I'm Pregnant!

With cautious optimism, I'm sharing with you the extremely early but exciting news that our 3rd IVF worked and I'm pregnant!

We did a three day transfer of three embryos on Saturday, October 8th; the second anniversary of my Mom's death. Two days prior, we learned that we only had 5 that fertilized from the 11 eggs that were retrieved. I was disheartened. Knowing that with our second round, of the 8 that fertilized, only TWO were ready to transfer on day three (the rest were not dividing or had two polar bodies) I was trying to prepare myself for arriving at our appointment only to be told "I'm sorry but...."

We checked in and they gave me an identification bracelet. That is a good sign, I thought, which was quickly countered with It's just a formality; they do that with everyone. We sat and waited. As I was called back, the woman said "The doctor will be in soon to do the transfer!" Shocked, I asked "Oh, I have embryos!? How many?" Immediately unsure and starting to backpedal, she said "oh, umm..I don't actually know. The embryologist is meeting with Dr. Frederick right now to go over the results." Apologetically, she scurried out and quietly closed the door.

When my doctor came in with a huge smile, I immediately knew and exhaled a sigh of relief. But I wasn't expecting her to say that we had THREE! Elated, we transferred all three, which is within the recommended guidelines for my age.

I went home and was on bed rest for three days, something that is much better in theory. And then we waited. And waited. The two-week wait is difficult at best. While I felt hopeful, I would quickly counter that with the fact that we also transferred three for my first IVF and none of them took.

Last Sunday, only 8 days after the three day transfer, I tested. There was the faintest line. The kind of line you could only see at a certain angle, in certain light. It gave me hope. On Tuesday, 10 days after the transfer, I had a line. A very faint one but the beginning of a line. Finally, on Thursday, I took the test above. I sent a picture to my husband who texted back: Trying not to get excited and you are making that hard to do. 

If you haven't gathered, my husband is more of a practical planner than me. While I'm over here shouting it from the roof-tops, he is keeping in mind that it is so early, and 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage. Also, we did not do genetic testing on our embryos, an additional cost of $5,000. So we do not know if this little embryo has the capacity to continue developing, even in ideal circumstances.

I'm an open person and one of the reasons I don't mind sharing this news so early is because if it turns out to be a chemical pregnancy, I would be really sad and I would want to share that too, as part of my healing process.   

But for now, I'm enjoying it. We're going out to dinner tonight to celebrate my beta blood test which was 232, a "good" number but not looking like multiples. I go back for more blood work in three days, and we want to see that number double or triple. My first ultrasound will be around October 28th, but we won't be able to see a heart beat for one month.