Silver lining...

*Ohhhh I could scream! I just had a whole post typed out, and our power went out at work-it saved the first half somehow! Ahh well, here we go again!*

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Happy Valentines Day! I have a very sweet husband who never needs a reminder for the "Hallmark Holiday!" When I got to work this morning there were 2 boxes waiting for me, and then about 2 hours later, 2 more were delivered! Each contained the "little things" that I love so much-and a sweet Disney Valentine with each one. My co-workers came in to ooohh and ahhh over it, and they joked saying "wait until you have been married twenty years!" Well, I have no doubt that my sweetie will remember for the next twenty plus years to make me feel loved!

-end of mushy stuff-

DH (hmmm, I am going off on a tangent here to see if I can't think of a more personal/fun moniker to call my hubby.....still thinking....got it! From now on I shall refer to the DH as "Mook" He'll understand why!)

Anyway, thank you all for the advice/information/comments about Pre-Seed. I don't think it will hurt us to try, so anything that gives us a little more edge, is worth a shot! We should get it in time for us to try it out this cycle, so we shall see!

Mook had his second "romance in a cup" session yesterday AM. He had to leave work, which is already becoming an issue, which will have to deal with as time goes. The lab we go to is located in one of our local hospitals, so our thinking was surely they will have "rooms" or at least a private bathroom that could be used. No such luck...back to the parking lot. The first round, I was with him so I could at least "keep watch." I couldn't be with him this time around, so he had to be extra vigilant and in his words "everyone and their mother was at the hospital this morning." Nice.
He called on the way back to work, "The mission is complete." After thanking him again for being so willing to go through all this, we agreed just to wait until Friday when his next appointment was to find out these results along with his blood results.

Well we didn't have to wait long! One of the things I have been impressed about this lab/doc is that they get back to us in a very timely manner. Mook got a call on his cell phone about 1pm with his blood results and the most recent analysis. Blood tests are all good: YAY! The testosterone was right on the border line of being slightly low, but doc said we can re-test that if need be in a few months. The even better news is that the little spermies have gone "substantially" up! Last count was 5 million, and yesterday it was up to 27 million: YAY! While it is still low compared to the normal range, we were thrilled to hear that! The motility and morphology are the same as last time, which are still not in the normal range, but at least now we have more to work with! Doc said we had 2 options at this point: a) he can go ahead and refer us to one of two specialists (one is at UNC, one is at Duke-the only 2 in the state--ugg. And Mook is a hard core Devil's fan, so guess where we won't be going) and b) let nature take its course for the next 3 months and come back for a 3rd "romance in a cup" session. We unanimously picked option b. Since we have the Pre-Seed coming, Mook's count is up,we are going to look into Pycnogenol (thanks Kirsten!), while still taking daily vitamins-so we will do the thing we hate most: wait. But we both feel that it is the right choice for now. I will have to remind myself to look back at this post three months from now!

Now that the 2nd results are in, let me take a moment to mention 2 things: when Mook was 2, he had hernia repair surgery. I have read on several blogs that this was the case in some of the male factor infertility issues-whether it was the reason, or simply a coincidence. My question is, why don't more doctors that treat this in the child tell the parents to have the child go for a check up every few years? Mook's parents never thought twice about it-until recently when we told them about all that is going on. I could see the look of concern on their faces--but really, they didn't know any better. And I am not a doctor--so I don't know if it would be possible to at least see if problems were starting to develop. And where our current urologist doesn't seem to think that his surgery has any corelation to what he is experiencing now (since both his exams were normal-no signs of clumped veins or blockage) I will definitely be bringing this up if and when we see a specialist.

2nd thing: At the beginning of January, Mook went in for a yearly physical (yes, poor thing has really been through the ringer lately) and mentioned at his appointment that he had been having severe heart burn for the past few months--and off and on since he was a teenager. Sure enough they found the H. pylori bacteria in his blood, and prescribed the PrevPac to treat it. Well-this stuff is $$$(thank goodness for insurance!). He had to take 4 pills twice a day-which contain prevacid, amoxicillin and biaxin-all of which have been linked to articles on infertility. Mook made sure to ask at his appointment and again at the pharmacy if it would affect fertility--we got "no" both times. But it is pretty fishy to me that his first analysis was done when he was on the 8-pill-a-day regimen, and his 2nd analysis was done while he is only taking prevacid. Coincidence? I have asked that this be put on his file and that our urologist look more into this not only for us-but for other couples as well.

Whew, another whopper of an entry. But, we got our silver lining--and while the journey is still "new" we are thankful for this good news!