Waiting, Wondering, Worrying

Well here we are, the day before Thanksgiving, the day before we're supposed to get our results. I thought I'd been dealing with the waiting and what ifs pretty well, I've been staying super busy and for the most part haven't allowed myself to think or dwell on it. I've been intently picking out super cute leggings from various Aussie websites (It's turning into an addiction and I don't even have my first pair yet), hunting for boots to go with said leggings, working on my aquarium which is always soothing and getting everything ready for Thanksgiving. I haven't been counting the hours but it would pop into my head every few days that we were that much closer to results. Somehow they always seemed far off, something that would be happening in the future.

Now, it's the night before and I'm thinking I'm not so okay. After a conversation about socializing with friends turned into a conversation about parents and babies, I suddenly felt quite irrationally emotional, like a cup in the process of overflowing. It's clear that even though I haven't been consciously dwelling on it, my subconscious has been drowning. I tend to internalize things so I can carry on calmly and I now feel like an idiot for genuinely not knowing why my hair seemed to be falling out the other day. It's one of the telltale giveaways that I'm under stress but at the time I couldn't think what it could be. Way to block out the big stuff brain, I'm sure that's super healthy.

On what will likely be the eve of our PGD results reveal unless the clinic closes for Thanksgiving, which is still a possibility, it appears my brain has run out of distractions. It's hit me like a freight train that this is it and I don't know what to do.  I can't stop going over horrible things even though I'm trying to put only positive energy and thoughts out there.

We still haven't paid for our PGS. H never called me back to get our credit card. Does this mean all our embryos were effected so they never did the PGS screening?

What if all our embryos are sick? What if we went through this for nothing?

What if they don't call with our results? How will I get through Thanksgiving with all those people? How will I get through it anyway if it's bad news?

E just got sick and has probably now exposed me. Will that effect our FET if when we get there?

I'm so, so scared our results won't be good. We've been through so much, I've been through so much I need these frozen babies to be healthy.  Now all I can think about is the worst case scenario and I feel like I'm going to choke on the lump it brings to my throat. Please be healthy embryos. Please be healthy.

Christmas Delays?!?!

Originally, I was planning on putting an embryo back straight away after this IVF cycle. I psyched myself all up for a November transfer and told myself I'd have good news for the holidays. I was ready to go, let's get this embryo toasty warm in my uterus!

Then, Dr. D put the kibosh on that. He said I've been injecting waaay too much medication into my body, two months in a row, and that wouldn't make for the most ideal environment for our embryo. Damn. He suggested that we take a wash cycle, wait for the drugs to really leave my system and start fresh with a nice, fresh cycle. Okay, I don't love the idea of waiting yet another month, but I would never do anything to jeopardize the success of my frosties so I got on board. One wash cycle to get everything out and THEN we'd thaw out a frostie and put it back.

With a regular cycle, it's pretty easy to plan when things should be happening. With this period showing up right on time I was pretty much positive that we'd be doing our transfer shortly after Christmas, probably sometime around the 28th if Dr. D really planned on transferring on CD 17. I've heard some people transfer later, closer to CD 20 or 22 but Dr. D said CD 17 so that's what I went with. I psyched myself up again for a Christmas transfer told myself I'd have wonderful news around January 9th. A September baby would be wonderful, right before the holidays really started to pick up.

I was reading through my IVF support group, reminding myself to practice patience when I read about some clinics closing for the holidays and delaying treatments. This should have been obvious, of course they'd want to go on holiday, but my clinic couldn't be closing because I'm transferring right after Christmas, right?  Right??

Nooooooo!!!

I got on the phone to Dr. D's nurse and asked them about their Christmas schedule. Bam, my worst fears were confirmed. They usually close for two weeks spanning the end of December to the beginning of January. Fuck. Right over when I was supposed to be doing my transfer. Double Fuck.

I explained to the nurse that I was supposed to be transferring over that time period and wasn't expecting my period to start until December 12th. She elaborated that the ART center closes completely for those two weeks but there's still a crew on the clinic side. The last day for most things is December 18th and there are only certain days after that where they can perform specific procedures. This is probably for those people who need to stim longer than expected and need their retrieval done over those two weeks, not for people who are looking to transfer a frozen embryo that's perfectly happy waiting on ice.

She told me to call with the first day of my period and we would see how things look then but it looks like we'll be delayed yet another month. I was just getting used to the idea of taking one month off and now we have to take two. I told my acupuncturist S how disappointed I was and she said that success rates are lower around Christmas because people are stressed out so I wouldn't want to transfer then anyway, but I'm pretty sure she was just trying to make me feel better. I don't see out of town family members or deal with a lot of family drama over Christmas so I'm fairly certain that my chances wouldn't be any lower just because it's the holidays.  My frostie certainly doesn't know it's Christmas.

All I want for Christmas is a batch of healthy embryos! One in my belly and the rest on ice.

If we have to wait two months, we won't get to transfer until the end of January, probably around the 25th. This means that I would potentially be getting good (because I refuse to believe otherwise) news on my birthday. It would be a wonderful birthday gift but I'm so anxious to get an embryo back where it belongs. This process takes so long and every month more feels like forever.

Biopsy Samples Off!

This was supposed to post yesterday, I'm not sure why it didn't :/ Weird! 

I wasn't expecting a call this morning since our embryos have already been biopsied, vitrified and tucked safely away, so I was surprised and a little worried when I saw SCRC come up on my caller ID. It turns out Dr. D was just calling to give me an update and let me know that my biopsy samples had been shipped and should be arriving at Reprogenetics today! I wasn't expecting them to ship out so quickly, especially since today is a holiday, but we're officially ready to start testing.

