(Part 2) Best products from r/infertility

We got all of our IVF meds through Freedom Fertility Pharmacy. I can't really say much about their prices since we had insurance coverage for our meds (with a $75 copay for injectibles), but customer service was really great. There were a couple of times I had to get refills last-minute, and even though I called the afternoon before I needed the meds, they still got them to me the next day. Always super helpful and friendly.

Aside from medications though, I was taking a DHA supplement in addition to my regular prenatals because I read somewhere that it helped with egg quality. I probably took them 2-3 months before we started IVF, and the prenatal my doctor prescribed for me also had a DHA supplement. I can't say with any certainty that it contributed to our success, but we retrieved 13 eggs, 9 fertilized, and 8 embryos made it to the 5-day transfer. We transferred 2 and the remaining 6 were all good enough to freeze, and I'm currently pregnant. So I'd recommend a DHA supplement - I took [Rainbow Light DHA 250 Smart Essentials] (http://www.amazon.com/Rainbow-Light-Complete-Mulitvitamin-Essentials/dp/B001HCDTCG) through Amazon.

Absolutely. This is my first post trying to link something click here for the amazon link. Hopefully that works.
You basically eat fruits, vegetables, and meat. You cut out bread and grains, dairy and processed sugar for 30 days. It is a tad extreme for some people but if you are not a picky eater there are amazing recipes out there. I follow an instagram account called Nomnompaleo and she is amazing, her recipes are super tasty and got me through the harder days of the whole 30. I had already cut a lot of dairy so that part was easy for me, the sugar part was hard.

Hopefully I have explained it well enough. Pinterest is full of ideas and recipes and youtube and instagram have tons of amazing people doing the Whole 30 that support people trying it. I found that it really helped and I am planning to start one in the next few days. Just getting all of the food supplies ready.

If you have any more questions let me know :)

For me personally, a lot of the reason infertility was and has been so difficult, is because of the emotional neglect I experienced as a child. While I had come a long, long way emotionally since I've been an adult, I still hadn't yet mastered how to process and deal with my emotions. In a way that sounds simple, but for me it wasn't at all obvious or easy to figure out, even though I had spent years trying to resolve various past traumas, thinking patterns, behaviors, etc.

Infertility, compounded with other issues, pushed me to the brink, and along with learning about new (to me) therapies and actually find a good therapist who I respect and trust, I was able to come to a turning point in how infertility was affecting me. For me it wasn't "just" the infertility, it was related to many areas and previous past traumas in my life. It was related to feeling completely alone and isolated as a child and teen, when I had zero emotional support or connection with my family. Deep down I feel as if I have no family. Based on my beliefs about what a parent should be, I have no parents.

It's amazing and wonderful to think that you can just create your own family, and give your children the things you were never given (emotional connection), but when that chance is taken away from you, you no longer have that opportunity to heal the past in the present, you no longer have the opportunity to have what you always wanted deep down: emotional intimacy, a (real) family, etc.

I don't know if any of that will resonate with you, but if you're interested, the way I made the most progress was by reading the books:

• Running On Empty: Overcome Your Childhood Emotional Neglect
  
  
• Running On Empty No More: Transform Your Relationships With Your Partner, Your Parents, And Your Children
  
  
• Passionate Marriage: Keeping Love And Intimacy Alive In Committed Relationships
  
  
• The Body Keeps Score: Brain, Mind, And Body In The Healing Of Trauma

Oooh, I looooove board games. From what you're describing I feel like Ticket to Ride could work really well; there are a good amount of instructions but they're pretty easy to follow along with (it's mostly for scoring purposes).

For something way more light/fun, there's also Sushi Go! or Love Letter -- they're both card-based games that look deceptively simple but are never played the same way twice. My wildcard choice would be Carcassonne, which is definitely more of a hard sell -- you build a Medieval French town with picture tiles -- but I promise is really, really fun. Again, the scoring is where it gets slightly more complicated, and it can be intimidating-looking, but the game is really fantastic. Lots of strategy and luck needed, and it's a really unique experience.

Whatever this is for sounds like it'll be a lot of fun!

Glad to share, we've had a lot of fun with it! For canning, this site has some really good general info and basic recipes. Lately I use this book more, but she does not use pectin, I still do. Her process often involves extra steps with separating solids from liquid and cooking down the liquid - I don't do that, too much time and mess.

