ET for Two

4/16 - Egg Retrieval: So we get up at the asscrack of dawn in order to get up, get ready, get the kid up and ready, and get to the clinic by 7:45 AM. We opted to bring her with us and switch off watching her, since it was waaaay to early to drive to and from a family member's house to drop her off. My mom, who would be the only one close enough to drop her off with, was out of town this weekend. And my sister, who was willing to spend the night before to watch her at my mom's house, had a big test for school that morning that she couldn't reschedule.

It went okay. DH and Little Z had to stay out in the lobby the whole time, which was kind of a bummer. Last time, at the other clinic, my husband got to stay in my recovery cubby the whole time, so we had kind of planned on being able to do that with her this time. They would have let him in, but they didn't want her in there since there was another woman just coming out of her procedure as well. Ah well.

I'm not a fan of needles. They make me dizzy and nauseous and I get the cold sweats, especially whenever an IV is involved. So I'm even less of a fan of having to be poked more than once for a blood draw or IV, yet somehow over 75% of the time, end up getting multiple pokes! This time was no exception. She did something wrong with the elbow vein, and apparently my arm was swelling up with the liquid leaking out under the skin instead of in the vein. Yay. So I got a shot of Lidocaine in my hand and an IV there instead. Joy. Three shots.

I was actually surprised that they weren't all double checking my allergies and date of birth and whether I'd eaten yet that day. Every other procedure I've ever had, every single different person would double check the same information. Luckily, I'm me, have no allergies, and hadn't eaten. (I almost ate a tiny bit of peanut butter off my thumb when packing a brunch for Z, but realized my error before closing my mouth and was able to spit it out.)

They have me pee, walk me into the OR, lie down, put an oxygen mask on, give me a nice heated blanket and pillow (*sigh* My favorite part!) but no leg massager thingy, and then I don't remember much after that. I don't even remember counting backwards. As I start waking up, I hear someone say something about how "she should just be waking up now" and then people coming in to bother talk to me. I got juice and cookies at least. And the shivers. I think I often get the shivers after anesthesia. My memory is terrible about that kind of stuff though. It could just be chilly rooms and no heated blankies (which they only give before the procedures.)

And then the doctor comes in to tell me the results. Which was nice, sort of. Last time they didn't tell me any numbers until the following day. The "sort of" part was the numbers. 3. 3 eggs. Last time we did this, I had 13 eggs. When she did the follicle count before we started the BCP, she counted 11 follicles. Apparently, after starting the shots, I had only 5 follicles they'd been monitoring (plus the cyst.) And 2 of those also turned out to be cysts. I'd been wondering why she was only measuring a few black blobs each time, but I thought they were just watching the bigger ones. I'd had no idea that those were all we had!
Three. Eggs.
Out of the 13 our first IVF cycle (3.5 years ago,) 10 were mature enough to ICSI. So already 25% attrition rate. Then of those 10, 8 fertilized. Additional 20% failure. Then, of those 8, all had higher than normal fragmentation rates. (Normal is 20-25%, my best 4 were 30-45%. The others went up to 80%.) So 3 out of the original 13 were even worth bothering with transferring. Slightly less than 25%. And of those 3, only 1 implanted.
So with only 3 to start with, my hopes kind of plummeted. The doctor and later the nurse told me that we only needed one to be successful, but I can't imagine these ones being any better than the last ones. It's not like eggs get better with age.

So there were some tears, and a lot of numbness. And the depression I've been fighting ever since I started the BCP came and hit me. Hard. I almost don't even want to try again, if it doesn't work this time. If I didn't have my little girl to take care of, I don't even know if I'd be able to function.

4/17 - The day after the retrieval was my husband's *cough*ty-second birthday. We had a fun time. We all ate brunch at the mall, shopped a little. Played at the kiddie play area for a bit. Hit a Half-Price Books store on the way home. And we got the call with our results so far.
Of the 3 eggs retrieved, 2 were mature enough to ICSI, but both fertilized. So that's good news, I guess. I'm hoping my body put all its energy into making those some really quality eggs.

4/18 - After getting the info for my Day 3 egg transfer, I called back to ask about my little embryos. They couldn't tell me whether they were fragmenting or not, but could tell me that they're still dividing, so that's good. They're both still alive. So that's where I'm at today.

Are they twins if they haven't implanted yet?