A few days ago, Dr. OB’s nurse, Libby, called to tell me that today’s appointment would include an ultrasound. Needless to say, I was excited but also so, so nervous. I know what can go wrong, but I need to keep hope that everything is going right.

The appointment went great!  All my fears were calmed as soon as the ultrasound tech got to work.  She found the sac and embryo, and we immediately noticed the flickering heartbeat.  It was SO COOL!  She turned the sound on and I couldn’t believe my ears!  I could listen to that sound all day, but unfortunately she had other things to look at, so it only lasted for a few sweet seconds.  The tech sent us home with a picture.

It’s blurry, but the live video it was easier to tell where the baby was because the heart was beating so quickly (125bpm).  The black circle is the chorion, the white, horizontal oblong shape at the top of the black circle is the baby, and the grayish circle below that is the yolk sac, which nourishes the embryo until the placenta takes over.  So Larry, Darryl and Darryl are now just one little one.  We’ve got to get our creative juices flowing to come up with a new nickname for this Little One.  Suggestions are welcome!

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My appetite is increasing, my boobs are growing (DDDs, here I come!), feeling more pregnant every day, and I couldn’t feel luckier. Thank you, Little One! I’m so glad you’re here!

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I forgot to mention — On the day after Thanksgiving, a knot on my bracelet stretched apart and became no longer wearable… I couldn’t believe it!  Somehow, my romantic notion came true!

We successfully told our families the news over the last five days.  All but D’s grandparents were face to face, which was really wonderful.  We have yet to tell my grandmother, the one who recently moved to Texas… I’ll wait to tell her the news around Christmas… she’ll already have 6 great-grandchildren by the time Larry, Darryl, and Darryl are born.

Everyone has been so excited for us and asked us lots of questions.  The most common question has been When will you know how many embryos took? Soon!  We have our first ultrasound with Dr. OB on Friday (we just found out about this one today) and another ultrasound with Dr. B on Monday.  I’m not sure what to expect from either ultrasound — what exactly should we expect to see at 6w3d and 6w6d?  I did some research online and watched a video of a 7 week embryo doing a jig… but I’m telling myself to only hope for a black blob (the sac) and possibly a little white speck (the embryo), just to play it safe.

Speaking of Dr. OB, she was able to prescribe the crinone (the fancy progesterone suppository in a tube that are much less messy than the cheaper prometrium tablets) and get my insurance to cover it, so no more progesterone-in-oil shots for me! It ended up being about a tenth of the cost it would have cost if I paid for it at the “out of pocket” rate.  YAY!

Being newly pregnant (me! pregnant!) feels very similar to turning 13 — as in, yesterday I was only twelve, and today I’m a teenager, but I still feel the same.  My body on almost 4 months of meds and my body at 4 weeks pregnant feel very similar.  However, I’ve definitely noticed an increase in symptoms during the last week or so.  While my boobs hurt on progesterone, they HURT now that I’m pregnant and on progesterone.  After the retrieval, I was soooo uncomfortable from the bloating that I was peeing at least twice a night.  I’m still peeing twice a night, but am wide awake after the second trip which usually is around 6am — not like me AT ALL (could be hormones, could be the nervous excitement keeping me awake).  I find myself feeling car sick even when sitting completely still on the couch, and I keep turning away sweets, also totally not like me.  Also, in case you didn’t know already, constipation sucks.  And I haven’t been able to fit into any of my work pants anymore for several weeks because I’m so bloated (thank you, IVF)… the week before Thanksgiving I wore jeans everyday (thank goodness the boss was out!) and I bought some maternity khakis on Friday to help and wore them today to work!

I have to tell you, it’s awfully strange to be here after nearly resigning myself to the fact that it would never happen.  A good kind of strange, I promise!  We’ve been appreciating every single moment.  We know how lucky we are to have finally made it to where we are.

D and I woke up around 5:00am last Thursday morning.  We’d both been tossing and turning, having dreams about pregnancy tests.  We decided to go ahead and get this over with…  we were crammed in our tiny bathroom, I peed in a cup, D dipped the stick, and we stared at the test for what seemed like hours…

We could hardly believe it!  We stood there in awe and crying, and realized we were both shaking from nervous excitement.  It finally worked!

