Blood # 3

Well, my blood work from today is 1695!! It went from 809 on Friday to 1695 today. So that is pretty good. I've run out of the progesterone shot that I have been doing every morning, so tomorrow I have to go to the Dr. for them to give it to me. Jason gets a day off! :) Then we will move onto the transition, so I won't have another shot until the 3rd of October of the new progesterone ( the one that stings like a motha' ) & I think I will only do that once a week until November 7th. That won't be so bad. Our first ultrasound will be on October 8th. I am excited, yet nervous. I hope that everything goes good with them & there are no problems. One day at a time, though, right?
I spent all of yesterday in Vancouver w/ my grandma. She is out of ICU & in her own private room. She didn't have any need for any more blood transfusions yesterday & so far today. So she is getting better. She has her appetite back & she was getting kind of feisty! She just needs to rest. She still has a long way to go still, but she is slowly improving, so that is all we can hope for now. They are trying to find a different blood-thinner to put her on, otherwise there might be more problems later on. She is a little fighter, so thank heavens for that!

# 2

Had blood work this morning to make sure my numbers from Wednesday went up. Was nervous about this one, because the day we found out we were pregnant, I got a call from my parents saying my grandmother was in the hospital & it didn't look good. She had a stroke last August & aside from her speech, she seemed to be doing o.k. Well, she began to bleed internally. I guess that can happen with the type of blood-thinner she was on since the stroke. She lost a lot of blood & honestly it didn't look good. I couldn't believe that the day I thought may never happen, the happiest day of my life turned into heartache. My grandmother is in Vancouver, Washington, which is about 2-2 1/2 hours away. We spent all day yesterday with her. She was alert but very weak. She has had 13 transfusions since being there. It is one of those catch-22 things. They found the source of her bleeding in her colon, but they are hoping it will heal on its own. Today she was doing a lot better, didn't bleed as much, but it will all depend what her blood work comes back as to what the next step is. This has been a crazy week to say the least. Our family also found out that Thomas Martin, the man that killed my sister, died on Sunday. Such a strange thing still to think that he is dead. He took a big part of my life away from me when I was 14 & I've had to live my life without her since then, but he has been alive & walking this earth the whole time. For me, it is something that will take some getting used too. Hopefully this will help bring some closure to my family after all this time.
Back to my blood work today. Wednesday was 401. Today it was 809!! It doubled! That is a great sign. So I started yet ANOTHER shot in the butt. I will say this, I HATE THIS ONE. It is progesterone in sesame oil. Lets just say that I am STILL feeling it in my cheek & it has been about an hour! Not fun. But all for a good cause. I will still do the same progesterone in oil like I have been doing...& in a few days I will do the other one. It was kinda cool, cause the little schedule she gave me for these shots today said "Days to begin progesterone after POSITIVE pregnancy results!" Yes!! I am still getting used to it. Will take some time to let it sink in. Thankfully my grandmother was alert & I could show her the pictures of them from the transfer & tell her she was to a great-grandma. I will never forget how big her eyes got & she cried. I hope this will give her something to keep fighting for. I am going to head off to bed, I am TIRED! And I am heading down to Vancouver again tomorrow morning to spend the day with her. I have another appointment on Sunday morning, so I will post the results then!!

The news

Today was my beta. I am PREGNANT!!! Can you freakin' believe it? My # is 401, so they said it was excellent numbers. I go in on friday morning to make sure my #'s keep going up. I am in shock still. Just got off the phone with Jason, he is at work, & they are short staffed, so I think he is in shock like me. He kept telling me congrats!! Poor thing. I really thought this was going to come back negative since I had a little bit of spotting yesterday..... I just can't believe this at all. I've gone through all of these fertility treatments for a reason, but after so many negatives, you get used to it after awhile I suppose. So when you hear something different, it puts you into shock or something. Such a weird place to be in. But a great one!!
Just called my parents, my mom is at work, but I talked to my dad. I told him that he was going to be a grandpa & his reply was "I am too young & handsome to be a grandpa". I know he said this to get me to stop weeping & get me to laugh. And it worked to some degree..... Now I can't wait for my mom to get off of work later & she finds out. You will probably hear her screaming from Montana!! :) She has waited a long time for this & I've wanted to tell her she was going to be a grandma for a long time too.....
Keep your fingers crossed that my #'s keep going up, & that they are healthy. And Christia, I know u read this so I will tell u that you've been such a wonderful friend to me. Always supportive & understanding. You truly are a wonderful person with a great big heart. You are far away, but I am sending u a little hug for always listening to me blab!!

