Testosterone-y, the Real San Francisco Treat

Let's all learn this dance.

First, some good news.  I got a call today informing me about my Free Testosterone Level (a major symptom of PCOS) and it was normal.  If you need to catch up please refer to My Damn Ovaries, Not a 19th Century French Novel.

Normally, with PCOS, one would have issues with cycles, depression, thinning hair, diabetes, high cholesterol, acne and issues

with weight/losing weight.  PCOS is kind of like, your womanly hormones say, "I want babies!" and your testosterone hormones say, "I kind of like a little facial hair on a woman" and then your reproductive area goes into a 'government shutdown'.  I have 2 of those symptoms and now with normal "testy" levels they confirmed that I have a very mild case of PCOS and should not be overly concerned. But they still want to put me on Clomid to increase the likelihood of ovulating/conception.

So for this post I'm gonna go through some meds they put you on/will put me on.  Don't worry.  I did thorough research (for the accompanying gifs).

We've gone through the different types of tests that I've had- I mean mostly blood work, but I've been stuck more times than the Male Olympic Figure Skating Team.

Pre-Natal vitamins with DHA - Complete prenatal multivitamin supplement with algae-sourced DHA. For use before, during, and after pregnancy.   DHA is important for healthy visual and mental development throughout infancy.  Also DHA sounds like a baller rap name.

We got these because you can use coupons.

Vitamin D - Everybody needs it and I don't want to look like "Tan Mom".  Don't google it if you're about to eat anything.

Levothyroxine - tTis is because I have a mild hypothyroid, basically meaning that my thyroid doesn't pull its weight.  Come on, Thy.

Progesterone- they gave me this after one of the first tests to help "jump start my system"- which it did.  They have recently put me on triple the average dosage.  But no one told me that the side effects of this mean heightened emotional state,

incredibly sexy bloating <sarcasm>,

weird ass dreams

leading to lack of sleep

thus feeding the first symptom.

Clomid - This is for stimulating an increase in the amount of hormones that support the growth and release of a mature egg.  Side effect?  Chance of multiples.

Other side effects of the process of Artificial Insemination: Dry mouth, gif overload, dizziness, One Direction song stuck in your head, cramps, bad credit, joint pain, ill fitting shoes, leakage, finishing every sentence with a hashtag.

After a Challenging Day of Cat Care, Meg Had 2 Drinks & Decided to Go to CVS Without a Bra On

Post by Meg (with gif interpretation by Kate)

What are you usually doing at 8:45pm on a rainy Thursday night?



If you’re anything like me, you‘d be walking to CVS in your pajamas after a stressful day (and a gin and tonic) to buy ovulation predictor kits (OPKs) for your wife. Wait…that’s not what most people do on Thursday nights?

So anyway, I walk into CVS and scan the aisle signs until I see “family planning.” That seems to be a natural place for OPKs to live, right? I walk by baby formula, baby thermometers, baby bottles and baby powder. Hmm…if you already have the baby, aren’t you kind of done with family planning?

It's a stretch to make this apply to scouring the aisles of CVS, but I (Kate) felt it needed to be on our site.

I come to the end of the aisle where I assume they must hide away the OPKs and right under the

“family planning” sign is, drum roll please…condoms. Now, I know I’m hardly an expert on condoms, but I at least understand that people use condoms when they’re planning NOT to have a family. The sign should actually read “Family Prevention.”

Kate's interpretation of what she thought Meg wanted to do to whomever designed the CVS layout.

In the end, I found the OPKs (which, by the way, are outrageously expensive), in the “Feminine care” aisle next to pregnancy tests, basal body thermometers and prenatal vitamins. Not that any of those things would be useful for family planning….

CMV, CVS & OPP: We're Down With Them All

If there’s one thing most people know about me (and this is Meg "speaking"), it’s that I’m terribly impatient. After our last appointment, we had to wait a full week before calling in to find out the results of our blood tests. I realize this is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of waiting- I hear the “two week wait” is truly agonizing. That's the two weeks between an insemination and being able to take a

pregnancy test. I’m sure you’ll all have the pleasure of hearing me lament about that later.

Anyway, a week after our initial appointment, Kate called RSC to find out about our blood tests. I still can’t believe I had to have blood tests at all, as the non-bio Mom. I guess it’s important to make sure I’m free of infectious disease just in case we contract a disease later from our baby. The blood tests give us proof that we were initially disease-free. We were assured this was just a precaution and very rarely happens. Anyway, we “passed” this first round of blood test and learned a couple things that will impact our sperm donor choose.

#1- Kate has a positive blood type, which means our sperm donor can have a positive or negative blood type. That’s good as it keeps our options a little more open.

Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P.,
shouldn't we keep the P.C.
on the Q.T.? 'Cause if it leaks
to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A.,
and then we'd all be put out in K.P.

#2- Kate and I are both negative for CMV. If you’re like me, you have no idea what this means or why it matters. According to stopcmv.org, Cytomegalovirus (CMV) is a common virus that infects people of all ages and is usually harmless to people with a healthy immune system. Most people have been exposed to CMV at some point in their lifetime without realizing it. Something like 80% of women in the United States have had CMV and would therefore test positive. Oddly enough, both Kate and I are negative. What this means is that we have to choose a sperm donor who is also negative (aka: has never had this extremely common virus). That narrows our options considerably.

#3- Kate has slightly low Vitamin D levels. Don’t we all nowadays? No biggie- we stocked up on

supplements with a buy-one-get-one coupon from CVS (Chuck- aren’t you proud of us???)

Kate's Artist Rendering of Fallopian Tubes

So our next steps are to get a few more tests that need to happen at a certain point in Kate’s cycle. I can’t even remember what they are- something about how many egg follicles are visible and if her fallopian tubes are free flowing. None of that is medically correct, but close enough. Those tests will hopefully occur over the next 2-4 weeks. Assuming we get the green light on all of those tests, we’ll go forward with choosing a sperm 



donor (Kate: don't you worry, we're gonna blog the crap out of that experience) and hopefully do our first insemination in...October? November? Stay tuned....