We are on our way now!

Well, we are definitely on our way now. It is really starting to sink it that we are really beginning IVF. No turning back now!

On Friday, we were at the IVF clinic ALL DAY! We had a meeting with the business office at 8:30 where we went over the financial obligations and just what the financial damage was going to be. Later, we met with one of the embryologists, a lovely, friendly girl named Jen, who is my age and clearly LOVES what she does. She explained what they are looking for in a "mature egg," how they fertilize the eggs, how we hope the eggs will develop over the next several days in the lab, how they need to look and what criteria needs to be there before the eggs can be transferred into my uterus or frozen for future cycles. We then met with an IVF nurse where she went over my treatment plan. For anyone that is curious, I've updated the calendar on the left side of my blog so that you know when to really pray hard for me!

We will start Lupron injections on December 28th (if my blood work on the 27th looks good,) and I will continue those injections until egg retrieval. My next cycle should start sometime during the first week of January. I will start some prescription strength vitamins at that time. I will have a baseline ultrasound and blood work on cycle day 2. On cycle day 3 if everything looks good, I will start stimming (stimulation injections,) of follistim and menopur. I will be monitored with blood and ultrasound along the way. When, my eggs look mature (usually 10-12 days,) we will trigger with an ovidrel shot, exactly 36 hours later, I will go in for my egg retrieval (under general anesthesia,) and then we wait.... We wait to hear from the embryologist to see if the eggs fertilized, how/if they are developing, etc. If we have some good eggs, then 5 days after the retrieval, we go in for our egg transfer (the easiest part of all this.) The nurse showed both DH and I how to give injections, we both practiced. We then both had some blood work to see if either of us are carriers of cystic fibrosis.

We then went to lunch and prepared for the afternoon appointments. I had to have a full bladder, so I drank a lot of water at lunch! We came back at 1:00 and our first procedure was the trial transfer. This is basically exactly what it sounds like....a trial transfer of the eggs. They put a catheter inside you and then an ultrasound on top; they are measuring your cervix and your uterus so that when they are doing the "real" transfer, they know exactly how far to go in. The only real painful part of this was that I had a full bladder and they had to push on my belly with the ultrasound.

After that, I had the saline sonohysterogram. This was really a difficult procedure for me. They put another catheter inside of me...the catheter had a balloon on the end. They used the balloon to "blow up" my cervix, so that they could get saline inside of my uterus. Immediately when the doctor blew up the balloon, I was in intense amounts of pain. It was like the worst cramp I've ever felt in my life. I screamed in agony and she let some air out of the balloon. Unfortunately, this caused the balloon to fall out and they had to start from scratch. This time, she didn't blow up the balloon quite as full, but it was still extremely painful. I fought through the pain, so that the procedure would hurry up and be over. It took all I had not to cry. They were able to get the saline into my uterus, and look inside with the ultrasound.....the doctor said everything looked beautiful and perfect....thank God! On the way home, I was still having an agonizing cramp. It was like the worst menstrual cramp I've ever had, intensified by 100, and constant. It finally subsided after about 30 minutes, and became bearable. That evening, I pretty much had to lay around....moving a lot hurt my cervix and uterus, and I was still bleeding a lot. By Saturday I was feeling MUCH better! I'm so glad I only have to do that procedure once....I would NEVER do it again!

We also bought all of our meds.....$5k worth...yikes!!! The meds are being mailed to us and will be here on Wednesday. I think this will be even more real to me when the meds arrive....especially when I start them on the 28th.

So, that's where we are at now. If ALL goes well and we are able to get some mature eggs, then we have an 80% chance of conceiving, with a 60% chance of conceiving twins. Please please please continue to keep us in your prayers....we need it! We still have a long road in front of us.