Two Heartbeats

Right there on the ultrasound. One (er...two) of the most beautiful pixel blips you'd ever hope to see. Shortly after noon on November 19th, right there in front of my disbelieving eyes. I'd been so cautious with my expectations, it was a little hard to wrap my head around it. It worked... it really worked. There were two little figures and there were their heartbeats.

We only got two eggs from the retrieval. They were both good, they both fertilized, they both made it to three days, and they both survived to eight weeks. As I said over and over again as I stared at the ultrasound monitor... Oh My God!

Let me back up a bit. So we'd been waiting anxiously for this day since...well, since the positive pregnancy test on October 27th. (Although believe me, that was only the formal pregnancy test... Red went a little test crazy for a while...remember the pregnancy test scene from Knocked Up?) I leave work shortly before our appointment at 11 am and make my way up Spring Garden Road to AART, nervous, heart pounding, willing things to be OK while preparing myself for them not to be. I meet Red in the parking garage as she's still looking for a spot; I get in the car and it's this bizarre moment where we're about to find out whether we're going to be parents or not but instead we need to focus on the mundane task of finding a parking space.

We head up to AART and I shakily take my seat in the waiting room. An older couple is there and a younger couple that I kind of recognize, but I'm not sure. AART is really behind schedule today, there are retrievals and implantations going on left and right. The young couple get called in to their ultrasound first and as the receptionist calls the woman's name I remember: this is the couple that had their retrieval immediately after Red's. In the recovery room that day, as we were trying to deal with the news that they only got two eggs, I had to listen to this couple, still filled with the pre-retrieval optimism, chat with the nurses. Sure that was us less than an hour ago before, but it stung to have to listen to them as I was trying to comfort my devastated, semi-conscious wife. And now they were ahead of us for their eight week ultrasound. The little pessimistic douchebag voice in my brain fires up: "Yep, that's how it's gonna be... they probably got loads of eggs, and now they're going to have loads of kids, and we'll have to sit here and listen, and then go find out that we've got nothing." My heart sinks lower and as I fight back the nervous movements and the tears, I say a little prayer and squeeze Red's hand. (I may also have done a little sudoku.)

So the couple is called, and minutes later the younger guy comes out, and asks whether the older couple wants to come in and see the twins. Yep... this is how it's going to happen... you're so right, little douchebag voice.

We eventually get into the room a little after 12 pm, and have to wait some more in the exam room, me pacing back and forth and trying (and failing) to make jokes about the equipment and the situation. It's just before 12:30 pm when Dr. Bouzayen comes in and slowly, carefully talks us through where we are in the process and what she's going to do. She brings a clerk guy with her who's being trained. "Great," says the douchebag voice, "we're about to receive terrible news and we've got to share it with THIS GUY? Of course we do..." Now the doctor has the probe in and comments on how Red's bladder is already filling back up. "Oh, haha, Red has to pee a lot... what about the embryos?" The doctor says that her lining is nice and thick. "OK, that's good... but not really what we want to know...embryos?" The doctor points out the cyst on one of Red's ovaries. Red and I share a telepathic, "Oh no...that's it...it didn't work and now there's a cyst." But the doctor points out that it's actually a good thing as the cyst is providing good hormones, and will probably go away on its own. She continues and suggests that it might be time to take a look in the uterus. "Gee, do you think? Arrggghh" The douchebag is winning.

As Dr. Bouzayen starts her sweep I think I catch a momentary flash of something that I recognize, something that triggers a shape memory... wait a second, that's what foetuses look like... and then she finds the right spot and there it is. It's pretty much an alien shaped blob, but it's the right kind of alien shaped blob. And there's a little bit of pixel noise on the image that I'm not used to seeing on the ultrasounds. Not pixel noise... that is the friggin' heartbeat. Oh My God! The douchebag voice is silent. The doctor reminds us that we put two embryos in; maybe we should check for another one. A few movements of her wrist and she finds it... other side of the uterus, another alien blob, another bit of pixel noise. Oh My God! The douchebag voice has gone home for the day.. hostile work environment. I'm stunned, thrilled, gobsmacked, grateful, excited...

