From the Beginning

I wasn't sure where to begin in the timeline of this blog and I wasn't sure which topic to tackle first. I have so many ideas flying in my head that I honestly don't think there will be enough space out here to compile everything. So where do I begin? I suppose like everything else, it's best to start from the beginning. Which means in order for you to understand our quest, you must first understand how Jim and I landed on IVF's doorstep.

I'll spare you most of the details from my prior attempts to get pregnant during my first marriage. While I'm sure that my first marriage will creep in here from time to time I'm really not in the mood to discuss it tonight. With that said, I'll start when my life really mattered...when I met Jim. Jim and I decided to start a family pretty much right off the bat. In fact I think we went through some testing and a few IUI's prior to the wedding. I remember thinking that since our relationship started in reverse than it would be perfectly normal to start a family prior to the actual wedding. And so that's what we did...

New Mexico doesn't pride itself on having the greatest medical care and the field of infertility isn't any different. In fact the entire state only has one Endocrinologist....Dr. Thompson resides his practice in Albuquerque. I had been a patient at Dr. Thompson's office prior to meeting Jim, but I was uncomfortable using him again as I was afraid Dr. Thompson would look at us as a cautionary tale. Through the grapevine I had learned that there was a Endocrinologist that practiced at UNM Hospital. Dr. Magarelli splits his practice between Albuquerque and Colorado Springs. Dr. Magarelli is equipped to perform IUI's at his UNM office, but he needs to send his patients to Colorado Springs for those undergoing IVF.

Before I continue, I feel like I need to define a few terms so that all of us are on the same page. IUI translates to intrauterine injection and is commonly refereed to as artificial insemination...as a joke you'll also hear it called turkey basting. During this procedure on the day of ovulation, sperm is collected, washed, and injected back into the woman's uterus. Nature is than allowed to do it's own thing and hopefully eggs will fertilize in their natural environment. IVF translates to in-vitro fertilization and is sometimes still refereed to as test tube babies. In this procedure, a woman's follicles are removed from the ovaries (by way of surgery), sperm is collected, washed, and then both sperm and follicles are allowed to interact in a small petri dish until the sperm penetrates a follicle. Once the follicles are fertilized than the fertilized product is injected/transferred back into the uterus.

Anyway, under Dr. Magarelli's care Jim and I decided to try a few IUI's. Obliviously the IUI's were unsuccessful, but I did get one positive pregnancy test. The pregnancy didn't last long and Jim and I were heartbroken. We met with Dr. Magrelli numerous times while we were at his office and each time we sat down with him, we felt he was more of a used car salesmen than a doctor. He was constantly trying to sell us on IVF and we always felt like new patients as Dr. Magarelli went to great lengths to educate us on how a pregnancy occurs...as if we didn't already know. Needless to say, at some point we decided that Dr. Magarelli wasn't the right fit for us and we should probably make our way to Dr. Thompson's office.

When Jim and I first met with Dr. Thompson I expressed my concerns to him about my prior experiences with his office and he seemed genuinely sympathetic and willing to work with us. We decided to skip the IUI's and go straight to IVF. Our first IVF cycle started out well. I responded well to the prescribed medication and all of the ultrasounds came back normal. On the day of retrieval, 5 follicles were removed and allowed to mingle in the petri dish with the prepared sperm. When I called the next day to inquire about fertilization, the nurse gave no indication that anything was wrong. A few days later when Jim and I arrived for our scheduled transfer, we were told that there was a problem with the fertilization. Typically one sperm enters the follicle and no other sperm are allowed to enter. Unfortunately in my case, I had several sperm that entered each follicle and when this happens the follicle doesn't divide properly and eventually dies off on its own. This event is known as polyspermy, but its unclear if this is "normal" for my follicles. The only way we'll know if this is a normal occurrence is to undergo another round of IVF.

Jim and I had originally planned to wait a few months before undergoing round two of IVF but our lives quickly got hectic. So we decided to put it off a year while we got ourselves more financially stable. During that year I fell ill and had several setbacks in terms of my health. I'll explain my other health problems in a later post. After I had been healthy for a consecutive year we decided to revisit building our family. A co-worker of Jim's told him about a fertility clinic in Denver that they used and I was quickly placed in touch with his wife. After speaking to his wife, I was confident that Denver was where we needed to be.