For fermenting, I went to a workshop to learn the basics. I'm really liking it because of how flexible and easy it is - no water baths and sterilizing, recipes aren't really needed. This site has a good guide for brine strength, but I approximate how much salt, and it's been fine. A basic sauerkraut, you slice up a head of cabbage, reserving the pieces of the core. Sprinkle about 3 tablespoons of Celtic sea salt or Himalayan pink salt (or some kind of salt with no additives) and massage it in for a few minutes. Sprinkle on some caraway seeds and mix in. Then pack it into a quart size, clean, ball jar. Pack it down firmly as you fill it, I use my fist, but you can get a sauerkraut packer - a wooden instrument to pack down krauts. Add all the liquid it has released too. Leave about 1-1.5 inches of head space, place the cabbage core and put a lid on it. The cabbage core is in lieu of other kinds of weight, basically you need the veg to stay under the liquid throughout. The cabbage should release enough liquid to cover it, but if not, add brine (3 tablespoons salt per quart) to cover. Then just let the good bacteria go to work for a few weeks, making sure to burp your jar every day at the beginning, then less frequently. In our first batch this year we forgot the first day after, and then the next day when we released the pressure it sprayed all over like a shaken can of soda. Because I am lazy, I got these lids that prevent the need for that step, but I still had one overflow because my cabbage released more water than I expected.

That is a basic recipe, but you can put in whatever you want, and just make sure it has enough brine. We made one with julienned beets, kohlrabi, onion, and carrot with some pickling spices. I did another with cabbage, greens, beets, onion and kohlrabi with mustard seed and oregano. These folks who ran the workshop I went to list their products here and there are some really good ideas for what combinations you might try. Have fun with it!

I really enjoy her books so I'm glad I can look for this one! Another friend said she recently read "Delicious!" by Ruth Reichel. https://www.amazon.com/Delicious-Novel-Ruth-Reichl/dp/0812982029/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1468799125&sr=8-1&keywords=delicious+ruth+reichl It's a novel but her biographies about being a food critic are really great as well.

Today I made brownies and butterscotch walnut bars for our doctor and the staff. I wanted to express our appreciation for the last 2 years of visits, emails and general hand holding as we get closer to procedures.

I adore molasses anything. I have never tried tea cakes, but I will now! There's a friend who has a younger daughter around 9 years old, and she loves to bake. So this fall I'm going to start spending one or two Saturdays a month with her baking things that we want to try or that might be beyond her skills right now. She was lamenting this morning that her meringue broke yesterday and she was disappointed that she didn't get a 3 inch meringue on her cupcakes. I love her!

I've never made tea cakes but they look a lot like Mexican Wedding cookies, which use almonds. I can eat those by the dozen!

Hi there!

I'm so sorry to hear about your anxiety. I can definitely relate as I also struggle with panic attacks and anxiety and the infertility treatment process has been challenging in that regard.

This reply will be long, but hopefully helpful. I'm also on mobile so bear with me re: formatting/autocorrects...

If you need to take mental health breaks I recommend doing so. I've taken a few- a month here or there over the last three years and it can help. But, if you take a break you should also be doing what you can to address the anxiety itself, otherwise a break won't help.

If you don't address the anxiety on its own terms, returning to treatment will bring the anxiety back with it.

If you haven't already, find a therapist or counsellor who deals with anxiety and (if possible) who understands and works with infertility. Most fertility clinics will have a list of therapists they recommend.

If you don't have the financial resources for a therapist there are cognitive behavioural things you can do on your own to help. I recommend doing these even if you do have a therapist as they can provide coping tools in the moment you are having anxiety.

There are a number of apps that can be helpful. Anxiety BC (a government sponsored mental health resource in Canada) had a great mobile app with a number of tools for anxiety and panic attacks. You can find it here. It is geared toward teens and young adults but is usable and applicable to people in all stages of life. You just might see examples that mention school stress etc.

Pacifica is also a good free app with anxiety tools. As is Stop, Breath, Think (which focuses on mindfulness). All of these apps are free. They have in app purchases but the free resources are more than enough.

There is a desktop and mobile compatible site I use sometimes when I know I need to work on breathing. http://xhalr.com you can use the settings to time the length of inhale, paused and exhales to your comfort level. I recommend 4-2-6 or 6-2-6 seconds. The interface is minimalistic and soothing. I use it at my desk when I feel panic coming. Many people find this kind of breathing can alleviate panic attacks like you are experiencing.

If, like me, focusing on your breath when you are already in a panic attack makes things worse not better, try a grounding exercise. I use one I call "5 things". You can say it out loud if you have privacy or you can do it in your mind while you are in public.

To do this, simply focus on 5 things for each sense. So, you say to yourself. "What are 5 things I feel?", and list them. "I feel the fabric of my pants on my thighs, I feel my feet in on the ground, wind on my skin, i feel tingles in my hands, etc" just any 5 sensations you feel in your body. Then 5 things you see, hear etc. Repeat as necessary.

