Take 3 “the REMIX” is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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What is the single most important thing a woman can do to improve her fertility odds?
After a fertility workup on both the woman and man to determine underlying medical problems like blocked fallopian tubes or a low sperm count, I’d say the most important thing would be to get to a healthy body weight. Women who have a body mass index of 20 to 24 [between 117 and 140 pounds for someone 5 feet, 4 inches tall] have the best chance of getting pregnant. Those at either extreme of the weight spectrum, underweight or overweight, are more likely to be infertile. But I don’t want to imply that obese women should throw in the towel. Numerous studies have shown that they can frequently jump-start ovulation by losing a modest amount, about 5 to 10 percent, of their starting body weight. So, the fertility diet recommends splitting the difference and aiming for a 7½ percent weight loss, which is 15 pounds for a woman who currently weighs 200 pounds.

My husband and I said back in March that maybe my weight gain has been a contributing factor to infertility.  I am diagnosed as unexplained.  I am a tall lady so I don’t look huge but you can tell that I am overweight.  I will share a picture.  I can’t believe that eating my wheaties can cause me to get a baby!  Well I guess I need to get my butt up and get back into eating healthy.

The Fertility Diet: Eat Right to Get Pregnant – US News and World Report is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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Starts and Stalls is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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So you decided that you are ready to try to have a baby. Maybe you will be one of the lucky ones who conceives within a couple of months or maybe you will find yourself among millions of fertility challenged couples. Whether you are ready to start trying tomorrow or you have been trying for a decade, you might want to improve your odds of conception with a method that is quick, painless, inexpensive, and non-invasive. Believe it or not, a visit to the chiropractor may help you conceive.

A series of research papers published in the Journal of Vertebral Subluxation Research found that chiropractic had positive results treating infertility regardless of the woman’s age, number of years infertile, previous medical intervention or health history including miscarriages, blocked fallopian tubes, amenorrhea, colitis, or trauma.

Your spine is a central highway of nerves. Just as an electrical cord has to be fully plugged in for an appliance to run, your reproductive system will not function properly if the nerves that lead to them are not functioning or are blocked in some way.

A chiropractor will identify pinched or pressed nerves and fix those spinal distortions, which are called subluxations. The distortions can be caused by many things including childhood falls, illnesses, accidents, poor posture, or even stress.

Once the subluxations are minimized or eliminated, a woman’s menstrual cycle can strengthen, the action that delivers the egg through the fallopian tubes to the uterus can improve, and some cases of endometriosis can begin to reverse.

Holistic websites, chiropractic patients, and chiropractors themselves abound with pregnancy success stories. Some women went to the chiropractor for other reasons only to find themselves pregnant, others have battled infertility for more than 10 years and then suddenly became pregnant within a couple of months or even a couple of visits to the chiropractor. These remarkable results are the same regardless of the technique used by the chiropractor.

Naturally this does not mean that everyone will get pregnant after a visit to the chiropractor only that it has worked for many women. It is certainly an option worth exploring either alone or in conjunction with other infertility treatments particularly if you have ever had an accident or illness.

You should be able to consult with a chiropractor and have an adjustment in less than an hour and the visit will probably cost $100 or less if it is not already covered by your insurance. The adjustments are totally non invasive, in fact they are done with the patient fully clothed. The procedure is painless although the sounds created by the adjustments may shock you at first.

Seeing a chiropractor is a great idea even if you are not trying to conceive because the nerves in the spine lead to more than just your reproductive organs but if you are trying to conceive, the benefits to fertility are just too compelling to ignore.

Does it really matter why or how it works? Or only that it works? Even if you do not believe in chiropractors why wouldn’t you try a proven fertility treatment that is easy, fast, gentle, non-invasive, covered by most insurance, inexpensive, painless and harmless?

I am back again (Invitro for the 3rd time) is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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Good question

After 2 disappointing invitros and no baby, I am back on the boat again.    My husband has been so gracious.  I went from grumpy, to tears, to this weird place of apathy.  Now I am back.  I am eating well, exercising and planning to adopt.  I know that God is able to bring a baby and I was told that a baby can come in many ways.  I feel more content.  It is such a true life journey.  I am 39.  I will be 40 soon.   My niece asked me why I didn’t have a baby yet.   I have resolved myself to try one last time.  At the same time I am taking adoption classes.   I encourage all of you who are experiencing this same thing.  It is a life challenge but we can get past it.  My nieces and nephew are my joy.  I look into their faces and see my future.  How can I be sad when God has given me such wonderful family.  This time I will try some natural remedies as well.   This time I am trying to look like a Goddess too.

Check out this article from www.mothernature.com, excerpt below.

If you want to be a fertility goddess, try to look like one. Some women can induce ovulation by putting on a few pounds or taking off a few. In general, the closer your actual weight is to the ideal weight listed in the Metropolitan Life statistical tables, the better. You want to be within 95 percent of that ideal but below 120 percent.

Researchers have found that body fat can actually produce and store estrogen, a hormone that primes the body for pregnancy. When total body estrogen is too high or too low, the system can be thrown off balance. The more fat, the more estrogen produced.

