IVF Round 3 Protocol

We are about a week away from starting the “priming” process of IVF round 3. I’m really excited for our next round. Yes, I wish we didn’t have to do it. But we do, and I’ve decided to completely embrace it and be totally hopeful. In the past I’ve worked so hard to guard my heart during our rounds. Which is 100% normal when you’re battling infertility. At some point, you just get to where you want so badly for everything to work out, but you’re also realistic and know that it doesn’t always work the way you’d hope.  But I’m going into this round full of hope. I’m still nervous to say “when this works…” or “when we’re pregnant…” but I’ve caught myself saying that a couple of times. During my nightly breathing exercises (as recommended by my acupuncturist), I’ve been saying “We will get pregnant this year, we will have a healthy baby next year.” Crap, that’s scary to type out. And I can hear my superstitious husband on the other end of this saying “noooo!! Don’t say that out loud!!!” But I’m declaring it. This will work. And if it doesn’t… well we’ll figure that out if it happens (see what I did there? Still a tad guarded, I guess)

We got our protocol for this round and I’ll admit at first I was a little nervous that maybe my doctor forgot what we had talked about. We had a discussion with him yesterday, and he explained his reasoning for the changes in protocol this time. I feel so confident that he has tailored this protocol for us, specifically based on our history and my health. Have I mentioned how much I love my doctor?

So here’s our protocol for Round 3…

• Once ovulation occurs (hopefully late next week, we start doing blood work to check on Wednesday):
• 2 mg of Estrace (estrogen pills) each day
• Androgel (testosterone gel) rubbed on my belly once a day
• Starting on Day 1 of my cycle (about two weeks later) “stims” (injections to stimulate the ovaries) begin:
• Inject 450iu (6 vials) Menopur each day
• We’ll start injecting Cetrotide (which keeps me from ovulating until we’re ready to trigger) a few days after starting Menopur (timing of it will be based on ultrasounds and blood work)
• After 9-12 days of stims (determined by how quickly the follicles are growing, and how many we have):
• We will “trigger” ovulation with Ovidrel
• Exactly 36 hours after trigger, we’ll go in for egg retrieval!
• Depending on how many eggs fertilize and make it to day 5, and how my lining is looking, then we'll determine whether we will do a fresh or frozen embryo transfer. 

This is quite different from both of the other rounds of IVF. You can see the protocol for round 1 here, and round 2 here. Our doctor has explained that this protocol has been proven successful for women with low AMH (which is what I have), and that lining the timing up with my natural cycle should really help us get some healthy eggs. I will say, I’m not sad about going from 5 injections a day last time to now 1-2 each day.

I’m ready for next week… let’s get this show on the road!!

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