More of the waiting game

It always seems like in the world if IVF, you do nothing but wait.  We “switched” to a new doctor whom I liked, but my wife wasn’t too thrilled with.  He really seemed to know his stuff, but she was upset that he talked down to us.  That and he looks like quasi-moto.  As long as our kids don’t look like him I’ll be fine.

He suggested that we skip IVF until he does at least 4 IUI procedures.  This is basically the turkey baster with a little Clomid to stimulate the folicles.  We tried this one time before, but he really feels that you should do 4 attempts before doing IVF.  AFter 4 attempts you had a 40% success rate, and if that failed you should move on to the next step.  Our last doctor never explained it like that to us so we went from one IUI cycle to IVF right away.

Seeing how IUI is about 10,000 times less expensive I thought it might be a good idea.  I also liked the way they do it there.  They will use clomid and via ultra-sound ensure that there are follicles and measure them.  Then they will give a trigger shot and I come in the next day to produce my sample.  Then they do another ultra-sound to see if the follices actually had released and then you wait two weeks to see if it all worked. The last clinic we went to didn’t do any of the trigger shots or ultra-sound, so maybe this is better?

He looked at the results from our last Dr and our IVF treatment and he saw that she produced a ton of eggs and our fertilization rate was awesome.  So that part is good.  I just think it is something with the lining and getting the suckers to stick.  She has all sorts of problems now like irregular periods, acne, going months without ovulating.  It seems that once we started treatment (hormone therapy, accupuncture, herbal diets, etc) that it fucked up her body something fierce.

The new clinic wanted us to call on day1 of her cycle.  She normally has a 30 day cycle, this month it was 28 days.  We called on day 1, nurse was out, called on day 2, nurse was out, called on day 3, she apologized she was on vacation, and we would need to start the clomid on day 3, BUT by day 11 we would need to come in for an ultra-sound.  Well guess what, we will be out of town for Christmas.  Damn, another month we have to wait now.  I guess January will be our magic month.

Speaking of Christmas, I am not looking forward to it this year.  Her older sister has 3 kids, and her younger sister has a newborn.  We are the only ones childless, and nothing is worse than being around kids when you have none.  Sorry, but it makes you uber jealous.

Well,I guess we will have to wait until January and see what happens.  In the meantime, we will just sit here and wait…

D-Day

Wife went in for beta blood work today at 7:45am.  We got the call from the Dr at 1:30pm that we are NOT pregnant.  Guess those two, healthy, beautiful embroys decided they didn’t want to stick around for 9 months.  Well, we are obviously very upset, but I kinda had a feeling.  She was cramping and spotting, and the home pregnancy tests kept coming up negative.

Well, now it is time to regroup and see if we try this game again, or something different.

T Minus 4 days…

We go in for our Beta this Friday and we are super nervous.  Her OHSS is totally cured, the swelling went down and she is feeling great.  Our main concern is that she has been getting cramps.  These are similar to what she gets when she starts her priod.  Today, 8 days post transfer, she had some slight spotting.  She panicked and consulted a friend who underwent IVF.  It is crazy all the different answers you get to yoru questions.  Some people say cramping is normal and a good sign (embryo implanting).  Some say spotting is a good sign.  Others report it is just the onset of their period. 

I guess there is no right or wrong answer, since every woman, and every situation is different.  Waiting has got to be the hardest part.  Not nearly as hard as getting a negative, but still hard.  Just a few more days to find out what is going on in there.  Wish us luck.

The waiting game begins

On Sunday at 7am we went to the doctors office to prep for the embryo transfer.  My wife has been having some issues with bloating.  Apparently her ovaries are hyper-stimulated, causing fluid to build up.  This causes her discomfort, the feeling of being full, difficulty breathing and basic abdominal pain.  It isn’t uncommon in IVF procedures, however I do fault the Doctor office in that she called them 2 times telling them of these problems and they just told her it was normal.  However, when we went into for the transfer the doctor looked pretty concerned and if we were candidates for embryo freezing it would have been done until her ovaries settled down and the fluid levels went back to normal.

The doctor stated, and I have confirmed via research that OHSS isn’t a risk for the baby, or even at your chances of getting pregnant, but it cuases the mother pain for basically the first trimester.  I don’t want my wife to be in any pain at all, so I am very upset and concerned.  We are going back to the office on Wednesday for some tests so they can monitor the fluid levels.  Hopefully they won’t have to drain her fluid as other women I have read about have had done.