I had my first beta that morning and got the results Friday, they were 42.  My follow up beta on Saturday was 98, and I didn’t get those until Tuesday afternoon, which was a long, nerve-wracking wait!  I’ve seen this nifty chart on other people’s blogs before and now I got to use one!

I’m officially 5 weeks and 2 days along.  I’ve not gotten used to saying the P word yet, but I’m definitely easing into the idea that we’ve finally gotten pregnant!  I have my first OB appointment next Friday (12/4) and my first ultrasound with the RE the following Monday (12/7).  I’ve not had any spotting(!), my boobs are tender and swollen and I’ve become quite burpy and queasy in the last couple days.  I’m still taking progesterone and will continue to do so through 10 weeks.  I’m still taking folic acid (gotta help this little one’s brain!), baby aspirin and vitamin D.  Today’s my last day of my V8 and Gatorade binge… Dr. B thinks I’m not at risk any more for getting OHSS… I can’t wait until I can drink water again!

We are trying to tell people in person so we can see their faces when they hear our news.  We have shared the news with some family (lots of screams, jumping up and down, hugs and tears!) and a couple friends, and will tell the rest of our family as we see them.  We’re seeing my mom tomorrow and are very excited to share the news with her.  We know we aren’t out of the woods yet, and we will share this information as we feel comfortable… If we know you in real life, we’d appreciate you keeping our news quiet for now.

We are so very excited this year for having a new little something to be thankful for.  Thanks for your supportive comments through this whole thing, especially the last four months…  We are so very grateful for this opportunity!

I hope that you’ve had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.  I’m full after TWO family dinners and am ready to call it a night.

I’m still a few days out from testing, but I’m gonna need some time to process the outcome, good or bad, so I might not be posting here for a while to share the news one way or the other.  I promise to post as soon as I feel up for it, and hopefully I’ll have great news to share.  I hope you understand — I imagine you do!

I’m feeling pretty optimistic at the moment, actually.  I’ve felt optimistic before, but I’ve never been allowed to feel optimistic for SO LONG!  I am very pleased to report that I am currently holding the record for longest time period without spotting during ANY of our 14 other IVF or dIUI cycles.  My previous record was 12 days without spotting, and that was two days ago for me!!!!

I’ve put the order in for the blood test at my generalist’s office… hopefully insurance will cover this ONE thing in this cycle. If not, I’ll have to fork over more money to the stupid hospital lab, I made sure not to lose my hospital band just in case!

Wouldn’t this be amazing to really be happening?!?  On our last try?!?  Less than two weeks before the FIVE YEAR MARK?!?  This might be IT.  Oh, the possibility is sending SHIVERS down my spine.

I’m taking next week off so that I can either do a 9-day non-stop celebratory dance, or gather the pieces of our broken hearts in preparation for several big family Thanksgiving shindigs.

I’ll be back soon, hopefully with good news.   Either way, good or bad, I’ll finally get to share pictures of possibly the awesomest gift I’ve ever made!

Thanks so much for your awesome support through all of this… I hope to make you smile soon!

It’s been 10 days since Larry, Darryl, and Darryl were conceived.

I’m reaching the point where in previous cycles I started spotting and or the cycle came crashing down.

I am so stinking nervous.

I wish there was a way to tell if this worked or not.  I could take a pregnancy test, yes, but remember the two doses of trigger shot that immediately turned the pregnancy test at the mere moistening?  It’s most likely still in my system.

My blood test isn’t for another week.  ANOTHER week!  I mean, come on!  If I make it that far, it’s pretty much a given that things are finally going our way.

Without further delay, please allow me to introduce you to Larry, Darryl, and Darryl:

The five of us (D’s taking the pic), a few minutes post transfer.

I AM READY.  WE ARE SO, SO READY.

We found out on Tuesday that our two remaining embryos didn’t make it to blastocysts.  These three embryos inside me are most likely my last chance at ever being pregnant.  I am working hard to not dwell on the grief associated with this potential future too much.   These three little guys (I’ve settled on calling them  “Larry, Darryl, and Darryl”), deserve all the positivity and love I can give to them, and thinking about the finality of this right now is too much to bear.  However, I do know if this all comes crashing down in a couple weeks, it’s gonna be ROUGH.  But, I’ll cross that path if I need to.  It’s just hard to be anticipating the death of something I’ve longed for and striven for.  And it doesn’t help that our five year mark of TTC is looming ahead in a couple weeks…

I know we’ll be parents someday.  D is going to be a great father, and I hope to be as good of a mother as D tells me I will be.  I’m excited to become a mother through adoption, but there will be an adjustment period as a shift from being an Informed Infertile to being a newbie in the adoption process.