I contacted the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine in October and was informed that we needed to set-up a phone consult with one of the doctors. After filling out a tower of paperwork, we were scheduled for our phone consult the week of Thanksgiving. As usual I was super nervous prior to this phone call because I was afraid that as a result of my prior medical problems we would be rejected. Thankfully we weren't rejected...in fact we were welcomed with open arms. We were also informed that we needed to schedule an appointment in Denver to undergo a "one day workup". I decided to wait until after the holidays before I called CCRM again to schedule the one day workup. At the beginning of January I called the office and was soon scheduled to have our workup on January 14th.

Jim and I traveled to Denver the night before our appointment and we stayed with my aunt and uncle in Lakewood. Both Jim and I were once again super nervous about these appointments...well at least I was nervous. Jim said he was nervous, but I can't imagine why...his test was a walk in the park compared to what I had to go through. Our day started promptly at 7:30am and we were whisked from one appointment to another while we met with nurses, doctors, undergoing tests, blood work, and signing more paperwork. The entire day was information overload...I mean when we first arrived, we were handed a three-ring binder of information. It was good information though and Jim quickly fell in love with them. I've never met office staff so friendly, so compassionate, and so professional. It was clear that the office held high standards for their staff and we appreciated that.

As we stand today, I'm still undergoing some more tests and we're still waiting for results on some prior testing. We have decided to pursue IVF using CCRM and I'm hoping to have all of our test results by our next scheduled appointment on February 4th.

Getting Back Into The Saddle

Holy cow, it's been almost three years since I last made a post out here! Let me begin by saying why I discontinued my blog. The original blog was started as a way to update friends and family on our quest to build our family. Jim and I underwent one round of IVF that is detailed here in earlier posts. Unfortunately IVF was unsuccessful for us and today we are still on the same quest. When we stopped IVF the blog turned into more of a diary than my ultimate vision, so I discontinued blogging.

Well here we are three years later and Jim and I have decided to take a leap of faith. We are once again going to the IVF casino and we are certain that we will come out a winner! So this blog will again be used so that all of you can pray for us and follow us through this emotional journey. However, due to the sexual content of this journey some of the posts may become graphic so please be advised. With that said welcome to;

A Girlfriends Guide to Infertility, by Margot and Jim Liberty Our Personal Quest to Build the Family of our Dreams

Stay tuned!

Playtime!!!

Sorry everyone but I really haven't had much to post lately. So, I thought I would share a few pictures of Tundra taken throughout the week during playtime. Jim and I continue to marvel at how big he's getting. Today, I plan on taking both dogs to Overlook Park....by myself. Jimmy and I went last weekend and it was really difficult on me, I was in tremendous pain by the time we returned. Jim plans to spend the day working in the yard so since he's busy I'll try this adventure alone. Anyway, here are the pictures from the week.

Monkey See Monkey Do

So I know its been a while since my last post, but I've been extremely busy these days. School has been almost overwhelming and work has been filled with drama. So when I get home in the evenings I'm either doing homework or trying to clear my head. Not to mention, now that I'm off crutches I've been doing some chores around the house in the evenings. Anyway, I've got a really cute story to tell all of you about Tundra and Nanook. At the end of this post you'll find some updated pictures...we can't get over how quickly he's growing.

Anyway, when we got Tundra naturally we got him a few toys to chew on as well. My mother had gotten him a toy bone and another plastic toy with a rope through it. For some reason the rope toy has been Tundra's favorite and he really hasn't paid much attention to the toy bone...or at least not at this point.



One evening Jim thought it would be a good idea to give Nanook his rawhide (we only give it to him every so often). I was a little hesitant since I wasn't sure how Tundra would react. So, Nanook lays down on the floor and begins to enjoy his bone. Meanwhile, Tundra is staring at him trying to figure out what he's doing and he begins to bark at him. Next thing we knew Tundra runs to grab his toy bone and lays down in front of Nanook and proceeds to imitate his every move. Tundra was holding the bone between his paws just the same way Nanook was and Tundra was chewing on his toy bone the exact same way Nanook was. It was the cutest thing I've ever seen! I actually told Jim that I had no idea that dogs imitate each other....monkey see monkey do.

