Expanding My Laboratory

Warning: TMI to follow

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Last Thursday I went in for my yearly p*p. It has actually been close to 2 years given that my nether regions have been, well, quite occupied with the multitude of IVF cycles that we've gone through.

Unbeknownst to me, my physician's office had lost a few of their staff and I was to see a new assistant. She came in and started off asking me the usual patient history questions, which in all honesty, felt a bit odd as I'm quite a regular in this office. My health history and that of my parents is pretty well documented.

She asked if I was having hot flashes or vaginal dryness yet. "Goodness no", I told her. Furthermore, we were actually still trying to get pregnant and had done quite a few IVF cycles, one of which ended just a few weeks prior. I forget what her comment was but it was pretty clear that she hadn't prepared for my exam by rummaging through my records when she made some suggestion to me that was predicated upon my actually HAVING fallopian tubes. To which I pointed to the keloided 4" scan on my abdomen and said, "Dr. G removed them last summer!" She had this pained quizzical look on her face, and asked yet another question which further reinforced my notion that she hadn't so much as glanced at my file before walking in. I had to explain how Dr. Moustache and Dr. G conferred and decided that with the massive amounts of endo that I had that it was likely that I had hydrosalpinxed and an exploratory laparotomy was in order. I explained that my tubes were found to be utterly destroyed and were removed with all due haste. It was clear from the look on her face that this was all new news to her.

But then she said the thing that makes many of us IF cringe. "Have you considered adoption?" It's a fair question, but it's a question that feels so dismissive of what we're aiming for: a genetic child of our own. I told her: "It's not for me. Of course I could always change my mind, but being that I was adopted and had a terrible experience with it, I don't think that I could be an adoptive parent myself. Besides, there are so many people who want to adopt and don't have the baggage that I have about it. Let them adopt."

I think that stifled her for a bit. I really do think that many (most?) people think that to undergo IVF means that you merely want a child. Any child. While that is certainly true for some people, it's certainly not true for me or for many people. Men, more than women, seem to have a greater difficulty accepting the idea of not having a biological child of their own and rejecting adoption out of hand. Perhaps it's a biological imperative thing? Who knows. It's true for "J" and I've heard it echoed by the DH's of many of my friends.

After this she swabbed my cervix and proceeded with the most vigorous pelvic exam I think I have even endured. She asked if anything hurt. No, nothing hurt, but wow did it feel as if she rearranged a few things. Mayan massage anyone? Geez!

Everything seemed in order and I left for home where I worked from home the rest of the day. By Friday night something was not quite right. It felt as though a UTI was coming on. I started to drink loads of water and although the typical UTI pain hadn't yet set it, I could feel that it was close.

Saturday morning a dear friend stopped by to bring me the latest H*rry P*tter book and when she left at 1pm I truly felt ill. I spent the entire day on the couch reading and heating up. By nightfall my temperature was up to 100.9 and I had intense body aches and something wasn't quite right down there. Mind you, this is a 3 day holiday weekend and not only are the physicians all out of town, save for the on call physician, but the pharmacies won't be able to fill prescriptions very easily.

By Sunday morning the fever had passed and I was back to a normal 97.7 (yes that's normal for me, so 100.9 is more like 102 for me) but still things weren't back to normal down there. A quick self exam showed opaque EWCM but things were a bit reddened and there was a mild sensation of burning. I've never been prone to yeast outbreaks but I figured that the high fever might have been enough to throw things askew. I read everything that Dr. Google could point me to about yeast and anything else that produced similar symptoms and, well, it could be quite a number of things.

I thought to myself: "If only I have a microscope here at home." You see, I have a veritible pharmacy of drugs here at the house and it's just a matter of knows what I have and then consulting Dr. Google for dosaging. Or Dr. Hungarian. It would be so easy to identify yeast. A smear on a slide with a drop of 10% KOH would make the candida cells quite clear. If that was the issue. Or a slide prepared with some of the EWCM would clearly show flagellated trich*m*nas if they were swimming around in there (they are easiest to identify in EWCM when they are literally pushed out of the cervix en masse). I would have to dig out the old microbiology books to find the methods for isolation and identification of the other microorganisms, but even E. coli is rather easy to identify, although the staining process is a bit of a pain in the arse even if you do have the requisite bunsen burners and stains on hand.

So being that I'm lacking a microscope and my physicians are all out of touch this weekend I opted to take the following:

1. For a potential UTI: 100mg of Macrobid, 3 times a day for maybe a week
   
2. For a potential yeast infection: A 3 day course of monistat
   
3. For any other BV related critters: 1g flagyl, twice a day for 5 to 7 days

It's a bit much, but I really do need to knock out whatever this is and fast.

I wonder what is really going on here though. The order of symptoms is just odd. On Wednesday I spent the day with my friend's two children at the beach. They had just gotten over a virus of some sort. Or did they? They're 20 months and 3 and a half. Maybe they're still sick and their parents just don't have a clue? I could have gotten their virus which popped up on Saturday in the form of a 24 hour fever. The vigorous p*p test could have, on it's own, had led to the UTI. And the fever and UTI, together or individually, could have caused my flora to get out of what and lead to the yeast imbalance or BV issue.

I hope I've covered all the potential bugs here, but if not, I've got a consult with my ob/gyn, the same one whose assistant gave me the free Mayan massage with my p*p. I can ask her to do another swabbing and see if anything remains on Friday. If I can wait that long.

So this morning I bid on a box of premium microscope slides with frosted edges and cover slips. I am committed to buying a microscope so that when things like this happen, again, I can quickly figure out if it's yeast, a UTI, or what, that I'm dealing with, walk over to my armoire and pull out the appropriate treatment, should I have it "in stock".

You might ask, "A microscope for a UTI?" Yes! With my trusty centrifuge(s) I can spin down my own urine and identify WBCs, RBCs, and microorganisms. Lovely, eh? I don't want to perpetually self treat, as I have done this weekend, for I am sure to miss something or do something wrong. But in the future, I would like to be able to treat myself in the case of an emergency and I would also like to be able to direct my doctor's assistants, who I am not confident of, as to the most probable cause for my discomfort so that I can get treated faster.

Maybe I can do sperm counts for friends to offset the cost of all this damned equipment?

The lab is now open.