And the doctor is disappointed. Tsk, she says as she makes notes, that's our second set of twins today. Our goal is really to have one healthy baby, she says, but she's grinning as she says it, and I'm.... well, I'm dealing with the wonderful fact that I'm much closer to becoming a father. The doctor says that as soon as she saw that both foetuses had their own amniotic sacs, and that both had strong heartbeats, the chance of miscarriage dropped from 25 % to 5 %. In a few minutes, we have jumped many rungs up the statistical ladder. The doctor is giving us lots of information about checkups and progress and due dates and I'm listening but it's like my brain has a soft filter on it... everything's warm and fuzzy and looking fantastic. The doctor and the clerk leave and Red and I are left to contemplate our new, very likely role as the parents of twins.

TWINS!

So that was was almost two weeks ago, at the eight week ultrasound. This Thursday, Red will be 10 weeks pregnant, a couple of weeks shy of the end of her first trimester. That's supposed to be the safe time to tell people that you're pregnant, so it's an important milestone, although all of you guys out there are obviously already in the know.

Red's already getting big. She went maternity clothes shopping for the first time on Sunday and was thrilled to be able to wear pants the past two days. She is still nauseous (but not vomitous, if that's even a word), especially at night, she's wicked tired, frequently ravenous, and wants her breasts gone. They are the worst thing for her so far, I believe. They are very itchy and hot and swollen. She's taken to putting cold cloths on them in the evening. Last night she discovered that paper towel works even better, "Cause it sticks!"

I'm feeling more at ease about referring to the foetuses as babies. I may have even started talking to them a little bit. But the fact that we're having twins is just a bonus. I wanted at least one... to get two is just double the blessing. And I know that sounds a bit cliche, but it's the truth. Red was pretty convinced before the ultrasound that if there was something in her oven, there were two of that something in there. (In fact, while I was blown away after the doctor found the first one, Red was waiting for the second.) I was so worried about there being nothing that two, three, four, whatever... I'm just thrilled.

To be fair, though, I was in a bit of a daze after the ultrasound. For a few minutes, Red was unsure if I should even drive. We'd both been at work before the appointment and were supposed to go back, but that seemed wrong. So we decided to drive over to Dartmouth and visit family. My Mom called and we gave her the news...very excited. We called my sister and gave her the news...I had to assure her three times that I was, in fact, quite serious... very excited. My sister passed me off to my Dad... who promptly reminded me that I wouldn't be able to go far from the house anytime soon. And suggested that the news would be good for my Mom since she had had a fender bender that morning. Dad has his own way of processing things...

So there we are. We have an appointment with our family doctor tomorrow, an appointment with Dr. Busayn next week, and then an ultrasound at the IWK the week after. Please keep your prayers and good energy and good thoughts coming our way... as some people have told us, you never stop worrying about losing your baby until they're born, and then you have a whole new set of things to worry about. Hopefully we'll be celebrating Christmas safe in the knowledge that we're through the first trimester, and contemplating that next Christmas we'll probably be taking care of two six month olds. Well, we bought this house with the idea that we'd fill it with kids... it looks like we're off to a good start. Wish us luck. I'll try to post next week with any news.

I leave you with some pics from the day of the Ultrasound.

"Aieeee! Twins!"


"Well done with the baby growing, baby!"

"One pretty mama..."

Six Weeks and Change

This past Thursday Red was officially six weeks pregnant. As I said in my previous post, at eight weeks we go for the first ultrasound. (Well, the first since the one they used to implant the embryos.) If that goes well, Red and I think we'll be able to relax a little bit. We decided a while ago to wait for eight weeks to start using the B word (and the accompanying mindset), and I'm trying to stick to that plan, but Red is already there. She frequently talks to the embryos in her belly, and I have to confess, I may have said a few encouraging words in that general direction.

A more significant milestone, at least for us, was passed last Tuesday. On that day in our last cycle, Red had the miscarriage. Getting past that point was a big psychological comfort for Red, even though we knew based on her levels that things were much better this time around. And symptomatically they are better as well, in that Red feels worse.

