The Boring Story

We have to be honest here….

We actually knew the results of today before it came. Nurse l33T Joy MIGHT have sent us an email on Wednesday letting us know the results. Going against protocol and asking us to NOT tell her helpers since she did a bad, bad thing. They of course know the test results that day, but want a second chance to see changes. Those drugs you take can affect the results. Give you false hope. It is all done for a reason.

BUT! Boy are we glad she wrote us that email!! Derrian got it while driving, did the horrible thing of reading it while still driving. She had to, see the Doctor emailing you directly is just a heart to the pit of your stomach kind of feeling. SO scared!

This is what that simple email said:

Simple day and a simple update. They took Derrian’s blood and she is not sad 😉 Both of us have been strangely optimistic this go around (Not a common thing for CKnight). There is a large ball of warmth forming in our souls, and it makes us smile. 🙂

This has been a LONG adventure for us. Just like a fantasy styled Novel. Trial and challenges galore, with little hope in site. But we are still moving forward and striving towards our goal.

We know we are not the only ones, and we are not the only GEEKY ones either. We think we are pretty awesome together and making this new little gamer will add to the world’s awesomeness 😉

So what have we learn in this year?

1. Needle are not so scary – Should we count the shots we have done (bot tummy and butt ones?) I’m sure we will once we are done. But in the end they are not as bad as we thought.
2. Don’t stress so much about it – Harder said than done for sure
3. Take a break if you need one – 3 months of not working about doctors appointments and drugs was a god-send.
4. Life does not need to be put on hold – We definitely had many days to ourselves holed up in our house, but we still went out with each other or close friends. Derrian traveled to Arizona (airports are actually very good about drugs when traveling)
5. Puking up Gatorade is a bit disturbing…
6. In the end it only takes one – One egg to rule them all.
7. MOST IMPORTANT – Be there for each other – Go to every appointment together, talk, laugh, and love. No matter what happens. Happy, crying or throwing things.
8. So many other things! I’m sure we’ll add to this list. But you know what?! You can contact us if you have questions.

To go along with point #4 & #7. Take a look at some of the things we did while going through all of this that was NOT doctor related. 😉

The couple shots we have between the Retrieval and the Transfer have been an adventure 😉 Lovenox is an anti-coagulate. So not only is it VERY important that you don’t stab yourself with a sword *cause you bleed to dead extremely fast), but it causes just a massive of bruising.

And on top of that we have the dreaded butt shots lol. Sesame seed oil is SO think and you have to inject SO much. It is just a lump under your skin. Yuck.

We also learned that cats make good pressing for a heat pack on the butt, making funny faces for ‘targets’ are the way to bring smiles to small children and their adults, and Petco is the best place to make a ‘Medical necklace”.

We haven’t been very nervous going into most of our Nurse l33T Joy appointments. But this one has got to take the cake (But the cake is a lie, remember?). We are doing breathing exercises, listen to some anime jazz, just about anything to take our mind off the numbers that we might be presented with.

But we got passed the point that the Smart Dino Egg people would call us with bad news. Score one for the light side.

They are running behind, so more fretting in the lobby. It is also the weekend so we don’t know the desk lady. But she sits down with us, feels bad that we are nervous and gives us word of encouragement.

Next wee see our favorite (and first) assistant Kaari. Not only does she have an awesome name, but she is what everyone needs to be in the field, positive, spunky, always smiling and laughing. So happy to have her today for this transfer.

Last room visitor is the Dino Egg guy. He was to the one we saw last time, and he remember us because he had to call us with the bad news about of little frozen dino egg turning into mush. 🙁 I don’t envy that job a all.

He had great news! 5 mature eggies. 5 fertilized, and 5 were still growing!

Stress is GONE!

Granted 3 are behind so he is not too sure they will make it to be frozen BUT the 2 dino eggs we have for today are perfect!

Grade 1 for the little goober on the right and a grade 1.5 for the one on the left. They are just perfect looking! He is happy and so are we! The right ‘hatching’ eggy is exactly what our frozen-saur would have been that we were so confident about.

WE GET A SECOND CHANCE AT IT!

Over the moon here! Derrian gave the picture a ‘pep talk’ as she calls it, really it his just her shaking her finger at the photograh and saying “Pep Talk!” sternfully over and over again. Guess she hadn’t planned on ‘what’ she was actually going to say, just that these eggs needed a ‘pep-talk’.

We got setup in the room for the transfer and Kaari tells us they ALWAYS wants quality over quantity (we have that in the ‘bag of holding’ son!). She tells Derrian that her bladder is perfect and the best bladder she has had yet!

And we don’t remember much of the rest Valium kicked in nicely 😉 . We got some more photos. We remember hearing the word ‘perfect’ a lot. And then CKnight tucked Derrian into bed were she promptly passed out for most of the day. (Waking up once when CKnight wanted to ‘check’ and make sure she was still breathing. Lol)

Perfect day peeps…. 😀

AND the phone rang. Nurse l33T Joy’s phone number came out. Queue the instant jitters and cold sweats. We do NOT want to see that number now! Really, this is our LAST chance!

We answer….

“Don’t worry this isn’t a bad phone call.”

Why the HECK don’t they start the conversations off like that ALL THE TIME!! Sweet Baby Geewiz!!

They just had to change our Transfer time for 15 mins……

We about had a heart attack.

As promised Nurse l33T Joy hit us up via the old cans and rope to let us know that we are doing our transfer on Sunday! We have never ever done a five days transfer! Can you say freaking out a little bit?!

Those 5 little dino eggies need to grow and survive a couple more days then ever before and it is SCARY! We got to see the progress chart from the smart Dino Egg people last time and our 7 eggs that time dropped out one after another until we had one lest on day 6.

Will we have any left by the time we go in Sunday!? Or will be get a dreaded phone call from the Dino Egg people an hour before we are supposed to go in to let us know we have nothing…….

Yep, yep…. freaking out just a bit.

So we mentioned that CKnight had a reason to not fully trust the drug lady we had that day (he said he was because she was a red head). Abot 9pm at night Derrian started to not feel good. Nothing to bad at first, but it slowly got worse and worse until it lead to puking in a trash can, puking in a toilet, then puking in a different toilet.

There are a couple things they tell you to watch out for during all the meds and surgery. Sever stomach cramps, puking, dizziness, fever…. Yep, got all of those but the last. So at 10:30 pm we are off to the ER downtown.

We had to make one quick pull over on the side of a large bridge or risk a pukey interior of a car. Luckily the ER and Hospital is just a quick drive. But of course it is the in the middle of the night, they are short staffed, the front desk lady looks liek she wants to be anywhere else BUT working that night. We are in the large cities downtown, which means there are some shady people going in and out, but at least there is a on duty cop, we’re sure just in case 😛

Check in is a bit too much for Derrian and she gets to go puke in her third toilet of the night, the joys! And basically goes in and out of the bathroom for about an hours as we wait, and wait, and wait. There was probably one person before us.

Thankfully a room becomes available and the doctor and a sweet older gentleman, whom you just know if going to everything rainbows and skittles again.

Derrian tries to pass out on the bed (but, unfortunately for her, can’t). They take samples of about every fluid they can (ever try peeing in a bed pan…?! How the heck does either sex accomplish that we have NO clue). CKnight wins husband of the year award (for the 7th year in a row) for doing simple things that helps her focus on anything but the pain she is in and her inability to pass out on command.

The Docs get her hooked up a cocktail of fluids, morphine, and anti-nausea meds. It is all wonderful at that point, Morphine is wonderful, and not puking is very wonderful. And we sit for hours and it all goes through the IV (Yay for double arm pricks!)

3am and we finally got back home and to bed. Not that Derrian stayed there very much, up and to the bathroom every hour. Luckily no more puking for that girl though!

It turned into a fun 2 days. She stayed on anti-nausea meds, ate next to nothing and could barley drink water. Best diet every! But we would not recommend it on our worst enemies. She lost 4 lbs in 24 hours.

Between the ER Doc tor and Nurse l33T Joy, we were given the conclusion that it was a bad reaction to the anesthetic. Oh joy, now we have to remember that when they ask us the question “Have you or a member of your family ever had a bad reaction to anesthetic?” It only took us 6 surgeries to figure this out….

We are not amused…

Today is the day (again and again). Number three is easier than the first two. With the cysts gone, Derrian is not feeling quite as fat as she normally would be by now, so that is a plus.

Nurse l33T Joy’s assistant for the day is smiley and laughs at our own silliness. We swear we are probably nothing like the other couples who go in and out of that building. Obscure and perhaps, not always, appropriate jokes. The assistant laughed along with us the whole time.

The drug lady for the day, Derrian can’t even remember her face really. But CKnight didn’t fully trust her (and later had a reason for that). She did jump the gun a little people and instead of having count backwards before sleepy time (Which she loves, cause she can say goodnight to everyone in the room) the lady just knocked her out… boo… no fun.

Luckily that was quickly forget (drugs and all) and replaced by the wonder warm blanket, oreos, and apple juice! Best way to be woken up ever!

