I'm PUPO

It's an infertility term.  It means Pregnant Until Proven Otherwise.  It's a weird state of limbo to be in.  Technically if I am pregnant, I would be 6 days pregnant because we transferred 5 day old embryos.  6 days pregnant doesn't mean really anything to my body, however the mind is a power thing.  Every breath almost makes me wonder if I'm pregnant.  Plus a few of the medications I'm on have similar pregnancy side effects.  And on top of that I have some slight cramping, but that's probably just due to the progesterone and the FET procedure itself.  It's still a funny spot to be in though.  Just constantly wondering.  Dealing and living through this so many times, it still never gets any easier.  The wait is always the hardest.
So what to do to pass the time?  Number one this to do is pray.  My Aunt wrote me a prayer and I've read that a few times.  I've also prayed on my own.  Now more than ever is a timenfor faith.
The next thing I do is talk to my babies.  I place my hand below my navel and welcome them home.  Promise to keep them healthy and well fed.  Promise to love them and grow a beautiful home for them.  Aside from that, there are lots of superstitions and good luck charms surrounding the infamous waiting period.  If anything,  it just makes me feel like I'm doing something and somewhat participating in the process.  I eat Brazil nuts daily.  Brazil nuts contain selenium, which is a mineral that helps to thicken the uterine wall, and a healthy lining aids in implantation.  I take selenium pills, but add eating brazil nuts after transfer.  I also eat pineapple.  Pineapple contains bromelain which has anti inflammatory properties that has a natural anti-inflammatory effect.  I eat warm things and drink tea and lay on my back or left side to increase circulation to the uterus and try and sit as little as possible.

Lastly I have some lucky charms.  First off, on our last trip I found a beautiful egg ornament in Hungary that came with a beautiful story about fertility.  It spoke to us immediately and we bought it and carried it with us everywhere,  continued taking it to every prenatal appointment and took Duncans newborn photos with it.  This whole trip I was looking for something to bring us luck and nothing spoke to me.  The day before our transfering, I was putting something in the diaper bag and found a small bag containing a necklace from Ryan's grandmother who recently passed away.  We were at her home recently and Ryan's mother let me choose what I wanted and I choose that.  I thought I had put it with the stemware I also brought back, but it was sealed away in a special pocket in the backpack.  As soon as I found it, Ryan said, "maybe that's our good luck charm".  Heck ya it is!  His grandmother was always so supportive and special and would send us these beautiful cards during all our previous cycles.  This is for sure her looking over us.  She is our guardian angel.  I put the necklace on and wore it to the transfer.  Duncan asked what it was and I told him it was Grandma Rita's and he said "I love you Grandma Rita".  And we do love her very much and feel so special to have her looking out for us.

Lastly I have another pair of lucky socks on.  Todays socks are lemurs.  Lemurs hold a special place in our hearts.  We have a memorial plaque for the baby we lost in front of the lemurs at the San Diego Zoo.  We chose lemurs for two reason.  Their name means angel and because they are vegetarians:)  I always say that Duncan has a very special angel looking out for him.  So when I saw the lemur socks I knew they would be perfect for implantation day.

Ryan and Duncan are enjoying a lovely afternoon in Prague and I'm relaxing in our room.

As always, Thanks for Reading!
HEATHER

x

Day 2 Prague->Kutna Hora->Zlin

I'll jump to the best part of the day first.  In the afternoon we made it to the clinic and I met with a doctor and had an ultrasound check.  Because we used miles to travel, we had few options on which day we left and that meant we were traveling on a day that I needed to have my lining checked and checking it at home would have been too early to matter.  Last time I did that back in the States but this time I didn't have any checks until we got here.  I was a but nervous that they would find something to screw things up, but my check went wonderfully.

• Lining measured 11.8.  This was wonderful news.  You want your lining to be a 7 or better.
• No cysts.  If they find one, it could cancel the cycle because the cyst feeds off of the same hormones you need for the embryo to implant and grow.  My uterus is still squeaky clean!
• No follicles are growing on either side.  That means the drugs are working and everything looks good for transfer.
• They checked my c section scar and gave the ok to transfer 2.  Our doctor in the US also did that and said my scar looked great, but this was a final check here that they needed to do.

