Anniversaries

Today is the one-year anniversary of when I got pregnant. I am "celebrating" by getting my first mammogram. Ironic, as I could not get a mammogram if I was pregnant or breastfeeding (as I would be now if I'd stayed pregnant), and as I am considered high-risk for breast cancer because a) my grandmother had it late in life, and b) I am 36 and have not given birth.

I got pregnant on the fifth try, and as I miscarried, I comforted myself with the thought, hey, I got pregnant pretty quickly, so I shouldn't have trouble getting pregnant again. Eleven tries later, I'm getting a mammogram. This cycle is my last IUI before moving to IVF. (I have incredible insurance coverage for IVF, so the decision to take that path is much easier.)

I have a lot of hope for my 17th try -- despite being a very rational person I have a strange superstitious streak when it comes to this stuff. Seventeen is a lucky number for me, and I really don't want to do IVF. First, I know I can get pregnant without it, and second, I'm worried about scheduling all of the shots, appointments, egg retrieval around my very busy job, as my bosses and most colleages doesn't know about the bun project. Furthermore, many of my friends who've done IVF have ended up with twins; that's not my first choice. So here goes number 17: this time with Femara, acupuncture, and now, yoga.

As the months have passed my brief pregnancy has felt like a dream, a fluke. I'd give so much to know and harness whatever magic was in the air on March 9, 2006, when two different ovulation predictor kits couldn't agree on whether I was ovulating, when an ultrasound showed imminent ovulation, and when a single IUI, performed apparently at the exact right time, knocked me up.