Red's very tired, her breasts are sore (and bigger), she's occasionally nauseous, and her food tastes have changed. She used to be very much a salad girl, and bread was causing her stomach trouble. Now the thought of a salad makes her ill, and she's craving bread. So not much fun for Red these days, but as she says when she catches herself complaining, the worse she feels, the better it is for our embryos. There are some benefits for me though. Aside from the obvious, one of my favourite pregnancy symptoms is the fatigue. I love naps, and since Red is all about the naps these days, I just tag along and nap supportively. If my wife needs me to nap with her (even if she doesn't sat that at all), then damnit, the household tasks I'm avoiding are just going to have to wait.

After the ultrasound we're planning to buy our own copy of "What to Expect..."; my sister has kindly been lending us hers, and we felt weird about buying our own copy until we were more sure. In a similar vein, at eight weeks, I'll feel like it's OK to start making changes to the house... finally putting in a pet door in the door to the basement so we can move the cat litter downstairs, giving a good cleaning to one of the bedrooms, starting to gather some of the baby stuff that's been offered to us by people who no longer need it. Everything's probably fine now, and we take comfort in the symptoms that we've been told signify a healthy pregnancy, but we're really holding up that ultrasound as the milestone we need to get through to go into the next stage.

On the other side of that milestone, in that next stage, that's when the reality will set in. As Mark said this week, you (mostly) stop worrying about staying pregnant, and start worrying about having a child, and all that that brings with it.

Red got her flu shot this week, and was at a clinic with a lot of screaming kids (kids under 5 and pregnant women are in the same risk group). Later that night she recounted the environment and wondered if we knew what we were doing. But we both do... at least, we both know that we want kids, the good and the bad of them. As for knowing what to do when raising them... well that's a whole other worry, for another time.

Mark and I had a long talk this week, and since Amynah's due in five weeks, and he's a thinker, he's thought a lot about becoming a father. One of the things he told me (and I hope I get it right) was that as he's been gathering stuff for his kid-to-be, he's felt a little more secure about being a Dad, but still not ready. But the thing that really brought it close for him was getting books from our mutual friend Carol. Mark has a strong memory of his Dad reading to him as a child, and said that getting these books, books he could read to his kid, really made him feel that he could be a father to his kid in the way his Dad had been to him.

Many of my close friends now have kids, and up until the last while, all of those conversations have been at least partially coloured by the difficulties Red and I have had in getting pregnant. And I really enjoy hanging out with our friends and their children, but there's always been a tinge of sadness present, selfish thoughts wondering why we couldn't have the same. I brought a sense of hope for our little project into my conversation with Mark this week, and I caught a glimpse of what it will be like when I'm able, without the slightest bit of regret or self-pity, to celebrate the tiny ones that people I love have brought into this world. I can't wait.

Alright then... that's enough of my little pity party for one week. I'm going to try to post once a week from here on in. Keep those good thoughts, and prayers and other fine mojo coming people... something's working. And despite the non-scientific nature of "mojo", I'm still generally a scientific-minded person, so I think we need to make sure we control as many variables as we can in this little experiment. Keep it up people... we can do this!

28 Times Better

Red went for her blood test on Tuesday. Things are better than last time. How much better? Her HCG levels at this point in our last cycle were 39. This time they're 1105. AART was happy with the levels this time and booked Red in for an 8 week ultrasound on Nov. 19. And on top of that, they gave us a due date. An actual, honest to God due date. July 1st. (That's right, the 7th month... not that that's anything but a coincidence.)

The last few weeks have been particularly brutal at work, so when Red called me Tuesday afternoon, I went out to the hallway and sat down on the floor and listened to the tears of joy pouring out of my cellphone. Despite the fact that Red had taken two home tests prior to the official blood, and both had come up positive immediately (not what happened last time), she/we were still nervous, not sure if we were deluding ourselves. Apparently we weren't.

In addition, Red has worse symptoms than before. Very sore breasts, frequent trips to the bathroom (er, more frequent), fatigue, some unsettledness in the stomach and food issues. Plus she says that she can feel her uterus expanding. All good signs according to the book. (Though it's still a bit weird to tell someone how badly your wife is feeling and have them be happy for you.)

