Stims, Trigger, and Retrieval

Here's the update:

Sunday, June 21

Our clinic visit on Sunday was a nice surprise! It's always nice to have my hubby there with me when he's available on weekends. My estrogen increased as it should have, and the scan showed 20 follicles! This was up from the 15 we saw on Friday, so we were pretty excited. Some of them were tiny, 9ish mm in size, so they are new and likely won't mature by the time the rest do. It was also nice to see some familiar faces of the ladies cycling with me. Chatting with them is so much better than sitting in the waiting area thinking too much! I continued another night of stims. We purchased three more batches of medication this week.

Monday, June 22

I returned to PCRM for monitoring on Monday. I've been super tired, but I was in good spirits. My scan showed some follicle growth, and the doctor said I was ready to trigger! Trigger means to take an HcG (pregnancy hormone) injection which gets the follicles ready to release the eggs and also primes the uterus lining to thicken in preparation for implantation.

I got a brief injection training and then received my HcG supplies, antibiotics, and instructions for egg retrieval. And that's when I kinda freaked out. Turns out that my antibiotics were capsules which I couldn't swallow. After a fair bit of panic and some weeping in the staff room at work, I managed to get a tablet version of the same pills, and I was good to go. The HcG injection bled more than the other injections, but it wasn't too bad. Pain was expected as my stomach is more sore each day. It was a nice to relief to know that it was my last self-injection in my belly - #28!

Tuesday, June 23

I was trying not to be super nervous about egg retrieval. Work is an awesome distraction, but the procedure was on my mind a whole lot. I also had a really sore belly and needed to ice it repeatedly. I'm blessed to have caring and supportive colleagues while I go through all of this. It seemed like a long day with too much time to think. Finally, I went to bed early and was really quite pleased when I remembered that I didn't need to poke myself!


Wednesday, June 24

I actually managed to get some sleep! Hubby and I were up early for the clinic. I was on an empty stomach and getting quite thirsty and hungry. When we got to the clinic, it was nice to see a cycle buddy before retrieval.

When it was my turn, they checked my HcG absorption and blood pressure, gave me a warmed up blankie, then hooked me up to an IV and got me started on sedatives and pain killers. I was happy to have a familiar nurse and my main doctor involved in the process. And it was nice to meet the embryologist beforehand too.

Once I got into the operating room, the nurses hooked up blood pressure and heart rate monitors. They put these sticky things with metal buttons (no idea what they're called!) on my chest and stomach which were a bit of a pain (literally) to get off later. I had a bunch of wires all over the place! Next, they put an oxygen line on my nose and added more meds into my IV line. The meds were going to make me feel relaxed and dizzy. I don't really remember anything about the procedure after that. I was conscious, but I just remember them saying it was done and they were going to wheel me to the recovery room. I'm glad I have no memories of pain or discomfort! My hubby joined me in the recovery room, and they kept monitoring vitals for 45 minutes. I was pretty happy to get juice and cookies. The embryologist came by to tell us 19 eggs were retrieved!! We were very excited to hear that number! We needed to wait a day to find out how many were mature and how many mature ones fertilized.

I was relieved to not be in pain. It wasn't until I got up that I realized how woozy I was. Walking made me dizzy and nauseated. I was glad I had my hubby around to dress me and get me to the car. The nausea continued for a few hours. I came home and began with my high salt diet - it's intended to prevent and relieve OHSS - ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. Basically, if you take in a lot of salt, it draws water out of your ovaries which are enlarged and fluid filled. So I was mostly just having chicken noodle soup and sugar free Gatorade. A 2-hour nap helped a lot with the nausea and dizziness. I spent almost the entire day in bed and on the sofa. Towards the evening, I could feel that the IV drugs were wearing off. I started getting crampy and a bit uncomfortable. Before things got worse, I went to sleep.

Now we have daily reports from the embryologist to look forward to!