The embryologist came in with pictures of our embryos.  Apparently only one of the AAs made it, and the next runner up was I believe a BA or BB or something like that.  Again, we were disapointed as of Saturday the AAs were still doing great.  So we got an AA and a B? implanted.  Now keep in mind the grades don’t effect the quality of the child.  That is the say, the lower the grade doesn’t mean the child will be retarded or have problems, learning difficulties, etc.  It is just that the higher the grade, the better the chance of implantation.  We made it all the way to a 5 day blastocyte, which supposedly increases your chances of success, but the little bugger still has to implant into the uterus lining.  So we wait until  this Friday when they do a blood test to see how her progesterone levels are, and then the following Friday for our beta pregnany test. 

They don’t give you a yes or no.  They basically monitor the hormone levels and if they are going up, then you are in the clear.  So we wait for 2 weeks now, and just take it easy.  This is the hardest part, because science has stopped and mother nature has taken over.  Wish us luck!

What do porn, eggs and sprite have in common?

So today is the big day.  Well one of many perhaps.  Today was the day that my wife had to have her eggs aspirated.  We arrived at the Doctors office at 7:45am for our procedure.  Now I have been to many doctors offices in my time, but I have to tell you, this place was run like a well oiled machine.  The second we walked in, they had paperwork for us to sign, had a room for us to wait in and had nurse after nurse come in asking questions.  The setup is basically this:

1) The take wifey into a room and have her undress, everything comes off, no jewelry, nothing
2) They bring her back to her bed and give her an IV and start a saline drip
3) They hook up every machine that beeps, bings, and makes noises to her to check her heart, temperature, whether she gets DirectTv, etc.
4) They wheel her away to the OR where they put her out, aspirate the egg and bring her to recovery
5) They have me go to a room and produce my sample
6) I meet her back in recovery and wait for the drugs to wear off and take her home.

So wifey gets undressed and I fill out paperwork, answer questions, etc.  She comes back and has everything off but her bra.  The make nurse scolds her.  Bad wifey, bad!  The only reason she kept it on is because with all the meds, her breasts are super duper tender and it hurts to have the material of the gown on them.  She comes back and lays back down.

10,000 questions and forms later they are ready to walk her to the OR.  I am told to wait in the lobby and follow orders, like a good soldier.  About 30 minutes later somebody comes out and gets me, leads me to the room to jerkoff and leave my deposit.  This room is always a little creepy.  I mean, you know about 500 guys have masturbated in there, and they have porn playing on the TV, nude magazines, etc.  It is uncomfortable because the nurse is a woman, so you know she is like, hmmm, wonder what porno this dude is into.  To make matters worse, I brought a bookbag with me with my laptop and other things so I could do work while I waited for my wife.  They probably thought I brought my own sick porn with me.  Then of course when you are done depositing the sample you wonder if you should just ring the bell to come out, or wait like 10 minutes to make it seem like it took you a long time.  I split the difference and waited 5 minutes after I was done.  I wanted to see how the porno ended.  Did she actually pay for the pizza?

I go back to the waiting room and wait, watching a little morning TV.  The Dr comes out and greets me, tells me she is out of surgery, and he got 19 eggs.  19.  Holy shit!  That sounds amazing.  I am ready to enter the Guiness book of records, until he tells me the record at their clinic is in the 50+ range.  Damn!  It isn’t the quantity it is the quality right?  But still 19 eggs is freaking amazing!  They lead me back to see my wife who is knocked out.

This is the fun time when all she says is jumbled jargon and you can tease her and she’ll never know, or at least she won’t remember.  She wasn’t out too long, maybe 20 minutes and she started to come around.  She was feeling pretty good, but the nurse wanted her to go pee before he could let her go.  I guess they need to make sure you can pass the liquid saline before they let you go.  Well she is in the bathroom for 10 minutes and it just aint happening.  She tried all the tricks, but she didn’t get so much as a drop.

They brought her back into the recovery room and increased her fluids and brought her a can of Sprite.  She hates sprite.  I drank it, yummy!  $13,000 Sprite!  She went through an entire new bag of IV juice until she felt the urge to try again.  Success!  She has never been happier to pee in her life.  It meant we got to go home.  Apparently we were the last people still around and left at 11:45am.

When we got home, she took some Tylenol with Codeine and had a light meal.  She was very happy, alert and had energy.  Just a slight discomfort, similar to menstral cramps, or gas, but nothing she couldn’t take, she is a woman after all, strong pain threshold.  She was feeling so well she sent me back to work.  I took the dogs with me and headed to the office.  Yes we own our own business and the dogs are with us daily.

So far everything seems perfect.  Her eggs were plentiful, they said my specimen was great and tommorow they call us to let us know how things are progressing.  We will either have them put back in Friday or Sunday, depending on how they are doing.  We heard conflicting information.  Some people say you want day 5, the dr office said they have a better success rate with day 3.  We are gunning for twins if possible, but will be thrilled with anything.

More in a few days as we start to get results back in.  Wish us luck!