Transfer

Yesterdays transfer went really well. The embryologist told us that the 2 we were transferring were grade A (meaning they are the best!) They will be freezing 5 others, possibly 1 more that are all grade A!! These are the pictures of our day 5 blastocyst that were transferred. :) The whole procedure itself was painless. Much easier than the those IUI's I did in the past. I would cramp up so bad during those. During an IVF transfer, your bladder has to be super full in order for them to get the best image on the ultrasound. We watched as the embryologist sucked them both in the transfer tube on a big screen, then they were brought in, & our re put them in. They had marked where my uterine lining was (which looked good still too) & you could actually see the catheter go in, then these 2 very small things come out. I lost it then. Was the most amazing thing in the world to see. Then it was all done. Just had to lay there for 20 minutes then off we went. I slept part of the day & just resting again today. In 10 days we will know if it worked. They said that there is a 50% chance of twins (Jason freaked a bit on that one) & a 70% chance at pregnancy. So we got some odds on our side, but it is still up in the air. They said I had a perfect IVF cycle, so that makes me feel good..... Now we just have to wait!!

Blastocyst Info

Here is some info about the day 5 blastocysts from our office. :)




Blastocyst and Extended Culture

The continued refinement of the lab and culture media offers greater opportunity for infertile couples. The introduction of blastocyst culture is the latest important step that helps increase implantation rates while minimizing multiple births. Recent studies confirm the fact that blastocyst transfers on day 5 or day 6 have essentially equivalent pregnancy rates if not greater than compared to embryo transfers on day 3. However, the advantage’s with blastocyst culture is the transfer of significantly fewer embryos while maintaining these pregnancy rates.

Traditionally, embryos have been transferred to the uterus on the second or third day of development after in vitro fertilization. New culture media now are designed to take into account the changing needs of the developing embryo in vitro allowing laboratories to extend culture of these embryos for up to six days.

After five to 6 days of growth, the cells of the embryo should have divided many times over, and have begun to differentiate by function. The embryos that survive to this stage of development are usually strong, healthy, and robust. They are now called blastocysts. At this point, the blastocyst contains around 100 cells that are formed into 2 distinct types, the inner cell mass that goes on to make the fetus and the surface cells called the trophectoderm that goes on to make the placenta.


What Are the Benefits of Blastocyst Transfer?

Blastocyst culture allows for better selection of an embryo for transfer as described above which leads to higher implantation / pregnancy rates and a reduction in high order multiple births. This means that various obstetrical complications that may arise from multiple pregnancies can be minimized. It is especially important in helping patients avoid having to make the difficult personal and ethical decisions regarding selective reduction. Pacific Northwest Fertility and IVF Specialists recommend transferring 1-2 blastocysts.

Is Blastocyst Culture and Transfer for Everyone?

Candidates for a blastocyst transfer typically are younger and have a large number of eggs. On average those having 8 or more embryos on day 3 are potential candidates for blastocyst culture. Other candidates may be those patients in which a multiple pregnancy would put them at an extreme risk. Unfortunately, blastocyst culture does not improve the quality of an embryo. Most poor quality embryos will not become blastocyst and even some high quality embryos will never become blastocysts. Finally there are those rare patients whose embryos develop very poorly in the blastocyst culture media and therefore need to be transferred on day 3.

7

Dr. just called, looks like my transfer will be on Sunday!! 7 of the 9 are super strong, the other 2 are a little bit slower. So, since we have so many stronger looking eggs, they want to wait to do a transfer on day 5 blastocyst stage to weed out the best ones. I am excited but a little nervous. They still have the rest of today & Saturday to keep growing, so I am hoping that we don't loose too many more. 7 is still a lot though. And we are only transferring 2. We shall see what happens. In so many ways this is better, scheduling wise. Jason is at work today & if the transfer was today, he would have to leave work to come with me since they have you take a Valium 30 minutes before the procedure. Not sure why that is exactly, so that has me a bit worried. Also, you have to drink tons of water. They say 1 liter. Yes, 1 liter!! They can better see everything with the ultrasound if you have a full bladder.
Everything is looking really good they said, so I can stop worrying now for a bit. I know if it is meant to be it will happen, if not, we will try again. This whole process really wasn't as bad as I feared. Don't get me wrong, it is not walk in the park, but really wasn't too bad. Jason has been doing a really great job with my progesterone shots in the morning. He is the lucky one that gets to give it to me since it is in the butt. The needle is frighteningly long, I will have to take it's picture & post it. Makes your cheek a bit sore the rest of the day, but nothing I can't handle. I am so freakin' proud of Jason for taking charge & having the strength to give me my shots. I am sure he takes some sick pleasure of jabbing me with that long thing in my rear, so he knows it will keep me in line. :) Depending on how I feel after Sunday, I will try to post. Keep your fingers crossed..............

