B-U-S-T

That's how you spell bust and the ending of our first Clomid cycle.


Our cycle started out full of hope and promise, and up until Sunday I believed we had a good shot at success. I had responded well to the medication with good follicles and endometrial lining. We had pretty good timing. I ovulated! We entered the dreaded two week wait and I felt positive that we had done it. We would have a little turkey in our family soon. I handled the first 8 days of the wait with ease as they seemed to fly by since I was more occupied with residency matters at the time. Then 9 days into the wait I started spotting, though I wasn't too worried about it given (TMI alert) the color and consistency. Dr Love even pointed out that it could be related to my cyst which we believe ruptured a week ago. Then everything turned on a dime.


I was still charting my basal body temp (BBT) this cycle and woke up Sunday morning to a temp drop that took my hopes with it. Dr Love came home from call to find a despondent wife trying to pull herself together. "It's not over," he said. "Temps don't tell everything." I wanted to believe him, truly I did. Aunt Flow, on the other hand, had other plans and came furiously storming in several hours later.

And that was the end of it. We (though really it's more me) had failed. There would be no little turkey coming to our home in November. Furthermore I didn't even make it to my test date and only lasted 11 days after my trigger, which is much too short. I'm left wondering what happened. Was my progesterone too low? Do I have some other kind of luteal phase defect? Were we successful but something wasn't right so my body halted any further development? Do I have rotten eggs? I know my mind is running away with me on the what ifs, and in the end the truth is we probably won't know and all we can do is look into it next round and adjust accordingly.

When we first started this cycle, I contemplated for a brief moment whether or not we would try again immediately after should we (in my RE's terms) "not reach our goal." Part of me had thought no, as we could potentially have a Christmas baby and I know kids hate having their birthday at Christmas. Now that I'm here, however, knowing that we may have other issues to address, and realizing that April will mark our 12th month of trying to conceive, I can't bring myself to throw away a cycle. If God wants us to have a Christmas baby, we'll have a Christmas baby.

So tomorrow I go to see Dr M. for an ultrasound cyst check and to learn the fate of this cycle. If things are clear, then we'll be a go for starting my next round of meds. If I have cysts that they're concerned about then we'll have to take a break from meds this cycle and that answers the Christmas dilemma on its own.

Only time will tell.