In one study by reproductive endocrinologist G. William Bates, M.D., a professor of obstetrics and gynecology and dean of the Medical University of South Carolina College of Medicine, 29 slim and nonovulatory women attained ovulation when they gained enough weight to put them within 95 percent of the ideal. Within three years of entering the program, 24 of the 29 became pregnant. In another study by Bates, 11 of 13 overweight and nonovulatory women regained ovulation after they lost weight: 10 conceived.

Go easy on the exercise. There are two reasons for this. If exercise causes you to lose too much body fat, you can stop ovulating. But even if you maintain normal body weight, you may still put yourself at risk if you spend more than an hour a day working hard at activities like running, cross-country skiing, or swimming.

In a study of 346 women with ovulatory dysfunction, Beverly Green, M.D., a maternal and infant health specialist in Silverdale, Washington, found some evidence that women who had never been pregnant and who exercised vigorously for more than an hour a day increased their risk of infertility. The study found that exercise exerted its effect on fertility through a means independent of its ability to promote weight loss.

What’s going on here? Dr. Green is not sure. Dr. Bellina suspects the endorphins, brain chemicals released during vigorous exercise, may, like morphine, affect a woman’s prolactin levels. Elevated prolactin levels may interfere with ovulation.

At any rate, Dr. Green, a marathon runner who had no difficulty bearing children, cautions against overinterpreting her study. Her advice to dedicated athletes? “Try to cut back and see if it makes a difference.”

Time it just right. If ovulation is occurring normally, maybe you’re just not making love when you’re fertile. It could be that simple, says Dr. Levine.

“Sometimes you’ve got two career people, they’re having intercourse maybe once or twice a week, and they’re just not hitting it,” he says.

How do you remedy this? Try to predict ovulation. If you don’t want to fuss much, you can predict the date of your next period and count back 14 days. Then make love every night from day 11 through day 16. Or you can buy an over-the-counter ovulation test kit, which will give you about 24 to 36 hours advance warning of ovulation. When the test indicates ovulation, make love that night and the night after, advises Dr. Bellina.

Thou shalt not douche. Anything that interferes with the pH level of the vagina can make life unfriendly for sperm. That includes douches, lubrication agents, and jellies.

“I tell people never to douche,” says Dr. Milkman. “If you leave the vagina alone, it will do just fine at cleaning itself.”

Go easy on caffeine. More than a cup of coffee a day can hurt your chances of becoming pregnant. The same holds true if you ingest the equivalent amount of caffeine from chocolate, soft drinks, or other caffeinated beverages.

In a study of 104 women who were attempting to become pregnant, researchers at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences found that those who drank more than the caffeine equivalent of a cup of coffee a day were half as likely to conceive as those who consumed less.

FOR MEN ONLY

And on the male side of the equation, there is more advice.

Give your sperm time to bounce back. Any viral illness associated with fever can depress sperm count for up to three months, says Neil Baum, M.D., director of the Male Infertility Clinic in New Orleans, Louisiana, and a clinical assistant professor of urology at Tulane University School of Medicine. Bad colds can have the same effect.

Why is the effect so long-lasting? According to Dr. Baum, the normal cycle to produce a sperm is 78 days. It takes another 12 days for the sperm to mature. Healthy semen, by the way, contains in excess of 20 million sperm per teaspoon. If you looked at the sample under a microscope, more than 60 percent would appear to be swimming forward.

If your sperm count is healthy, a cold or flu probably won’t knock it out of the fertility range. But if it’s borderline, an illness may.

Say no to steroids. Anabolic steroids can shut off the pituitary gland and alter the body’s natural hormone balance, says Dr. Baum. “It’s not uncommon for athletes to have infertility problems,” he adds. “Long-time use of steroids can permanently damage the testicles.”

Be wary of drugs and alcohol. Various over-the-counter and prescription drugs can depress sperm count. If you’re not sure about the medications you use, consult your pharmacists or doctor. Tagamet, an ulcer medication, is one to watch out for. Others include chemotherapeutic agents and certain antibiotics. And various studies over the years show that chronic drinking and habitual marijuana use can be at fault, too.

Keep ‘em cool. Nature’s way of keeping your testicles a half-degree cooler than your core body temperature is to house them outside the body. But if you heat the core temperature too much, or heat the testes themselves, you can affect sperm production.

Dr. Baum advises you to be careful about excessive physical activity, temperature extremes, hot tubs, and close-fitting underwear if you want to father a child.

Remember that abstinence makes the sperm grow stronger. If a baby is what you’re after, daily intercourse can be too much of a good thing because it can decrease your sperm count.

“For the average couple, this doesn’t matter,” says Dr. Levine. “But in a borderline case, this may do it.” Most experts recommend you abstain for two days prior to the woman’s fertile period to let the sperm build up, then make love every other day.

PANEL OF ADVISERS

G. William Bates, M.D., is a reproductive endocrinologist, professor of obstetrics and gynecology, and dean of the College of Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston.

