In my TCM diet, I'm only allowed alcohol during ovulation. Last weekend, I was certain that I was super close to ovulation, so I may have felt confident allowing myself some beers when we attended the Stone Sour Fest at Stone Brewery with our friends Bob and Maryla. I was DD so that helped me to not over-indulge, but it was difficult because I wanted to taste all of the beers.
This was on Sunday... I may have also squeezed in a couple beers on Saturday night when we hung out with Megan and Chris. We went to dinner at Pint House in Fullerton which offers a BEER TOWER, so of course we had to order that. Duh. (They also had a really great "backyard" patio which I really wished was my own backyard patio.)
After dinner, we adventured a few blocks to find Bootlegger's Brewery. We'd had Bootlegger beer locally before but had yet to visit. It's a low-key place that kind of looks like it's run out of a truck garage with it's large roll-up door. There's a few picnic tables inside, but the majority of the tables are outside. They serve their beers in mason jars and have cornhole and a giant Jenga game set up outside.
It was a fun weekend! I didn't feel bad for cheating and having a few beers because I was so certain that I was so close to ovulation. Turns out that I didn't ovulate til like Tuesday or Wednesday, so then I was like "oops! Cheat days I guess!" Meh, I'm not going to worry too much about it. The rest of my TCM diet is going swimmingly. I haven't cheated with the food at all and I'm still seeing results in my treatment which motivates me to stick to it.
[Now it's time for some cycle talk.]
Last Friday I mentioned that Dr. Lee gave me a second herbal blend to help raise my temperatures. Well, it definitely helped regulate my temperatures, but on Monday he upped my dose in hopes of bringing it up by another tenth of a degree or so. It sounds minuscule, but it makes a difference. My follicular phase (pre-ovulation) temps are hovering between 97 and 97.1. Ideally, I need to be at least 97.2.
The red line indicates when the app I use things I ovulated based on temperatures (temperatures always rise after ovulation) and other indicators like positive ovulation tests and physical symptoms that I record. This post-ovulation phase is the Luteal Phase where we wait for hopefully (and ideally) implantation. My temps so far aren't looking great, though. They need to be up to at least 97.8 and so far, I'm not quite there. I have a feeling my herbs will be adjusted again on Monday to help me out here.
Now, we wait. Anyone who has tracked their fertility to try getting pregnant knows how much this two week wait sucks. In the first half of the cycle, there's stuff to do that helps the days go by while you're waiting to ovulate. Checking symptoms, peeing on sticks, and with this TCM stuff there are things like keeping my feet warm and using a heating pad on my belly every other day, then, of course, all the doing it. (Did I mention that according to Dr. Lee, I need to immediately prop my butt up and stay that way for a minimum of three hours after it? That was fun trying to sleep like that for three days in a row.)
After ovulation it feels like there's no purpose. All I get to do now is continue my diet and herbs, acupuncture, and temping just for the purpose of recording it all the while, somehow retaining my sanity while waiting for my period to show or not show. (I guess we can still do it for the fun of it.)
It's a lot. This is all kind of a lot to maintain which is why we've taken so many breaks from really going gung-ho with trying. Now that I'm seeing Dr. Lee, though, I have a new hope. His office is basically wallpapered with successes; the walls covered with collages of thank you notes and photos of babies and pregnant women. I try to read some of the notes on every visit.
This last Monday, I found this one from a couple who were told that they couldn't conceive. This is what gives me hope.
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