Of course we're still nervous. We're approaching the day of the miscarriage in the last cycle; every day without problems is one day closer to confidence. If things are good at the ultrasound we'll be a little more sure. Once we hit 3 months (mid-December) we'll be even better.

We've been so paranoid about using the B word, we still call it the embryo. Or maybe it's still calling them the embryos. Red's levels are high enough - maybe both embryos survived. How crazy would that be?

We're a little nervous with all the swine flu talk going on, especially where being pregnant puts Red in one of the high risk groups. However, being in that group means queue jumping abilities for vaccinations. In accordance with the song Mark posted on his blog, I think she should find a way to maximize smugness when she does her queue jumping.

Anyway, as Buddy Holly would say, we're crying, waiting and hoping. Keep sending the good mojo our way - it seems to be working.

One last thing: 28 times the levels, same day as my birthday, in July, and 28 is a multiple of seven! Eh, eh... (Travis is right... you can do this with any number, but it's still comforting in a weird way. I think it's the imposing of an order on a situation that you can't really affect.)

Love to you all...

Ah Computers...

In bygone days, if one wrote that one looked like a bearded puffer fish, one's readers only needed rely on their own imagination. Nowadays, within mere hours, we are lovingly provided with the following...


Kudos to my dear friend Travis.

As to the actual subject of this blog... Red is still resting, we're still waiting and hoping. We're very grateful for all of your supportive comments. They give us warm fuzzies, and it's been clinically proven that warm fuzzies are beneficial to the "embryo snuggling" process. (My apologies for going all medical lingo-y on you.)

Hoping the Second Time's the Charm

Sorry dear readers...I have not been giving you the attention you deserve. It has been a very busy 12 days since my last post. And as we've learned is normal with IVF, it's been an emotional ride, especially in the last week.

Red felt pretty good during the ovary stimulation, and the doctor gave us the go ahead to inject the HCG a few days earlier than in our last cycle. Went that night to get the HCG from our magical bag of pharmacy provided material... no HCG. The pharmacy had been so good the last cycle at giving us everything we needed well ahead of time. Pharmacy is closed. Doctor on call won't call us back. Finally the doctor calls us back and Red can instead inject another dose of the stimulating drug. In our heads we knew that another day didn't really matter... we knew from talking to the nurses that it was a 50/50 call for the HCG that day anyway. But in our guts we were so worried. We were completely reassured when we went in the next day, and the pharmacist apologized, but it was more stress in an already stressful situation.

And then we went in for the retrieval. Red's Estradiol levels weren't as high as last time, and there weren't quite as many follicles. (I actually don't know why we didn't go as long with the stimulation as we did last cycle.) But we expected, based on the levels and follicle numbers, to get at least six eggs.

We got two.

It was so disheartening and disappointing. We were extremely sad after the retrieval. We tried to lift our spirits with the fact that we got even two eggs (some people going through the cycle don't get any), but we kept comparing it to the last cycle where we got seven good eggs. In that cycle we lost three to panspermia (Red's nickname for it is "slutty eggs"), implanted two on Day 3 and lost the other two in attempting to get them to Day 5 for freezing. We knew we were doing ICSI (direct injection of sperm into egg) to avoid the panspermia but odds were not good that both eggs would survive. (We found out later that it's about 70% survival, but how do you apply that to two eggs.) It's always better to have more in case the unforseen happens. And we didn't know the quality of the eggs so we didn't have any idea what their chances were. It was a pretty low day.

So the next morning we're asleep and the phone rings. We instantly know who's calling and we brace for the worst. I'm a little shaky as I hand the phone to Red, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

The ICSI went well, both fertilized, and our little cells our chugging along. A little bit of relief for that day, but still the nagging, depressing worry. Next day, same thing: awakened by phone call, shaky handoff... and they're still going strong. One is scored at 19 out of 20, the other a perfect 20 out of 20. Later that day we get the call to come in the next morning for the implantation. One more night, still worried as we get to the clinic, and Sonya the embryologist comes out and tells us... still two, still scoring 19 and a 20. She shows them to us on the microscope hooked up to the monitor.




