One Year Ago - Part 2

May 3, 2011 was met with giddy anticipation and some fear. The hpt I took the previous morning was a shade or 2 lighter than the one before it. I shook it off and kept an open heart and mind. I was pregnant and this was for real. I had a beta scheduled for that morning. I was excited because I knew it would be positive. I just didn’t know how big the number was going to be. I was hoping for over 100 because I did a lot of searching on the evil internet. This was the first time I had ever sat in the chair with a big smile plastered on my face. I was happy to be getting stuck with that needle and nothing could change that. It was a great feeling. I had taken the whole day off because we also had a meeting at the school later that afternoon. BJ and I met up for lunch and I kept my phone close by. I could hardly eat my food I had such butterflies in my stomach. Of course, the tomatoes had to come off my burger because I just couldn’t stomach them. We didn’t get the call until about an hour before the school meeting. We were lounging on the couch in pure silence. My cell phone rang and I jumped up and leaned forward to take the call. My nurse said the words I’ll never forget, “they did find HCG in your blood...” and my heart sank because her tone was not as excited as it should be. She continued, “but it was a bit low. It was 38.” My heart sank even further. At the stage I was at, it should have been well over 100. My shoulders sank and I leaned over as if I had been gut punched. I could see BJ out of the corner of my eye. His shoulders sank and he turned his head away from me. The nurse told me that I’d have to repeat in 2 days, blah, blah, blah...it’s a blur from there. I cried to BJ and had to explain to him that yes I’m pregnant but it won’t last and I’m going to lose it. He just held me and let me cry. He didn’t fully understand the significance of the number so he was asking questions but I don’t think I answered them. I had to dust myself off shortly thereafter because we still had a meeting at the school to attend. It was so hard to concentrate on anything that was said in the meeting. All I kept thinking about was that number.


May 3, 2012 was met with giddy anticipation and some fear, too. Things have been going so well with our donor and this process that I keep waiting for the bad news. BJ’s appointment was set for 10:30. He wasn’t happy about it. Of course, this made me stress a bit. I hate it when he gets agitated with the process because he’s very vocal about it. Yes, he was inconvenienced ONE MORNING through this whole thing. I’m the one that has been on bcp and stabbing myself in the ass with really long needles. I’m the one that has had to have the blood work and the ultrasounds and he’s going to bitch about having to watch p.o.rn and take a couple of hours off of work? But I digress. His appointment time meant that he could lolly gag at home in the morning and do his thing and head out. I sent a text at 8:00 to make sure he was up. He was. He called me at 8:50 to complain about the traffic. He hadn’t even gotten out of the county yet. Then he’s sending me texts about how bad the Beltway is backed up. I’m sitting at my desk reading these messages and I’m about to go into full blown panic. I hate the traffic in this area. It’s so unpredictable from day to day. Who would have thought that as late as he left there would still be rush hour volume out there? Ugh. I had butterflies in my stomach as I was watching the clock. His next message said that his GPS told him that there was a 25 minute back up now. HOLY HELL! Since I know my husband, I sent him a message back that stated to keep the sample warm and be careful. If he feels stressed about time he’ll drive like a crazy man and all I could think about was him either getting into an accident or being pulled over and delayed. I started thinking of when I would call the clinic and explain that he’d be late...would they cancel us out? Would they still be able to perform the wash in time for the procedure? What if he’s delayed so much that the swimmers all die? Cue crazy internal freak out. As I’m trying to distract myself with work and NOT watch the time whisking by, my phone buzzes again. It’s the husband, of course. I’m dreading reading it because it’s now 10:05 and I don’t want more bad news. The message reads “made it early!” AMEN! Now began the wait for the phone call regarding the number of eggs. And of course the freak out of hoping the donor gets there in time and is not caught in all that awful traffic. BJ called me when he left at 10:30 and we both breathed a sigh of relief that our part had been completed. Now we just had to wait for the all-important number. I had no clue what time her procedure was scheduled for but guessed maybe around 11:30 since we always had to hang out for an hour or so for our IVF’s. I was waiting on an e-mail from someone else and decided to check to see if it had come in when to my surprise my nurse sent me an e-mail at 11:00 with the count. We have nine mature eggs all to ourselves! They will all be fertilized with ICSI and I’ll get an actual fertilization report tomorrow. NINE MATURE EGGS! That means that this girl produced at least 27 mature eggs for the 3 recipients. How wonderful to be 22 and fertile. How wonderful to be willing to share that fertility with others. I feel so blessed right now I can’t even tell you. I know there are more hurdles and more numbers to wait on, but that number is so much better than I was hoping for, than I even dared to dream of. It makes my sore left butt cheek (from my PIO shot last night) hurt just a bit less. The next number I’m hoping for is at least 4 growing embryos that look great and can be cultured to 5-day blasts. But for now, I’m relishing in THIS great number.

