Oh my goodness this last week has been an intense rollercoaster of emotions.
Egg Retrieval Day
To everyone who reassured me that I would be out cold, that the sedation would sent be completely to sleep and I would wake up once it was done… You all LIED!!! I was sedated but very much conscious throughout. I think this is something to do with my hypermobility as from research I understand that sedation and local anaesthetics can not work properly with people who have this condition. I am not sure why but I definitely felt the pain. The doctor got 7 eggs, all from my right ovary as my left one was too far away and they couldn’t seem to push it close enough. I hate that my body fights against what is being done, I know I hinder the process.
I’ll be honest, I was disappointed in my 7 eggs. With my AMH (35.8pmol/l) I was lead to believe I would get lots of eggs. I think my high AMH actually hindered the IVF stimulation stage as the specialists had to be so careful not to over stimulate me. I was also very concerned that my best eggs were going to be in my left ovary and therefore not collected.
Day One
I had my first call from the embryologist today and what a lovely lady – yet another fantastic employee of Care Fertility. Out of the 7 eggs collected FIVE had fertilised!! 71% fertilised, what an amazing percentage. I had been worried that no eggs were going to fertilise (always the pessimist!) and that was why the IUIs didn’t work. The embryologist said the only reason the other two didn’t fertilise is because they weren’t mature. There is nothing wrong with my eggs!! YEY!!
Day Two
Nothing much happens on this day so I filled it with acupuncture, reiki and visiting a good friend who has 9 week old twins, conceived at my clinic!!
Day Three
I had my next update from the clinic today. The embryologist called first thing to let me know how the eggs were developing, if they felt it necessary I would have been called into the clinic for transfer on the same day. I was told that all five of my eggs were still going; I had 3 at 8 cells which is ideal as they wanted them to be over 6 cells by day 3, then 2 slow developers at 4 cells. However, the 8 cell embryos had fragments. I was told the doctor still wanted to do a 5 day transfer but they have to warn me that I could have no blastocysts by then. The whole conversation sent me into a massive panic. I, of course, only heard the negative things and went straight to a bad place. I didn’t know what fragments meant so used Google and my Twitter community to research and I contacted the clinic to get some more information. It turns out only 2 of the eggs had fragments (This occurs when the cells divide and the embryos fragment off a little part, and this is normal but my two have a bit too much.) The fragments can stop the embryo from developing to blastocyst stage but if they do develop then the fragments don’t matter. One of the 8 cell embryos was however right on track!! However, it’s not looking promised for any to be good enough to freeze.
Day Four
Normally one doesn’t get an update on day 4 but because I was an anxious and needy drama queen the lovely embryologist said she would call me with development. OMG what exciting news she had. The good 8 cell embryo was already turning into a blastocyst – this is the one that is looking the best and probably the one that will be transferred and could become my baby!! The other two 8 cell embryos are at the stage behind blastocyst. One of the 4 cells is developing nicely and the other 4 cell embryo is now TEN cells!!! I like this embryo, she is doing it at her own pace, not following the norm…I kind of want this embryo transferred, I feel it is my child!
So here we are, on the eve on Day 5 and ready for a transfer at 10am tomorrow. They will only be transferring one embryo, we have had discussion about this and they recommend just one because I am young (yeah! I’m young!) and I have no history of problems. I was asked if I really wanted two and I asked them to make the decision. I know if it was my call I would say two because I would rather have two babies than none but I know it is not sensible. If my embryo splits then I will happily have twins but I will not ask for them.
Here we go!!!!
