Fert Report - Day 3

The embryologist called with an update on our 22 embryos. She said that all 22 embryos have divided and are excellent quality for the most part. She said that at this stage (Day 3), they'd like to see the cell number be between 6 - 10 cells. Seventeen embryos are within the 6 - 10 cells, with 11 embryos being at the perfect 8cells stage. Three embryos are at 4 cells. One embryo is at 3 cells, and one embryo is at 2 cells. She said that, on average, 40 - 50% of the embryos will go on and develop to the blast stage. We will get another update on Day 6 (Friday), after the biopsy and vitrification. I don't want to get my hopes up, but I'm somewhate relieved that the majority of the embryos are progressing nicely.

After the call from the embryologist, my nurse called to see how I'm doing. Yesterday, I wasn't feeling too well - very bloated and nauseous. We went in so that we could update our communicables, and I asked to see a nurse. After talking with the nurse, she wanted me to have an ultrasound and blood work done to check my CBC and electrolytes. The ultrasound showed a little bit of fluid in my ovaries and behind the uterus. I also was running a little bit of a fever (101 F). The nurse also weighed me, and I had gained 3 pounds since my physical. She said that wasn't bad, but for me to keep an eye on it. Yesterday after we got back to the hotel room, I weighed myself to get a baseline with the hotel scale. This morning, I weighed myself again and I had lost 5 pounds. But my stomach still feels bloated and distended. I will go in tomorrow for another ultrasound to see if there is more fluid build-up. Hopefully, I'm on my way to feeling better.

What I'm feeling now is no where nearly as bad as my 1st IVF in FL. OMG, it's like night and day. So the plan today is to rest and still drink lots of Gatorade.

Fert Report - Day 1

Kristy, our embryologist this cycle, called me this morning to give me the fertization report. Out of the 34 eggs retrieved, 25 were mature, 22 fertilized via ICSI. She said that I will get another fert report on Day 3 - Tuesday. I am anxious to hear about the embryos' grades. I hope all of them make it to blast, so that they can be biopsied for CGH. I will be on pins and needles until I hear from her again.

In comparing this cycle with my last CCRM cycle back in July:

July cycle
E2 at trigger (Lupron) = 4577
E2 post trigger = 5742
Eggs retrieved = 30
Mature = 26
Fertilized via ICSI = 23
Day 3 biopsy
PGD/FISH for chromosomes 13 & 15 = 7 normal for 13:15
Transferred 2 embies (grades 5AA & 4AA) = BFN
One embie made it to freeze on Day 6

November cycle
E2 at trigger (hCG) = 3534
E2 post trigger = 3944
Egg retrieved = 34
Mature = 25
Fertilized via ICSI = 22
Blast biopsy
CGH = Results in about 8 weeks but may be sooner

Now compare it to my first IVF back in FL:
E2 at trigger (hCG) = 3808
E2 post trigger = Didn't measure
Eggs retrieved = 23
Mature = 20
Fertilized via ICSI = 18, but one died before biopsy
Day 3 biopsy
PGD/FISH for chromosome 13 only (should've tested 15 as well) = 8 normal for 13 only
Freeze all cycle due to severe OHSS

Saturday's Egg Retrieval

Yesterday morning was my scheduled egg retrieval (ER) day. So we arrived at CCRM around 7:15 am. We were way early for once. So we took a walk around the building and started taking pictures. It was cold, but it felt nice with the sun beaming down on us.

We finally pulled up to CCRM's parking garage located on the west side of the building. Jerry pressed the intercom button and spoke with a receptionist, who then buzzed us in. So we pulled into the parking garage and parked right outside the double doors. We took the elevator to the 2nd floor and waited in the surgery waiting area. A nurse came to get me back for the pre-op. It took about 15 minutes to get me ready. During this time Jerry had to wait in the surgery waiting area. Once I was done (IV put in, heart monitor, blood pressure cuff put on, oxygen meter, etc.), the nurse went and brought Jerry back to where I was. We had a few minutes before the anesthesiologist came in to speak with us. He was extremely nice. We discussed how nauseated I get every time I go under, and he told me that he would try to pre-empt the nausea by giving me Zofran and Decadron in my IV.

