Cycle Update

This cycle has gone better than I ever could have imagined. I am so, so happy I decided to go with SIRM and Dr. Peters. I haven't posted anything since the baseline so let me catch you up:

- I did 8 days of stims. Last week was a little rough because I had to drive to Jersey and back three times. But it was totally worth it. I am impressed that the Doctor does all the ultrasounds to check on follicles himself. He was great about explaining everything to Garry and tell us how big each one was. The two follie checks I had at SIRM were the best I have ever had.

- At the egg retrieval on Thursday they got 11 eggs! (as a reminder I got 4 eggs on IVF #1 and 10 on IVF #2.

- Of the 11 eggs 8 were mature, that is amazing for me! IVF #1 only 1 of the four were mature, and IVF #2 only have four mature eggs. I guess we found the right mix of drugs to get the best results out of my crappy ovaries.

Today is day 3 and I just got the call from Dr. Peters with our update. We have four 7 cell embryos growing today! SIRM has a grading scale from 1 to 3 with 1 being the best and 3 being the worst. Three of our embryos are grade 1 (yay!) and one is a grade 2!

We talked about doing the CGH genetic testing, and since we only have four embryos we decided to skip it. Dr. Peters explained that with three or four embryos it is not worth the cost because more than likely at least one or two of those will arrest by day 5.

So the plan from here is the embryos will continue growing until day 5 If all four embryos make it to Day 5 than we will transfer the best two and wait to see if the other two make it to freeze. If we have three left on day 5 then Dr. Peters, Garry and I will have a serious discussion about whether or not to transfer all three. The idea of triplets scares the ever living crap out of me. I think we could handle twins, and I am sure we would figure out how to handle triplets, but the idea of being out numbered by babies is really scary. I know the odds of all three implanting in me are slim, but there is still a chance.

I feel great about this cycle. Even if it doesn't work and we don't get pregnant I know that we tried everything, got great care from SIRM, and there was nothing else we could do. But I gotta admit, I am feeling very hopeful today.

So so confused...

I hope this makes sense to everyone, because I am so confused right now I am not sure I can even put everything going through my head into writing.

First the good news: I have two embryos that are growing strong. The embryologist checked them twice today and the last time she checked they were both at 2 cells which is great for Day 1. She is also still watching two eggs for signs of fertilization. Apparently they were immature at the retrieval yesterday and they may have matured overnight and fertilized, but I won't know if they turned into embryos until she calls back Sunday night with an update. The transfer will be Tuesday, 5 days post retrieval.

Now the confusing part. I was under the impression we were doing ICSI again this cycle, that is what Dr. F and I talked about at my WTF, and he never mentioned the possibility that we wouldn't do ICSI (for those who have forgotten ICSI is when they take a single sperm and inject it directly into a single egg). Apparently the embryologist did not ICSI my eggs. Not one. She simply placed the eggs in a dish with the sperm sample and let them fertilize naturally. I don't totally understand why she did this.

Here is what she told me (paraphrasing): Last time she ICSIed one egg and it did not fertilize. Two of the immature eggs (which can not be ICSIed) were left to mature and fertilize normally, one of those fertilized abnormally and one normally. The one that fertilized normally was the one we transferred. So since the fert rate was better when she let the eggs fertilize normally on IVF #1, she decided that should be the route we take this time.

The thing I am having trouble with is this: You can't know off of one egg not fertilizing with ICSI that all of my eggs won't fertilize with ICSI. That could have been a bad egg. I could understand if she had ICSIed half and left half to fertilize normally. But she decided to just let all the eggs try to fertilize on their own. Now we have two embryos growing, and two eggs that we don't know if they fertilized or not. I can't help but feel like if she had done ICSI we might have more embryos now. I even asked her if she could have tried doing rescue ICSI on them (ICSIing the eggs that did not fertilize by the next day). She said she considered it, but ended up not doing the rescue ICSI because if she had done it on an egg that had already been fertilized by a sperm, and wasn't showing signs of fertilization yet, then that embryo would have been essentially destroyed (two sperm can't fertilize a single egg and turn into a healthy embryo).

The thing I am having the hardest time with (and the thing that is making me want to cry every time I think about it) is this: we will never know. It is possible if she had ICSIed every egg we would have ten embryos right now. It is possible we would have zero. If she did half and half we might have a couple more, or we could have the same results. We'll just never know, and if this cycle doesn't work I will also think that had she done it differently it would have turned out differently. That thought is going to keep me awake for the next two weeks.

Now I am honestly not sure I can trust my RE's embryologist. At the very least I feel like the possibility of not doing ICSI should have been brought up at some point before the retrieval so we could all make the decision together. Now I feel like this whole process is even more out of my hands than it already was. I feel like they went behind my back. I just want to cry.