Whew...a little bit of relief... our two eggs held on until day three. The doctor said the implantation went very well, very smooth. We got a similar ultrasound picture as last time, with the little white dot showing the air bubbles placed around the cells within the medium.

Red is not feeling as sore as she was at this point last time, but other than that, we're at the same place we were last cycle. We've got two cells (with even the same scores) in the oven. We have to wait a little more than two weeks to go for a pregnancy test. So sometime before the end of the month, we'll get our first test results back. That's test #1. Hopefully Red's levels (I think it's the pregnancy-generated HCG) will be nice and high this time and then it's more waiting for the 7 week ultrasound sometime in mid-November. That's the first time we'll be able to feel any kind of confidence. So it's at least another month of worrying. And then there's the 1st trimester hurdle to reach...

But we take some hope from the fact that with only two eggs harvested, we got pretty much the best possible result, and an identical situation out of implantation as we did the last time. Now we just have to wait. Red has taken all this week off, and she's just going to relax. The doctors say that she could do her normal activities (work, school, etc.) without any affect on our little embryos, but it makes her feel better at a gut level to give them a nice relaxed home for the first week of their time in her uterus. I have to admit, it makes me feel a little better too.

So that's the story so far. Please keep sending us your love, good thoughts, prayers, meditations, and crossed fingers and toes. And just to confirm, Red still thinks I look hot in scrubs, but she doesn't want to see me in them again for at least 34 weeks. I'm very hopeful that that will happen.

P.S. Here's us making eyes at our camera trying to relieve a little bit of our nervousness on implantation day. Red's bladder is full to bursting for the implantation, but she looks great. I, on the other hand, look like some sort of bearded puffer fish.

Some Interesting Reading

I forgot to put this in my last post. A pair of articles in the Herald concerning fertility treatments. The first is about the experience, the second is about the idea of having provincial health care cover fertility treatment costs.

I recognize the system is pretty strapped for cash, but there is an argument to be made that infertility is a medical issue. And specifically for IVF, there's also an argument that without the cost burden, people might be more willing to implant less eggs, resulting in less multiple births, which tend, in the long run, to cost the health care system more.

On the other hand, I can understand the argument that any public health system IVF dollars could be better spent elsewhere.

I don't know the answer... just wanted to raise the question with you all. I'd probably feel a lot stronger about it if we didn't have mysterious benefactors.

Two posts in one night... aren't you all lucky!

3 Months, 3 Weeks and 6 Days...

...since my last posting. Most of you probably know, or can guess, why...

I'm lazy.

That's the main reason, but there were some other factors as well:
1. We were pregnant and then we weren't. I didn't want to talk about it for a long while, and certainly didn't want to blog about it.
2. The NDP won the election June 9th... it's tough to find things to blog about when you're living in a Socialist utopia.
3. On June 12th I was taken down playing soccer and broke my collarbone.
4. It was summer y'all, I had things to do.

But let's talk about why the blog is back.

After taking the mandatory three months off, Red and I are now well into our second IVF cycle.

Red started the Suprefact September 4th (the same day we toiled as wait staff for our mysterious IVF benefactors), had her Down Regulation Check on September 24th (bravely all by herself while her deadbeat husband was flying back from Ottawa meetings) and started the injections the same night. The first post-injection blood test and ultrasound was Monday morning, and things are going well. The technical term, as used by Brenda at AART, is that Red has "billions and billions of follicles". (Brenda's kind of like a cute Carl Sagan.)

If things progress as they did last time, we should be going in for retrieval the end of next week. If we have a number of fertilized eggs to implant a few days later, we'll have things to be extra thankful for this year.

But that's next week. Before we get there, we have more tests. And Red has many more vajayjay ultrasounds, blood tests and nightly injections to get through before we get to the main event. I've said it before, but she's the brave one of this partnership... I'm always impressed by how she handles all of this. Even more so this time, knowing what she has coming. If my ovaries were so full they were smooshed into each other and somebody started poking a giant needle-shaped vacuum into them and digging around like they were looking for loose change... I wouldn't be in very good humour.