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The ladies in my family, after about 45, tend to have lots of uterine issues.  I don’t think anyone’s made it to 50 without a hysterectomy, and lots of bladder and vaginal issues because of the hysterectomy (did you know your vagina can FALL OUT?!?).  My grandmother, one of my aunts and I all go to the same gynecologist, and I really like that because Dr. OB can see what I have to look forward to in 20 and 40 years.

My mom,who’s still a couple years away from 50, has been dealing with heavy bleeding for a while now and had a hysteroscopy done a few months ago and another one last week in preparation for an endometrial ablation procedure.  When she called me and told me about the first procedure, I told her to be prepared to feel like she’d been kicked by a horse.  I also welcomed her into my world.

She called last night while we were at the movies to say the ablation went well and she was going home to sleep (A Serious Man was seriously boring), and when I heard the message I felt terrible — she sounded so out of it!   However, I spoke with her earlier today and she’s sounding much better.  She is hoping that the procedure will prevent her from needing further procedures, especially a hysterectomy.  It’s so weird to be on the other side of this… I’m used to being the one who has the lady problems and gets calls while I’m drugged out after procedures.  But, it’s also kinda nice to repay all the kindness I’ve received!

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I don’t think I mentioned in my recap of our retrieval the funny things that happened.  As background, Dr. B doesn’t have offices of his own so he’s renting out space from another RE, who I will call Dr. S, until he can get on his feet.  Dr. S doesn’t have an anesthesologist, so Dr. B also hires out for that service.  Maybe these fall into the category of You Had to Be There, but I thought I’d share.

I was in the recovery recliner, BAWLING happy tears, and Dr. S walked by.  He went to one of the nurses thinking I was in lots of pain and saying that it looked like I REALLY needed some drugs!  The nurse checked on me and started laughing when she realized I was crying because I was happy!

As D was writing the check for the anesthesiologist, he asked me how to spell “anesthesia”… we had to laugh because it took me four times to spell it because I had just woken up from being under anesthesia and was still in a daze!

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Current cycle update: 9DPO, no spotting, tender boobs (I always get these before my period and also when I’m on progesterone, so this doesn’t really mean anything), twinges in the uterus (I felt these the first IVF, but you know how that ended…).

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I’ve been meaning to post the pictures of our embryos here — I keep forgetting!  I’ll post them soon, I promise.  In the meantime, does anyone have pictures of their embryos they’d share with me… we weren’t given pictures during our first IVF cycle, so we have nothing to compare these to, and the only pictures I can find online are of either “perfect” embryos or bad ones.

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I’m heading out to babysit my last December doula client’s baby in a little while.  She’s starting to walk (with fingers!  We’ll work on no fingers tonight if she’s up for it!) and she’s AWESOME (super cute, super calm, super sweet, and super silly).  I’m looking forward to lots of giggling and snuggling and hopefully some of her baby goodness will rub off and Larry, Darryl, and Darryl will have yet another reason to stick around.

RJ at BabyOCD sweetly nominated me for the Kreativ Blogger Award.  It took me a while to thank her and post on here (sorry!), but here’s the way it works:

Rules:

1. Thank the person who nominated you for this award:  Thanks, RJ!!
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog.
3. Link to the person who nominated you for this award.

Name 7 Things About You that People Don’t Know:

1. I’d consider giving up vegetarianism during pregnancy, and eating chicken occasionally to prevent hypospadias (a male genital defect with higher prevalence in vegetarian pregnancies).  I know this makes me sound like a hypochondriac, that’s why I haven’t told many people this.
2. I could see myself becoming a crazy cat lady or a hoarder if D wasn’t around.  ( I think people know this!!!)
3. I’ve had several surgeries in my life where I’ve had to be knocked out, but they’ve all been related to either my mouth or my uterus.  Unless I’m forgetting something, I’ve had four on my mouth, and four regarding my uterus.
4. I think I’ve reached the point where I own too many books.  We go to the bookstore, but I rarely buy anything because I know I have at least a dozen I should be reading instead.
5. I wish I’d chosen to be an engineer or an OB.  I love the education I got, but I’d much rather being doing one of those two jobs than working as an office admin.
6. I’d like to take lessons to learn to dance, any style.
7. This was way too difficult!  I’m finished!  This will have to do!