9

The egg retrieval yesterday went really well. You have all this build-up cause you are not sure what to expect from it & how you will feel afterwords. Everyone was really nice & so helpful. I got dressed in my lovely gown, booties, & cap & off I went to the procedure room. Jason had to head off to his special area to do his thing. They started an IV, got me hooked up to all these monitors, then came the very nice "relaxing" drug. That was wonderful. I didn't really care at that point who came in or out of that room then. Then our Dr. came in & talked to me a bit. Not sure what I said or even if it made much sense, but next thing I knew, the oxygen mask was on me, & they knocked me out.

I woke up in the recovery room with Jason at my side. I took one look at him & I wept like a fool. Not sure the exact reasoning behind the tears. I know I kept asking him how they were & how many there were. "They" being my eggs. There were 10, with the possibility of more once they got washed. And everything went well. I wasn't in much pain at all. Just achy, kind of crampy feeling. Nothing major at all. I spent the day in bed, doing nothing.

Today I am better, little bloated, but no achy feeling. I have been cleaning up the house while clenching onto my cell phone for the update as to how the follies are doing. The nurse just called & told me they got 12, but 9 have fertilized so far. The other 3 were not quite mature enough. That is fine with me. I was terrified they wouldn't fertilize at all or something would be wrong with my eggs or something. So far they have me scheduled for day 3 transfer (Friday @ 3:30), but she said it is looking like it will be a day 5 blastocyst transfer on Sunday.

I'll see if I can add the pictures off of our clinics website so you can see what they look like. Pretty interesting stuff. We will also get a picture of them before they get transferred. So far everything is looking good. I will post later once I know more about how they are doing!

http://www.pnwfertility.com/laboratory/microscope.asp

If the pictures don't show up on my post, just click the link to our fertility clinic, & you can see the pictures. :)

Here we go!

Today was much better than yesterday. I saw the same re as yesterday, but this appointment went a lot better. Thank heavens. Started off like usual, checking my lining, which she said was beautiful. Only someone in her field could say something like that. :) Then the EXTREMELY large right ovary stuffed with follies. No doubt the right ovary is the over-achiever in this cycle. The left is still being a turd. Still hiding partially, but we could see more today. She says that it won't be too difficult to get those out even if it is tucked behind the uterus. We shall see. I have a total of 18 follicles, but only 12-13 are mature enough. That is plenty. So this morning was my last shot of Lupron ( tear ) & the only shot I get tonight is the HcG. And that is the one I've feared since the very beginning. Partly because it goes in my ass & the other part is that Jason has to be the one to give it to me. God, I hope he can do this tonight. It has to be done at the exact time they tell you ( at 9pm tonight) or it will affect the whole retrieval on Tuesday. Oh, yeah, did I mention, my follies are getting sucked out this Tuesday at 8 am sharp!! Thank goodness. I've promised myself not to ever complain throughout this whole thing, & if there is one thing I could complain about is the bloating. Yuck. Makes getting dressed interesting. :)

In a nutshell, today was a good day. Makes me confident going into our appt on Tuesday. Now, if I could only stop having those dreams. I have this reoccurring dream of the scene from "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (the original one), where they go in the room with the golden goose. Except the goose is me. In a cage, laying the eggs that either are "good" or if they are "bad" that awful rejection noise comes on & the rotten egg is dropped down below. Strange I know. But every night for the past few nights, that has been my dream.

So there it is... Tuesday is my big day. Doubt I will be able to post that day, but will try on Wednesday to keep it updated. I should know by then too, how many made it & how they are doing. Also the day of the transfer. Wish me luck!!

