Apology

I wanted to apologize for my "whiny" post a few minutes ago. I am in a really bad emotional place today and it came off really whiny. I am fully aware of the fact that especially with the economy the way it is right now, there are people out there struggling to put food on the table to feed their kids and people with medical bills piled up from fighting life-threatening diseases and people about to lose their homes because they are unemployed and can't pay the mortgage. I sounded like such a whiny brat on my previous e-mail. Yeah, we were saving for a bigger house....but we're lucky we have a nice house as it is. Yes, we would love to be able to make love and bring a baby into this world instead of paying thousands of dollars to do so, like the lucky ones do, but that's just not what's going to happen for us so we've accepted it the best way we can. The bottom line is that even when life seems so unfair, we are very lucky at the same time. I have to have faith that Tenley will be okay and that we will be parents very soon. It just may not be the way we had hoped and planned for. :)

Thanks for listening,

Love,
Tiff

Fertilization Report Part #2

Today has been a day of good news, bad news and lots of tears.

The good news is that of the 8 eggs they were able to mature in the lab, 4 of them fertilized normally. So the good news is we have 16 embryos!!!! I will get a day 3 report tomorrow to see how many are still developing and how many we have lost. It's a great starting number though. :)

24 eggs
12 mature on day of retrieval
12 fertilized
8 more eggs matured overnight and were ICSI'd on day 2
4 more fertilized
= 16 embryos. :)

I will post the day 3 update tomorrow. :)

The bad news today is that I've been crying pretty much non-stop all morning. As you know, Our 5 year old Pug, Tenley lost her vision a few weeks ago pretty much out of nowhere. After a trip to the emergency vet, several trips to our regular vet and a trip to a veterinary opthamologist specialist today...she has 2 completely detached retinas and is completely blind. They ran some specialized tests today and were able to scope her eyes to find her retinas completely detached. The poor thing just shakes and has a hard time walking around because she can only see light. Surgery is an option. There are only 4 doctors in the country who do retina reattachment surgery and luckily there is one in Chicago. The cost.....$8,000 for both eyes. Thank God we're good savers. Unfortunately, with the $50,000 + out of pocket we've already paid over the last 4 years to start a family....something most people get to have sex and do.....plus this bill, I really hope we don't have to adopt. That's another $30,000. So much for being good savers to buy a bigger house or for me to stay home with our kids one day. Our savings just goes to "life" for us. We'll be okay, but it just never seems to end. My only wish from this post is for people to TRULY realize how lucky they are and to not take anything for granted.

So that's been my day. Good and Bad...but such is life I suppose. This was the hand we were dealt and we're going with it...1 dollar at a time. :)

Tenley will be having surgery in the next few weeks because they like to do it as soon as possible from the time of detachment. Please say some prayers for our little "Tens" and for our embabies.

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Fertilization Results

Have to get on the plane:

24 eggs
12 mature
12 fertilized
8 more matured overnight and are being fertilized today...will get the report tomorrow.

Will write more later!

Retrieval Details

So I'm feeling a little better than earlier. Still super crampy, but I would think that's to be expected after carrying around 24 eggs. :)

So we arrived this morning around 8am. They took me back and after a few sticks and tries, finally got my IV started. Adam came back and stayed with me until the anethesiologist came in to start the "happy juice" and wheel me away to the O.R. I remember giving Adam a kiss goodbye and getting on the table in the OR. I remember following a few instructions....and then......nothing. I woke up in recovery with my adorable hubby there. While I was in the OR, Adam got to make his fairwell visit to "the room" to make his contribution. He says it went well and I believe the word he used to decribe everything was "stellar." The embryologist came in and talked to us after I had woken up a little bit and told us they had retrieved 24 eggs and that Adam's sample looked great....of course, Adam prefers the word "stellar."

So they will fertilize them this afternoon and call us in the morning with a fertilization report. They usually expect about 75% of the eggs to be mature and about 75% of the mature ones...to fertilize. Hopefully we 'll end up with about 15 embryos tomorrow. After that, about 50-60% of the embryos won't survive until day 5 blastocyst stage where they are biopsied. Then once we send the biopsied cells off, about 50% will come back abnormal on average. In the end, after 24 eggs, if we can have 3-4 normal embryos come back from testing......it would be considered FANTASTIC. So that's our ultimate goal.

The test results take about 6 weeks so hopefully around April 19th, we will find out how many normals....if any...we have to transfer. We will get a phone call on Monday to tell us how many we had biopsied and how many were sent for testing. I'm going to be a mess until then. I have no control over anything at this point though, so I'm trying not to stress about it.