Dr. D said he spoke with Reprogenetics today and they're going to run our tests consecutively - the PGD for Fragile X first, and then the aCGH PGS on any unaffected and premutation carriers. This means that only Fragile X negative embryos will be screened for chromosome issues, which makes sense. What I'd like to know, is if we pay for "up to" 8 embryos and only test 6, can we test 2 more in the future without additional charges? Probably not, but its definitely on my list of things to ask them since I've heard of other people doing this with their labs. I still need to give them my credit card information for the aCGH but I haven't been able to get in touch with their financial person H yet. I left a message with their messaging service on Monday so I'll probably call again tomorrow.

Cilly sneaks into the linen closet for a relaxing nap

Dr. D also hinted that he thought we might get our test results early. He said the 15 day estimate was quite conservative, if the lab was busy, etc. Once the PGD is complete, and this is the portion that takes a bit longer, the aCGH will be performed the next day and then we'll have our results. Everyone at the clinic has their fingers crossed for us and we're all thinking positive and willing these embryos to be healthy.

As for recovery, I'm still really bloated and starting to get occasional cramps in anticipation of my period which should be due at the end of the week. I can wear my regular jeans but the belly is definitely there and it's deflating unevenly. When I woke up this morning my belly button looked off center which is so weird, the right side seems to have gone down a bit faster than the left. I can't wait for my belly to be huge and lopsided because there's a tiny person in there, not just a ton of fluid.

Cycle 2 Trigger Time

I slept pretty poorly last night, which isn't a terrible surprise given my nerves, and didn't get to take full advantage of the time change and extra hour of sleep. I think I got up three times to pee (thanks hormones) and finally gave up on going back to bed around 7:30am. I had been worried about how I was going to take my morning meds since my appointment was at 8:45am, I usually start prepping my shot at 9 and inject around 9:25am, but I neglected to take into account the time change. With the extra hour, my shot clock was moved up to 8am and I was able to finish both injections before I had to leave.

My view from the ultrasound table

The clinic was pretty much empty with only a couple other people there for monitoring and I got in to do my blood in a flash. The lady tech was working today and she was able to get my arm vein in one go, giving my poor bruised hand a much needed break. She's gotten pretty darn good at finding that vein, I know certain techs have better luck with different patients, it's too bad she only works over the weekends.

After bloodwork it was on to the ultrasound, where I got to spend a few minutes waiting for the tech and admiring the fake sky ceiling tiles. When all these cycles are done and I'm good and pregnant,  I'd like to go back to Hawaii with E and enjoy some real tropical skies. I think we've definitely earned it and as long as it's safe to fly, I can't see any reason why a little bean couldn't bake just as well on the beach in Hanalei Bay as it can here at home.

The tech for this ultrasound was really thorough, I think she knew I was disappointed with the results we've been getting and she checked and double checked to make sure she wasn't leaving out any potential follicle that could be hiding. I'm still waiting to hear back from Dr. D with the results of my lab work, but from what the nurse said, it looks like we're going to be taking a stab at 4-5 follies - the 17, 20, 22, 22 and 26. Unfortunately the 26 is likely too mature to fertilize and the 17 is probably too immature but I'm not giving up on them just yet. We could still get 4 good eggs that turn into 4 good embryos to add to our batch.

12.6mm lining, nice and thick

My lining has also finally picked up which should be another sign that the follies are putting out a good amount of estrogen and it's time to trigger. I don't have the grapefruit sized ovaries feeling since I have so few follicles but I am still feeling bloated with the same weird temple pressure head ache I've had for a week. S says the pressure is dampness in my body so I'll probably ask her to put those needles in again when I go for my acupuncture appointment before retrieval.

Nervous

Oh man, I'm feeling so nervous about tomorrow. It doesn't do me any good to speculate on the next ultrasound but that logic hasn't stopped me from running through all the "what ifs...?" in my head.

• What if we have even less follicles than yesterday? 
• What if the follicles aren't growing?
• What if all the follicles arrested?
• What if Dr. D wants to cancel the cycle?
• And in that vein, if he does want to cancel, how much will we be out?

I tried to talk over the possibility of having to cancel with E, just as a "what if" since he won't be at the appointment with me tomorrow but he didn't take it well. I was trying to figure out the numbers in my head and led with a figure waaaay higher than the actual amount, making him panic and freak out. Not at all helpful and not at all my intention. Crap.

I'm trying to be positive and hopeful that these 5 follies I have will look wonderful and mature and have healthy, perfectly fertilizing and growing eggs in them. That said, I can't not consider all the possibilities when the cycle looks so disappointing compared to last time. I think if Dr. D were going to cancel he would/should have done so already, instead of letting me stim for almost two weeks, so I don't see this happening. But, if we do have to cancel, the cycle rolls over and we are out the services/medications that we have already used. For this cycle, that would be:

• All monitoring appointments that I've had including ultrasounds and labs
• All medication I've used thus far 

This would leave quite a bit left to roll over:

• ICSI take two which we've already paid for
• Embryo Biopsy
• Egg Retrieval with anesthesia etc 
• Cryopreservation and storage
• Any unused medication, in this case it would be just the Novarel and a day of Menopur
• Any unused money ear marked for monitoring 

So really, it could be worse. If for some reason I walk in tomorrow and they say we need to cancel, we wouldn't be paying for the entire cycle all over again. It would just suck incredibly, but not as much as going ahead and getting no embryos.

Come on follicles. Come on eggs. I need you to be good and healthy in there. I don't think E could take cancelling a cycle and I couldn't handle giving up on getting more embryos to test. I've put too much of myself, my marriage, my heart, my hope, my love, my health, my body, into this to give up on one crappy cycle.