still worked.

The problem came after the needed. She passes me a bit of puff to press over the entry point, which I do, and then in a minute she tries to put on the bandage – but, nope! My blood rises up everytime I stop pushing. The damn thing won’t clot! Again and again we wait, check, and ‘Hello!’ there’s the blood again. At this point I was getting worried. What if I can’t clot? What if my blood keeps leaking? What if I had been in an accident, and the wound was bigger and they couldn’t get that to clot? What if, what if, what if?

The nurse leaves to get help.

I keep pushing the cotton into my arm.

Zsolt sits beside me, thumbs up.

And then the nurse returns with another lady. This second nurse checks out my arm, which I’ve been pressing super hard, and sees that the bleeding has stopped (for now), she then tapes another cotton thing onto my arm, wrapping my arm in tape (which resulted in a lot of ‘ow!’ later on as it waxed the circumference of my arm of any hair), and then, and then, we realized that my stupid LuluLemon sleeve was acting as a ‘strapy thing’ [not technical language] which they normally tie one when taking blood. Essentially, my fashion choice for the day was unfortunate because the cuffs of a LuluLemon shirt are very tight, and rolled up onto the top of my arm, it became extremely tight, which then caused me to bleed continuously with the pressure it caused.

Mystery solved! We rolled down my sleeve and there were no more problems.

That blood now goes to a lab in London, so we’ll see what they say. It’s possible I’ll receive my results on Friday, but if not, then the Friday following. Zsolt is optimistic, which makes me feel better.

And speaking of Zsolt and good vibes. Can I please have one more ‘proud wife’ moment for my husband? He received a written review of his viva, and it’s so great I just want to share it with everyone.  So, here it it:

“Zsolt Sámson performed well in the viva.  He was able to discuss his work in depth, was confident in his explanations and able to extend the discussion beyond the immediate issues raised in his thesis.  He was also good in understanding questions and ensuring appropriate answers.  We spent nearly all of the viva discussing science, and it was clear that he understood his topic well and could relate the experimental results with theory in a critical manner.  We were happy that he was of PhD level and, taking his viva and thesis together, are happy to recommend award of the degree subject to the minor changes which are detailed below.”

Wohoo!