One year ago today I was devastated by a number and today I’m on cloud 9 because of a different number. I hope that things continue to move in a positive forward motion and that very soon I will be even more blessed.

Side note – my shot went well last night aside from apparently hitting a blood vessel. I bled like a stuck pig after I pulled the needle out. And as stated above, my butt is pretty sore today. Not sure if it’s from the PIO or the fact that I haven’t done any shots on that side yet. I’ll find out tomorrow because I will be stabbing the right side tonight.

Retrieval Recap

First, the nitty gritty:

8 follicles
5 eggs
5 mature
3 embryos - as of 12:00 yesterday.

Now the details:

Friday afternoon I began to feel a headache coming on.  I left work early and by the time I got home I was pretty much in migraine-ville.  My concern was that my hormones were falling off fast and that all my eggs were dying.  Yes, I have a vivid, morbid imagination.  We took the Little Guy over to my SIL's and stayed to chat for a while.  All I wanted was peace and quiet and a dark room.  I had to force myself to eat dinner.  I felt horrible.  BJ was convinced it was the HCG causing it.  He must have told me to call the doctor 5 times.  I refused...nothing was ruining this for us.  He started looking my symptoms up online and had a real eye opener to what I was actually putting in my body.  He really thought I should call the doctor after his research.  I just laid down on the couch and watched the hockey game.  I slept for a while and when I woke up I felt extremely nauseous.  I went to the bathroom and dry heaved about 6 times...nothing would come up.  Then all of a sudden my stomach felt better.  My head still hurt but that was it.  It was off to bed.

Saturday morning went fine.  We arrived at the clinic with 20 minutes to spare.  I changed into my sexy gown and cap and we hung out together until it was time.  We thumb wrestled and were cracking each other up.  I'm sure if the other couples could hear us they were probably wondering what was so funny.  We kept things very light for the remainder of our wait.  I was pretty groggy afterward, like in the past.  I felt a little disappointment at only 5 eggs but was hopeful that they would all be mature given my E2 level on Thursday.  They had mixed up my instructions and tried to tell me that I would be doing daily PIO shots.  I had to set her straight and she checked and found out that I was right.  Whew!  We were stuck in some very nasty traffic on the way home and it took us an hour longer than it should have.  The nurse specifically said not to wait too long before eating so that I could take my pain pill.  Well BJ being BJ, didn't want to go off route to get food and thought it would be fine to wait until we were closer to home.  Thankfully I slept some in the car because I was in pain and starving...it was after 3:00 before we got something to eat.

I took my pill when we got home and laid down on the couch and was in and out most of the evening.  The pain subsided and I was able to enjoy dinner.

The only 5 minutes that I didn't have my phone with me was when the lab called and left me a message to tell me that all 5 were mature....my heart soared.  My heart promptly sank when we she said that we had 3 embryos.  I'm happy to have one more than last time but at the same time I'm sad to only have 3 after everything had been going so well.  I was so hoping to be able to freeze this time.  I should be getting a call soon from the nurse to tell me how many we still have and what day we will be transferring.  I'm sure with only 3 our transfer will be tomorrow.  However, if we have 3 great looking embryos I don't know that we will transfer all 3.  I'm pretty against it but BJ is on the fence.  Also, I don't know if my clinic will freeze just one.  Of course, this might be a non-problem depending on the phone call I get in a little while.

Thank you all so very much for being here for me during this time...and always, really.  It has meant so much to me to be able to come here and lend a voice to all my fears and dreams.  I will update later with news from the lab.  Right now, the Little Guy and I are off to IHOP for breakfast and then heading to the movies to see Rio.

I've Been Egg-Napped

For anyone that just needs the stats, I will go over those first. For anyone that likes to read stories about these procedures I will explain it all below in my long winded, TMI way. :-)

5 follicles
E2 of 1001 - Sunday
4 eggs retrieved
3 mature
2 fertilized
64 million swimmers pre-wash and 16 million post-wash

Now I wait...transfer (provided all is well) will most likely take place Friday.

