sorry traffic was a little backed up, i was late dropping the browns off at the superbowl

Ok here goes.

I am four days post retrieval and I still feel, pardon the pun – shitty. Or lack there of. I called the clinic this morning and they confirmed what I learned in some online articles this weekend. Sometimes this procedure, or more so the sedation can cause bowels to slow. Ugh…. I didn’t want to write about this, but this will support my case that egg donation is not easy. It’s time consuming, painful, inconvenient and it temporally upsets the lives of family, friends and co workers. This is why egg donors are compensated the way we are.

So back to the down and dirty, I haven’t been able to go number 2 in days, somehow number 2 has become my number one priority. I’ve been eating salads, using benefiber, trying to walk / some ab exercises, massaging my tummy, applying heat all to get stuff moving. Nothing works, I am still super incapacitated.In between seemingly crippling pain in my belly I am googling phrases like “constipation after retrieval” “what does it mean when I rabbit poop” “what side do you lay on to relieve constipation” and so on. Basically I am “shit” outta luck till I can get my bits to work properly.

Yesterday the long suffering BF bought me some “poop tea” a natural laxative, i drank a cup of it and waited for the magic to happen. Other than some horrible gas, nothing. I was still distended and unable to walk upright. It still felt like I was going to explode. Oh boy, happy valentines to him! this was not how we wanted to spend the day. He’s amazing, super supportive and super adorable to boot.

I decided that it might work over night, so I went to bed, hoping that the tea would help by dawn. Nope, wrong again. So now I’ve moved to the heavy guns, the laxative, some nasty pink pill that I have had sitting in my medicine cabinet for a long time. Get me a little tipsy I might tell you about that horrible experience, although when I bought that I had no clue what real constipation really was. It’s now approx six hours later and I am waiting. I’ve felt a little gurgle here, and little gassy there, all false alarms.

Don’t worry, when it finally happens I will leave out the nasty details, this post has at least been funny and somewhat informative.

To top all of this off, I am going through a set of pajamas a night and a set of sheets, hot flashes (night sweats) started on Wednesday. Wednesday was the first full day I went without the hormones, they have gotten worse as the days have progressed. This unlike the constipation is usual for me and the egg donation process. It usually takes me two weeks of soaking the bed with sweat until I am back to normal. The difference is this time, the BF is here full time, trying not to drown or cook because of this overheated ball of hormones. Again he is wonderful, helps change the sheets, washes the laundry and brings me glasses of cold water to rehydrate myself. I don’t know what I’d do with out him.

He woke up at 7, so he could get ready for work (not all gov’t employees have the day off, like I do) as soon as he got up I moved to his side, his non-sweaty side of the bed. He returned to kiss me goodbye an hour or so later and i had created a perfectly mel shaped wet spot in the bed. I soaked the fitted sheet, the top sheet and the light blanket on top. I am a sweaty mess, he gave me a kiss and told me to rest up. Oh and had me drink some more water. He was off to work.

I took the sheets off the bed tossed on some new pjs and snuggled in with a blanket on the bare mattress, to my surprise I soaked the mattress pad too. An hour later I woke up and had sweat through the pjs. At least the mattress was ok. Nothing feels better than a hot shower after you’ve sweat out 1/2 your body’s water. Oh wait, going number two might feel better!

I didn’t think to get a pic of the spot, but this is my generally tidy and relaxing bed all rumpled up, until I get the cover and blanket out of the dryer.

a Side note, that seems funny now but not at the time…. the first time I experienced these night sweats I thought I was peeing the bed. It didn’t smell like pee, but it covered me from the waist down nightly after the first retrieval. I went to Rite aid and bought some incontinence briefs and wore one to bed. It was dry the day morning but the rest of me was soaked. that was a relief but I wasn’t happy about the night sweats.

Thanks for reading….