Day 8 of ART cycle

This morning was my appt. I didn't see my regular re, this was the one I saw on Tuesday, that I wasn't too impressed with. I've been feeling good, almost too good I suppose, so I should've seen this coming. She walks in, asks how I am, I tell her I am doing good, & she tells me that I have nothing to worry about because I've had " the most perfect cycle". Kiss of death right there. Then the ultrasound starts. Of course lazy left ovary is still partially blocked. The right one, the one that hurts sometimes has the most. But, after all the measuring & counting, she counted 10. 5 less then what my dr. counted on Thursday. I am not sure what happened to the other 5, nor did I ask. I don't know if she got all of the follicles or not. It is hard to tell which ones have been counted or not. I can only pray she counted wrong. I asked about the 10, which she said was on the low side. I remember my dr. telling me she like 15-20. I made a sour face, I am sure of it. This dr. noticed, then she said that even though it is low numbers, that because of my young age, that it could mean they are better eggs. Yeah, right lady. I may not be a dr., but I've read my stuff. Thing that sucks is that my dr. & my coordinator don't work weekends. So, I have to wait until monday to find out from them what they think. And to top it all off I have to go back again tomorrow morning. Not really sure why.... so she can tell me I have 5 instead of 10?! I don't know what to think or do anymore really. I should've remember from all the previous things, that even though things can be "perfect" doesn't mean crap really in the end. All you end up with is some positive words & a negative pregnancy test. I knew they were being too careful with me. I just knew it. So, they are still saying retrieval is on Tuesday, I will still go on with it, just to get the experience under my belt for the next cycle. I knew this could possibly happen, so that is just the way it goes I suppose. Hopefully by some great miracle tomorrows appt will give me a little more of my hope back.

Day 6

Yesterdays appt. went well. Actually saw my Dr. so that was wonderful. My left ovary was a little more visible then on Tuesday. I have 15 follicles so far. My Dr. likes to see 15-20, so she is happy with what I have so far, & the other part of my ovary isn't visible yet, so I am really on target. I know there was concern about hyper stimulating, & I completely understand that, & I don't want to deal with the side effects of that at all. But I am hoping there is a little more than 15 in there. It sounds like some huge number, I am sure. But that is no guarantee that they will be viable. I am not being a debbie downer or anything, but there is that chance. Any who, we decided to to the conventional method. Meaning, they will put my eggs in a dish & add the sperm & pray the sperm can figure out where to go!! Shoot, there isn't anywhere else they can go in the little dish, so lets hope they don't get lost in there. We got some serious problems if that happens! :) The other method is ICSI, where they inject 1 single sperm into the egg. That is usually for sperm related issues, which we don't have. I hope it works. Yesterday was also my pre-op. Just did my weight (damn my scale IS right), height, blood-pressure, all that fun stuff. Everything checked out o.k. She went over the procedure itself, which takes around 15 minutes. They don't mess around that is for sure!! In & out!! I will be there for around 2 hrs or so. It was reassuring that they don't let you leave until you can at least get up & dress yourself. Better than what they did to me after my laproscopic procedure. I woke up & 5 minutes later they were shoving me outta bed. Craziness!
I asked the Dr. when she thought the retrieval might be, & depending on how tomorrows (Saturdays') appt goes, it looks like it will be this Tuesday! Then the transfer will either be on Friday or Sunday. Most likely Friday. One week from today! Oh my!!
I know the egg retrieval will not be pleasant at all & I am prepared for that as much as I can be. But the idea or thought that this might be it for Jason & I makes me wanna take whatever discomfort or whatever to reach that goal. Honestly, I've never been more proud of myself ever. I've had some emotional moments during this, but all & all, I've been strong. I am no longer the little weak infertile person. I'm a person who was dealt with a challenge & I am going to face it head on. No matter the outcome of this cycle, or any others we may have to do, I will never forget how hard I fought & how many fears I've overcome.

1st Check-up

Yesterday was my first check-up since starting stims. My right ovary was easily visable cause it has 10 pretty good looking follicles in it. My left, though, was hiding behind my uterus. Strange I know. But that is me. Strange. She could see part of it, & there were 4 there. So, 14 so far. I turned in all my consent forms & triple checked to make sure my body is doing what it should be doing. She said there was nothing to worry about yet. Yet. But we still had to wait for my bloodwork. If my estrogen was too high, I would be back at the office today, if not, I can wait until Thursday morning. My estrogen was 187! Which is not too high, so I am set for the next step! Meds stay the same. I go in tomorrow at 9:15 & was told it will take a little longer cause I have to have pre-op instructions. Eeeekkkk!! If all goes well, my egg retrieval will be next week & a couple days later, my transfer. That is, if all goes well. Can't believe it! Look forward to the day that I don't have to poke myself with a needle. It wasn't so bad in the beginning, but now that I've got 3 going in my stomach, it is not really fun anymore. Feel like a pin-cushion sometimes.