And I know a little bit how I would respond... I'm sure I was a bit of a wimp this summer with the broken collarbone. Only a few days after having a miscarriage, my wife had to deal with her gimpy husband asking her to wash his armpits. Nice timing on my part, eh? She's been very strong... sad for much of the summer, but strong all the same.

I'll end this post with gratitude.

I'm grateful for our mysterious benefactors. We couldn't be doing this without you. I'm hoping some day we can begin to thank you enough for your unwavering commitment to our little project.

I'm grateful for all the people who spoke up and shared their miscarriage experiences with us. It was so important to know that we weren't alone. I'm especially grateful for my two hiking partners... after sharing self-induced pain with them in the great outdoors, it was very comforting for Red and I to be able to share our painful fertility experiences with them and their partners. Whether on long rambling drives down the Eastern Shore, or over tea and Oatmeal Raisin cookies, I am grateful for those conversations.

I'm grateful for the friendships that have developed and deepened in the wake of the miscarriage. To have such joy essentially develop out of such sadness is truly a remarkable thing. I believe it to be the Spirit at work in the world; for others it is simply one of the wonders of being human. Whatever it is, I am truly grateful.

And I'm grateful for Red. Strong... let me tell you. The day of the miscarriage was Election Day. After it happened I rushed home to be with her. After a while, when she ran out of tears, she insisted I go to the victory party, because she knew how much it meant to me. Strong, that one; she's going to make a heck of a Mom.

That's it for now... I'll keep you posted on our progress. Please keep us in your thoughts/prayers; we're going to need all the good vibes we can get.

We are potentially a little bit pregnant...

... and we're trying to contain our excitement until we know for sure.

Red went in for her blood test this morning. I worked from home today, and we just waited and waited... AART was supposed to call around noon. By 12:30 we were getting very antsy. Why hadn't they called? Red thought maybe with bad news they procrastinate on the phone calls. Maybe the results are hard to read, or inconclusive.

So at 2:30 pm Red called AART. Red was in the papazan and I was lying on the bed. Stephanie passed us off to Brenda (who we both wish could be our nurse forever) and I watched Red's face. She had her steady phone voice going ("OK, OK, mm-hmm, mm-hmm"), so it was hard to tell at first, and the conversation just kept going on. She started to tear up - was it bad? Good? Finally, Red started smiling and nodding at me, tears coming quickly.

I'll be able to remember that minute exactly for the rest of my life.

We'd been so careful not to get our hopes up (and frankly by today we were pessimistic) that we were surprised at the results. Red had taken a pregnancy test a couple of days ago, but without any instructions, so we had no idea how to read the result, or even if she'd done the test properly. We guessed at what the result meant and expected the worst. But now...

Well, now we have to get another blood test. Red's HCG level was lower than they'd like it to be, so she's going in next Wednesday to make sure that it's still climbing. But Brenda was confident enough to let herself sound happy and to say that for the time being at least, we were pregnant.

Even if the next test comes back good, we still have to get through the critical first trimester. Fertilization was May 15 so by August 15 we should be able to be full on with the yays and huzzahs.

Believe me, we want to get crazy excited, but we're well aware of all the stuff that can go wrong. So please keep bearing with us as we try to work through the next week and then the next two months. We're honestly not trying to take the fun out of it, we're just trying to be realistic.

But for now, we're letting ourselves feel cautiously happy.

Keep sending that good energy our way... it's working so far...

Waiting and Sleeping

All our eggs are in one basket.

On Wednesday we got the call from AART to let us know that the other two eggs hadn't survived to Day 5. We have pretty mixed emotions... sad, because it would have been good to have the option to freeze embryos, possibly avoiding the IVF cycle in the future... happy because we implanted the other two on Day 3 rather than waiting until Day 5. Although, the two that were implanted were the best ones, so maybe they would have survived until Day 5.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter. Red may have embryos that have settled nicely into the uterine lining and are dividing like gangbusters. She's been very tired this week, known to be a symptom of pregnancy. (Symptom... hmmm, don't really consider pregnancy a disease.) Or there might be nothing going on, and she's simply tired from weeks of drugs and unpleasant poking of her lower torso.