The magic number of the day is 5. 5 mature little dino eggs. Right in the middle of our three times. (3, then 7, then 5). Again, this leads to a bit of sadness, we want more. but we’ll strive on with hand we have been dealt. We are a couple of tough (Oreo) cookies after all!

Time to go home, rest for a couple days, and maybe play lots of video games!

Nurse l33T Joy wanted us to come in a second time. We’re feeling like the vampire missing us though. We haven’t seen them since 10/12 and it sounds like we won’t be seeing them. We miss our little blood sucking friends!

That being said we made a ‘little’ me progress, but it gives us some hope. 9 total dino eggs this time around. Some of our little eggies grew up fast!

And this puts us on schedule for the retrieval being on 11/1, which is what the Healer people had planned for all along. They are pretty damn good and what they do 😉

First day in to see Nurse l33T Joy. Again, very odd to be going in so little with the amount of crazy concoctions she has us on. But we are told everything is plainly slower and there is nothing to worry about. 😉

The number made us a little disappointed. The goal of surgery, and this long regimen was to promote MORE dino egg growth. And that is not what we saw today. 7 total are developing at a good pace. We had 7 total last mature, but double digits would just be a DREAM right now!

Of course Nurse l33T Joy has told us from the beginning that there is just much left to give. 🙁

Give her all you got Scotty! Come on! Just a bit more homie!

Derrian has had a countdown going all week until “Bacon Cheeseburger Day”. Basically the day Nurse l33T Joy tells her she has to be off her diet to things can grow correctly. Her parents are even in town before they take off in their RV for the winter, so there is no better day then today to celebrate with one of the best bacon cheeseburgers in town! Fireside! OMG SOOOO good!

And so ends the cardboard packets but we did pretty good. Getting one pound under her goal weight of 169 (the weight she was when her and CKnight got married in 2009)

Diet Tracker!

• Highest– July 9th 2015 – 208 lbs
• Stop – Sept 25th 2015 – 180 lbs
• Start – Dec 28th – 190.5 lbs
• Stop – Feb 12th – 176.25 lbs
• Start – July 19th – 194.2 lbs
• Lowest- Oct 14th – 168.8
• Stop – Oct 22nd – 169.8

Total lbs Lost – 67.65 (Woo!)
Total lbs Gained Back – 29.45 (about 10 lbs per round of shots)

Time for the big drugs! The ones that cause Derrian’s poor little tummy to swell up and just feel fat in general. We have been told 2 shots in the morning and one at night. We don’t even flinch at the thought of that many needles any more.

No anxiety the night before, just wake up and Git ‘Er Done!

This part always feels like it goes the fastest. 9 ish days of shots, lots of visit to the healer and the vampires and then it is off to the retrieval surgery.

Thought this time is a bit strange (of course this protocol has been). Normally we go in every other day for ‘something’. Nurse l33T Joy likes to keep a close eye on Derrian’s insides to make sure nothing is getting too big too fast. But this time, just one little appointment is on the schedule…. weird.

Well… here goes nothing! Shots, shots, shots, shots shots!

Round 3 (well I guess 4 if you count the summer surgery). Nothing much to report on this. Derrian didn’t like her clinic doctor. They never pay much for mind then the sheet of paper they are filling out. BUT the nurse before was pretty bomb and gave us lots of luck. 😉

Ready to get the eggies out!

Endo-scratching doesn’t sound like such a bad thing, really. But it is probably the worse thing we have ever had to do with Nurse l33T Joy. And this is our SECOND time doing it! Please make it stop!!

The whole point of it is the injure poor Derrian’s insides so that that internal ‘clock’ resets itself to the timing that the healers want. Then Nurse l33T Joy makes the horrible comment of ‘I think I’m going to do a second pass.”

These are what Days off are made for…

……………..

CKnight has made an official request that Derrian cut off all her nails before the next appointment. 😉

We’re broke…. This has been the most expensive round of drugs we have ever had to pick up (not to mentioned surgery costs…). We were lucky enough to get ‘just’ enough money in, in time to make our big “Not covered by Insurance” order. Minnesota really needs to get on the game of covering some of this crap. Really. We have no choice in the matter, and are willing to go above and beyond to bring the best little gamer into this world, and we get next to know help.

We are afraid to total this all up in the end, but we will. And maybe it should be sent off to an official to maybe push the envelope a little bit on it.

• 11 different prescriptions (not including what Derrian is already taking, so add another 2)
• 138 pills
• 52 injections (plus 20 more that are in their own big vials)
• Only 5 items on this list are covered by insurance…… All the cheapest things of course.

And we may have to buy more at any point.

Our closet is a full little cookie!

Today is ‘technically the beginning of the our regimen from Nurse l33T Joy. She nice us a nicely laid out piece of paper starting from August 3rd, and going through November 1st. This is a LONG cycle compared to what we are used to BUT she did say we are now ‘seasoned professionals’ and should have no problem with this ‘weird schedule’. 😉 So much faith she has in us!

A good third of this plan is pretty easy. Oral potions, on and off for about 2 months.

A visit to the place of Healer for a Endo-Scratching *shudder* and the pretty black and white machine that they like to stick in funky places. “All to see you better my dear…”

The fun stuff starts on October 5th. We can’t wait to see the load out of our ‘herbal closet’ this time around! There will be pics, we promise 😉

CKnight has long had a dream…

(Get ready for car nerdisms)

To put a Rotary engine from an RX7 in to a NA Miata. SO basically brap brap engine with torque, into a itty bitty car that drives like a go-cart. The first car we bought as a ‘couple’ was the RX7 that house this engine. We bought the bar to just take out its motor and use only that. BUT CKnight drove that little FB RX7 and fell in love with it in.

So, needless to say, we never took the engine out. 😉

BUT the RX7 rusted on us slowly (many years later), in places where it was no longer safe to drive. So the Miata got its heart transplant at last.

The Miata was the first car we bought after we were married. It wasn’t the prettiest thing but it was the apple of CKnight’s eye. And with the new engine in it, it was a dream accomplished for him.

Well Cknight got hit in that Miata 🙁 We were lucky enough that the other insurance adjuster saw the value in the parts and work we have done to it and didn’t total it out. This allowed us to to some that we have wanted to do for a long time, but it was just too expensive.

The car got a full paint job. Making her “look and good as she drives.” as CKnight put it. He was a car he couldn’t believe he actually owned. It came back fantastic! We love our body shop, like there is no other.

There has been many drives in this car (and a rock chip in the hood). But it is a car that people flock to, ask questions about, and CKnight grins ear to ear about.

Of course, this is the third time that there has been a time for Derrian to diet during this whole process. We are pretty sure July was the month she first started her diet at 208 lbs.

Now at 194 lbs, it is time to start again. She needs to be under 186 lbs in order to do the surgery. Here we come cardboard food…

… and there was much rejoicing… (hear the sarcasm?)

Diet Tracker!

• Start – July 9th 2015 – 208 lbs
• Stop – Sept 25th 2015 – 180 lbs
• Start – Dec 28th – 190.5 lbs
• Stop – Feb 12th – 176.25 lbs
• Start – July 19th – 194.2 lbs

Total lbs Lost – 42.25 (Woo!)
Total lbs Gained Back – 28.45 (about 10 lbs per round of shots)

We have talked about going to Convergence for a while. It is a big gathering of geeky geeks, who do geeky stuff together in a big 3 hotel ring. Thousands of people go through it, free alcohol, panels with famous people, games, anime… what more could you ask for?!

We got permission from Nurse l33T Joy that we could attend, since it was so close to Derrian’s surgery, and got the go ahead!

We both dressed up even! CKnight at a Division Agent, complete with color changing beacon, and Derrian as Louise from Bob’s Burgers.

The panels were probably the most interesting aspect. With the theme  of “How do we get there”. Traveling of any sort was the discussion. Favorite Star Wars vehicles, to time travel, to a whole table of drinking Submarine Navy men who answered any (we mean ANY) question asked of them.

Of course there was the big costume show on the big stage for awards and some shopping. CKnight picked up a Gamera dvd for $2! Talk about a oldie, but a goodie!

We did the photo booth! But unfortunately we have never seen photos from our photographer 🙁 We’ll try to dig up something that we might have taken somewhere else. This pic is of Derrian as Louise, that was taken between panels. She got yelled at from down the long hallway to take a ‘Bob’s Burger crew family photo’ lol

With CKnight working and Derrian needing to be watched and helped a bit for the next week or so, Derrian’s Mommy came to visit! Mommys are the best, if for simply lounging around and watching far too much Frasier on Netflix.

Helps out everyone! Because we all know CKnight worries just a ‘bit’ too much 😉

And she is just silly!

Almost 2 years ago, Derrian had this exact (almost) same surgery. And now here we are again. At least we tried to be. We might have gotten lost in all the twists and turns from the address they sent us to, but at least a nice worker lady took pity on our souls and led us to where we needed to be!