Neil Baum, M.D., is director of the New Orleans Male Infertility Clinic, a clinical assistant professor of urology at Tulane University School of Medicine, and a staff urologist with Touro Infirmary in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Joseph H. Bellina, M.D., Ph.D., directs the New Orleans-based Omega International Institute, a fertility clinic in Louisiana. He is a national adviser of the Child and Human Development Council of the National Institutes of Health.

Beverly Green, M.D., works in infant preventive health and family medicine with Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound in Silverdale, Washington. She specializes in maternal and infant health.

Mitchell Levine, M.D., is an obstetrician/gynecologist with Women-Care in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Marilyn Milkman, M.D., practices obstetrics and gynecology in San Francisco, California. She is on the clinic faculty of the University of California, San Francisco.

Andrew Toledo, M.D., is a reproductive endocrinologist and an assistant professor in the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.

Finally awake is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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Woe is me. I think. My feelings are starting to squish together, I feel numb. I am tired. This is my second in-vitro cycle and it was unsuccessful. For some reason, I knew it didn’t work before the pregnancy test. I kept feeling that leakiness you get sometimes before your cycle starts. I kept checking to see if there was any RED. So I feel disheartened but I am not ready to give up. I need to rest my body. I have been poked with so many needles my butt is soar. I am ready to have a glass of wine, take a vacation, jog off some of these winter pounds and start again in a few months. Say a prayer for me and I will say a prayer for you. Keep smiling, nothing beat a failure but a try and I say, never stop smiling and NEVER give up even if you feel like you want too.

NOT PREGNANT AGAIN is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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3 more days is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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The Eggs are baking is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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 This time my protocol changed a little, I took Microdose Lupron 2x’s each day with gonal f 300 and menopur 225. I only did this for 3 days which was shocking.  Then they changed my dosage amounts.  I was reduced to gonal f 225 and menopur of 150.  I took this for about 7 more days. 

When you have your ultrasounds which you will have many of them, I advise you to look at the computer screen and watch the growth of your eggs. Also don’t forget to get a clear understanding of your estradiol numbers. Your doctor will be following that closely. You will get a phone call daily explaining your results.  ASK QUESTIONS:  If you feel uncomfortable with a result.  ASK.  No question is too small. 

I messed up my meds the first day.  I traveled to Dallas right at the beginning of this cycle so, I had to carry an Ice-pak with my meds in it and THEY LOST MY LUGGAGE.  I had part of my meds in the suitcase.  Note to self “Never pack medication in a suitcase”.  I got my luggage the next morning.  But of course my heart was in my mouth all night.  I couldn’t get my mind right and I started the drugs the next day and forgot to mix the gonal f with the menopur.  I took 2 separate shots.  I called the doctors office and they told me I was okay.  You will want to carry the instructions on how to mix your drugs with you if you travel and make more than one copy for your house, just in case your brain farts and you temporarily forget.

 My estradiol numbers doubled every day. This cycle went really quick. There are some side effects that you should know about. I felt so full and i gained weight. I didn’t eat more but the meds make you have that super full feeling and you bloat a bit. I went in wednesday of this week with 16 follicles (eggs) all of them were numbered all over the place. I had 4 that were 19 or larger and the rest were 15, 16, 17, 11, 12, 14 etc. I was happy to see so many eggs. This time around the Dr. Kawolczyk increased the gonal f to stimulate more eggs. I want to freeze more this time so I am hoping for the best. I just finished egg retrieval TODAY Feb 5 2010. I tell you the drugs are so good. When they retrieve the eggs they put you under complete anesthesia. You don’t remember a thing. You come out with some cramping but you wake up on your hospital bed from a wonderful sleep. The lady in the  little room next to me cried when she woke up. So I guess you can have a surge of emotions. I didn’t feel that. I was happy to get those little “eggs” in the petrie dish. The next steps to me are the hard part because when you leave you start the next protocol which for me was prenatal vitamin and asprin. 1 progesterone injection (I did the endometrin vaginal inserts the first time around and I hated it). Now the progesterone injection is an oil so it goes in your buttock with a freakin big needle. Its a bit intimidating but doing it once a day is way better than the endometrin to me because you do the suppositories 2x’s per day. I also take 1 estrace which is a tiny blue pill no sweat. The exciting part is coming up in just a few days. I will let you know how the little eggs grow. I have to tell you that I absolutely love my doctor’s office staff. You go to the doctor every day when you get close to egg retrieval and they want you to get pregnant just as much as you do. Be nice to them, they handle everything for you and can be fantastic support. They know some really good stories too. If you are in Michigan try the Center for Fertility and Women’s Health, in Warren Michigan. Tell them Yolanda sent you! They even offer support groups. I laugh when I get the calls from their counselor Rhonda because she is so loving it feels unbelievable. But overall this has been the best experience ever. I am not afraid of the results. The second time around is so much better. I trust God will do what He will do! My prayers support you in your journey as well.

P.S. Don’t forget to have sex.  It is easy to get caught up in the process of baby making and forget the process of love-making.  Your husband will appreciate you and you will enjoy him too if you take time to remember your connection with him before you go through the egg retrieval process.  They may forget to warn you but after they take the eggs NO SEX for about 2 weeks.  So prepare your partner for a little dry spell.

IVF: Second Time Around is a post from: Hard to get Pregnant

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