Invisible progress

I've taken four sets of the stim injections so far. Each one is technically two medications, but the nurse at the fertility clinic showed me how to combine them into one shot so I only need to have one needle prick per night for now - as we get closer to the retrieval, we will add more medicines into the cocktail, but for now this is just what it is.

To be honest, I'm not sure if I can tell any difference yet. I don't know if it's because it's too early or because of my body or if it's not working, it's hard to say. I was having a conversation with my son the other day about how this happened in my pregnancy with him also. He was conceived without IVF, but even still, I spent a lot of my pregnancy struggling with body dysmorphia and trying to figure out what was happening when my body didn't quite look like any of the example images in books or online. A body that is eight weeks pregnant "should look" like this, but mine didn't, because of my body type and especially my apron belly skin after my weight loss. It took a long time for me to look pregnant, and even then I felt awkward - obsessed with wondering if I just looked large or if my condition was apparent.

The perk, I explained to my son, was that because of my awkward body shape, I got extra ultrasounds to make sure he was measuring properly, because they couldn't do it with a simple measuring tape like with someone with a regular stomach. So I got to get little glimpses at him before he was born, more than most folks get to see.

Right now, there's nothing to see. In preparation for the injections, I sought out information from folks who had gone through it before, wondering about side effects and symptoms. One person said she looked several months pregnant because of the swelling, that her ovaries were distended like baseballs.

If there's anything like that happening now, I can't see it or feel it. I mostly just feel tired, but even that is not necessarily related to the injections - there's also my usual end of semester tiredness, family stress, parenting stress, and anxiety about this process and the next few weeks of updates and information.

My friend Natalie said that IVF is "the most hardcore lesson in patience you'll have," and I get it. It's so hard to have faith and trust that everything is happening the way it should even when you can't see or feel any progress. But I'm trying.