Just in time too! We just turn our ‘waiting room seats’ and Derrian’s name was called to head on back to ‘prep’. A WHOLE room to herself, pretty nice digs there! It was a slew of people coming in and out, greeting, introducing, explaining. It is just amazing how many hands go into a process of people people in an induced coma and taking a knife after them 😉

This time around the surgery was bit more intense than the ‘Retrieval’ ones we do with Nurse l33T Joy. BUT she is here with us again leading the path. We don’t know what we would do without her. She is a great people person who understand not everyone can speak ‘l33T-isms’.

Though she is a little scary when she mentions that if she sees ‘anything’ that doesn’t look good. She is just going to remove it since she is there. Anything…. eep!

Follow the light!! Oh wait.. maybe not. :p

Want to see some big words?!

• Chromotubation of Oviduct
• Removal of Adnexal Structures
• Partial or total Oophorectomy and/or salpingectomy
• Hysteroscopy

Geezes… Sounds like another language for sure. These are all the ‘fancy’ words that were done during this surgery. Big words for basically saying Derrian has 4 new scars on her belly along with no ‘button’ on her belly button anymore (she is quite devastated!).

But… BUT! Everything was good news. Where we had a mass of leopard spot (Endometrosis) scarring up everything is sight. Now there are just pin pricks of the creepy brown stuff.

A scarred and closed up tube is not free flowing.

The GIANT cysts were dying where they sat. These caused for the extra scars, as they broke apart and floated away as Nurse l33T Joy was pulling them away. She had to go digging a bit more to find the left overs and get them out lol.

Good, good, good! Everything was good! Which is basically unheard of. Who knows which piece fixed the problems. BUT the good news is that it is.

Okay maybe she is not sick of us. If fact Nurse l33T Joy says we have been in her dreams (Which a very sweet thing.). She has another pair of adventurers like us that are also in the same state. Two tried have come and gone with no end in sight.

She is as unhappy as we are. We’ll never know exactly what went wrong. It is just a 10% chance that we happened to stumble upon.

It sucks! She agrees.

She worries so much about us and this other couple, that we are in her dreams at night. How can she help us? What else can we try? WILL IT WORK?!

Her second pair just got the good news. That is wonderful for them! Now we are the only ones left in her dreams.

We love Nurse l33T Joy ALOT!

So what do we do now? Round 3 is our last chance. We need to up the dino eggs we are producing, we need to give them the best environment we possibly can to thrive in. We need to succeed!

We also need a break. A break from this constant worrying, are we doing everything correctly? Are we missing anything? Will it work THIS time?!

Nurse l33T Joy agrees that a break is a good thing. Give Derrian’s insides a chance to chill out. Give our brains a chance to relax and not worry. BUT she does have an idea she wants to do.

She wants to check up of good ol’ Killer T and see what we can do to further weaken his defenses. Of course he is a villain we can only see from the inside. So Derrian is going to surgery! Yuck, lol. It gives Nurse l33T Joy an chance to test the waters again on Killer T’s domain. She has few weapons in her arsenal that she wants to wipe out and give it to him!

It also has a 3 month rest period afterwards. Just what we need.

The morning started out as normal as we have dealt with in this adventure. Wake up early. Follow the long list of directions the healer has given us. Triple check that we are doing it all correctly and get ready to head out.

Then the phone rings.

Derrian ignores it, because it is not a known number and we have too many thing to do, and if it is important, they’ll leave a message. And they did. She eventually checks right before we are packed up to head out the door and make our quick journey to Nurse l33T Joy’s place.

It’s the Embryologist……..

He asks that we call him back….

We don’t want to…

We are SO scared to……

But we have to… Our amazing little frozen but HATCHING dino egg. The one we have been SO excited to meet because it is HATCHING….. Didn’t make it through the thaw.

It died.

Died before it EVER got a chance to live.

Heartbroken is not even scratching the surface of the emotions we are feeling.

The first time around, when we got that call saying it didn’t work was HORRIBLE!

The second time sucked, but nearly as bad as the first.

This time is 10 times WORSE. Our little egg was to the point that it wanted to live, it was growing. It continued to grow. It came out of it’s shell to find a warm snuggley place where it would thrive for 9 more wonderful months.

But it never got the chance…….

Short update, since we have a busy day tomorrow.

Tomorrow we get the fun of waking up early to start a long day of playing with a little hatching baby dino egg! Come out of your deep thaw little Raptor! It is so amazing that this little bugger decided it like us SO much that it was going to come out of its shell to greet us this time around.

We are most excited about getting the chance to see the picture that Nurse l33T Joy’s assistants give us each time. We’ll get our first glance of where our baby dino is coming from.

Then straight to the warm comfy home we have been getting ready for it for FAR too long!

So we finally ended out search for an experienced Chinese healer who was well versed in needles in body. She is a nice lady for sure. Healer Zhuo! And very well versus in the art of dino egg making (IVF Process). You just had her a mountain of paperwork from Nurse l33T and she digests it all!

Of course the bad part is she sticks about 20 little metal needles about a half an inch into Derrian’s body to stay for a while.

Want to know something worse?! She then hooks up a little shocker machine to needles in Derrian’s stomach and lightly shocks them.

Did we ever tell you that Derrian is deathly afraid of electricity and shocks? Yeah…..

Of course then you are supposed to relax for an hour, and maybe take a nap. Yeah right… take a nap while being shocked at two different tempos… psh silly Chinese lady!

A full week in the sun is wonderful. The heat, vitamin C, and server lack of white stuff is great 😉

Derrian had a grand time (almost all of it). She got to visit her family, see the London Bridge (yes the one in the song), ride a cool boat, look at all the fishes. There was also buffets, and other delicious things to eat.

Her mother got out the telescope and they all looked at Jupiter and its many moons. Also Saturn! Those rings are just amazing when tilted just right!

Not to mention a bit of gambling with dear ol’ Papa. They enjoy shaking the dice a bit and hopefully making some money. They visited something like 7 casinos along the river, gambling a little bit at each one!

Craziest thing was the ALIENS! Dead serious… Go to enjoy a coffee after the sun goes down on the back ‘porch’, look at the bright casino lights and BAM! Freaking aliens!!

(Hey we believe in magical Dinosaur eggs, why not flying saucers?)

There was much freaking out to be had. Even Derrian’s dad was freaked out. Talk about a major goose bump moment. He is not freaked out by many things. These white specks kept flying over one of the casions in the sky.  3 or 4 of them, different directions, coming and going, until sudden they grouped together and flew off away from the buildings!

FREAKING OUT!!!

Two more nights they all watch the aliens, the specks multiplied. They were able to catch few in the telescope. Just rapidly moving specks of lights! The freaking rings of Saturn were visible, the strips in Jupiter, the giant spot! And these little specks remained just that when viewed through the telescope.

There was a bit of research done, since these space ships were appearing in the same spot each night. Right around the star Arcturus. Did you know that there is supposedly a portal to another dimension by Arcturus?!

The plot thickens!!

Even with Derrian vast knowledge of internet searching, it was ont he fourth day that she found the true identity to their aliens.

Birds/Bats…. freaking things. Illuminated by the upwards lights from the casino, they gather to eat the bugs that the lights attract in the spring.

Lost a few years of our lives from that one lol. But it made for a great story to tell others… like you, dear readers 😉

Derrian decided to leave MN and visit her folks, whom are currently living near Denver, AZ. They have been living in an RV full time for several years now. Traveling to different spots in the US before coming back during the summer to visit family (and not freeze).

Unfortunately it is not the happiest of journeys. Her parent’s cat decided his time to cross the Rainbow Bridge was now. He was not very old, maybe 6? It was not something that anyone wants to be a part of at this point in time. A bit a good luck in the near future would be a WONDERFUL change… can anyone help with that , please?

Derrian’s daddy is a wonderful man. He offered to foot the bill for the flight from MN to AZ. And of course CKnight is an amazing man to just say “Go”.

So she packed her bags and left, that very same day.

We can think of it as a little vacation. Working one (It was last minute vacation, so Derrian actually took her work with her). Luckily she has that option where she works.

Started picking of the drugs we needed from the potion people. Geezes… Even with the main footprint of this adventure’s bills being paid for in one (GIANT) lump sum. There is still SO much gold that we have to dump into this journey.

Still don’t want to do math.

$600 was just added on to the total (what ever that might be)…. for ONE drug. Daily injections for a 2 week period, yippie! Those are our favorite 😉 You know it homie!

We have no further updates, than damn. Need a few more jobs to pay for it all lol.

Got to go in and have a little one-on-one time with Nurse l33T Joy. I feel like we have done this little meeting a few to many times for anyone to be happy with.

She is, of course, just as disappointed as we are on this whole baby Raptor making thing. Everything is still looking good. Dino egg numbers are low, but better then before. CKnight got a high five for his part in the numbers 7 for 7 is pretty damn good.

Come on, how awesome is a Healer whom gives you a high five for putting tadpoles into a cup and them being little troopers later on 😉

BUT we can look toward the future a little differently this time.

