"You must feel like an egg basket!" These were the first words out of the mouth of the nurse as we all looked at the ultrasound monitor this morning and we saw my ovaries overflowing with follicles.

"You are coming down the home stretch!" "Almost done!" "You're doing great!"

Everybody is saying such supportive things. So, why do I feel like crying or screaming or going to Target and buying a basket (there is that word again) of things I don't need.

I think I do feel like an egg basket. A hormonal, cranky, if I have to have one more shot in the thigh someone is going pay, kind of basket.

Today was my last ultrasound before my very first egg retrieval. Or "egg-straction" as we say around here when I am feeling happy and positive and not stressed and frustrated. I had an ultrasound yesterday too but although estrogen was high and eggs were plentiful, they were a little small, so "please come back tomorrow."

So I did. I got up crazy early two days in a row (the blood work lab is almost an hour away), got stabbed in the arm for the third time this week and then off to the doctor for another vaginal ultrasound (love those). But, we are moving forward as they say and the extraction is scheduled for this Friday!

I'm excited and a little nervous, but more than that I am just plain tired. Tired of the shots, tired of rearranging my schedule around blood draws and ultrasounds and tired of peeing on a stick for the last 5 years and seeing a negative result.

Since this is my first blog post on the subject, I'll give you the quick and dirty. I am a 34 year old woman (married for 6 and a half years) and for 5 of those years, my husband and I have been trying to get pregnant. We have never been successful, although there have been a few "maybe this time..." moments of late periods and sore breasts that gave us a glimmer of hope.

About three years ago (two years into trying), we decided to see a fertility doctor. We were living in New York at the time and started the process of figuring out what was wrong with us. Results, like for so many, were inconclusive and they diagnosed us with Unexplained Infertility. Awesome. What does that mean???? We decided that means that as a couple we have the worst timing in the history of timing. I guess that makes sense, my husband is a get up super early and then take an afternoon nap kind of guy and I am a sleep till noon and work late into the night kind of girl. Somehow that makes us a great couple, but incredibly bad at reproduction.

As life goes, we decided to move down south and with all the job changing and moving and distractions, we put the fertility stuff on hold and thought maybe a change of locations would be exactly what we need. So we gave it a year on our own. Nothing but faint glimmers and all the prayers and "good thoughts" our family and friends could muster.

At the end of 2008, we were settled in to a new house, life quieted down a bit as we fell into a routine and the peace of the country cleared our heads. We vowed to make 2009 the year of the baby. And we put everything we had into it. Time, energy, MONEY, we let everything else go by the wayside as the focus was getting pregnant. We found a well-recommended fertility doctor, we went through 3 IUI cycles, we prayed, I ate right, exercised, didn't drink coffee or wine, tried not to get stressed and did everything the doctor told us.

It didn't work. 2009 was not the year of the baby.

In January 2010, I made a slideshow of pictures of our history together (10 years together, 6 and a half years of marriage). We watched the slideshow and laughed about silly jokes and fun vacations. The last few pictures were of 2009. All of the pictures were of us eating or sitting on the couch. We didn't go to Thanksgiving with the family because I was having an IUI, we stayed local during the summer because I was having an IUI, we didn't do anything but sit on the couch and feel sorry for ourselves for most of 2009.

We were talking later that night about the slideshow. We both felt the same way. It was depressing looking at the pictures from last year. 2009 sucked. We vowed to do better in 2010.

So, here we are. It was obvious that we couldn't do this on our own, IUIs were not going to work and IVF became the new glimmer of hope.

As I laid on the exam table waiting for the doctor last week, I was on my itouch (thank god for wireless at the doctors office). My feet were in the stirrups and I googled "stirrups" just for the heck of it. I came up with Stirrup Queens and was motivated by all of the amazing women on that site and decided writing could be really therapeutic.

I have a lot more to say. But, it will have to wait till later. I have another shot to get.