In the morning I will go for my infusion and blood draw to determine my next medication schedule.  This is all great stuff and made me feel so much better to cross this off the list and move forward.  Ok so now I can tell you all about the rest of our day, but wanted to share all that good stuff first.

After a rough go of it getting Duncan to go to sleep, once he was asleep, he slept like an angel.  Ryan went and got our rental car and I reorganized our things and got us all ready all while he slept.  We loaded up the car and headed to our first stop.  We decided on Kutna Hora to break up the long ride to Zlin. As soon as we made it onto the freeway, we found a radio station called Rock Zone and Motley Crue's new song The Dirt came on.  I take this as a very good sign. Kutna Hora is about an hour and a half outside of Prague.  It is a small city with quaint curvy cobblestone streets.  Duncan learned the hard way that he can't run on them like he does at home and feel and scraped his hand.  We went to St. Barbara's Church.  It was beautiful on the inside, but we were short on time and had to skip the full inside tour.  We had time for one thing there so we choose to go to a chocolate museum and chocolate shop.  She said the museum was the worlds smallest.  It was really just a room in the back of the store, but it was filled with artifacts and information.  She gave us a brief history of the company, which at one time made over 5, 000 types of candies and chocolates, but then enter Nazi's and WWII and they were taken over and ruined. Recently they reopened as a small batch company and does everything on a much smaller scale.  After the museum, of course we had to buy and sample chocolate.  Duncan has had chocolate in things before, but this was the first time he has ever had a chocolate bar.  At first taste, he declared "I like it, I like it"!  We bought dark chocolate with cacao nibs, plain milk chocolate, white chocolate with cocoa nibs and dark chocolate with ginger.  All were pulled from a bag and pieces were broken off and weighed.  It was a great experience.  Then we walked for a bit and then had to leave to head to Zlin.

Zlin was about a 3 hour car ride away.  We all piled in the car and choose to eat granola bars and other car snacks instead of a proper lunch.  Duncan lasted about 1 hour and then fell asleep for the rest of the ride and I joined him soon after.

Next stop, Zlin.  We arrived about 10 minutes before my appointment and Duncan was still asleep. Ryan stayed with him in the car and I went upstairs.  It is very surreal being back here.  Walking through those doors, it all came flooding back.  I was so nervous last time.  There was a wall with baby pictures on it and I remember praying that one day I would have a photo on that wall.  Now I'm returning and I have a 2 year old in tow with me outside.  Just a flood of all the feels as I walked inside.  On our last trip out here, we became obsessed with a TV channel called Octo Gold.  It was a Czech version of a music television channel, but everything was from the seventies and it was amazing.  The music, the clothes the make up, all fantastically amazing eye candy in a it's so bad it's great kind of way.  Well I walked in and they had on their TV in the waiting room, Octo Star and it was just as glorious.

This made me laugh and immediately made me relax and smile.  I sent Ryan a screenshot of it as he was stuck in the parking lot with our sleeping babe in the car.

After my appointment,  Duncan was still asleep, so we piled back in the car and drove to an old castle that is about 20 min outside of town called Hrad Malenovice.  He still was asleep when we got there so we each took turns walking around.  He woke up right as we were leaving so we got him out and let him run around a bit. Then we piled back in and headed to dinner.

At Hrad Malenovice with a view of Zlin behind me

I had researched and found a restaurant in town that had vegan and gluten free options.  It did not disappoint and for those that dont know, finding anything vegan in CZ is a herculean task so to find one in Zlin was amazing.  It wasn't all vegan, but had several choices for me.  I devoured my grilled tempeh Asian salad because I'm not sure when I'll have more food like this in the next week or so.  Ryan had a peanut chicken salad and what I absolutely loved was that the choices off the kids menu were grilled chicken or grilled salmon, not mac n cheese or friend chicken fingers.  It was actual good food, not crap, but just smaller portions.  Duncan was served a grilled piece of salmon, on potato puree and a spring salad. He ate every single bite.  We also decided to have some drinks. Ryan had a pint of Bernard beer.  I had a glass of house made mulled wine and I ordered Duncan a grapefruit lemonade which I could opt for no sugar added.  It was basically, dried grapefruit, lemon, mint, strawberries and sparkling water.  He was a fan.  We then found a small patch of grass and let him run around to burn some energy before heading back to the room.