The little Dino egg that we have left. (Just the one) did amazing well at the time of being put on a deep freeze! Like hatching?! Yes dino (human) babies hatch, isn’t that crazy to think about? We just never know of this process very well until we have to get a little too close and personal with it (remember the cup?)

Nurse l33T Joy thinks this one is probably even better quality and has a better chance of sticking than the two that already went in (little bastards).

So amongst the horrible appointment, there is something to look forward too. This is new territory for both of us. We have no clue what is next, or when, what is the process, etc?

Onward and upward!

Oh.. here’s another fun idea. Lets deal with more needles! Many different ones all over your body at one time! And let them stay there for an hour, just, you know, because.

Acupuncture has long been raved about for making little Raptor (baby) eggs. And it is a way of healing that, at least, Derrian greatly believes in. The power of your body, the flow of qi (chi) and harmonizing everything

Qi (chi) is considered a vital energy responsible for controlling the workings of the human mind and body. Qi flows through the body via channels. Imbalances in the flow of qi cause illness; correction of this flow restores the body to balance.

Dragon Ball anyone? We could use a spirit bomb about now.

Derrian found a post by another set of adventurers. Similar issues, not many dino eggs to attempt to even hatch. The lady-friend decided, why not, lets become a Hippy for this baby making crap…

Sounds pretty funny, but we kept on reading. THEY HAD GREAT RESULTS.

So begins the grinding on our reading levels. There is too many potions recipes for everything we touch in this day and age. How do you even pronounce some of these names! And you put that where?! Geezes…. witch craft, we tell ya.

Researching how to become a hippy is … interesting. Some people take it WAY too far, bashing, criticizing. It is just nuts for information that is suppose to help others on a similar adventure in hippy-ism. Shouldn’t we all be supportive, but respectful? Come on people!

None-the-less we did find narrow down and write out a list of what seemed correct to avoid.

• Parabens
• Phthalates
• Triclosan
• Sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS)
• Sodium laureth sulfate (SLES)
• Formaldehyde
• Toluene
• Propylene glycol
• Synthetic colors
• Fragrance/parfum

Maybe a few things like ‘metals’ and plainly things that can’t be pronounced. We probably don’t even want to know WHAT it is lol.

Of course potions with these ingredients don’t come cheap on the little ol’ gild pouch either. Just one more expensive to add to this journey…..

We haven’t done the math in awhile. We don’t want to…

We can honestly say that the second time around, that Nurse l33T Joy called us to tell us that our little dino eggs AGAIN did not like their nice warm home and that the tests came back negative….. was easier in way of disappointment.

Not that the anything with that phone call was easy. Derrian refused to even look at the phone all day, dreading the call from the Nurse. The news brought about rivulets of tears, swearing, and starring passed everything and at nothing at the same time.

IT SUCKED! It still sucks, and it will for a long time… Just like last time. But our hopes were not as high as last time, because we already knew what that devastation was. We were perhaps expecting it this time around. Which is DUMB, but it is the truth for all of you to know.

CKnight helped dye Derrian’s hair, something she couldn’t do during the treatments, and the time afterwards while we waited for the news. She has a little more gray up there then she would like even only being in her early 30’s. But that is just life. It was also something to take our minds off the bad news, and attempt to relax a little bit.

Then it was our normal ‘Dinner with the car people’ at the pizza joint. Extra’s came to give hugs, loves, and drink alcohol since that was something else Derrian was not able to do before.

It all helps… being around such GREAT friends helps… being able to talk out loud to anyone helps…

At the end of the night we snuggled in bed, watched American Dad and actually had a good night sleep (mostly).

We are already thinking about the future. We have our little baby dino-icicle waiting for us in the deep freeze, and we have NO idea how any of that works. But we’ll be meeting with Nurse l33T Joy next week to discuss.

And we are FREAKING out!!

Monday was bad enough because Vampires sucked it up and Derrian’s arm HURT for a good chunk of the day.

Then we have to go through a full day of nothing but wondering? Will we sleep tonight? Probably not! And it is going to suck. Can’t even drink a little happy go lucky alcohol to catch some Z’s… Nope that ceiling is going to be an interesting one tonight.

CKnight is a mantra of “Keep Calm”. The total opposite of his normal demeanor, but it is SO appreciated. He says he freaks out over the little things so that he can be calm during the big things. It is great having a strong shoulder to lean on when the Man’s got you down!

Wed, early morning is the second blood draw by Nurse l33T Joy and we’ll get the call later in the day.

Quote for the Day “Never Give Up!”
“LEEROY JENKINS!!!! Ah Crap, get in there!”

We got the email today that we thought would be coming around mid-week. The nice Male Embyro doctor that Nurse l33T Joy employs is on his game!

We can’t say that we are a little saddened that of the 5 dino eggs they were watching only got put on ice. We wish they would give you a little bit more info on it all. Did they just not make it to day 5? Or was it just the quality being too low that they might not survive a freeze/thaw. Even with a lower quality we wouldn’t mind the option to choose. Especially since we don’t make the number of little eggies like other people. Lower quality is better than no chance at all.

In the end it is still better than last time! And while Derrian hide in a bathroom to gain a little composure while at work. CKnight is great and bringing a calming situation. So staying positive is the name of the game!

Our Fighter Stats to Date

• 10+ Follicles
• 7 Dino Eggs
• ALL 7 Fertilized!!
• 2 Transfered
• 1 Frozen

Friday, last time, was also a day for rest. But this year Nurse l33T Joy said we could be up and around as long as nothing was strenuous. Derrian still decided to rest quite a bit. A good dose of Xenoblade Chronicles on the couch, LOTS of Gatorade and some soup.

We are back to the waiting game. March 14th & 16th are the appointments with the Vampires to see if the little Raptor Army stuck around this time. 😉

Today is the big day! We can’t believe how nervous we are! And everything with today is about being CALM and RELAXED! We don’t know if anyone can live up with expectations like that! Be serious now!

There is a lot of prep this time around, just like last time. Before we can even go into the See Nurse l33T Joy there a full page list of things that need to be checked off with a 8:15am start time.

8:15am – Take drugs (the dumb kind)
8:45am – Pee
9:15am – 600mg Ibuprofen
9:15am – Eat lightly and take all the normal drugs (6-8 pills)
9:15am – Start drinking 6-8 large glasses of water
10:15am – Be at the doctor!
10:15am – Take that lovely valium!
10:15am – 11:15am – Sit around in a room for a while, ask a couple question, go through some paperwork. Sit around some more even through Derrian NEEDS to pee, she is NOT allowed to.

About 11:15am and we were finally escorted (including a walkie-talkie announcement) to our dimly lit room and has the awesome secret door to it. The door is pretty cool, we don’t think it even opens from the outside. It leads back to where the mad scientists play Jurassic Park with our little egg and swimmers. 😉

Derrian gets her normal pedestal (or torture device) and is given the awesome warmed blanket. Before the Mad Scientist come to chat. We have a male one this time. This is probably the first time we have seen a male anywhere in this Office. They must all be hidden in the back! LOL.

He’s casual and cool, has a little trainee following him around. The best kind of doctors are the ones who relax around you, that is for sure!

He gave us the picture!!! Squee! Two perfect little Raptor eggs all ready for they new squishy Pokeball home! We blink back tears, that news is great. One is top quality, “textbook” he called it. The second is still high quality but has a bit of fragmentation on it (We had to research this later, but it is very common).

Fragmentation, also called blebbing, is a process where portions of the embryo’s cells have broken off and are now separate from the nucleated portion of the cell. It is preferable to have little or no fragmentation. However, fragmentation in human embryos is quite common. You just don’t want a lot of it.

We are over the moon! But what about the rest? There were 7 total taken out. How did they do?

THEY ALL FERTILIZED!!!

All freaking 7!! We have never seen this in all of our time with Mr. Google and the wide wide interwebs. You are constantly losing numbers with process, EVERY step of the way. How did all 7 fertilize! OMG.

We are growing a little pack of Raptors this time. Everybody better watch out!

They will watch these 5 until Day 5, and if they are high enough quality they will then be know as “Dinos on Ice”, to wait for another day.

The doctors all left us to prepare the next part of the procedure. There might have been some fist-bumping going on. It definitely made the nerves go away. (Or was that the valium kicking in??) ;P

The rest of the procedure was WAY easier then the first, nothing notable, less painful. Quick and easy! Nurse l33T Joy’s assistant even humored us with a little “10-4” on the walkie once we got the okay that all the dino eggs had made it into their new home safe and sound.

Nurse l33T joy gave us “sticky vibes” and said at that moment we were pregnant. Really a heart warming thing.

It is really amazing that we made the journey through 2 other healers before arriving here. And it was totally worth it!

The rest of the day was Derrian in bed sleeping off the drugs! And us getting news that our friends burnt some sage for us and prayed all went well. 🙂 Our friends are amazing!

Night night!

Friends are amazing. So many people come in and out of our adventures through life. Some stay and some go, but in the end they all make an impact of you as a person.

