Thursday, July 22, 2010

Only 3 Days from Normal

I'm officially 4 dpo today. The week of bloating, gassiness, and a lovely swollen ovary feeling culminated with a fairly dramatic ovulation on Sunday. Dramatic in that I could feel it all day, probably because my ovaries were so freakin' huge. I don't actually know how big they were, but they felt huge. I guess clomid can do that.

But guess what day Sunday was? CD 17! I can hardly believe I ovulated that early, even with the clomid. My earliest previous clomid ovulation was around CD 22, and my earliest natural ovulation was CD 33. I also had way more ewcm this time than I've ever had before, and very nicely timed sex. And I'm on herbs that will supposedly help my luteal phase. So I've got all that going for me.

Going against me are the period-like cramps I've been feeling since yesterday. Way too early for anything implantation-related, so probably progesterone-related. But the fact that I've had similar cramps this early in several of my previous two-week waits, during which my progesterone has always been too low, makes me think that nothing's changed in that arena. That I'm still having progesterone problems, and that my period will come too early again.

Before you suggest progesterone suppositories for my LP, I'll just say that I've taken them for three of my cycles. And they do lengthen my LP. I'm simply not convinced that they're solving the problem. I feel like my body needs to start producing more of its own progesterone before I'll get pregnant. The suppositories just stretch out the agony of the two-week wait (and make all the PMS symptoms much worse). If I'm not pregnant, I'd rather just get my period and get it over with. I know many women have gotten pregnant on the suppositories. I just feel like they aren't doing it for me. At least for now.

But seriously, body. Do you really need to give me cramps so, so often? I would really like to be able to forget about my abdominal region every now and then. Especially during the two-week wait. But you just won't let me.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

If You're Curious

I thought I would drop in here again and just give a brief update. I noticed that I have actually gained a few followers in my absence, which makes me laugh, but is really fun. So far, following me has been a very low time commitment for those of you who have just joined!

After a couple of days of tiny hints of spotting, my period came at either 10 or 11 dpo last cycle. I'm not sure which because I'm not sure exactly which day I ovulated. I like to believe it was 11 dpo, which would give me an almost acceptable luteal phase. But still a bit shorter than I would like. So my body seems happy to ovulate nicely on clomid, but apparently is not quite as good at producing adequate progesterone. I'm going to take some kidney yang strengthening herbs this time around during the LP and see if we can lengthen it a bit.

One really interesting note about my last cycle: Starting around the middle of the previous cycle (the one where I did not take clomid, and in which my body tried really hard to ovulate but never made it), I was having lots of gas almost all the time. I would get a bit of relief for about one or two days a week, and then it would start up again. It wasn't really painful, but just annoying to the point of keeping me awake at night. It gradually morphed into a general upset feeling in my stomach. My acupuncturist predicted that it might ease up during my next cycle if I took clomid and got things moving in my ovaries better. But I didn't really believe her and decided I just needed to grit my teeth and endure it with a good attitude. And try not to think about it too much. Traveling helped a bit with that.

And then I ovulated. And low and behold, the gas disappeared! Like, almost completely! Apparently my stomach was not happy with my ovaries. Neither was I, so at least we agreed on that. I've had a little gas here and there this cycle, but I'm guessing it will go away again after I ovulate. And it's not nearly as bad.

So there's your fun fact about my digestive system for the day. I should add that at least the gas wasn't stinky. For which my husband was very grateful.

Oh, and I'm on CD12 today after another round of clomid. Here we go, clomid round 3!