Next, Dr. Minjarez came in. She was the on-call doctor, as everyone else had gone to the conference. She did my July ER, and I was hoping that she would be able to do my ER this time around. And I'm glad that she did! She even remembered that she did my ER last time. She said last time, I had 30 eggs. And she didn't know how many I'd have this time, but she told me that she would aspirate all of the follicles that she could see.

Then the anesthesiologist came back in and injected a relaxing drug in my IV. I don't remember anything after that. Jerry said that about 15 minutes later, Dr. Minjarez went to the waiting area and talked with him. She told him that the embryologist was still counting my eggs, but she said that I had 20+ so far.

The next thing I remember is waking up in the recovery room with a nurse hovering over me. She took the tube out of my mouth but kept the oxygen tubes in my nose. She also changed my IV bag - I think it's a bag of electrolytes/Heparin to prevent hyperstim. I drifted in and out of sleep. Then the next thing I remember was Jerry standing by my bed.

He had a worried look on his face. But I knew why. With my 1st IVF back in Pensacola, FL everything went wrong. But we attributed that to the incompetence of the FL doctor. And since I triggered with hCG back in Pensacola and now this cycle here at CCRM, we didn't know what to expect. Last cycle at CCRM, I triggered with Lupron, and I was just fine. So we didn't know if my bad reaction in FL was because of the incompetence of the doctor or my body doesn't react well to the hCG. After yesterday's ER, my bad reaction to the hCG in FL was due to the complete incompetence of the FL doctor. I triggered with hCG here at CCRM this time, and I was just fine! In FL, I triggered with hCG, the FL doctor retrieved 23 eggs and I developed severe OHSS and was hospitalized for 8 days. Here at CCRM, I also triggered with hCG and Dr. Minjarez retrieved 34 eggs. No adverse reactions. Hmmm. Makes you wonder huh? CCRM doesn't get the honor of being dubbed the #1 fertility clinic in the United States for nothin'. They really know what they're doing. I just wished that we had come here first instead of going to the incompetent FL doctor.

Let me tell you what a genius Dr. Schoolcraft is. He wanted me to do the hCG trigger this cycle, and he knew what a bad reaction I had in FL. So he kept me on the Antagon protocol so that I would have the Lupron trigger to fall back on. That way he kept his options open, if my E2 levels started to get extremely high. If my E2goes high, he could trigger me with Lupron. However, this time, my E2 level was almost the same as my E2 level with my 1st IVF back in FL. Dr. Schoolcraft triggered me using the hCG trigger and I didn't have the same adverse reactions as when I was in FL. Plus, this time, I had more eggs!

34 eggs!!! When I told my sister, she called me an Easter basket. Gotta love her sense of humor!

I'm waiting for a call from the embryologist today to see how many eggs were mature and how many fertilized via ICSI. I hope that the numbers are working toward our favor. So right now, we're just anxiously awaiting the fert report.

Trigger time!

So finally, after 15 days of stims I finally get to trigger!! This time, I'm not using Lupron as my trigger shot. Instead, I'm using hCG. My E2 is 3534.

I took my last Cetrotide injection this evening, and I get to skip the Follistim shot. Yay! The phlebotomist who usually draws my blood in the mornings (one of the nicest people ever) will be coming to the hotel to give me the hCG injection. The hCG has to be given at exactly 10 pm. This injection is intramuscular, and Jerry has never given me the intramuscular shot before. And tonight is not the time for him to practice.

Tomorrow morning, I go in for blood work only.

My egg retrieval is Saturday morning at 9 am. We have to be at CCRM at 8 am.

I am so excited to finally get to egg retrieval. I am anxious as to how many eggs they get from me, but I have to have faith that whatever number of eggs they get, that'll be enough. I'm already looking forward to the fertilization report on Sunday.

8th Stim Check

My E2 is slowly creeping up. Today it's at 2920. Dr. Schoolcraft decreased my Follistim from 300 to 225. I take it that he's thinking it's almost time for egg retrieval. When the nurse called me, she asked me if I was getting antsy. I told her yes, but I want what's best and it doesn't matter how many more shots I have to take.

After receiving the call from my nurse, we went to Todd's Pharmacy to get more meds - 2 more amps of Menopur. The people at Todd's know me by name by now and they know what I need. We are taking it one day at a time, as far as meds go. I don't want to buy more than I need. Jerry has been keeping all the receipts. Let's just say with 2 IVF cycles this year plus the meds, hopefully we'll get a hefty income tax refund.

