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January 04, 2004
Call me Pincushion
Well, since Tuesday, I've had 5 Gonal-F injections and blood drawn once. I got up early on Friday morning to get to the lab so the bloodwork would be ready in time for my 3:30 appointment. Unfortunately, after we got to the clinic, we learned that the lab results hadn't arrived yet. I told Dr. Vaughn that I'd gone to the Seton clinic on 1431 in Cedar Park and he said, "oh, no, not there! Don't go there anymore. They can NEVER get it right, so we've told them to direct patients to another lab."
The ultrasound showed that I have had some estrogen activity because my uterine lining is thickening. Also, the largest visible follicles in my ovaries had grown from 4mm to 6 and 7mm. But lacking the lab information on my estrogen levels, Dr. Vaughn opted to have me inject the same dose Friday night, hoping the report would show up on Saturday.
It did, and I received a call from Dr. Vaughn this afternoon. He said that the report shows my estrogen level to still be low, so tonight we injected 225 IU of Gonal-F. Tomorrow night (Sunday), we're to dose me with 150 UI again, then Monday morning I have more blood drawn and follow up with an afternoon appointment.
Dale's administered all but one of the shots. On New Year's Eve, some family arrived, and I had to take care of the injection alone while he entertained. This was only my second shot, and though it didn't really hurt when Dale did it the night before, it hurt when I did it. Making myself actually insert the needle was pretty damn hard. Afterwards, the spot on my thigh hurt and burned for about 30-45 minutes, which it hadn't done before or since.
Dale's injections haven't really hurt, until tonight. And even though I know it's not going to hurt, I can't watch and I flinch when he inserts the needle, though that feels like little more than a push.
I think what happens is that he can't help flinching when he jabs in the needle, and that makes me flinch in turn. The start of the injection tonight was no different from the other times he's done it. Since there wasn't any pain, I looked down while he was doing the injection, and it started to hurt. I looked away, told Dale to slow down, and it stopped hurting. I looked down again, and it started to hurt again.
"When I look down, it hurts."
"Well then, stop looking!"
"Oh, ok."
I didn't feel him removal the needle, but I felt his other hand lift from my thigh, where he'd been squeezing the flesh to aid the insertion. Then he said, "this one was bad." I looked down and saw blood, not more than a watery drop, but it was more than we'd ever seen and there was a purple thumb-sized bruise already visible. Most other times I hadn't bled at all. Dale disposed of the needle, stood up, and said, "I feel woozy." I voiced my surprise saying that it wasn't much blood, but he just said that he doesn't like doing that to me.
Poor guy. I think the injections are harder on him than they are on me. At least they haven't seemed to produce nasty side effects like the Clomid did.
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