Ahh, this is our little penthouse boy. He sleeps like this all the time!

Tundra Has Arrived!

Well after many months of waiting Tundra has finally arrived! All of us are very excited and we really enjoy watching him play and get to know the other animals of the house. So far everyone is getting along really well. Nanook doesn't know what to think of the little guy and he has been growling a little. He hasn't snapped at Tundra, but he's certainly been showing Tundra who is boss. To my surprise, Corki is doing really well. I'm not sure if you guys remember or not, but I was expecting Corki to live on top of the refrigerator for the next several months, but he doesn't to notice Tundra. Sasha is a different story...she's not a happy cat. She's also all of a sudden become skittish of sudden moves. I'm sure she'll get over it, but it may take a few months.

Anyway, I took some pictures of Tundra yesterday during play time so I hope you enjoy the following photos:

These are my two favorite pictures thus far.

Beautiful Banff

Jim and I had an amazing time in Banff!!! I can't say enough about how beautiful this town is and how much I would love to live there some day. Everything about our weekend was such a dream and even though I was on crutches I still made the most of it. We arrived in Calgary on Thursday and we spent the afternoon driving around just getting to know the town. I was a little disappointed in Calgary, I was expecting it to be similar to Colorado Springs in the sense that Colorado Springs is nestled up against the mountains. Calgary is a little over an hour from the mountains...not nestled up against the mountains. Between Calgary and Banff there is a lot of open space used mainly for farming, but also has rolling hills.

On Friday Jim and I slept in and then we headed up the mountain in a gondola to enjoy the view. It was rather cold on top of the mountain, but the views were amazing! We finished up the day back in Calgary where we watched the Calgary Flames take on the Nashville Predators...the flames lost but Jim thoroughly enjoyed the game and the people. Saturday was spent hanging around Banff and doing some shopping. Yes, even though I was on crutches I was still able to shop! When we woke up on Saturday morning I decided that I wasn't going to let those darn crutches ruin our weekend so I crutched around Banff all day. Of course I took a few pain killers during the course of the day though...to help with the arm pain of course. I even managed to wear Jim out walking around town! Moving on, Sunday was spent in Lake Louise and then back to Calgary to catch our flight home.

I decided during the weekend that Jim and I need to make this an annual trip. He came up with the idea of rotating seasons...summer one year, winter the next. We hope to go again next summer and I'm hoping to take Zach, Sam, Aaron, and Jimmy with us. The entire time we were in Banff I kept thinking to myself how much Zach and Sam would love this town and I can't imagine being there without them. I have numerous pictures to share with you, so sit back and enjoy the show.

Here are a few images from out hotel.

We stayed in a castle in Banff (The Fairmont Banff Springs), so here are a few images of the hotel. I have a better "airel" view later on during this post.

The next two pictures are of a "bus" used to take tourists to the columbian ice fields. We were very intrigued by the sheer size of this thing.

The following pictures were taken during our gondola ride.

This picture was taken on the gondola ride, and you can see our "castle in the woods". Its located in the bottom-center of the photo in case you can't see it.

This is downtown Banff.
Here I am at Lake Louise. Crutching my way to the lake....


This picture is a hockey rink on Lake Louise. The lake was frozen...allowing people full access to walk on water. Which included playing hockey on the lake, ice skating on the lake, and walking from end to the other. This was a completely different concept to me...one that was hard to comprehend.

Here's the ice skating rink that I mentioned above.

Here's Jim standing on the hockey rink.
And finally, here's me standing on the lake...something I've never done before.

Coming Soon!

Well, I just thought I would let everyone know that I am alive and well. The last few weeks have been extremely hectic for me. Jim and I just returned from Banff, plus Tundra is now home with us. I don't have time for a big post but I promise pictures of Calgary/Banff will be posted soon, as well as, pictures of Tundra.