So Adam's swimmers are going through the ironman competition this afternoon as we speak...all competing to be the "chosen" ones. They are put through the ringer in tests. They are observed, washed, observed again, forced to swim up a tube, observed again, forced to swim towards some sticky stuff, then observed again and looked at closely....then chosen one by one out of several hundred million to fertilize each of my eggs. Crazy isn't it?

Today is my grandpa's (Gompers) birthday. Our potential future children are being created on his birthday. :) We also have 2 frozen embryos on their way to Denver as we speak from Chicago and they should arrive tomorrow. One of those was created on IVF#3 on what would've been my brother Ryan's 30th birthday. So hopefully he's watching over us and sending good vibes to our little embryos.

I have been wearing a gold thumb ring as well for good luck. My grandma (Gommers) gave it to me at Christmas for good luck and is wearing a matching one. She is so cute. :) My Mom and Dad had given me a St Girard necklace (fertility Saint and protector of mothers) as well about a year ago and I have been wearing that non-stop as well. We're not Catholic (we're Presbyterian), but we figured God would be cool with it. :)

So Adam is going to get me some cheesefries now and I couldn't be more excited. :)

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Egg Retrieval

We're back from the retrieval. We got 24 eggs, which is more than we've ever had. I'm feeling pretty crampy and pretty out of it, but glad it's over with. I'm off to find my heating pad and will update with more details later.

As always, thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Egg Retrieval tomorrow morning!

So we went to my Dr. this morning for my final blood test. Only one more "stick" to go! My IV for my retrieval tomorrow. We got really lucky and are apparently the first retrieval of the day in the morning. Since I can't eat or drink anything after midnight tonight, I'm glad we're early. It normally wouldn't be a big deal, but since I feel like complete CRAP and my throat hurts....not drinking anything for that long is not going to be fun. The trigger shot is an HCG shot....which is the pregnancy hormone, so I have been nauseas now too. Oh joy. Let's just say I'm SUCH a treat to be around right now. Poor Adam.

*Angry post warning*
.....At this point, I would like to extend a special "shout-out" to anyone who insists on going to work or out in public in general while they're sick. Thanks to you, Adam got an awful cold....who in turn gave it to me. I understand that work needs to get done, but for the love of god, please work from home or something. I know some people don't have that option, but if you do.....don't drag your sick rear to work just to get everyone else sick. See? See what a "b" I am today? Okay, I'm done. :)

Dr. Adam did a great job on my trigger shot last night and I got a great picture of him coming at me with the injection. :) Picture "mad scientist."

So after watching 7 hours of the Golden Girls yesterday, while Adam wanted to jump off the balcony, I'm bored out of my mind. We decided that since our procedure was pushed up to tomorrow instead of Wednesday, we are coming home on Wednesday instead of Thursday now. I miss my bed and my girls, Tenley and Cooper. This trip was never meant to be a "fun" trip, but we never imagined we would be miserably sick the whole time. We're looking at it as more of a business trip. We thought we would at least be able to get out and see a few things, but that never happened. Oh well, let's get these eggs out of me so I can come home and start feeling better.

That's enough complaining for now.......

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A

Stim Check #5 and Trigger tonight!

I officially feel like crap. I'm sick as a dog and bloated and sore as hell, but the good news is we trigger tonight!

My ultrasound went well this morning and my E2 level has climbed to 4,400 so instead of letting it get much higher and get dangerous, they would like me to trigger tonight with the egg retrieval on Tuesday morning. I have been craving cheese fries like crazy for the last few days, but since I'm trying to eat so healthy.....I can now look forward to some on Wednesday once these little eggies are out of me. :)

Dr. Adam has to give me my trigger shot at exactly 10pm tonight. This is the fun one in the rear with a 1 1/2 inch intra-muscular needle. woo hoo! We have to be there at 8am on Tuesday morning and my retrieval is scheduled for 9am. For those of you unfamiliar with trigger and retrieval. CCRM does the trigger shot exactly 35 hours before the retrieval. Everything is timed just perfectly. Please just pray for lots of eggs!!!!!

So my instructions for tonight are to take the ganirelix shot as usual, followed by the trigger shot at 10pm on the dot. I go for bloodwork in the morning....and then no more shots!!!!! My IV for the egg retrieval surgery will be my last "stick" for awhile.....at least until we start prepping for the Transfer in a few months. :) The light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter and brighter!

Thanks for being here!

Love,
T & A