We don't know. And we won't until June 3, when we go in for Red's blood test.

It's frustrating... after years of nothing working, we finally had tasks to do to make it work, drugs and needles and appointments and do your thing and don't do your thing... now it's just relax and wait.

We're very grateful for all the positive energy coming our way, whatever its form. We feel it. Sorry to those who we may have been testy with on the "we're not pregnant yet" point. We're not trying to argue semantics... it's really important to us that we not consider ourselves pregnant until we actually are. If it doesn't work it's going to be really hard on us... it'll be worse if we allow ourselves to believe we're pregnant now.

(Oh, and for those out there who are questioning my choice of pronoun, i.e. how is it that you are also pregnant Sperm, I fully admit that Red has had to bear almost all of the burden here. It's just an easier way to write.)

Red is still sore, but it's a lot better than what it was on the weekend. She is very tired and has been both taking naps and going to bed early. It's actually been really good... we've been getting much better sleep this week. (It helps that the Bruins are no longer in the playoffs.) She's trying to keep her stress low and not exert herself too much. We're doing all we can to keep those little eggs/embryos warm and snuggly.

Beyond that, all we can do is wait. And sleep.

I'll try to use the waiting time to flash back to some of our earlier experiences with this process. In the meantime, keep praying for us, thinking about us, sending us good vibes, and juxtaposing those phalanges.

They're All Up In There

Some of our eggs are in one basket.

We went in this morning to discuss what to do with the four fertilized eggs, and ended up having two move back to their old neighbourhood. After a long discussion about the pros and cons of Day 3 vs. Day 5, the pros and cons of implanting two vs. three, and the chances of birth defects with multiples, it took only 10 minutes for Dr. Hamilton (with Brenda on Ultrasound and Danielle handling egg transport) to put the two best eggs in place once we'd made (been guided to) the decision. They were in literally before we knew it. The most painful part for Red was the full bladder she had to maintain. (Apparently it helps the uterus line up nicely for the implantation.)

Here's the ultrasound from just after the implantation... the UFO I've circled shows the medium that has just been implanted... inside the medium are the two fertilized eggs... everybody chant now... Go Blastocysts Go! Go Blastocysts Go! (The dark area on top is the very full bladder.)



Red's still in some pain from the retrieval on Friday, but having three holes poked in your va-jay-jay will do that. And she has a nasty bruise on her hand from the IV. We took a picture of the bruise, but it really wasn't that impressive, so here's a shot of the IV being put in.



They're going to keep the remaining two eggs going, and if they're still viable on day 5 or 6 (and meet the criteria) they'll be frozen for next time. Red is not keen on doing the egg retrieval again.

Red has been taking this drug called Prometrium since the day after retrieval (Saturday) that helps maintain the lining of the uterus. If I remember correctly, it's progesterone, and it tricks the body into thinking it's pregnant, because the natural cycle is still shut off. Once the eggs take hold as embryos in the uterus, the right hormones (HCG) get produced and the body is able to start doing what it's supposed to. But for the first several weeks, the prometrium helps keeps things comfy for the eggs/embryos.

Because the prometrium capsules resemble mini, gray Glosettes, and are taken as a vaginal suppository, I've taken to calling them "vag candy". When I mentioned this to Dr. Hamilton and Brenda in my nervousness this morning, I got polite laughter. But Red has somewhat adopted the name... so I declare phrase creation victory!

More sevens... Red just realized today that the locker we used at AART today and on Friday was locker #7. And not by conscious choice. Spooky wha'? (Thanks to Travis and Mark for humouring us with the numbers thing... and for the good wishes.)

So now we just wait... in 16 days time (June 4th) Red will go in for a pregnancy test... keep your good thoughts/prayers/energy/digits going for those little suckers all up in there...

And as an added bonus on this post, I've included this glamour shot of Red and I from Retrieval Day... how hot are we!?



P.S. to Travis... I'm sure Red would appreciate some good luck belly rubs from you and Tycho while you're here this week... bring the west coast love and warm up those fingers...