Quick Update...

I am currently resting up at my Mom and Dad's house, and being very well taken care thank you very much. The retrieval went great, they got 10 eggs! I could not be happier! I never thought we would get that many. When I let my mind wander a little and be optimistic I would think about getting 7 eggs, never ten. I am ecstatic, and truth be known, so so hopeful. I have all the excitement that was missing for this whole cycle rushing back today. This could actually work... Wow saying that is very scary.

So now I just wait (and try not to bite my nails down to the quick) for the call tomorrow from the embryologist telling me how many embryos we have. I am trying to keep my expectations realistic despite today's amazing out come. I will be over joyed with two great quality embryos to transfer. More than that will just be icing on the cake.

Well This Sucks

Nothing turned out the way I thought it would. Let's start with the retrieval.

Everything with the actual retrieval went pretty smoothly. When I got to the office and was signing all the paperwork the girl in the curtain next to me was getting her report on how many eggs they retrieved and i was very jealous because she got 19. But I tried to brush it off and concentrate on my retrieval. They took me back to the room and started hooking me up to the IV and monitors. I always find it amazing how fast the drugs work to put you under. One minute I remember the anesthesiologist telling me to take a deep breath and then I am waking up in the recovery room. The bad news: they got 4 eggs. I was really disappointed. I was hoping all 7 of my follies would have something in them. The RE even tried to get something for some of my smaller follies, but no luck.

I felt pretty good after the retrieval. Even stopped and got donuts on the way home. Then about two hours after we got home I noticed the pain on my right side (where most the follies were)was getting worse. I went upstairs to go to the bathroom and the pain started becoming unbearable. I called for Garry and he called the RE's office. They called in a script for Tylenol 3, but in the time Garry left to get it and got back the pain tripled and I was on the ground begging for him to make it stop. So we went to the Emergency Room. Long story short, I developed a blood clot by my right ovary. Not really sure why I got it or what it means, but they said it should dissolve on it's own. They kept me over night to keep an eye on my blood work to make sure I wasn't bleeding someplace they couldn't see, but everything looked ok this morning and they sent me home.

Now for the really bad news. I got my fertilization report and things aren't good. Of the 4 eggs retrieved only 3 were mature. We did ICSI (they inject a single sperm into each egg) on those three. 1 fertilized normally. 1 fertilized abnormally and they had to discard it. One they aren't sure if it fertilized. i guess there is a small window of time to see if the egg fertilized and the embryologist isn't sure if the point has already passed or if the egg just didn't fertilize. She is going to watch it until tomorrow to see if something develops. So as of right now we have one fertilized egg. And as the embryologist was so kind to point out, there is no guarantee it will continue to develop.

I am heart broken and very angry with my body right now. I worked so hard to get to this point, and I feel like I am being punished. Everyone always says "it only takes one" but right now I have no faith that one will make it long enough to be transferred back to my body. I have even less faith that my body would be able to do anything right even if it does make it to transfer. So now I just wait to hear back from the RE tomorrow on what we are doing.

I am off to take more Tylenol 3 and a very long nap.

It's go time...

So I had my second, and it turns out final, follie check today. I won't lie, I was a little disappointed today. As you will recall I had 8 solid follicles with 2 more that could have been something on Friday. Today I have 7 solid follicles and the other three stopped growing altogether. I was really hoping that I would have over ten follicles today. But my stupid left ovary has failed me once again. All three of the follies that puttered out were on the left side, there is only one half decent follie on leftie.

Don't get me wrong, I am happy I have any follies in there at all, because I know there is no guarantee. But I went into this thinking I would be a pretty decent responder, so I am a little disappointed to find that I am not as decent as I thought I would be.

This doesn't mean that this cycle won't work though. And I am trying my best to stay up beat and optimistic. I have heard lots of stories of women who have retrieved under 5 eggs and still gotten pregnant and gone on to have beautiful babies, and I absolutely believe that could happen to us as well.

So tonight is go night. The 7 follicles that are left are ready to go. I trigger at exactly 10:30pm this evening and go in at 10am Wednesday morning for the retrieval. I am very nervous and excited to get this part of the process underway.

The good news is that the raging case of diarrhea I had over the weekend seems to be resolving itself. I am not sure if my stomach problems the last couple days are meds related, Crohn's related, or just a bug that I picked up. Whatever it was though, it sucked! Although I did lose 5 pounds over the past three days so that is a bonus. That makes my official weight loss 68 pounds and 9 BMI points. Not too shabby.

Ok, the next update will be post Egg Retrieval. Everyone send as many Egg-cellent Egg vibes my way as you can muster up! Thanks!