False Alarm

I'll have to apologize in advance for the length of this post. I have so much going on emotionally and I need to get it out.

I took some tylenol pm last night in the hopes of getting a relatively uninterrupted night's sleep. It worked for the most part. I woke up 3 times to pee, as per usual, but otherwise I was sound asleep all night. When my alarm went off at about 8:30 I reached over to shut it off, but quickly realized it was a phone call and I'd picked up. Once I gathered my wits about me and realized it was Shady Grove calling, my stomach dropped. I assume the worst - that all our embryos stopped growing. I couldn't think of any other reason they'd be calling me. She sounded chipper enough, though, and told me that our embryos were growing so well she couldn't tell which was the best, and they wanted to push me to a day 6 transfer. HUH?

My stomach dropped a little more. Yesterday was a horrible day here at work and changing my schedule was just going to make it worse. I spat out something about "Yeah we'll make it work" and went downstairs to talk to Andy. He was more uhappy than I was. I kept trying to think "Maybe this means they are all perfect blasts right now" but he was thinking "now I can't go with you!". Things were well covered for today because Tuesday is his day off.  Unfortunately one of his coworkers went into the hospital yesterday with what they think may be a heart attack, and he absolutely HAS to work tomorrow.

I hopped in the shower and got to work 45 minutes late. My boss is none too pleased about the change, but has approved my leave. I don't have any left, so I'm going to have to beg SG when they call to make my transfer early. I absolutely must be at work as close to 9:30 as possible on Thursday because I'm running a luncheon, and I have no leave, but I'm supposed to get 24 hours of bed rest. When they call, if I have an afternoon transfer, I'm going to have to beg them to switch it. Otherwise I won't get the 24 horus of strict bed rest they say I need. I'm praying for a 9:00 or 8:00 transfer so I can get up and just come right to work thursday. And again, I have no leave after tomorrow! I've only been here 2.5 years, and when I first started I took 7 or so days off for kidney treatments. I've had tons of doctors, an IVF cycle, and a honeymoon. I can't help it. I can't help that I'm infertile or that I have bad kidneys. It's not my fault and I HATE that I have to feel bad for needing this time off. It's messed up in so many ways. It's not hard enough that I need to do IVF to conceive?

So I'm feeling awful and like my boss hates me, and then I look up day 6 transfers and read that success rates are lower because a lot of time they're done because of slow growing blasts. Are mine slow!? They didn't say. So now I'm freaking out that my embies are slow and aren't at the typical stage of development for day 5. My nurse is out so I called the backup and she hasn't called back yet. I'd thought they were just all too perfect to differentiate... but what if they're just slow?

I am OVER this process emotionally. I don't like what it's doing to my stress level or my job. I know that if it works it will be worth it, but if it doesnt, I am absolutely taking 3 months off. It might be hard to be not doing anything, but I need to relax, and I need to stop having these sorts of situations to deal with.

I've been eating like my stomach is a bottomless pit, and I can see that I've ganied weight. It's just awful. My bank account is cleaned out, too. I just can't handle the stress. I need a vacation but I can't take one because I have no leave because I have kidney failure. It's just too much. And it's not one of those things where I want to break down and cry. I want to scream and yell and be angry.

I know I should be thankful that I have a job, a great husband, and the money to do a second IVF cycle. But... emotionally I'm a wreck and I don't think I can handle anything else. Life needs to calm down. Work needs to understand. And I'm just not sure how to handle all of this. I will... I know I will. But I don't know how. I want this to work out. I want to hold our sweet little baby in my arms. I want to pick out baby stuff for real... not because I'm wishing and hoping. This process is so hard. It's so draining. And there's no guarantee. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

OK. Now that I've gotten that out, I have work to do. I'm freaking out.