Tuesday, December 15, 2015

{The Littlest Angel}


We are thrilled to share our very happy news with you...

WE ARE PREGNANT

IVF is giving us a chance at a Christmas miracle. We couldn’t be more grateful to everyone that helped us get to this point. This little babe (or babes) will be loved by so many and that makes my heart so very happy!

I’ve had some people ask me if we know if it is a single or multiple pregnancy. The answer is that we won’t know for a few weeks.

There is a LOT of waiting in this process J

We realize letting all of you know this early can be both a good and a bad thing. Hopefully this will be a strong and healthy pregnancy! We are prepared that anything can happen, and we will figure out how to deal with whatever it is if we need to, but for now we are focusing on our success and JOY!

A few experiences worth noting about this very new pregnancy are noted below:

About 2 minutes after finding out we were pregnant last Friday, I got a call from my step-mother that my dad had suffered a heart attack earlier that day. Even though he was already all set up with a stint in his heart and eating dinner by the time I found out, it added to an already emotionally packed few minutes of my life. He went home on Sunday is recovering...thankfully ANOTHER Christmas miracle J

Second, Monday I was due to go in for a blood test to confirm the pregnancy. Of course that was the day Mother Nature decided to hit us with the biggest snow storm we’ve seen in over two years. It didn’t stop me though…but it really should’ve! I drove across town and got stuck in a neighborhood only about 2 blocks from my doctor’s office. I knew I was going to get stuck and picked a street where I was hoping people were nice. I lucked out because there were THREE very nice people that helped dig my car out. Not only that, but they dug a spot in front of one of their houses so I could leave my car. One of the other guys actually took me to my appointment and insisted if I needed a ride after the appointment I could call him. I thought I’d be able to at least walk back to my car, but after about ½ a block my boots were full of snow and ended up calling my new friend Robert. He took me all the way to the train station so I could at least go to work. THEN a good friend from work, Shelisa, drove me back to my car after work. By then the snow plows had been through and I was okay to drive. Talk about eventful!

Thank you for sharing our good news with us! Merry Christmas!

Love, Ben & Kate

Sunday, December 6, 2015

{The 5-Day Post Lab Report}

We got a final report from the embryologist lab this morning (Sunday, Dec 6th) and only 1 of the remaining 5 blastocysts made it to the final stage and qualifies for freezing. This does not include Monica and Ross that we already transferred.

What does that mean for our 3rd little survivor? Let's call him Joey.
  •  If neither Monica and Ross turn into an embryo nor turn into a viable pregnancy, then a little later we will prepare for a similar round of IVF, but this time without the egg retrieval. At that point we will go through the process of an egg-thaw and if he makes it, we'll transfer Joey and wait that process out.
What happens if Monica and/or Ross turn into a baby? What happens to Joey?
  • Joey will stay frozen in time until we make future plans regarding him.
What if after both cycles we still aren't pregnant? 
  • We will go through all of the shots (about 30-40 injections and numerous blood labs) and egg retrieval process and transfer all over again.
How are we feeling?
  • GREAT! Seriously. I feel like my recovery is taking unusually long after everything, but I've enjoyed taking it easy and just listening to my body if I need to take a nap or not doing any strenuous housework. Ben has been amazing. I came home yesterday after running errands and my heart was so touched at all of work he did here at home. He is my best friend. I still can't believe sometimes that I found someone who fits me so perfectly and makes something like infertility bearable.

I'll post another update around the 17th :)

Thursday, December 3, 2015

{Meet Monica & Ross}



A little earlier than expected, but today (Thursday, December 3rd) turned out to be our transfer day!

Because one of my friends who is also doing IVF this month named her embryos, I mentioned it to Ben and we decided to as well....for FUN (just to clarify-these are not real names we've chosen, nor do we even know their gender).

Meet....Monica and Ross. Totally my idea. Ben doesn't get any credit because he wants to keep thinking of superhero sibling names. I write the blog, which means that I win! (My only-child syndrome seriously just came out while typing that)

All 7  of our fertilized eggs made it to today (Day 3 post retrieval).

The grading scale on the Super 7  is as follows: 3 were good+ quality; 1 was good; 1 was fair-; 2 were poor

We decided since our numbers were small to go ahead and transfer our 2 best today.

Watching the transfer process was actually really cool. I wasn't sure what to expect but I was surprised to find myself getting emotional seeing it happen. I am so glad Ben was able to be with me last minute (I only gave him an hour notice). Someday I hope he writes down his feelings about everything too. He's going to make such a good daddy.

As my friend Erin McBride would say, "Yay SCIENCE!" 

  • What happens if this works? Well, we get a baby or babies! 
  • What happens if this doesn't work? We will hopefully be able to use one of the other 5 embryos if they made it to Day 5 and we were able to freeze them. The reality is that possibly none of Super 7 make it. That is just nature's natural selection process and there is nothing we can do about it. We know this and we want you to know that we know this. If it happens, we will tell you, I promise. Then we will try again. 

Why are we being so open about all of this? Because we always have been. Since the miscarriage last year we found a lot of support by talking about it. It was helpful to know that we weren't alone and that there are options. It may happen again and when I get pregnant I'll probably worry  about it. I have nothing fancy to say about that.

Today though, there are nothing but happy thoughts floating around :)

And now we wait.

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

{IVF Egg Retrieval Update}


Update Time! We started IVF and did our first egg retrieval yesterday. We ended up with 11 eggs, of which 10 were mature. Of those 10, 7 had normal fertilization. Those little 7 embryos will sit all nice and cozy in an incubator and hopefully the cells start splitting and multiplying like crazy. On Thursday we will get another report from the embryologists and find out how they are doing. Depending on the report, we will most likely go in to the clinic and I'll receive the eggs (hopefully 2 strong and healthy ones) back via transfer on Saturday. Any remaining after that will be preserved and frozen. I am feeling okay today after the procedure, but not great. This is normal and should last for about a week or so I'm told. We are hanging in there and happy! :)