We got news that the transfer of our little dino eggys is going to be Thursday! So Derrian was talking to a couple of our friends this night as we were out with a group we see every Wednesday to get some pizza (and talk about cars). She was enjoying a couple of Fuzzy Navel drinks (a play from another friend’s book that got her positive results with IVF – granted that was a full bottle of wine and Derrian might have died if she tried that, lol.) and sending them pictures of said drinks.

“This is how you make a baby.”

The conversation turned to “Making it Rain Babies”, and signing “Its Raining Babies, hallelujah!”. The first friend took her cat in her arms and did a wonderful rain dance to make it “rain babies” lol. Trying to see if “native blood will yield the kinda rain we are after here.”

The other friend… well he twerked. We don’t think that is a rain dance, but we will take it! It is the thought that counts!

Bottom’s up our friends! Last day for a drink for hopefully 9 months!!

Today is the day we go back under the knife! Another special day, as it is Feb 29th! Leap Year day of all things is the day we do the extraction of all the dinosaur eggs.

Nerves are bad this time around. We know how it goes, we know what to expect. All the people are the same. They remember us, give us well wishes and jokes to make us smile.

OH! And warm blankets, did we forget to mention the beloved warm blankets? There was two… hmmm. 😉

We brought a few more items this time too. Some snacks for CKnight while he is waiting. Some handheld gaming consoles. The beloved knitted Pikachu hat, and a plush Pikachu for company. CKnight packed a backpack this time, which was a good idea for sure!

We had a little mishap with the IV line. The little bugger got it and then leaked EVERYWHERE! Which means blood did a back-draw trick and as soon as the nurse said blood everywhere, Derrian closed her eyes. Bad word. ;P

CKnight waved Pikachu in her face for awhile as a distraction a blanket made the boo-boo go away for a little bit. They replaced everything just in case and struck up a conversation about building potato guns (silly country folk). It is always an adventure our friends!

Pikachu continues to be a source of entertainment, even when the anesthesiologist opened the current to Pikachu on the clipboard of ‘very’ important paperwork. She thought it was hilarious. How many couples come into this stupid battle with the Evil Mr. T and be so silly about it?

Probably not many (or any) but this is just who we are 😉

Laughter is the source of everything wonderful in this world. We laughed before we got there, we laughed while we waited, and we laughed with all the Ladies at the surgery table up until the point Derrian was told ‘Nighty night”.

It was easy as pie this time around again. We are thankful for that! CKnight didn’t do the balancing Oreo trick this time (that we know of) << …. >> …. <<

But Pikachu was there for when Derrian woke up to eat said Oreos and Apple juice.

Going home was no problem, but resting on couch and there is pain! We didn’t deal with this that last time around!

🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

And it is weird being in Derrian’s left side and back. SO uncomfortable, but nothing so bad as we thing a trip back to the doctor is needed. Tylenol and an ice pack is all we get and it will eventually go away.

Today is a special day! Pokemon turned 20! That means Pikachu is 20! We LOVE Pikachu!
(Well Derrian LOVES Pikachu, CKnight loves Pikachu because it make Derrian REALLY easy to shop for lol)

Also happy coincidence. As of 11:45 pm tonight, we have done our 20th injection for this round during our whole ‘create an ultimate gamer baby’ (I.E. In-vitro Fertilization). If that isn’t a sign for good thing to come, then we don’t know what is!

Pokemon 20th Anniversary, 20 tummy injections, 13 Pokemon band aids.. 😉

Happy 20th Birthday Pokemon/Pikachu and Happy 20th shot and we are done with the pokey bits! YAY! ‪#‎pokemon20thanniversary‬ #‎pokemon20‬

What the heck is this all about!

We (CKnight and Derrian) are battling through dungeon after dungeon in order to collect all the pieces needed to create a new little gamer (through In-Vitro Fertilization) that, we hope, will take the world of nerds by storm! Who knows… maybe he/she will someday rule the world!

Read Our Adventure Synopsis here!

We screwed our schedule with Nurse l33T Joy, but we’ll come in whenever she needs us!! Mon, Tues, Thurs and possibly Fri… whew!

This time around, our little buggers are doing better! there was about 10 counted (way better then the 4 we originally saw). Not all are big enough yet, but we’ll still have a little bit of growing time to hopefully pull some healthy little dino eggs from them later.

Still at 3 shots. We can’t seem to get rid of that, BUT we will get our break day Sunday! Woot woot, no shots that day!

Surgery is currently scheduled for Monday, UNLESS they call us on it later.

(Bonus points if you can tell us what the above picture is of… 😉 )

One day early and we are back to see Nurse l33t Joy and the Vampires of Awesomesauce.

Derrian is exhausted after this day. Migraine level headaches since Sat, exhaustion in general and she couldn’t fall asleep again, so was lacking in the sleep department. Good thing CKnight is an awesome driver and will limo her around anywhere.

We were hoping for news that there were LOTS of little Dino eggs growing away in there, but it sounds like 4 are at a viable size, and then of course a lot of little ones. Not entirely what we wanted to hear. We were really hoping the increase in shots would get a few more then last time (we had 5 last time).

But, it only takes one. And if last time taught us anything, it is that we make good quality Raptors in the end.

Also the happy day of ‘One shot’ turned into a happy day of both arms being needed to give blood to the Vampires, and a hat-trick of injections (3) for the day. 1 in the morning and 2 at night.

We had to make a run to McDonalds for the Shamrock shake for Derrian. This was the first time she debated passing out for the Vampires in her entire life. We got chicken nuggets, a whopper, fries, gummy lifesavers, mexican cokes, AND a Shamrock shake!! To share of course, lol.

Derrian got to go see her best friends the homely Vampires today! You would thing they wouldn’t want to be seen at 9am in the morning (with the sun being out and all) but they were there as usual. Smiley, pointed faces and all.

Nurse l33t Joy did give us a call later in the day. Apparently the injection must be working a little ‘too’ well. We have to lower the drugs (YAY one injection only!) and go back tomorrow for a full work up.

We can hope this means that things are working VERY well! Here’s to hoping!

Today is the day we hug a Cactuar!

With the amount of drugs Nurse l33T Joy wants us on, we have no choice but the start our morning, bright and early, with 2 (not 1) tummy injections! Woo! Feel the overwhelming joy that just starts our day!!!

Or not, lol. But we tried.

Derrian has been on-call for her job for the month of Feb. This actually makes it very easy for us to do all this doctor business because she works from home when on-call. BUT her schedule changes from 9am-5pm to 12pm-7pm. So, simple to say she is used to sleeping in until noon every day right now. And this morning had to be up by 9. She was not a happy camper! Not to mention the fact that she finally fell asleep at about 3am because of nerves.

Dragging ourselves out of bed is a correct vision for this morning. But we did, and we got all our supplies out before trying to remember how this all worked. 8 vials to 2 syringes, how do we want to split this up?

At least we figured that prepping everything right away would be the best way to go. That way Derrian’s brain didn’t have a chance to freak out 😉

With the deed done, Derrian said it was not bad. The shots really don’t hurt. One of the potions stings going in, but as long as they are giving quickly, one after the other. Things went smooth.

Now we just have to remember all the other meds and their funky side effects!

No alcohol, no caffeine, no anti bacterial soap, no sun.

(Good thing it is winter here in MN)

A quick little in and out to Nurse l33t Joy’s place of business today.

We got our baselines for both UltraSound and Bloodwork. The Vampires have missed Derrian so much they say. We be back soon little Vampires, don’t you worry!

Everything normal here, for the most part. Yes there are still little jelly cubes that should not be, there are still leopard spots there that should not be. But that never changes.

One daily potion has to be upped. It just never seems to work as it should.

Next stop! Shots, shots, shots… shots, shots!

On a side note. Derrian is sad today. She was looking to test for her second degree Black belt in Tae Kwon Do in March. The timing would just be perfect that she was hoping to be off restrictions! Well. She realized the date she thought the test was was incorrect. March 12th is right in the middle of our ‘YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING’ time from Nurse l33T Joy. She is pretty bummed. 🙁

Or valentines day, which ever you prefer. Crappy picture at the top is how we spent our Valentine’s day. White Castle with family, our one single friend, and some candles and chocolates for setting the mood. 😉

We hope your day was as good as ours!

The day has arrived!

No, not a good day, a feared one. We are still cringing over here. The Nurse that led us back even asked us what we thought about the upcoming ‘Uterus Scratching’. We both cringed immediately, replying that it is the worst termed thing in the entire world!

She agreed. 😉

It was a quick procedure, more prep than anything, but definitely not pleasant by any means! Derrian attempted to squeeze CKnights hand off several times.

To go into more detail or no? I suppose we are doing this blog to help inform other geeks such as ourselves 😉

What does Uterus Scratching *cringe* entail, you might ask (actually you probably did not). Well, I’ll just tell you a tale of a cute little catheter name Cathy who wanted to explore a dark dark cave. The opening to this cave was not very big and Cathy had to shove herself this way and that in order to fit.

