It Takes Two, Baby

Transfer day has finally come and gone.  When we scheduled our IVF a couple of months ago, I felt like it seemed so far away and didn't want to wait any longer.  Then before we knew it, it was here.  The 11 days of injections flew by, the retrieval was done, we waited our 5 days for the eggs to grow to embryos, and now it was time.  

Kyhle and I were quite nervous for today, wondering how many of our embryos would be left to transfer and if we would be able to freeze any.  You see, on Friday, we got a call saying that out of our seven eggs, four of them fertilized.  They rate the embryos on a grading scale of 1-5, with 1 being the best quality.  One of our embryos was graded #1!  This was such great news to us!  The other three embryos were all grade 3--not horrible, but not great, either.  You can still transfer a grade 3, but odds are they won't stick.  We still had two days until transfer, so we were hopeful those three would progress a little further.  Unfortunately, you cannot freeze grade 3 embryos, so we were fearful this really would be our one chance. 

Kyhle took me on a fun little date last night to help distract me and boost my spirits.  We went to dinner at Smokey Bones, and then went to the mall to walk around and bought some candles and lotion at Bath and Body Works.  We then got some shakes at Steak and Shake, and came home and ended the night watching the Redbirds.  It was a pretty fun night, other than seeing the Cardinals lose to the Giants.  (We are watching game 2 now.)

When we arrived at the facility this morning, Dr. Gentry did not arrive until 9:15, so we just sat in our recovery room and took a little snooze for an hour.  When he walked in, he shared the news with us that the results were still the same as Friday--one grade #1, and three grade #3.  He told us the grade #1 was a perfect blastocyst and just what he wanted to see for transferring.  He let us know that we could decide if we wanted to go ahead and transfer one of the grade #3's just to take a chance and see if it would stick, and let us know that it would not take any chance away from our good embryo.  

So two it was.  I couldn't help but feel like I wanted to transfer all four just to give us the best chance possible of at least 1-2 sticking, especially since we couldn't freeze the rest.  It is very sad to me that those little embryos are just going to be thrown away.  After all our efforts to get them to grow and develop, I felt like that was a dagger to my heart.  

The transfer was quick and easy--just around 15 minutes long.  I had to lay flat in recovery for one hour, which was shear torture, as I had an incredibly full bladder.  They require you to drink 16-24 ounces of water so you can have a full bladder for the ultrasound, and I was so worried my bladder would explode on the table! The coolest part of the transfer was seeing the embryos on the ultrasound screen!  We watched them get placed right in to my uterus, and then we received a copy of the photo.  Kyhle was pretty giddy getting that little photo. I kissed it for good luck, and Kyhle has rubbed my belly a few times, saying, "Stick babies, stick!" :)  

We have just been resting at home the rest of today, and I am supposed to take it easy for two weeks--no lifting over 20 lbs, no exercise, no heavy housework.  I will be happy to go to work and come home to be lazy the rest of the night.  I was debating if I should go to work tomorrow or not, but I think I will be alright since I have a low-key job.  I am trying to save my PTO in case of  future baby appointments. :)

I know everyone is wondering, so we will be able to test in about two weeks.  In the fertility world, it is called the "two week wait".  It will be so hard to wait and wait, but I know that it will end up going by fast, just like the rest of the process.  We have waited four years, so I guess we can wait two more weeks. 

To be continued...