Doctors and lack of communication

On May 17th we went to see a new doctor for my annual and to discuss our fertility journey. I wasn't horribly pleased with the outcome of the visit even though I really liked the dr herself, I just didn't feel confident that we were making a whole lot of forward progress as far as checking to see what was going on. She gave us a prescription for Clomid and wanted me to have some bloodwork done. Beyond that my instructions were to use opk's to confirm ovulation and...well that was it. Beyond a vague gameplan of what we were overall doing (get an egg, have somewhere for it to go and something to fertilize it with) that was it. I came away hoping the round of Clomid did it's job and we got pregnant so I wouldn't have to try to figure out what to do next.

At the time of the appointment AF was already a few days late. I came back in for bloodwork on the 23rd and still no sign of AF. Finally she reared her ugly head on the 26th which was cycle day 46, longer than any cycle I had had in quite a while. I had not yet heard back the results of the bloodwork so I called the clinic and said I wanted to check on the results of my bloodwork, wanted the dr to know that my cycle had been 46 days long and if that information, along with anything in the bloodwork, indicated a different gameplan than starting Clomid on the 29th. The nurse (or receptionist or whoever called me back) pulled up my chart, said the dr had "signed off" off on my bloodwork and therefor, yes, go ahead and start the Clomid.

Well the Clomid did it's job. I had some pretty big hot flashes for 4 of the 5 days I was on it and, right on schedule, the opk's agreed with my temps regarding ovulation and I even had ovulation cramps! First of all this was my first positive opk EVER and also my clearest temperature shift. We were stoked! We did what was necessary and then waited the most agonizing two weeks (my first official 2ww ever since I've never had any signs of ovulation, therefore no specific time period of "this could be it"). My temps climbed and climbed for 12 days, then started dropping and AF showed up right on time. :(

Sean and I talked about what to do next and decided to go ahead with round two of the Clomid and see if maybe we should get an appointment for near the end of the cycle to either confirm pregnancy or discuss where to go from here. This was a few days ago. I started the Clomid on Monday.

Today is Wednesday. This morning I awoke at 8:30 to my phone ringing. It was the clinic, calling to inform me that the bloodwork I had done showed a sky high dhea level "which is common with pcos" (wtf?? I was under the impression that, other than symptoms, nothing was pointing at pcos?? When exactly did pcos come back into the picture??) and that the dr wanted me to come in for another bloodwork to recheck and, if it's still elevated, schedule a ct scan of my adrenal gland.

Now I am not the most with it person on the planet when you wake me up and all I could do was pretty much nod and grunt. It wasn't until well after I got off the phone that my brain woke up and had some questions.

#1 WHY THE FUCK DID IT TAKE A MONTH TO TELL ME MY BLOODWORK SHOWED A PROBLEM??? ***ESPECIALLY*** since said problem is something I mentioned in the original appointment had shown up on previous bloodwork but it hadn't gotten any attention AND I CALLED IN TO ASK ABOUT THE RESULTS OF MY BLOODWORK??? Why wasn't I told THEN that something was off and further testing needed to be done?

#2 Back to the pcos. The nurse on the phone implied I had pcos so this elevated dhea level was no surprise. I have never been diagnosed with pcos. In fact we specifically discussed at the appointment that while I have classic symptoms of pcos, no testing had shown any indications of it at all and that she would be specifically checking the bloodwork results for indications and I was sent home with the prescription for Clomid to take "unless the bloodwork showed signs of pcos in which case we would go in a different direction".

So after stewing on it today and talking to Sean tonight, tomorrow I need to call the clinic and find out what the hell is actually going on. I was not happy about starting the Clomid to begin with, I am so NOT pleased at the possibility of having started it not only once but am half way through the second round, if something else is awry that makes the Clomid pointless at this time. I hate doctors. Why couldn't my body just do it's fucking job and get pregnant so I didn't have to deal with them.

New Blog and more

I started a separate blog for my knitting. I think I will probably also separate out the posts on this blog a bit by interest...maybe. I am working on organizing my life a bit and am finding that compartmentalizing things a bit more tends to keep me on track a little more.

I set up a Facebook page to discuss being crunchy, infertile and lots of other parenting things. Look me up, the page is The Crunchy Infertile.

I started the knitting blog, simply called Greenfoley Knits. I know, imaginative, eh? I have posted a few times and intend to at least attempt to keep up with my knitting and other crafting endeavors on there.

I know I got sidetracked on the circumcision posts but I found that the circumcision fight has been stressing me out pretty badly and decided that, for the sake of my sanity and in the interest of reducing the amount of stress in my world I decided I need to take a break from the debates and, subsequently, the researching for the posts. I still read a little here and there and still spread the word where I can in hopes of saving more baby boys but I have left the debates and fights alone. I haven't even been going to the pages and forums where the debates take place. If the question pops up on FB asking views, I state mine and move on, I don't even usually come back to check on the thread because I simply can't handle it. Not right now. I have enough trouble keeping my sanity through this infertility journey, I simply can't handle the overwhelming emotions that the circumcision debates fuel in me. I can't. So to the little boys out there who's parents might have had their mind changed had I been involved, I am sorry.