So, about the ovaries.
Yes. The focal point of the last few weeks. The point of these dag-gone fertility drugs is to make those small, little ol' egg producing factories do what they do best... create eggs.
And boy did they.
These doctors/scientist have this process refined to (near) perfection. I know that there is a bit of "guessing" at the initial dosages and what not, but when they get it, they get it.
The doctor(s) explained that my ovaries contain follicles. Typically, each follicle produces one egg. Not every egg will mature in time for ovulation... but our goal was to mature the eggs, induce ovulation, and catch those suckers before they drop.
You can't imagine how heavy an ovary can get... i swear a had a 10 lb bowling ball in my abdomen. Seriously.
HEAVY.
Have i mentioned in any of this that I am painstakingly modest? Well well well...
To monitor these growing, egg producing, heavy ovaries, the doctor takes blood and does an ultra sound....
Doesn't sound too bad, does it?
Yeah, right.
The ultrasound wand....... GOES INSIDE!!!!
What the heck?!?!?!
You want me to do what? You want to put that WHERE?
Oh my gawwww... super embarrassing. But, I lived to fight another day.
So we monitor these ovaries... all the while my jeans are getting snug. Great, I'm gonna get fat while I'm at it.
They grow my ovaries to the size of small grapefruits. yes. small. GRAPEFRUITS!
I will say that it was cool to watch the follicles continue to get big. Inside each follicle, they believe there would be 1 egg. The first ultrasound we did the doctor said, "oh goody, you're full of follicles"
By the time we were done "growing" the eggs, I had approximately 7-8 follicles in each ovary. Each follicle was about 1 inch in diameter...
Holy crap... I felt like I was going to explode.
I have managed to make it to the final step of the "fertility" part. The last part is a shot, go figure. They call this one the "trigger shot". It is a shot of HcG. It makes the eggs mature. It also makes you ovulate in exactly 38 hours.
Like I said, they have this down to a fine science... so, at the 36 hour mark, they go in and grab'em while they're hot.
Waiting... waiting... waiting... BAM!
So... we made it to the retrieval days. John's retrieval was Monday... I will let him fill you in on that excitement. (Fellas, you may not want to read about that one. It isn't for the faint of heart.)
His retrieval, although seemingly painful, went very smoothly. We extracted some sperms and sent them to the incubator to bask for the night.
My retrieval was the following morning. Bright and early.
(I was naked under that thing... that in its self was an experience. lol)
They got mad at me because I had a piece of gum that morning. WTH? haha.
Oh and I should also mention, that was the first time I had been given anesthesia... WOAH! That stuff messed me up. One second I was talking to a room full of people about being modest, the next thing I know, I'm waking up as I'm being rolled outta the room.
The retrieval was a success. 15 eggs were retrieved. That, from what I understand, is a great number. The doctor did say that we wouldn't be able to use them all because some were not as developed as they needed to be. I was fine with that... I just wanted to have a couple at the very least.
We ended up being able to fertilize 8 eggs!
So, off to the lab with my eggs! My eggs and John's swimmers had a blind date. lol
CONCEPTION.
Now we wait. 72 hours.
72 hours and the products of all this torture will emerge.
In the first 24 hours the embryo will split into 2 cells.
the next 24, it divides into 4 cells.
If the embryo makes it to the next 24 hours, ideally it should be 6-9 cells.
On the day of my transfer, I was notified that one of the embryos did not make it. So, now we are down to 7.
The doctor did come in and say "today, we are going to be transferring two beautiful embryos"
My heart was put to a little ease.
We had one, 9 cell embryo.
One, 8 cell embryo.
Two, 7 cell.
And three 6 cell. ( i think i got that right, something along those lines)
John and I had already decided we were going to transfer 2 embryos. Statistically, there is a chance there could be twins. However, statistically, there is a chance we could also not get pregnant.
The transfer went smoothly... John got to be in the room when they did it. ( I think it would feel weird if I got knocked up and he wasn't even in the room. Explain THAT to a kid later down the road)
(side note :: he wore that thing home... just like that) (( this is gonna be a weird kid))
Wellllll... I caught you up to the transfer day.... Friday, June 13th.
Now, you get to wait with me. 13 whole days!
They refer to it as THE 2WW. (the 2 week wait)
It is the most miserable, heart wrenching, stressful (but good stress), anxiety inducing, traumatic 2 weeks of a woman's life.
I want so bad to know.
But I must wait.
2 more days!!
Thursday. That's the day I have been counting down too. The day I am afraid of.
What if it didn't take. What if it did?
My mind has been a pinball machine for the last 11 days.
Guess... I will just have to keep waiting.
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