While we were in a different section of town, we decided to just eat dinner over that way. Luckily, we had packed my evening meds (Cetrotide & Follistim) and took them with us. After dinner, we had to drive around the mall parking lot and find a secluded spot under a light. We had to keep the car running with the heater on because it's frigid cold tonight. Jerry liked it, but I couldn't stop shivering. So I got in the back seat of our Yukon and got the Cetrotide ready. It's basically just injecting a saline solution into the powder vial, waiting for the powder to dissolve, draw the solution into the syringe, and change needles. Once that's ready, I took my usual position when getting shots. I held the syringe up high, so as to not to bump it. Jerry made a comment about mall security and having to explain why we're both in the back seat with a syringe. We both had a chuckle at that. Anyway, he gave me the shot and drew blood this time, which is the first time this cycle that's drawn blood. I have bruises in my abdomen, but never a drop of blood. Oh well. It was bound to happen.

Tomorrow morning, I am instructed to take 2 amps Menopur and then go in for my ultrasound/blood work appointment at 9:45 am. It's getting close. I don't know if it's in my mind or what, but I think I can feel my ovaries getting bigger.

7th Stim check

Ultrasound shows that my follies are around 14 mm to 21 mm, with about 11 being mature and about 10 more little ones trying to catch up. The nurse said that I may not get as many eggs as last time, which was 30. My E2 level is only 2192, whereas last time it was 4086 after 12 days of stims. I'm still on the same dosage of meds that I've been on for the past few days. Tomorrow morning, I go back in for another ultrasound and blood work.

I can't help but think what the genetic counselor told us... That there is a possibility that we may not have any normals after CGH testing. Do you know how scary that is? Dr. Schoolcraft hasn't given us the donor sperm speech...yet. But our genetic counselor brought it up at our last meeting. And this evening I finally broke down and cried uncontrollably, shaking and bawling like someone who's lost all her hopes and dreams. This may sound ridiculous, but I feel like I'm mourning the deaths of the children that I will never have. I mean, they don't even exist; and yet, I feel like I've already lost them. How can I feel this way about someone that hasn't even been born? It doesn't make sense. I've had all these hopes and dreams for our future children, and suddenly I feel like someone had taken them all away. I feel robbed.

This is our 3rd and don't know if it will be our final IVF. We've sunk a fortune into trying to conceive. Where do we draw the line? When we're in debt up to our eye balls? I'm afraid we're already there. After 2 IVF/ICSI/PGD cycles and 3 FETs, and this will be our 3rd IVF cycle...when will my body finally say enough is enough? It seems like it's on its way there, as my ovaries aren't cooperating much this time. My mental state is shot all to hell. My happiness seems to depend on the results of the ultrasounds and blood work. I feel like my life isn't my own anymore. IVF has taken over. And if we can't do IVF anymore, what do I have left? Ugh. I hate this!

Today's hormone levels & a brief freak-out moment

I finally got the call from a nurse about my hormone levels. My E2 is 1798, LH is 5.3, and P4 is 0.5.

To sum up everything this cycle:

10/23... 1 amp Menopur & 75 iu Follistim
10/24... 1 amp Menopur & 75 iu Follistim
10/25... 1 amp Menopur & 75 iu Follistim
10/26... 1 amp Menopur & 75 iu Follistim (E2 = 73)
10/27... 1 amp Menopur & 75 iu Follistim
10/28... 1 amp Menopur & 150 iu Follistim (E2 = 103)
10/29... 1 amp Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide (E2 = 147)
10/30... 2 amps Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide
10/31... 2 amps Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide (E2 = 464)
11/1 ... 2 amps Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide
11/2 ... 2 amps Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide (E2 = 1052)
11/3 ... 2 amps Menopur & 300 iu Follistim & Cetrotide (E2 = 1798)

Tomorrow, I am instructed to take 2 amps Menopur and then go in for ultrasound/ blood work. It's getting close. The tech measures only the bigger follicles, so I really don't know how many eggs I'm cookin'. I've been comparing this cycle with my last cycle, and things seem to be similar but not quite. The only difference this time is that I started the Cetrotide one day earlier and am on more Follistim. I'm also doing the Cetrotide injections at the same time as the Follistim injections this time whereas last time, there was about 4 hours in between. But I've been told by my nurse to take both shots at the same time, so I've got to trust that.