Here's the story:

I was instructed to take my Zithromax before bedtime Monday night. I did that, had an ice cream sandwich and then took my prenatal about 1 hour later when I actually went to bed. It didn't take long for my stomach to start hurting. I wasn't sure if it was nerves, the Zithromax, the prenatal or all of the above. I wasn't sure if I wanted to poo or hurl. I decided to poo. I still felt bad and now I was getting severe cramps. I tried to go to sleep but it just wasn't happening. I decided that I needed to hurl and tried to talk myself out of it because I knew I wasn't supposed to be throwing up my Zithromax. I went to the bathroom downstairs because I didn't want to wake anyone up with my loud vomiting. I know, too descriptive but sometimes I have to lay it all out there. I didn't have to hurl after all but instead poo'd again. It was definitely diarrhea so of course I thought I had caught a bug and wouldn't be able to have my procedure Tuesday. I'm such a negative thinker these days. I jumped on the Internet and looked up the side effects of Zithromax. Sure enough....stomach cramping, diarrhea, vomiting or near vomiting...it was all there. I felt better, mentally anyway. I went to bed and finally got some sleep. My alarm clock cat woke me up at 6:00 on the dot. Obviously she didn't realize I wasn't late for work and that I had another hour to sleep. All the logistics got worked out and BJ and I were on our way at 8:30. Traffic was slow and so of course I just knew all the swimmers were dying a slow and painful death in their little cup. We got there with 20 minutes left before the swimmers supposedly croak after being "expelled". We were taken back less than 5 minutes after we checked in. I had left my Nintendo DS in the truck because I thought we'd be able to leave after we dropped the specimen off and then come back in a little while. Not so. I undressed and we waited for this person and that person to come in and talk to me and collect the swimmers and take my vitals and give us papers to sign. We sat there and listened to all the couples within earshot of us get their instructions and such. The lady next to me was making me sick. All she cared to talk about was when she could get back in the gym and what kind of work out was ok to do and on and on....I wanted to tape her mouth shut. After her procedure she was laughing and reading a book and STILL talking about going to the gym. BJ said that I would be fine afterward if she was that good and ready to go. Let me break in here with my wisdom teeth story:

I got my wisdom teeth out 3 years ago and was put under for the first time in my life. When I came to, BJ said that I woke up about 5 or 6 times telling the same story and asking the same questions. The nurse walked by the room and laughed and said that I was really taking my time clearing my head and that I was recovering much slower than most of the patients. So I don't know how he got it into his head that I'd be any better this time.

I got my IV and then about 40 minutes later took my last trip to the bathroom. They came to get me and lead BJ to where he was to wait and I turned around to give him a kiss and the anesthesiologist about ripped my IV out because he was walking so fast. The nerves were really setting in now and I was tearing up because I just wanted it to go well and maybe get an extra egg out of there. He said that I'd be fuzzy for a minute and then not remember anything. He was right. I remember them asking me my SSN and sticking a probe on my arm and my BP cuff and then trying to put my leg in the stirrup thingy and then I was out. I'm guessing that they had to do my other leg without me because I have this vision that I just fell over on the table. One reason I think that is because my left leg was hurting and stiff when I woke up. Anyway...I came to as they were wheeling me back into my curtained room and said they were going to get BJ from the waiting room. I was so groggy and my ovaries were hurting, especially my left one. They gave me a hot compress and took my vitals again and here came BJ. I was so glad to see him even though I could only have see him because I couldn't keep my eyes open all the way. I told her my pain was an 8 out of 10 and she gave me something in my IV. BJ went to get my Vicodin and while he was gone my pain went down and she made me get up and walk. What is wrong with this lady? I can't keep my eyes open and the room is spinning! The only reason I didn't fall flat on my face was because I was holding my IV pole. I laid back down and they told me I only had 4 eggs out of the 5 follicles. I teared up again and BJ told me to stop crying. Great support babe, thanks. I couldn't believe the lady next to me was talking about going to the gym when I probably couldn't even tell you what a gym was at that point. It's a good thing we went over my instructions and plans beforehand because there is no way I could have remembered/understood any of it afterward.

I was in and out on the way home and I ate a cookie in the truck and we stopped for lunch and then it was home to crash. It was about 3:30 by this point. We snuggled on the couch and slept until about 5:30. I was still worn out but felt better. I took some Tylenol when we got home because I didn't know how the Vicodin would affect me. I took a half pill before bed because the pain started up again. It felt like ovulation and period cramps magnified. Not terrible, but uncomfortable enough that I wanted it to go away.

This morning I still have some twinges especially in my left ovary but other than that I'm fine. Plus, I have 2 fertilized embryos! That's the best part of this whole thing. So please pray that they make it to Friday. The next round of prayers will be for implantation, but I don't want to get too far ahead of myself.