The New Two Week Wait.

Usually when I talk about the two week wait, I am referring to the what feels like forever long wait to find out if we are pregnant or not. This month again there is that, but after 26 months, let's be honest here, most likely that is not going to happen (as in, give it up already, right?.)

Rather, this time around my two week wait is a countdown to our next and (hopefully) final IVF cycle. We have been here before, and of course we all know how that turned out, but this time around I am feeling much more confident, and a lot less apprehensive about moving forward with this process. Oh, and what a process it is. Over the weekend when my truckloads of medications arrived, I did not weep like I did last time, but instead with no emotion put them away in their respective spots in the fridge (for the record they prefer the back, filed along with the mustard and the ketchup.) I have learned that tears are wasted on that sort of thing.

Most of my comfort (or lack of discomfort) is due to the fact that I finally feel like I actually know what I am getting myself into. I know how it feels to be poked like a pin cushion, and how those hormones will make me a raging lunatic (can I please preemptively apologize to everyone I will come in contact with) for the next month. I now know about the repeated, daily, doctor's visits and how I can try to convince my toddler to sit still for just "one more minute" while mommy finishes getting poked and prodded for the 10th time that week. (Believe me when I say lollipops and an ipod go a long way at 8am.) I will no longer be surprised when something goes wrong, or like last time, when our goal of creating three or four embryos turns into sixteen or seventeen causing my stomach to look and feel like I am already nine months pregnant (this is why god invented yoga pants, right?) Further, this go around I will not be caught off guard when I am faced with the excruciating pain of hyper stimulation, and I will be prepared for the weeks of bed rest that will surely follow if I am able to successively implant that little embryo. (Books on the Kindle; check, babysitter standing by; check; family ready for a "visit;" check, check, check.) Lastly, this time I will not be overly optimistic assuming that if you put a completely viable embryo in a perfectly primed uterus, that this will actually result in a pregnancy. Nope, this time around I know that there are no guarantees and if it's meant to be, it's meant to be.

This time around I'll be ready.

Two weeks?

Bring. It. On.