50/50

We are all in a flurry here. Laundry, packing, trying to check items off our three-headed hydra of a to-do list. We leave for vacation in a couple of days. Tomorrow night I will drive Lilly two hours to the airport for a week-long adventure with her mother. The next night Brian and I will drive south to indulge at our favorite restaurant, to visit my mom, to seek out blooming dogwoods and 70 degree days.

I am beyond exhausted - running only on excitement, adrenaline, and the promise that when that to-do list is indeed crossed off, I will be able to sleep for 18 hours on the blank, anonymous canvas of hotel room sheets.

I have had enough of winter, and as it has gradually receded over the last weeks I can see how it has ravaged me, and how I will have to do things differently next year. Take the damn vitamin D pills. Make at least one trip south before winter gets too deep. Build a sauna in my bathroom (ha!).

Enough of that. It is warmish outside, and I've got a full six month before I need to begin dreading winter 2012. My long-awaited, hard-earned vacation is almost here.

But I can't shake the idea of next winter, because there is an unbelievably even chance that I could be pregnant then. We had our first IVF appointment yesterday, at a new clinic, and the more I think about it, the more I can't quite believe how well it went. For some reason this particular RE grasped pretty quickly that, for me, the issue is maintaining a pregnancy, more than "getting pregnant". And she was able to explain how, because IVF so tightly controls hormone levels, it will probably greatly increase my chances of both getting and staying pregnant.

That was good to hear, because that is what my intuition is telling me too. I think our eggs and sperm are just fine, thank you, but my uterine lining is just not hospitable. And she's got a plan to fix that.

Plus she was on it. All about prevention and early intervention and seeing an MFM next month and giving me as much progesterone as my little heart desires. All about preventing another loss. Boy, was it nice not to have justify myself to a reluctant medical professional, not to have to fight for obviously needed help.

We will probably do our first IVF cycle in June or July, and this clinic has over a 50% rate of making take-home babies on the first IVF try for women in my age bracket. That's high for this procedure, and way higher than the 2% (if that) chance I've got on my own. Of course, there are lots of statistical black holes I could fall into, but right now I feel like taking any chance at hope I'm offered. Even a 50% chance.

I'm so deeply glad it's spring, but my mind keeps wondering ahead. 50% chance that next winter I'll be pregnant. Hm.