But once Cathy was inside, she realized that she had forgot her pick axe outside. So back out she went, it was much easily going out than it was getting in mind you 😉

A SECOND time this little catheter had to squeeze into a space that twisted and turn in direction that went meant to be fit through.

Of course she couldn’t see once she was inside, but she found the wall to lead her in a bit farther, until her hands found something squishy all over the walls. This is what she had been looking for!

She took her trusty pickaxe to those walls in order to collect samples to test later. For all of 30 seconds! Then, happy with the results, she left the cave to (HOPEFULLY!!) never return again.

True story…

The idea behind this little adventure is that, by injuring the walls, the Uterus has to heal and reset itself. We kid-you-not Nurse l33t Joy compared it to Mario. Start then Select and you get to start over.

This puts the Uterus cycle in sync with Derrian’s cycle. If these two are not jiving together, then nothing is going to work as it should. Those little Dino’s need a place to groove!

We’re so happy it is over and done with lol.

This one was about the same as the first time around. Though Derrian did finally get the doctor she had wanted to see. The first time the wanted doctor was on-call and swapped, so she got a sub. Derrian was not very happy with the sub. She was poked and prodded for 2 minutes and sent on her way. Nothing personalized. Where is the emotion button on some of these doctors, this is why we never go the normal doctors. They see you as a time slot and that is about it. In and out.

This time Derrian saw the correct doctor (on whom she found via a YouTube video with said doctor documenting her deer hunting trip). And it was MUCH better!

The lady asked questions, gave suggestions. Thought really hard about what lab work might be important to check. She was in that room with the doctor for a good 15 minutes! That is just unheard of with Clinics anymore.

It was a wonderful change. We’d go back there if we needed to again for sure.

Derrian has been busy as well! Since motion and really doing, much of anything is a big “no no”. We have been working on some good old house cleaning. Eventually our little minion is going to need a place of their own, and our spare rooms are a mess.

This is the spare room. Can you tell what Derrian likes to collect? It looks like a LOT less then when it was in piles. She said she needs more 😉

We have had our nice little sit down with Nurse l33T Joy and her plan makes sense. We are needing more of those little dinosaur eggs this time around. We SAW them in there, but the little buggers just refused to grow to the size they needed to be in order to be useful.

That means some new drugs for Derrian. Both the Vitamins (the kind you order through Amazon) and the ‘poke yourself in the tummy’ kind. She is not too thrilled about that second one.

“Yay we’re done with shots for the day! Oop nope, sorry, we lied. You have to do another!”

The last time we had to worry about two injections at the same time, Derrian had a bit of a mental freak out. Mind you, this was on Thankgiving and we had a house full of people. We’ll see how it goes this time around.

Another new thing! Kitty scratch scratch scratching! (No, not really a fluffy feline, but rather a uterus….ew…). Uterus scratching is the WORST medical term we have ever heard. Both CKnight and Derrian just cringe every time it is mentioned. Don’t you?!

Come on say it with me….

Uterus Scratching……

Ugh!

We are currently scheduling our life away with the IVF clinic and anyone else that we need to (pre-op with family doctors, etc). There are always so many things to worry about but our Fertility Doctor emailed us a handy dandy calendar with everything written down! It just sits in the middle of the kitchen, so not to be forgotten.

Going into round two of this whole ‘making a baby’ is both easier and more difficult than the first time. We know what we are getting into this time around. We know what drugs there will be, when we start and stop them, what they do and hoe long with have to be on them.

BUT with a failure the first time and just knowing that great disappointment we felt, and having NO way of knowing what went wrong, it makes this time around harder. There is always a chance of a failed outcome again and now we know exactly what that feels like, and it is not good at all, it took us a couple weeks to even adventure out of our house to see people again.

More thanks with this post!

And we want to take some extra time this time around to just THANK everyone! We have had so many people sharing our story and in general just trying to help us. It is amazing. We know no one has to do these kind of things for us, but they still are and it brings tears to our eyes.

• Anonymous #1
• Sandy & Keith Lundmark
• Anonymous – Family Donation that was mailed in to our loan sharks 😉

We are currently in a holding pattern for round two of IVF. The scheduler called and let us know end of Feb will be the time that we can do our surgery to harvest the eggs, meaning we will be back at daily injections mid Feb and we know how happy that makes us all! We’ll be sure to keep you all updated.

And again, we have been having such a wonderful out pouring of love. It is crazy! Thank you so much! People have been asking how they can share our story/gofundme/etc. So here are some easy links, just click one 😉

They will all post the GoFundMe url to your social media of choice

Or you can just click this to go directly to GoFundMe page at http://www.gofundme.com/1upbaby

Here are our next round of Thanks for the donations.

• Mom & Dad
• Garrett & Chanell Nutter
• Darcianne Siefkes

This website has never been about raising the $26,000 it is taking us to create a little human being. We state this a few times. It is about the journey, the friends we have and meet along the way, the others like us who have infertility issues that we hopefully can help.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t have people who help us. Derrian’s family, the kindness and love of CKnights family. The random purchases that show up on the site…

And now this…

Thank you to Jason and Marilyn Jungbluth for being our first donations! We are both blown away (And CKnight might have some firm words he would like to speak to you with.. something about putting your hard earned money towards this loopy idea).

We love you long time!

A New Years celebration post. We spend the evening playing video games, Battlefield 4 to be specific.

Low key and wonderful! Here is to NEW beginnings!

We took a trip to visit the IVF Doctor today. It was an appointment to go over a little of what had happened and what we would try differently the next time.

She explained that there was both good and bad in our attempt to conceive a child.

The Bad

It didn’t work… of course. And there is no way of knowing ‘why’.

And 5 follicles, 3 eggs, and 2 fertilized eggs to transfer in the end. The starting numbers for this procedure is low, low, low…. BUT we got good odds out of the rest of it.

The Good

Our 2 fertilized eggs were of the highest quality, which is wonderful considering the rest of the news.

And we get to try again! The good Doctor has some items in mind to better our odds. We are now being treated as a couple twice our age! (well, maybe not quite that much lol, but quite a bit older anyway). The drugs are going to be increased both before (vitamins) and during the shots to the tummy. They are also going to ‘reset’ Derrian’s uterus…

I’m not going to go into details on what is involved in order to reset a uterus… Just know that both CKnight and Derrian cringed. It’s not pretty.

On to the next time!!

We were, honestly, torn if we even wanted to do a Christmas celebration this year. We weren’t the happiest of people, we didn’t want to be around anyone, and we just… really weren’t in the celebrating spirit (even Derrian, who tends to push it on CKnight).

But we did a one-on-one meal with CKnight’s sister and enjoyed the simplicity of it enough to finally putting up our tree on Christmas Eve (we weren’t sure it was worth the effort for the longets time).

Then for  Christmas Day, we kept it just the two of us. Derrian made a beautiful breakfast (that her mother use to make). Notice the prettiness in the pan, THEN the mess it became all over the floor in a, typical ‘Derrian is in the kitchen’ fashion lol. It still tasted delicious after most of it was saved. Gifts were exchanged and I realize I’m missing pictures, but just imagine all the cuteness of stuffed Pikachus along with a Metal Gear Solid Big Boss PSP that CKnight has had an eye on forever. It was relaxing in the end to be in solitude.

But in the end we decided that we would throw our normal ‘Orphans Christmas of Noms’ and invite our friends over Sunday. A taco bar was served and it was great to be around the people we care about.

Well after a decent sized hiatus and many, MANY pieces of candy later we feel like we can move on in our journey to have a child. The end result we got was NOT the one we planned on, or had high hopes for, but it is a speed bump that we will careful navigate and move forward!

A surprise order in the queue was a nice surprise this morning. Family has helped us out so much in this stressful adventure and we know they will always be there for us. We even screwed up the sticker order (by making one WAY too big) and just sent both along for the ride to their new home

Packages went in the mail today to 4 awesome companies, we hope to like sweet stuff we put in them. And we hope they like the story we have written for them.

• Game Informer
• IGN
• Felicia Day
• PC Gamer

This time we had to wait 2 weeks for any news from the Doctor. Well I guess it is really only 13 days, but close enough.

Take we took the long trip to see the Vampires, eerrrr Lab people at RMIA for a blood sample. But we won’t hear anything today. They need one more sample (Wed) the hCG number are rising, meaning the egg attached and is growing.

The time went fast, but the nervousness we are feeling this time around is much worse, then when it was just 2 days of waiting.

It is hard to get it into your head that the first time may not work but, luckily, that will not be the only attempt we get.

But it is still hard to put that much effort into something so grand and know that it just might not be enough.

Chins up mates! The little Dinosaurs will prevail!

Thursday and Friday are days for rest. The hardest parts of this whole process is now over and we have all the warm fuzzy thoughts that these are all the pieces that we need in order to finally defeat the infertility issues that have been plaguing us for 2 1/2 years (and a bit more)”.