P.S.S to everybody else... I don't think I'll provide one of the flashbacks I was considering... a comment on the first post made me realize that since my mom and my sister and my aunt and my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law are reading / might read this, maybe I should keep some details to myself. If anyone is curious, I'll provide on a want-to-know basis, but you've been warned.

Three at Fours

We've got three at fours.

I think "fours" means they've divided four times. We learned what it meant last week in the IVF info session, and saw pictures, but I can't remember clearly.

Implantation might be tomorrow (Monday). We're going to go in and discuss it in the morning. If we put all three in to give us a better chance, there's a chance we'd get triplets... or more. But if we don't put them in there's a chance they won't survive for an implantation Tuesday or Wednesday. There are a number of factors to consider... it's weird... our goal is to have one healthy child, but the best way to reach that goal might be to accept a real risk of having two or three.

Well, that's one of the reasons we stayed in the same city as our families, right? You up for multiples potential grandparents?

========= FLASHBACK ========================
Last Saturday afternoon (May 9th) we get the call with the results from the AART team's discussion of that morning's blood test and ultrasound. (It's Sherri (Cheri?)... she's the one the staff say is a little crazy... but you know, the fun crazy.) Sherri says things are progressing well and it's a possibility that retrieval might be that Wednesday. After the phone call, Red is in the middle of explaining to me what she said when the phone rings again. She picks it up, says hello, and the response is this:

"Hi again... have I talked to you about your husband's ejaculation?"

Best...Conversation-Opener...Ever! And as a bonus, I have to - HAVE TO - ejaculate Sunday night... well, if I have to...
============================================

So... please keep the good thoughts coming our way... your prayers, positive energy, good wishes and crossed fingers (especially the arthritic ones) are appreciated.

3 * 7 is 21.... her street number and mine growing up. Also the date of our anniversary. (Four years this Thursday.) It's probably meaningless, but we'll take any good omens we can find...

Seven Eggs

On Friday morning, they found seven* eggs.

It's now Saturday night... they called this morning to say that four of the eggs had successfully fertilized. We can do nothing but wait.... they'll call tomorrow to let us know which ones are still cooking along.

FUN FACT: The incubators in which they keep the fertilized eggs are made by a company called Cook. There's a joke in there somewhere that has a "how do you like your eggs cooked" punchline, but it's not coming right now... any suggestions?

It was extremely tough on Red... after all, they had to start an IV in her hand, drugged her up, hooked her up to more monitors than a matrix pod, and then poked a ginormous needle through her vaginal wall and drained her ovaries.

It was tough but the staff were awesome. Brenda and Karen were fantastic... caring, empathetic, gentle, reassuring, and often hilarious. Dr. Hamilton got probably more than a dozen vials of fluid out... and she was very reassuring... this one knows what she's doing... and there was Josee's matter of fact voice calling out from the lab in the next room as she found each egg... Red was so worried there wasn't going to be any eggs... the relief, combined with the drugs, meant tears once the procedure was over... I was so in love with her sharing her joy and relief... she did so well...

And then, 45 minutes later, it was my turn... as Joey would say, "That's right, I stepped up, and I would pee on any one of you if I had to." Except in this case, that wasn't quite my task. Unlike Joey, however, I didn't get stage fright.... everything worked just fine, especially the homemade stuff (more on that in a later post).

They keep telling us that every gate we get through makes the chances of success better. We just have to keep thinking only about the next step, and all of the ones we've passed, and not get freaked out about all the other stuff that needs to go right.

Let's see, what was before this one...would they fertilize? Before that, were there any eggs? (I suppose there was also a technical concern about whether the sperm would be available, but as I told Red, "I've been practicing my whole life for this task" ... if we were talking Malcolm Gladwell, I'd more than have my 10,000 hours.) Before that, would Red's follicles respond to the drugs? Before that, would Red's system be down-regulated? Before that, would Red's uterus pass the cavity check? Before that, would my boys pass their cavity check? Before that, will I be able to get this TV working so I can enjoy the fine AART pornography?

That will bring me to my first flashback... on my next post.

* Josee actually came in later to announce she had found an eighth, but she thought it was "post-mature" and wouldn't be a good one.