The Making of Spontaneity or What Changed?

After my ectopic, I spent YEARS in timed cycles, medicated cycles, and "perfect" IUIs.  I did Clomid, Femara, and injectibles, and nothing worked.  And then, in my two month break between IVF cycles, I got pregnant with a unicorn spontaneous pregnancy.  Trying to figure out the difference between then and now, I have three major things that I think contributed to this success.

(1) The stress level.  This is that annoying "just relax and it will happen."  That was the only month in three years I hadn't used an OPK.  I'm not sure if it was timed correctly, even today, I still think it was off by a day or two.  I'll never know because I wasn't even using OPKs.  I had to go back and backdate my period because I had honestly just given up.  Months before, I had screamed at someone who had told me just relax because obviously my body does not work, I don't have tubes, and obviously IVF is the only way anything is ever going to work.  So don't give me a stupid tip about relaxing, god.  I literally was not trying.  I had finally relaxed.   We were drinking heavily, having sushi, going out with friends.  I had put babymaking on the backburner until the next IVF cycle.

(2) My health.  In my first fertility consult three years ago, the RE said I needed to be at "normal" BMI, which meant losing 30 lbs.  I freaked out, but I made some choices, and I kept moving toward that goal.  Over the three years, I did that, but I also completely changed my lifestyle.  When we were on break from IVF, I was working out 2 hours a day, which is a BIG change from the sedentary fattie that walked into an RE three years ago.  Today, I'm right at the cusp of "normal" and I'm certainly fitter than most.

(3) The CCRM supplement cocktail.  When I changed REs, literally days before I started my first IVF cycle, I started a modified CCRM cocktail.  CCRM has a lot of different supplement plans you can look up, depending on what your issues are.  Mine was L-Arginine, pycnogenol, DHEA, fish oil, melatonin, a ton of CoQ10, and an over the counter prenatal.  I wonder if my years of dicking around with timed cycles and IUIs would have been helped by a few bucks worth of supplements.  I don't know if the supplements actually do anything, but I'm happy to keep this going.  I really wish I had tried these earlier.

We have another mandatory break before our next IVF cycle, and judging by my sperm donor's reaction, it might be even longer.  Maybe these three changes can get me another unicorn baby.  Maybe.