5 Follicles, 3 Eggs, and 2 fertilized, growing up just enough to be shown their new home for the next 9 months.

Fingers crossed that they like it. 🙂

Did we mention, in all this craziness, how hard it is to eat Chinese when not being able to sit up? We are amazed the bed is not covered in lo-mein and gyoza sauce. But it is NOT! Victory!

Early morning again! It is always nice to see Doctor Leonard’s smiling face during these days. You’d think we’d be use to it by now lol. She had her whole crew on deck today. It was kind of fun. People in crazy outfits, secret doors in our room, and personal tv screen for us to watch the action on the ultrasound.

Derrian was given another slew of loopy drugs and some warm blankets before we were handed a picture of the two little eggs (our baby dinosaurs) that had enjoyed their warm environment so much that they grew in size. 2 out of 3 is more than we could have hoped for. And we were told they were A quality! So wonderful!

We are sure they will be the best of friends in their new home.

Cute little eggs… Pardon us while we admire the again and try not to cry… *sigh*

Loopy drugs kicked in, Doctor Leonard got to quick work setting up her work area before getting on the walkie talkie to call out the embryologists from the secret room. With them came the little eggs we had seen in the picture.

Damn cute things they are.

In the uterus they go and we got another black and white picture with them circled where they are going to settle in. One itty bitty space…

We got the call we have been waiting for and Doctor gave us good news! Phew! OMG!

*insert many more exuberantly typed words here*

5 follicles is not many, in fact, it is a borderline ‘call the whole thing off’ number.

Then only 3 eggs came from those 5. And the quality did not look the best (from what CKnight was told at the time of the surgery), so to get this phone call was one of the happiest moments we have had on this adventure together.

We both cried (you would have too, I promise).

And the next fun news that was relayed was that the ‘transfer’ of those eggs would be done Thursday, tomorrow. Oh geeze. Why is everything so quick with these people lol!

We are in for another early, early day folks! Wish us wonderful dreams in dreamland and not another nervous and sleepless night. ;P

Now the waiting game starts. We can’t move forward with the process until we hear back from RMIA.

We have to wait ‘2 days’!!!

Longest.. two… days… ever!

Grow little petri dish eggs! Grow!

From 5 little follicles we got 3 eggs that the Doctor is giving all her love and joy to. They will be combined with the sperm and put in an incubator to keep them warm and cozy.

At least Derrian took her downtime to ‘finally’ finish a video game she has been playing for most of the year.

The staff of RMIA was bright eyes and bushy tailed at 8am today!

We were not so much, but after 15 shots in 8 days (the last being Sat night at 10:15 pm ON THE DOT!) can you really blame us? At least Derrian gets to be put to sleep for the surgery and then do nothing the rest of the day.

Great people in these situations are always the best, explaining, calming, joking. It is the best way to keep the nervousness away. Surgeries are simple, and fun really (from what Derrian says). They give you happy drugs, warm blankets, and food after!

All for only 15-20 minutes of sleep.

CKnight had a harder time with it, but got to chuckle at his ‘out-of-it’ wife and balanced Oreos on her nose to take pictures to send to family.

He’ll make up for it later when he has to wait on Derrian hand and foot since she is not allowed to get of the couch for 24 hours. Lol.

Black Friday visits to the Doctor! We can’t wait for a nap! Ugh.

But some good news came out of the early morning appointment. We have our special Harvest date lined up. One full day early!

November 30th!

It is exciting for sure, and also a little frightening. It is amazing how quickly you go from ‘start this routine now’, to ‘stop everything and we are going to put you to sleepy for a little bit and take things out of you.’

(yes that is a White Castle Crave Case we use to make Stuffing)

We host the ‘orphans’ during the Holidays. Open our doors and cook way to much food and see who shows up. It is normally a house full, and today was no different. It was great having friends around and chit chatting. Forgetting all the crazy that has been going on the past year (and more important the past week).

We learned a long time around that speaking about the issues you have during a tough adventure is so much easier than trying to hide it from the companions you have in the world. We are amazed that more people don’t do so, it is a big relief to have that support system.

So house of people, full bellies, and a slightly traumatic couple of evening shots during that time (why does that second one in a row cause so much angst!) and it was a good day!

Now some late late night shopping with family and friends, before a 7 am appointment with Doctor Leonard. Who needs sleep anyway ;P

4 Days and 4 needles. Not so bad right?

Well we took a visit to Doctor Leonard to see how the little follicles were forming and things sounded good. In fact our big ‘harvest’ day might move forward! Sounds amazing! Get this hard journey done sooner then planned! Right?

Wrong!

The Doctor upped 1 shot a day to 3… for 3 days… Starting today. Ouch ouch ouch.

We’ll just keep repeating out mantra… “It’s all to make a baby. It’s all to make a baby. It’s all to make a baby that your really REALLY want!”

11/21 the worst of the checkpoints. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to give yourself an injection in your stomach?

Nope, nope, nope.

Why?!

Cause the Doctor said we had to…. *insert the biggest, saddest faced we can find here*

We invited over an old friend of ours, she is in the medical field and can show us the ins and outs of mixing drugs into a needle ourselves and administering them in to Derrian’s stomach with a cute little needle.

The anticipation was really the worst part… Derrian only had a small little bruise to show for the mental fight she put up with. It is a load off our minds.

One needle down! (How many more is there again?)

No, not one of those dating websites that are advertised on the TV, radio, computers, and really just everywhere!

We mean the paper that shows us each checkpoint we have to make during this whole IVF process.

10/8, 10/14, 11/3, 11/10, 11/11, 11/16, 11/17, 11/21, 12/1

We are sure there will be more revealed soon. We have been crossing them off as we pass each, there are now more crossed off then not. That is an accomplishment in and of itself. But with each one we take pen to, the scarier it gets.

We have no guarantees of the outcome to this adventure.

You never realize how many drugs a person can take until you start picking them all up. Sure we got a list of 31 drugs, of which 12 are marked and ordered… ugh. So many, PLUS the 4 other ones they already have us on.

The pharmacy is awesome, we are now ‘frequent shopper’ and get coupons for picking up so many drugs from them. We are kind of proud of this title, though we are not sure if we really should be lol.

NOW, what the heck do these all do?! 12 check-boxes turned into 29 physical boxes of crap that we have no idea about. Mostly at least. It is a bit of shock, the adventure (while already in process) is getting to the important part.

A good part, we hope (of course). Because we are getting a bit nervous at the reality that these simple little check boxes show us.

Well, we guess it is really the beginning of the beginning.

Now is the time for the real fun! Not that needles and drugs are fun, but we can be hopeful.

Doctor Leonard did a FULL work up on us and then sat us down and we chatted. Of course she has some concerns, that is why we are there in the first place, though she is a bit more cautious after getting her own inside view. The cysts, that are back, take up area on the ovaries, they cause visibility issues and we have less space for follicles to grow during the stimulation. She also doesn’t think those poor ovaries have much left to give.

She is going to put us on a more aggressive drug regimen right off the bat. Still leaving a little safe room if things need to change.

We left her with a LOT of paperwork, and a job to make a trip (and call) to the pharmacy to gather a, rather, extensive list of medicines and needles (Ugh needles).

We wrote Doctors a check today (the total being $500 less since it was paid ahead of time), and with the handing of that check….Cknight had a request.

He has requests for several things, but we like this one a bit more then some of the others. Doctor Leonard, I can’t fully gauge her yet and her taking to the request, but I think she was entertained at least. ;p

He wanted the Jurassic Park theme to be played while they put the little sperm in the little eggs lol. It’s all the same thing really lol.

(Note the memo line on that official check we wrote.)

Daddy to the rescue! We can’t believe the generosity of family in a time of need! Derrian’s father saved us from the crazy amount we would be paying because of the high interest on the loan we currently had.

He (with the wife’s permission) loaned us the money and asked us to make monthly payments set at a price we could logically afford! We are so floored… beyond words!

WE made it!  2 1/2 years later and we can see the Doctor that will hopefully help us get a child! Well one more month to wait to speak to her but a month is a piece of cake after the years we have been trying.

For the first challenge, Derrian in with a lose of 28 lbs! Pretty impressive for 2 months of eating cardboard.

For the second , we chose option #2, to the tune of $26000…. OUCH! But it stacks the odds in our favor quite a bit better with less out of pocket if we need multiple tries.

Getting that kind of cash, money is not easy either. You can’t just go to the Bank and say “Yo! I need twenty G’s!” without having some sort of collateral to offer up in exchange. The banks are sympathetic to you when you explain this is for ‘medical’ reasons. But really it is still unsecure and a LARGE amount of money.

We did get a loan through an online company. It is they just gave us a 20% interest on the loan…  But we took the offer, it was all we could get really after looking for months.

Requirement #2. A very very important one… Money…

We can do the one time thing and pay as we go, but that seems pretty silly. You are not guaranteed a child with this.

OR

We can pay for the package, $26000 up front and get several changes. There are also the warranty here.

