Going for broke

I've taken 5 days of the stimulation meds so far, and this morning I had my first monitoring appointment. This consists of a vaginal ultrasound to look at my ovaries and measure the size of each follicle, and a blood draw to measure the levels of estradiol, progesterone, and LH. The estradiol will tell them how functional my follicles are, and the progesterone and LH will tell them if my body is about to ovulate. So I want the estradiol to go up, and the LH and progesterone to stay low.
Today, everything looked great. The nurse said today was sort of like a baseline. They counted the follicles, and hopefully I'll have somewhere between 10 and 15 when all is said and done. They all seem to be about the same size and growing at about the same rate, which is good. My estradiol is only 71, but she said that was normal. I'll go back on Thursday for another such appointment, and hopefully everything will be progressing well.

In the meantime, they've increased my dose of Gonal-F. I was taking 300 IU per night, and now I'm up to 450 IU per night! I suppose I've got nothing to lose, so let's go for broke. I don't really know what the upper limit is on the dosing for Gonal-F, or if there is one. But this feels like a pretty high dose given that I was taking 225 IU for my previous IVF. I expect to get more hot flashes, mood swings, and headaches with this change, and with my increasing estradiol level. We'll see. So far, the side effects have been minimal. In fact, I would actually say I've had more energy lately, and a decreased appetite! I can't help but wonder if this is more like the way I should feel all the time, if my ovaries were making the right amount of steroid hormones all the time... Would be quite a bonus if I could drop a few pounds in the midst of all of this, but that seems unlikely given my now total lack of exercise. I'll just try not to gain any weight I guess.

Well, none of this is a guarantee. But I like having something positive in the end, even if it isn't what I set out to get. So my silver lining (albeit small and arguably insignificant) is that I'm going to take this opportunity to whiten my teeth. Given my forced time away from red wine, coffee, and soda, I've got time to let some whitener do its job. All the products say that for the best results you have to stay away from such staining liquids during the two weeks or so that you use them. So I'm wearing my Crest WhiteStrips right now. My gums are tingling. Come to think of it, so are my ovaries... :)