Bladder of Steel !!!!

Every month when my period starts I make a call to my GYN’s office and schedule an ultrasound to check for any cysts caused by the Clomid the cycle before. I have been doing this since September. I make my appointments for around 6am so I can go before work and I don’t have to alert the whole office that I am making monthly trips to the doctor’s for something reproductive related. They know we are trying, they know we are struggling, let’s just leave it at that shall we? Right.

The 6am ultrasound makes the drinking of water an issue. Everyone knows you are supposed to drink 32oz. of water one hour before your appointment. Well, I am not going to get up at 5:15 (my usual waking time) go to the bathroom, then hurry up to drink 32oz. of water before I get to the hospital at 6am. Not.Going.To.Happen. So, I just don’t pee when I get up. Simple enough even if a bit uncomfortable. Keep in mind that my Endo causes great pain when my bladder is full, or even slightly inflated.

I am taking this cycle off the Clomid to give my body a break and to find out the results of T’s SA, which was submitted on Saturday morning. We should get the results back from that towards the end of the week. I still needed to go in for the ultrasound since I took 100mg of Clomid last cycle. I have been feeling cystish pain in my right abdomen for about a week now, so I suspected they would find something this time.

I started using the monitor this cycle. The first cycle in use it has to figure out your cycle patterns so you go through many pee sticks. I knew it would ask for one this morning. Well, the whole not going when I get up in order to not drink for my u/s got in the way of this plan. The pee sticks only require 3 seconds of pee time. Could I only pee for 3 seconds and then stop? What if I couldn’t stop? Worst case scenario I have to slam down some water in a hurry and hope it gets through me fast enough.

I decided to give it a try. I peed right before going to bed last night to start with a clean slate. I had been drinking quite a bit of water all evening so I knew there should be plenty this morning. I got up, and went into the bathroom where I am rebelliously storing my monitor although it told me not to due to moisture. I put it in a Ziploc sandwich bag, I figured that would be safe enough. Sure thing, it asked for a pee stick. I thought, well, here we go. I peed for about 4 seconds getting about 3 seconds worth on the stick then stopped. OY! This is not for the faint of heart. I clenched up for all I was worth, got dressed and took the dog out to pee. I’m glad one of us got to feel better. (I never got to see the result on the monitor since it was still reading the test when I had to leave. I’ll check it tonight but I am expecting a Low day since it is only CD8.)

I got to the hospital and of course was the only one in the waiting room since no one in their right mind would schedule an ultrasound for 6am. I waited and read through the December issue of Country Living and a fishing boat magazine with a wonderful article on how to store live bait to keep it fresh.(Did you know there is special dirt to store your worms that turn them green so they are easier to see and supposedly the fish like them better that way.) I’ll keep that in mind the next time I’m shopping for a bass boat.

The tech looked at my chart and said “So you’ve done this before haven’t you?” I said “Once or twice.” She asked if I had done my drinking and I knodded yes while secretly hoping that I hadn’t let out too much on my pee stick. This apparently was not a problem since she complimented me several times on my nice full bladder. It was uncomfortable enough; it should have been full. The pictures were so clear and so good that she didn’t even have to do the transvaginal today. My first time ever. Usually the pelvic doesn’t show enough (tipped uterus, trouble maker) and they have to break out the dildocam but not today!

I told her that in January I had a 5cm x 2cm cyst on the right side and that I have been feeling pain on the right side for about a week. She confirmed there was a 2.5cm cyst on that side. I wonder why this one is causing pain when the other one didn’t hurt until it ruptured. Since I am taking this cycle off the Clomid it should just go down on its own but I guess I won’t know for sure until next month. Stupid ovary.