About 6 weeks ago, I posted a blog explaining that the ERA biopsy failed — the lab said there wasn’t enough tissue so I’d have to do it all over again. I waited the month for my next period, and then began the now-familiar routine of 3 estrogen pills in the morning and evening for 13 days, then a monitoring appointment to ensure my uterine lining was thickening properly, and then 5 days of progesterone meds (shots and vaginal suppositories), with the ERA redo on day 6 (today).
Unlike last time when my lining did not respond to the estrogen, this time the monitoring exam last week showed that it was more than thick enough, which was surprisingly good news. The actual biopsy was scheduled for this afternoon, so my plan was to get to Tallahassee early, eat a relaxing lunch, and then head over to the doctor’s office for the immensely painful procedure (they say it feels like bad cramps, but it feels like someone is scraping tissue from your insides, which is exactly what they’re doing).
Like all good plans, it required adjustments. We had our first cold snap last night, so of course the low-tire warning light came on when I turned on our car, which meant I had to take it over to the mechanic to get that fixed before getting on the road. I was 90% sure it was simply because the overnight temperature finally dipped below 75 degrees, but I didn’t want to find out halfway into the 2-1/2 hour drive to Tallahassee that there was a real problem with the tires. Our mechanic is amazing and so when I walked in and told him that I needed to be in Tallahassee in 3 hours but the tire warning light was on, he immediately had someone go check my tires instead of making me wait. Four re-filled tires and two quick stops later (the drug store for ibuprofen because at the monitoring appointment the doctor told me I could take that ahead of time instead of waiting until after the procedure, and the local coffee house for some unsweet black tea to caffeinate me for the drive), I was finally on the road to Tallahassee.
However, I was leaving much later than I anticipated, which meant my plans for a relaxing lunch pre-procedure went out the window. I’d have about 45 minutes to kill once I got to Tallahassee, so I decided to go to Target. Granted, it’s easy to kill time at a Target, but I went there with a specific purpose: purchase the towel bars, toilet paper holders, and hand towel bars for our new house.
New house, you ask? (Well, only if you haven’t talked to us in the past month.) Indeed. I strongly recommend AGAINST going through a mock transfer cycle while also working AND trying to pack your current house AND coordinating the final renovations on your fixer-upper house AND needing to purchase all of those pesky house items (like towel bars or curtain rods). If you want to see how high your stress and anxiety levels can rise, add a bunch of hormones to your body that cause your emotional responses to increase anyway, and then mix that with multiple deadline-specific work projects, sneak in a dose of making all the final decisions for plumbers, carpenters, electricians, fence folk, HVAC things, and general contractors, and then fold in a gazillion purchases that all have to be made at one time. Plus packing.
In any case, sometime within the next 10 business days I should get the results of today’s ERA biopsy, assuming that there aren’t any additional not-enough-tissue problems (that’s a big assumption).
In the meantime, next steps are as follows:
Go cold turkey off of all the hormones (fun)
Move all our “stuff” to the new house this Sunday, with the help of some amazing friends, assuming that the brewing tropical storm doesn’t (a) come through here or (b) doesn’t cause too much damage if it does come through here
Attempt to catch up on all the work missed due to appointments in Tallahassee and needing to spend hours coordinating all the renovation stuff/purchasing everything
Finish packing
Work through all of the change-of-address notifications for credit cards, banks, magazines, mail, etc.
Wait for real movers to show up next weekend to move our furniture
Wait for my second-next period and hopefully start the real transfer cycle at that time (end of November)
But first, I have to go buy those towel bars online because Target doesn’t sell any that aren’t part of a floor stand.