A shocking turn of events

DH's sperm count was low.

<This is the part of the movie where the music rips to a stop and everyone stops dancing and looks around>

Very low.

Dr Awesome moved us from "unexplained" to "explained".

He seemed to think that whatever was up with me would be relatively easy to overcome.  But as for my poor DH... Dr A even threw the "IVF" word out there, if sperm count stays so low.

So this is super unexpected.  Last sperm test (Nov), DH was a rock star.  This new (Feb) test was done at a different and supposedly better clinic (a good hospital in town vs a commercial clinic).  So for sure DH needs another test at this new clinic, to compare apples to apples.  I'm kind of not buying it.  Such a huge change!

All along we've been focusing on what's wrong with me and improving me with diet and acupuncture and such things.   Oh man.  Our strategy has been wrong - with low sperm count, BD every day around ovulation isn't the way to go.

DH has committed to stepping up exercise (he gets really slack in the winter, since his major sport is a summer sport), and being better about diet (breakfast/dinner are usually pretty good healthy-wise, since I make those, but lunch he often goes out with friends, and sometimes for...horrors...fast food).  And maybe we'll send DH to Dr T for some acu - from a TCM point of view, men are supposed to be easier to fix.

They are going to cycle monitor me next cycle to see if everything is hunky dorry with me, or if I have any timing issues.  They took 20 blood vials from me yesterday (13 from DH!), and they did an ultrasound on me.  (Is ultrasound the right word?  A wand up the hoo-haa).  They called me a few hours later (impressive) and said everything was ok but progesterone was a little low.  I am a little surprised they can process all the 20 vials in such a short time - it was like 2 hours later.  Maybe they only checked the sex hormones, and the fancier tests will take longer?  Don't lab tests normally take 2 weeks?

A side note - the office is very swanky.  It is in an old mansion downtown converted to officies, and the ultrasound is upstairs in a room (with a very fancy rotating chair).  And this really did it for me - there is a little screen to change behind.  Since the ultrasound tech normally stays around and it gets akward - why not just have a screen?  The last place I went I ended up glaring at her since she didn't leave and come back.

Yesterday was sad.  It was one of those sad IF days for me.  I didn't want to have to do this.  Against my wishes, I did leak a few tears in the doc's office.  And I think I don't really like Dr Awesome.  He's probably a very good doc, so I am not thinking of changing at all, but... well, for whatever reason, he did make me cry.  Probably his attitude that "this isn't a big deal", "stop trying", "stop taking your temp", blah blah blah.

So I am to call them on the first day of spotting to set up my appt for Day 3 monitoring.

But here is where things stay interesting <roll of eyes> - I am spotting today.  It is CD23!  WTIF!  And we know I don't usually have mid-cycle bleeding.  Last Jan cycle (I also had a fever - suspicious?), I had spotting CD22 and it was a 23 day cycle.  This is a whacky cycle, I think, prob exasperated by the 12 hour time change, but not unprecedented.  Talk about short luteal phase!  Boobs are still sore.