There are also some workbooks you can get and work with on your own if therapy isn't an option.
My therapist recommends reading Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy to get a sense of the basics of cognitive behavioural therapy. This is an older book (1980's ish) but is a good foundation. Not everything in the book will apply to everyone, and no book should be considered a replacement for working with a qualified professional, but I find them helpful for adding to my mental toolkit.

A doctor once gave me Mind Over Mood which is a helpful workbook with concrete exercises to get you practicing CBT. This can be very helpful.

**edited from desktop to add links

• For PIO - I got these little hand warmers. Then when I don't have time to sit on a hot pack after the PIO in the morning I can pop one of these in my pocket and go on my way. It also worries me less post-transfer when I don't want to heat up too much.
  
  
• I started wearing cloth pads/liners. My periods have always been super light so I generally can't wear tampons. During my stim cycles I had a lot of cervical mucus and wearing pantyliner all of the time was so uncomfortable. These are much better!! I haven't done suppositories, but I assume that they would be better for that as well. I got this idea from someone on this board and thought it was dumb but was willing to try it anyway. They are amazing!
  
  
• Arnica for bruises, especially the ones I get from repeat blood draws. It really helps the bruising to dissipate - I always get the blood draw from the same place and it really starts to hurt.
  
  
• I paid the extra $2.99 or whatever it is a month to have Visual Voice Mail on my cell phone. I don't have a job where I can answer my phone whenever the clinic calls and it stresses me out to not be able to talk to them or listen to the voice mail. But with the VVM I can read the message and get the gist of what's going on. It's not perfect (it doesn't get my doc's name right or 'blastocyst'...a few other things), but it's good enough. At least then I know right away whether things are OK or if there's a problem.
  
  
• I bake cookies for my clinic. I go to a satellite clinic, and on the last day that I see my RE before retrieval/transfer I bring her a plate of homemade cookies, and then I bring a plate on retrieval/transfer day to the main clinic. I find that a) it's good to feed the people who stick you with things and b) they remember it. I only see those nurses at the main clinic for procedures but they know my name and go out of their way to help out...which ended up being super important on my 4th retrieval. It's a little thing, but they all really appreciate it. Apparently this isn't super common, and I think it should be...they do so much, they can have cookies. You are all welcome to this hack as long as you don't see MY RE at MY clinic...that's my thing and she knows it!

Yea, some of those low tow ratings are STUPID. Why does the outback or forester only have a 2000 capacity!? I ended up trading my forester for a jeep liberty CRD which had a tow rating of 5000, before moving to another "family car" which now has a 7,200 tow.

I mostly do music festivals and state camp grounds so the bathrooms aren't always an issue. I had one of those cassette toilets that was small enough to fit in a cupboard, but my husband refused to use it and when I was camping with friends it was a little awkward :D I had a pop up shower tent and those good old fashioned solar shower bags. I even was able to hang one on the outside of the trailer with a super duty suction cup and run it through the window to get hot water to the sink. It was loads of fun macgyvering things.

Just a suggestion, but I ended up covering my upholstery instead of redoing it. If the padding is still good anyway. That let me go with some crazy fun fabrics with out fears that I was going to kill resale. I also opted to cover my cabinets with contact paper for similar reasons, less permanent, but I could pick something fun. I highly recommend finding sticky vinyl tiles if you want to do a backsplash. Virtually no weight, but clean up nicely. Something like this: https://www.amazon.com/Art3d-Stick-Kitchen-Backsplash-Tiles/dp/B074J9LHN2/ref=sr_1_36?keywords=stick+vinyl+tiles&qid=1557176946&s=gateway&sr=8-36 (but to your own taste obvi). Oh! and if suction cups will stick to the exterior, you can get shower baskets with suction cups which can be turned in to faux window planters (and removed for driving).

You are going to have so much fun!

I don't have much except to say that I'm sorry that you're going through this. I have unexplained infertility, which sucks for so many reasons, but one of the only good reasons is that there's always a chance that it's either or both of us (my RE said that even if SA results come back normal, there is always the possibility that there's something they might not be seeing). As far as your question about when to cut the losses? Other people are absolutely right: counseling is so important, and especially good if you can find someone who specializes in IF. And even though it might be a little early for it (for me or for you), I've been finding a lot of help and comfort in this book, which was written by a woman who was One of Us: http://www.amazon.com/The-Next-Happy-Planned-Forward/dp/1616495723 Best wishes to you. All of this stuff sucks. I hope you stick around here and get some of the help you might need. <3

CCRM's study is based on 1200mg and from my conversation with Dr. Choi the preliminary results are very promising. I couldn't find a good quality Acai Berry at 1200, it was either 1000 or 1500. So I choose 1500. I take Puritans Pride. It says 3000mg, but that's for 2 capsules. I just take one.

Puritans Pride Triple Strength Acai 3000 Mg, 120 Count https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004R64LJE/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_q0RBCb65KA619