Mother Hen's Dozen

The last few weeks my sole focus on this IVF road was to grow as many quality eggs as possible.  It's a nerve-wracking process with lots of ups and downs.  My first ultrasound a week and half ago showed that my left ovary wasn't invited to the party and had only one small follicle.  This wasn't the best news.  My right ovary was carrying me.  I had 7 follicles of good size.  Dr. Potter was optimistic but reminded me time is not on my child bearing years side which explained why the last time I had more follicles.  I left feeling defeated.  Even though he said the 8 follicles were maturing equally and appeared to be of good quality we were, "no worse off or better off than the first cycle."  I was pissed and sad.  I had hoped for a dozen.  For some reason I like the idea of 12.  I continued on with the same injections and waited for my next ultrasound.  I wasn't looking forward to my ultrasound, to the drive to Laguna, to going by myself, to hating the left side of my body.  Side note: when I had cancer as a child the tumor was on the left side of my neck, when I had breast lumpectomies they were on the left side, when I had mastitis from nursing it was in my left breast and now my damn left ovary.  And to think I am a democrat and lean way left as opposed to right.  You'd think the left would be a little nicer to me.  Anyways, the news was basically the same EXCEPT my left side now had 2 follicles.  Ok, that's still not getting me to 12 but it's a 100% increase from before.  This was progress.  We were scheduled for the egg retrieval on St. Patty's Day.  Good sign, good luck.

Mark and I stayed in Laguna last night so we wouldn't have to worry about traffic this morning.  This mini vacation was just what my tired, bloated IVF body needed.  That and a King sized bed, we really need a bigger bed at home.  Anyways, I was nervous.  Mark was nervous.  I think this time I was more nervous than the first time when I had no idea what to expect.  But we were ready.  You are under general anesthesia for extraction which is actually nice.  Lying there waiting for the medication to knock me out I held on to 2 of B's lovies.  What could bring me better luck?  The procedure took about 25 minutes but the longest part is in recovery when we were waiting for Dr. Potter to come in and tell us how many of the follicles had eggs according to the fancy scientist back in the lab doing the counting.  He came in shook our hands and said, "well we got 12!"  Oh my GOD, a dozen, I got my 12.

How does this happen you ask?  Well, those little buggers hide sometimes.  And apparently we had 3 hiding.  You might also wonder why I want as many eggs as healthily possible.  Ok, a little education here, these are not embryos.  These little eggs have a long road ahead of them to become embryos.  Some of the 12 won't fertilize and some of them won't grow enough to make it to transfer.  Some will grow but for no apparent reason die off.  So the more we have going in the more we can "afford" to lose and still have a good number for the transfer.  You also hope that you have enough to freeze just in case this round doesn't go the way we hope.  Tomorrow afternoon we will get the "fertilization report" and know how many are still growing and find out whether we are doing a 3 or 5 day transfer.

Anyways, we are home now.  I am resting.  A little sore and feel just ever so slightly empty without my dozen but rest assured knowing they are in good hands.