The world of Lupron

Last night was my third Lupron injection. Which apparently, in the new world of Lupron which I now exist in, is Side Effect Day. Side effects kick in after the 2nd or 3rd injection. They weren’t kidding. The one SE that J was freaked out about was the night terrors. You know…where you wake up paralyzed, screaming in a complete panic attack where it takes you 20 minutes to calm down. Then you wake up with total amnesia and have no idea it happened. The thought of that happening kind of cracks me up…I can just imagine J's reaction to THAT! I get the good end of that…I won’t remember it ever happened.

Well, luckily for DH, I just had bizarre nightmares all night long…not terrors. Actually - not sure that I’d call them actual nightmares…more disturbing than scary really. He said I woke up around 2, announced I was starving…then proceeded to fall back to sleep. 20 minutes later I’m thrashing around mumbling in my sleep…he wakes me up. I was dreaming that I was standing in a cow field with a knife & fork, just chopping into this cow while it was grazing. Like I said…disturbing.

All in all, he said he had to wake me up about 6 or 7 times last night because I was kicking or moaning or talking (and at one point laughing). Don't remember all the dreams (there was the cow...then a dog eating my feet...lots of hazy-weird-drug induced dreams that I don't remember after that). So needless to say, I didn’t get a whole lot of sleep last night. Neither did J….in fact, he was probably worse off.

I think the main problem with sleep is that I’m so freakin’ uncomfortable. Every time I move I end up with this pain in my chest…or my boobs feel like they’re going to fall off. So that’s probably the main cause of the moaning.

Only other side effect I’ve had is the mood swings. I was REALLY scared of this one…but the mood swings I’ve had have been GOOD mood swings. I’ll just be sitting there and all of a sudden I’m so freakin’ happy I’ll either start crying…or I just walk around in this euphoric daze. The movie “The Rock” was on TV last night…and when Nicholas Cage got pulled out of the water by Sean Connery, I was pumping my first in the air yelling “WOOHOO!!” and tears were flowing. J looked terrified.

Other than my weirdness, things are going fine. J did the first injection (all by his little self!) on Friday. He was more nervous than I was…ended up dropping the first syringe on the floor. He practiced on a lemon…then shot me in the stomach. Hurt like hell. He was trying to be “gentle” by doing it slowly…that didn’t work out for either of us. We were BOTH in tears by the time it was over. Saturday he threw that shot in me like a lawn dart…didn’t hurt at all. So we’ve got the injections down. Unfortunately, with the next phase of drugs…the needles get bigger. Stupid doctors.

We broke down and told our parents about it this weekend. The scary drugs and the surgeries are going to take place around Thanksgiving…so we’re probably not going to be able to do much with our fams for the holidays. Plus, just in case something happens and J has to tell them I’m in the ER…didn’t want him to have to go through the whole stupid story (always the optimist, I know). So the surprise is off…but at least my ‘rents are in the know.

Our next doc appointment is on the 9th. The rest of my drugs arrive tomorrow, so I’ve got to take them in with us so the doc can go over the next steps. J and I both had the rest of our “genetic testing” (so weird to say that) done last week and we’re hoping they’ll have our results in by our appointment Thursday. We’ll also have to sign our lives away with the consent forms they’ve given us. Holy crap, is that stuff scary.

All THAT aside…I have the most insane week for work ahead of me. Lowe’s is here as I type installing the last of the cabinets. Can’t wait until life is “normal” again…I feel like I’ve forgotten what that’s like. I wish so badly that I could just take the next month off of work to take care of myself and concentrate on all this. Everything else going on in my life just feels like background noise compared to IVF….it’s really consuming every ounce of brain power and energy I have right now. Well, at least Turkey Day IS coming up…that’s a few days off work if nothing else.