Fert Report - Day 6

Today, we learned that 5 more blasts were biopsied and vitrified. So out of the 22 embryos, a total of 15 made it to the blast stage to be biopsied. The embryologist could sense my disappointment over the phone, so she kept telling me that having 15 embryos out of 22 go to blast is "great." She reminded me again that the percentage of embryos making it to the blast stage is 40 0 50%, and we had 68% make it to blast. I know that's great... if you're not factoring in any genetics. Unfortunately, I know the severity that the genetic factor plays in all of this. So my mind starts doing the math. Cells from the 15 blasts will be analyzed. Due to DH's Robertsonian Translocation of the 13th and 15th chromosomes, roughly 65% of his sperm are affected. So right off the bat, 65% of the 15 blasts will be abnormal. In other words, at most, we should have 5 - 6 normals. Then we have to take into account the extra percentage that the other chromosomes might be affected due to the bulkiness of the translocation, making the embryos aneuploid. So again, the numbers will be decreased... By how much, we don't know. But there have been studies that show more chromosomal abnormalities - other than the affected chromosomes - when one parent has a translocation. Ugh. I hate this. It's so frustrating. Anyway...

While I had the embryologist on the phone today, I took advantage of that by asking tons of questions, including the grades of all 15 blasts. There were 2 blasts with a grade of 5AA. Two blasts with 4BB. One blast with 3AA. Four blasts with 3AB. Three blasts with 3BB. And 3 blasts that are 2/3.

Then I asked the embryologist at what point do they grade the embryos - before or after the biopsy. She said that the embryos were graded before the biopsy. That way, they would know which embryos were good enough to biopsy.

After getting all the information that I can about the embryos, I asked about the sperm. Basically, these questions were out of curiosity more than anything else. The total sperm count is 13.6 million, but the total motility was 2.7 million. She assured me that they do a morphological assessment on the sperm and pick only the best ones (as far as they could tell under the microscope) to fertilize the eggs.

After getting the info about the sperm, I had even more questions. I asked her how my eggs were (again, out of curiosity), and she said that they were "excellent." They did do ICSI (ICSI in lamens terms: physically inject one sperm directly into the egg), but they didn't have to do the laser ICSI , which she said was good. She explained that they don't routinely do laser ICSI, as the less things they have to do to the egg the better. She said that my eggs fertilized "beautifully."

The embryologist was so patient with me. She stayed on the phone with me for a good 15 minutes or so.

I guess I'm just trying to process all the information. I don't want to get my hopes up just to have them shattered. Been there, done that... not once, not twice, not even three times. Let's try years and years worth of disappointments. Not to mention that I don't even count the temp and fertility signs charting nor the medicated IUI's. Heck, that's "child's play," for a lack of a better phrase.

What happens next? We wait. The genetic counselor told us to expect to wait about 8 weeks, as the holidays are coming up. So now, we rolll the dice and the countdown begins...