In the morning we will have breakfast at the hotel and then I head to my next appointment.  Oh and we celebrate another trip around the sun for my husband.  What better way to say happy birthday than a trip to a fertility clinic in Zlin :)

Thanks for Reading,

HEATHER 

Day 1

Day 1 has not much to report.  It was a very long travel day.  We started off a bit stressed though.  My dad took us to the airport in our car. We hopped out, grabbed out suitcases and said goodbye.  Made it to the ticket counter and realized we left the car seat in the car.  Emergency phone call to him to come back and we paced outside until he got there.  Hopefully we got our mistake out the way early on this trip because it's always something.  We left San Diego at almost 9pm at night.  I wasn't sure how this would turn out, but it worked great.  Duncan was so excited to be on the plane,  he was having the best time.  I hit up my local Buy Nothing group so he had a few new to him cars and trucks for the flight that kept him busy for a bit.  Then they served dinner pretty quick and that helped.  He also doesn't get any screen time at home and was over the moon excited to watch TV on the plane.  They have a kids channel and on there they had old school Tom & Jerry cartoons.  He kept saying "what are they doing" and laughing really hard.  He then quickly made himself at home on my side and slept the rest of the 10 hour flight. Me not so much because there just isnt enough room for both of us. 

I tried laying on my side, but that just put me on top of a very hard piece of plastic, buy hey at least he slept.  I ended up sitting up and watched the Girl in the Spiders Web, which was awful by the way, but nice to relax and veg out and watch a movie. Ryan slept a lot which was nice for him too.  Duncan only woke when I had to put him back on his side and buckle him up.  So the first long flight was great.  Then we ended up having about a 5 hour layover in London.  This too wasn't bad.  They have a kids lounge in the British Airways lounge that was full of toys to keep him busy.  The last flight had a lot of fussing because he was just exhausted.  He wanted to be held and was mad that he had to sit in his own seat.  A few meltdowns on the short 2 hours to Prague, but nothing terrible.  We booked a hotel right at the airport because we landed at 11pm.  Wanted to just pop over and grab some sleep before we head out in the am. We checked in and that's when the real meltdown happened.  He was just way over tired.  He kept saying he wanted to go home, this bed is weird and he is all done.  Wanted to read books and not sleep.  He didn't end up falling asleep until about 3am.  I'm writing this at 6am wide awake.  He is still asleep.
Today we have a quick stop in Kutna Hora just to break up the drive.  Then on to Zlin for a 2:30pm meeting with my doctor and an ultrasound to check on my lining.  There is always a fear that the small amount of radiation on a plane can collapse your lining so here is to thick numbers. And an uneventful 4 hour drive today to the clinic.

Thanks for Reading,
HEATHER

PS - if you want to communicate with us while we are gone,  I opted not to pay for a plan on my phone, but Ryan has one on his phone.  So you can text him, email either of us, use fb messenger for me or What's App for either of us. Basically just don't text me because I won't see it.

We Have a Green Light

We are officially moving forward with our cycle in the Czech Republic.  Today I went for an ultrasound with our clinic here in San Diego and was given the green light.  Our clinic in the Czech Republic require a lining of 7 or higher after being on estradiol for 10 days.  Today marked day 10 so off to the clinic I went at 8am.  My lining measure 10.5 and we measured 3 times to make sure.  As a side note my AFC was 9.  I swear they were just there mocking me.  So I sent off my ultrasound pictures and results and received an email back from my clinic in the Czech Republic saying:

Your lining is excellent. Please, continue with the medication schedule without any change.

 Look forward to see you soon.

So off to the Czech Republic we go.  First we are heading to Budapest to get in a quick 4 day vacation before the whole process starts.  Here is our anticipated timeline:

April 9th - 12th - Budapest
April 13th - Ultrasound and Blood work at the Zlin clinic to make sure my lining and estrogen and progesterone levels are correct
April 14th - Egg retrieval from donor
April 15th - 18th Vienna
April 19th - transfer
April 19th - 22nd - bed rest in BRNO
April 23rd - home

We appreciate all the love and support we have recieved.  We can really use your prayers and well wishes in the next several days especially on the 19th.  CZ is 9 hours ahead so we are guessing our transfer will happen at around 1am or 2am west coast time.

Thanks for Reading,
HEATHER