When the going gets tough...

The tough get cooking.

I had a followup appointment with the RE on Thursday. I'm still slightly puzzled as to why no-one has looked at my lining before - is it not standard in the UK, is it just good fortune that both my previous appointment and this one were about day 21, did my clinic in the UK see my pre-period but also post-miscarriage (and therefore post-pregnancy, albeit only a 5 week pregnancy) uterus and think "ah, juicy", or was it actually OK when I had my uterine biopsy/doppler study when I was being potentially entered for the NK cell trial?

It actually occurs to me that I can email and ask whether a thickness was noted at that time, since the nice specialist's nice secretary said I could ask any further questions...

Anyway, it improved a little this month but not enough (5.7 - I think it was 4.9 last month). Apparently estrogen is used with women doing IVF who have this problem but as it may prevent ovulation, we don't want that. I hadn't found anything on the little blue pills in suppository form to show the RE but now I have so will perhaps take that along to my next appointment. As well as seeming quite thin, there appears to be a gap in the lining. She described is as "a dimple" which sounds so cute. But apparently it could be a septum - though she didn't think it would be too big.

So I'm supposed to have an HSG early next cycle. Thing is, this isn't covered on our plan (or at least, not unless we stick to the expensive plan we're on now, which is going up $300, so we were going to switch to the next one down, which is $200 less than we are paying now). I keep telling myself I only have to do this ridiculous coverage dance for another 4 months, but if this is not too pricey, I'd rather get the HSG done now and then if I need surgery I can set the wheels in motion when I get home. So I'm calling tomorrow to find out the price.

I felt OK about this on Thursday but with a combination of things I felt very weepy today - recurrent miscarrier friend delivered her second baby (anti-coagulation having enabled her to stay pregnant, which makes me feel even worse if they can't make my problem better, why can't I have a fixable problem?); two other people at the party we were at last night were pregnant; so is a lady in knitting group who insisted on discussing C-sections with one of the other ladies (I got back at them made everyone depressed by telling them about my friend who died last year - she was a twin but this was pre-scans but her mother was fully aware "unless it's one baby with two heads"**); and we had the Annunciation as the Gospel today.

Anyway, I have just made pomegranate pie and roasted pumpkin for pumpkin risotto - and Mr Spouse took me on a walk along the beach and we discussed our fostering plans.

I have been thinking about it and I actually think that even if one of my previous pregnancies had worked, it seems so unlikely that we'd have managed a second (or that we would do so now) that I think I'd have been talking about this when our child reached the age of 5 or so, anyway. I have been feeling a bit stuck over adoption - why wait and do fostering when we could forge ahead with adoption - but as he has pointed out, we'll be approved as foster carers pretty quickly but adoption could take ages, and it will be good experience, and even if we just have a couple of placements and only do it for 6 months, it will look less like we can't make our minds up.

**This is one of the funnier pregnancy stories I know, or at least it was until last year. So I tend to reel it out when the conversation turns to labour. In this case, it was particularly appropriate since one of the other girls there was also a pre-scan-era twin and her mother didn't know she was having twins. My friend's mother's midwife thought it would be a nasty shock to find out there were two in there but my friend's mother was well aware of the two heads and told the midwife so.

However, I can't say "I have a friend who..." any more because this is the friend who died 18 months ago and as I still think of her as my friend, I keep forgetting this and launching into the story.