My Nominees:

1. Jem from Ambivalent Womb, who is a few days before the beta for her first IVF.
2. Melissa from Banking on It, who is also currently in the TWW.

I’ve been crafting a lot recently, mainly for Christmas presents and one REALLY AMAZING birthday present (I cannot wait to see his face!!!  I’ll be able to share photos after Thanksgiving.), but I’ve not been able to share anything because several recipients of the craft awesomeness read this blog. I’ve got one Christmas gift 100% done, two 75% done, and two more 25% done.  The birthday present is about 50% done, but the last 25% will be speedy.

I take refuge in crafting in a way I formerly took refuge in books.  Books take lots of brainpower.  Infertility takes lots of brainpower and emotions.  Guess which one has won.  With crafting I can think only about what my hands are doing, or, when I’m in a groove, I can zone out on everything but IF and not have to think about what my hands are doing at all.  Either way, it’s very soothing.

In addition to all the half-finished projects and others waiting to be started, I’ve decided to participate in a Mystery Christmas Craft-Along, which also happens to be my first craft-along, and I’d like to invite anyone who knows how to crochet to join in, too, and let me know so we can compare notes!  I’ll be making this mystery item (a tree, perhaps?) using olive green yarn, and will post pictures as soon as I’m finished with Step One.  Step Two will be announced on Wednesday.

Happy crafting!

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In other news, we’re still waiting to hear about our two remaining embryos.  We’re also waiting to hear what the embryologist graded our three embryos.  I’ll have a hard time feeling confident if our last two didn’t make it… but will be trying to focus on the fact that we transferred the three best on Friday and the two that were left to grow were of lower quality.

I’ve been also trying to not be bummed about only having 6 eggs… I feel like my ovaries were just tired out from having just cycled in September… Must remember: worrying about the past does me no good.

Thanks to everyone who voted in my poll yesterday.  I appreciate all the great comments, too!  For some reason, it made the nerd in me very happy to have a poll that people voted on!  (Or should it be voted in?)

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I am officially Pregnant Until Proven Otherwise (PUPO).

The transfer took place around 11:50am.  We were very excited because D wasn’t allowed in for our other three embryo transfers.  He got to see my giganto bladder (20 oz is A LOT OF WATER), and the bright lights when the embryos were transferred.  Also we got pictures of the embryos.  I’ll upload those as soon as I can get that orchestrated.

We decided to transfer the three best embryos because it will give us the best chance at this.  I’d always wonder if the outcome would have been different if we hadn’t, just like I have wondered about our first fresh transfer.  They didn’t grade the embryos, but the RE said they were beautiful.  Two of them had some fragmentation, but he said that is normal at three days.  I’m gonna do some research tomorrow about what they should look like and compare them to the photos.

We spent much of the ride home talking about what to call these little embryos.  My favorites include “Winkin’, Blinkin’, and Nod” and “Larry, Darryl, and Darryl.”  While the thought of the potential of triplets is overwhelming in the truest sense, BUT we’ve been strong enough to make it to this point, we’re up for whatever may come.  It’s mostly a tripletpregnancy that I worry about… that and, to quote a friend with a three-year old, the “F#$% You Threes.”  I continue sending all my good will towards my midsection in hopes that one, two, or all three of them decide that what I promise is good enough to stick around for (things like ice cream and tickle monsters).

Good things can happen… and good things will happen.  We’ve done everything in our reach to make it so.

Dr. B just called and scheduled the embryo transfer tomorrow morning.  TOMORROW MORNING!!!  He has also recommended that we transfer three embryos because we’ve had “so much unsuccess.”  He’s unsure of the quality of embryos because they’ve been living in the incubator since fertilization on Tuesday.  If they are good quality, I’m nervous they’ll all stick.  If they’re poor quality, then I’m not as nervous.  D and I have a lot to talk about tonight.

While I have you here, would you mind voting in the poll below?  I’m anxious about this decision and am wondering what others would choose to do or what you chose to do when you found yourself in this situation.  Any and all comments are appreciated if you’d like to elaborate!