clarified (somewhat)

At our follow-up appointment, my doc had found out that the “unclear” parts of the MRI were so because of all the scar tissue / adhesions I have from my previous surgery. Which means that they cannot see much in this area. The overall conclusion remains, no big bloody masses or anything to be seen, which is good. Whether there are small amounts of endometriosis or not they cannot really say, as far as I understand. Nor where my pain comes from — my doctor thinks it could be from the adhesions, but what I find weird is that it mainly occurs during my period, and to a lesser extent until ovulation — to me this screams estrogen-dependent. Anyone with adhesions, or other “weird pain”, has had this experience?

She had also finally received the SA results from last year — oddly enough, on that report morphology wasn’t even mentioned (where I’m from, you don’t actually get any records unless you, or better another doctor, specifically asks for them). So now I don’t know whether they tested for it at all, and hence whether the new results are worse or just “another factor we didn’t know about”. Not that this would help, I guess… H, although very skeptical about anything that is not traditional western medicine, has agreed to start trying a supplement for male fertility. Let’s see if that brings us anywhere. It cannot hurt, I suppose.

The best news of the consultation was that the doctor thinks we could be successful with IUI. Of course it is hard to predict anything as nobody knows how my endo (if it is there at all) affects my chances of getting pregnant, but based on his numbers she would suggest us to try 4 rounds of that, and then think about IVF. One of the insurance plans at my next job would cover 50% of IUIs, including the drugs, which would be a start. No IVF coverage, though… sigh. I’m not entirely sure how it would be with my insurance here, and unfortunately the only clinic that works with it was not very impressive (they wrote the wrong diagnosis on the SA, and needed 4 attempts to put the correct name on the invoice).

I think in part I’m still grieving the idea of conceiving naturally, so perhaps it is not the worst thing in the world if we have to wait a bit, until we have moved and settled in our new location. Still, it hurts me that some friends will probably be preparing for the arrival of #2 by the time we even have a chance of conceiving #1 (and we all know that this does not mean we’ll actually have a baby 9 months later). I got though most of this month fairly well, given my IF-unhappiness and the anniversary of my mom’s death in late November, but last Friday I just lost it, and all I could do was cry on the way home. A BFN on Saturday morning didn’t make it any better, but HP7 was at least distracting, and afterwards we went for drinks with friends. In a place that used to be super-nice with great food, but now has new owners and is… less nice. But more expensive. Sigh. This will get better, right?

evening primrose oil – advice?

The title says it all, I think. Have you used it? Specific recommendations on dosage, when to take it — according to this article only in the follicular phase, as it may induce cramping — or any other helpful advice? (Brands likely won’t help much unless you live in Old Europe.)
I’ve read that it can help both with endometriosis (fatty acids making cell membranes smoother, relieving adhesions etc.), and with getting pregnant — and, if you believe the pages that sell it, it’s amazing for all aspects of health anyway. I asked my doctor about it and she said that it won’t hurt, and that fatty acids are important (and some missing from the local diet, apparently) so I’ll try. If I get better (or pregnant!), great. Regarding my odd pain we’ll do an MRI during my next period and see what that shows. Of course the problem is that it may show nothing and there could still be endo… but she wasn’t very keen on jumping to a lap right away, and I do understand the “the less invasive the better” point of view, particularly when we’re not sure what we’re dealing with. She also did an u/s and I had already ovulated, and my lining was transforming in the way it should. I think that our timing was not bad this month, but honestly, after all the other months with ok-to-good timing, I don’t have a lot of hope that I’ll get pregnant this time. H should repeat his SA soonish, and then perhaps we’ll know a bit more, namely, if we should really worry about his side as well or if the last one was a fluke / badly timed.