We do pretty well money wise. CKnight takes care of the house while Derrian works. But a loan that size will hurt anyone financially. Us included. It is something we really need to sit down and talk long and hard about.

Before we can talk to the Doctor, we have been told by the nice nurses that we must have a couple of things that need to be done first. They have their own ‘package’ deal on the IVF tries, and they are nicer then the last place.

3 fresh cycles and you can use every ‘extra frozen’ egg that is a result of those fresh cycles. It could give us a ton of tries! AND the injections are ALL included. The prices is a little higher at $26000 but drugs alone (for a single try) will eat up more then that difference easily.

And of course their is a warranty. 100% money back if you have not child (technically it is a live child for 30 days or your money back).

But with the extra perks also means more restrictions. They all had a BMI restritions. CRM was 35 and RMIA is 33. We aren’t shy here. Derrian is 208 lbs… a BMI of 33 means she needs to be 186. Appointments are booking about 60 days out. That is not a lot of time. BUT there are crazy diets out there, and she has the will power when the end goal is important.

Ideal Protein for 2 months it is! Crazy restrictive of food and exercise that can be done, minimal movement really, and a lot of strange packets that taste strangely like cardboard. :\

Fine, fine! We’ll do it! The tasks is not big and we will come out at the end of it better then when we started.

Okay, we thought we were done. We had ‘hoped’ we were done. But sometimes there are detours, they are not always a bad thing. This is just the ‘scenic route’ 🙂

We have a sister of friend who has gone through this exact process with success (just recently). And it was just by chance that we learned this at his birthday party. CKnight’s comment of ‘Yay team broken!’ was understood and she reached out to us later on. Offer up advice and support.

That is just an AMAZING thing to get from someone you know just in passing. Infertility is a ‘very’ common problem to humans now-a-days… but NO ONE talks about it. I’m sure there is a level of shame there. Not that long ago (and possible still, in other parts of the world) Wives unable to provide their husbands with a child would be tossed aside.  🙁 It was their fault and they were shunned for it.

(That idea of ‘sharing that you are not alone’ is also what spurred on this website. YOU ARE NOT ALONE!)

Our IVF friend told us about her experience (all the gory details) and her doctor. It was actually the same clinic we used to find out CKnight was broken. She LOVED her doctor there.

SO we traveled to another seminar, it was a good chance to check out the clinic and ask questions again. It was worth it. There is just something about pictures of a baby flicking off the crowd that just does it for us… what can we say 😉 It is that little bit of ‘humor’ that will get your through any hard time in your life.

There is a saying here “Third time’s a charm”. We like this saying.

Round Two!

Second IVF Doctor was WAY better. She listened, explained things in words we could understand. We are happy we made the change. A little compassion goes a long way in a difficult situation. The other worker were maybe not quite as ‘happy’ as you might expect to see first thing walking into see the Doctor. But it is what it is.

So much was done the first day too, explaining the whole process, the cycles you go through, experimentation (not the mad scientist kind), Ultrasounds, and the blood draws…. so much blood.

We saw this Doctor several times, to get a better understanding of what might lay before us. Most we already knew, but got clarification on. Really a second opinion. Which is always good to have in a high cost procedure.

She agreed with the idea of going straight to IVF to increase our chanced. And their clinic actually provides a neat ‘package’ for IVF.

$23000 and you get 3 fresh cycles and 3 frozen cycles. That is 6 tried for less than the cost of 2 normally. And If it does not work out. Then the cost is refundable! Only extra cost is the injections you need. Which can be costly. But this is great information.

Time to take matters into our own hands and start out on the last leg of this process.

On a recommendation we go to the U of M to start the IVF process. We always think of them at the top of new technology. Both CKnight and Derrian like this idea a lot. But man… you would expect a Doctor in such a sensitive field to be kind, smiling, and wholly understanding. That was NOT the case with the first Doctor we saw.

Quite the opposite in fact. Wrinkly, grey thinning hair, wiry thin. The slight lisp and constant nervous movements didn’t help in the slightest.

Derrian is the most patient person in the world and she even wanted to leave after a short time talking to this older gentleman. No eye contact, arguing over and over facts presented to him…. grrrr…. it’s just birth control! No we did not finish the whole pack! We have said this 4 times already…

We still don’t like to think back to it. Not all Doctors are created equal and while this one might be an amazing one, he was just one that we would not see again after that first meeting.

We know the issues and have been given our chances of success to naturally have a child, the odds are not good. Single digits. Derrian is broken 3 different ways, and CKnight 2. 🙁 We are given a couple of options. IUI, basically white washing the sperm and putting only the best back in. The cost is about $4000 a time for that. And our best chance is up to 6 months after the surgery. We are still in single digits for a percentage of success with this.

Or we can try IVF, take both the egg and sperm out and put them together, then put them back in. Cost here runs about $12000-$15000 per try with a 50% chance of success.

IVF costs more, but the higher chances means that our money is better spent here. That is what we decided to try.

We find and attend an IVF seminar at the CRM clinic here in Minnesota. It is a full house when we arrive. Everyone is different, we come from different life styles and background. All different shapes, colors, and sizes. A gathering like that lets us know that we are not alone, which is a bit comforting and a bit scary at the same time.

There is lots of information passed, stories told, and some creepy videos that made us cringe a little. The the knowledge gain by going to the gathering is of high value.

Knowledge is power after all.

(Not to mention the mountain of paperwork we left with to read later)

Surgery isn’t really that scary. Doctors and Nurses will take great care of her patients, and once things are all finished up, then you get a nice warm blanket to snuggle with. Apparently Derrian just smiles when she is drugged up on anesthetic as well, all the Nurses found this amusing, lol.

And with this challenge comes MORE clues to the baby mystery. (Can we take any more?) It is pretty bad. The Doctor explained to CKnight that if she didn’t know we wanted to have kids, then she would have taken both ovaries OUT! They both were the size of an orange (when they should be about walnut size). Not good. Also the Endometriosis is a real thing here. Leopard spots of the ‘very impressive’ kind, all over causing damage, pain, and blocking up one tube needed to carry that egg down to the uterus.

So many check boxes on the ‘negative’ side of this list.

But with the surgery comes some positives, we know some next steps we have to take, and the Doctor took care of the cysts and lasered away as much Endometriosis as she could.

Woo! More doctors! We figured we would go see more of a professional in terms of lady bits. Especially when said lady parts cause poor Derrian to curl up and cry for hours every month. SO to a dedicated OBGYN we go!

More poking and prodding and we get more answers to a year long list of questions (and really a life time issue). Both ovaries have large cysts on them. ‘Chocolate cysts’ is how the doctor described them. These are normally caused by Endometriosis, but of course you can’t tell for sure unless surgery is preformed to look outside the uterus.

A whole pile of fun issues can accrue because of this and most we have been experiencing since before Derrian ever know of who CKnight was. We don’t like this one bit!

So next steps? Surgery is the only answer.

Unexpected trips to the ER are never a fun thing. The medical people there might be nice and friendly but nobody likes being poked and prodded (Anyone? Anyone? Didn’t think so) no matter how cute the nurse might be.

It was the same for us. Did we perhaps get food poisoning when we weren’t paying attention? Derrian’s cooking can be deadly, but we don’t think she was cooking that day. Luckily CKnight is good at being a bit persistent and a short drive lately we got the chance to deal with Doctors.

It was a long day, some 6 hours into this little detour but we got some answers to questions that we had been asking for over a year now. Crazy pains can be explained by cysts attached to ovaries and one has possibly popped. Oh joy! That is not what we were expecting, but it also not a first time this has been an issue for Derrian.

But answers are answers and they could be answers to the issue we have been dealing with the whole time of trying to conceive a baby.

Okay, maybe making a baby is not ‘hard work’ But you put all your hard mental prep into that first month, JUST knowing that you will be successful. But in the end you just get squashed, and no matter how many times to you try the end result is the same.

It is disappointing for sure, possibly down right devastating. We remember the tears quite well actually (it is okay to admit, we promise).

You don’t know what you did wrong, it seems so straight forward. Ugh, it is something that is still hard to even think about.

But what can you do but move forward? Plan a little better, do some research, and just keep on trying, you’ll eventually get the end result you are hoping for.

“Just keep swimming…”

I’m sure many people go through the same mental check. Are we physically ready for this? Are we mentally ready? Where will everything go? Do we have enough money?!

We did the same, planning seems to be part of the fun. Though for us, we had the conversations ‘after’  a quick ‘thinking…. thinking.. okay lets try!’. It is a very exciting time. Smiles, laughs, excitement. I still remember where I was, what I was doing, and who I was with.

March 2013 is when we said, ‘Let’s make a baby’. OVER 2 1/2 years ago (Since I’m writing these posts much later then the date on them.) But the date on this blog is that day for the start of our adventure. We were a normal (maybe not so normal) happy little couple, ready to take on the journey ahead of us where ever it might take us. Dreaming about how this would all unfold.

The journey became much longer, and harder then we ever thought it could be, and it is not over yet. But together we are still fighting strong for each other.