Holy S*#t!

To be completely blunt, these past 5 years have sucked. Every single pregnancy announcement, every crying baby, every rejection, every needle, and every setback. The universe has tested me. Despite these years being the hardest of my life -- they've been the best. These years have made my marriage incredibly strong. They've made me incredibly strong. They've made me appreciative. They made me a(dog)mom. 

These years have been everything. 

These years have lead me to where I am today...

15 weeks pregnant with a healthy baby.

I am so overwhelmed with emotion even typing those words. 15. weeks. pregnant. healthy. baby.

How did we get here?

Our frozen embryo transfer (FET) took place in early August. And like our first cycle, everything went "perfect". Only this time I didn't follow the rules and started taking home pregnancy tests (HPTs) 5 days after the transfer. 

Positive, positive, positive. They were all positive. 

I tested everyday, multiple times per day. We should have bought stock in those tests. We'd be rich!

Then came the blood draw. The real test since the HPTs can be unreliable (the reason phil and my clinic told me to stay away).

You know the old adage "a watched pot never boils"? Maybe we would update it for the 21st century to be "a watched cell phone never rings". I watched and waited and at long last.. I missed the call.

Beta 1 = 649

The first beta is a good indication of how everything is going, but it needs to double in 48 hours or there could be cause for concern. 

Fertility treatments are one big waiting game. Waiting for calls. Waiting for results. Waiting for news - both good & bad. And waiting 2 measly days between beta blood tests. 

While I was still taking HPTs and they were still positive, there's no better indication that it worked than these darn blood tests.

Beta 2 = 2724

Holy S*#t! We were pregnant. 

But then we waited again. And this time longer than the 2 measly days between beta blood tests. Two whole weeks. Two weeks. Two weeks + anxiety. Anxiety is that evil bitch who rears her ugly head in the times when you need to keep her buried away. 

The morning of our first ultrasound finally came. Finally. And it should come as no surprise that I was a ball of emotions. While we waited for the tech, I made Phil tell me about his walk with Charlie that morning to keep the tears at bay. He told me the story to keep my mind off the baby and all I thought about was the baby. 

"There's the baby. There's the heartbeat" 

These 6 words might have had more impact on my life than any others. 

After another 2 weeks and another emotion filled ultrasound, we finally graduated from the reproductive endocrinologist. Sorry PLHS grads, this graduation day was far, far sweeter.

And, maybe best of all. Our first child is getting a sibling. 

So, that's it. Life is now filled with new anxieties and emotions but they're so, so welcome and we couldn't be more excited. Thanks for reading. Thanks for tagging along with us. Just, Thanks.

Hey, Remember me?

Hey, Remember me?

It's been a minute.

This post was either going to be 'yay! we're pregnant' or 'shoot, it didn't work - what's next?'. Unfortunately, it's the latter.

what happened?

I signed off in the midst of our cycle. Everything went literally perfect (I hate when people use literally when something didn't literally happen - but I assure that it's an appropriate use of the word).

egg retrieval - 17(!!) eggs retrieved

fertilization - 9(!!) eggs fertilized normally

8 of the 9 fertilized made it to the blastocyst stage. 

blastocyst - an embryo that has developed for five to seven days after fertilization and has two distinct cell types and a central cavity filled with fluid. The cells in a blastocyst have started to differentiate and the surface cells around the cavity are called the trophectoderm and will later develop into the placenta. The inner cell mass becomes the fetus.

EIGHT. 

It's almost unheard of. Above average. Excellent!

We transferred one perfect embryo. Per everything else, the transfer was flawless. To make the procedure more comfortable, my RE prescribes Valium. I've never had Valium and didn't quite know what to expect. Phil was thoroughly entertained because it hit me like a ton of bricks. I was slurring my words, stumbling and requested the drunk girl favorite; taco bell.  

Then we waited. 

The 9 days in between the embryo transfer and blood draw/beta seemed like an eternity and somehow I had enough willpower to not use any home pregnancy tests. 

I had grand plans to let the call with results go to voicemail and listen with Phil when we were together. That plan went completely out the window when my phone rang. I answered and frantically paced around our house while the nurse gave me the news... 

Beta #1 29.3. Low. Too low.
The preferred minimum number at our clinic is 30. So, we were so close.. pregnant!.. but low - so many emotions. I kept (incessantly) telling myself in the days between Beta 1 and 2 that what would be would be.

Beta #2 34.
The level didn't double as it should and it was confirmed that this was a Chemical Pregnancy (fancy phrase for miscarriage)

Naturally, we took the news hard and I had a good cry (or four), but hung our hats on the fact that we have 7 beautiful frozen embryos. We're incredibly lucky that even though this first cycle didn't result in a viable pregnancy, it set us up for success in the future.

what's next?

Frozen Embryo Transfer!
It's a very similar process to the full IVF but sans egg retrieval.


sign on / sign off.

I'm signing off.. again. We'll be keeping things low key and super positive. Cross anything you can for us; fingers, eyes, toes.. everything.


Cheers,
AM