I am freaking out. I NEED to have at least 30 eggs. With 65% of Jerry's sperm affected by the translocation, the percentage of chromosomal abnormalities in total is increased. In other words, there is a high probability that the percentage of abnormal sperm is even higher than 65%. There is no way to tell if the translocation has affected the other chromosomes; however, the genetic counselor said that there is a high likelihood that the percentage of abnormals is higher than the 65% originally thought.

Let me explain. Last cycle, I had 30 eggs retrieved. 23 eggs were fertilized via ICSI. After PGD, only 7 were normal for chromosomes 13 & 15. We transferred 2 grade AA blasts, which left 5 more embryos. Only 1 out of the 5 made it to freeze. By looking at that, it makes sense that the percentage of abnormal sperm is way higher than 65%.

One second, I'm all peachy. The next, I'm so sad. I don't know if I will produce as many eggs as last time. I'm trying not to stress out about it, but that's all I can think about. I have to make more eggs to compensate for the abnormal sperm. If I don't, then we might not even have any normal embryos after the CGH and then all of this would be for nothing. I know I'm jumping ahead of myself, but I'm the type of person who thinks two or three steps ahead. This sucks. It's so not fair.

6th Stim Check

This morning, I had my 6th stim check (day 12 of stims). The tech only measured the bigger follies, but I still have quite a few smaller ones trekkin' along. Today, my follicle sizes are between 12 mm and 20 mm. The nurse told me that 15 mm is considered "ready" for trigger. So it looks like I have a couple of days to go. After the appointment, we had to go to Todd's Pharmacy to purchase more meds. I got 2 more amps of Menopur and 2 more syringes of Cetrotide. Right now, we're going day by day, just like the last cycle. So far, everything with this cycle is very similar to my last cycle. While I'm waiting for the nurse to call with my blood work results, I thought I'd take this opportunity to post some pics.

Below is a panorama of the lake in Evergreen, Co. We had a great time walking around the lake. I've been told that when the lake freezes, it's opened for ice skating. How fun would that be!



Here are a couple of pics taken on top of Buffalo Bill's lookout mountain in Golden, Co. Of all the places that we've been to so far, this has the best view of the mountains. Below is a pic that we're going to get enlarged and framed when we get home.





Below is a pic from the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs, Co. The rock that we're standing in front of is the famous Balanced Rock. Jerry and I had so much fun exploring the park and we even climbed on a few, even though the signs say don't climb on the rocks. Whoops.

5th Stim check

So the time change had me all flustered this morning. We had to make adjustments as to when to do the Menopur shot. We had the hardest time last night trying to figure out when I should get the shot this morning. You wouldn't think that it'd be this difficult, but it was. Jerry and I had to literally count out loud the number of hours between the shots. Anyway...This morning, we woke up at o'dark thirty so that I would have enough time to get the Menopur shot and make it to our 7:15am ultrasound/blood work appointment in time. Even though the traffic from downtown to CCRM wasn't that bad, we were about 5 minutes late. The ultrasound showed my follies just trekking along, taking their own sweet time. My E2 is 1052, LH is 1.6, and P4 is 0.4. I am still on the same meds that I've been on for the past 3 days through tomorrow. We told the nurse that we have enough Menopur for tomorrow morning, but I only have 150 iu Follistim left. So she went and got me a 600 iu cartridge of Follistim to tide me over for the next couple of days. It will show up on our bill later (at least that's what happened last cycle). I will probably need to go to Todd's Pharmacy and get more Menopur and Cetrotide tomorrow.

After the appointment, we went to brunch at Ellyngton's Dom Perignon Sunday brunch at the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs. Let me just say this: The food was divine! My sister told me about that place, saying that they were featured on the Travel Channel. They spend all week planning for the brunch, which I didn't understand why it would take a whole week to plan. But after having eaten there, I totally get it. The eggs and omelets were prepared anyway you like it - fresh at the buffet station. Waffles, pancakes, wide selection of breakfast breads/pastries/croissants/muffins and meats. They also saute fresh made-to-order meats, poultry, and fish. There was a salad station and a cheese and crackers station. There was also jumbo shrimp, oysters, mussels, salmon. And the best part was the sweets station - chocolate fondue (strawberries, marshmellows, bananas, etc.), cakes, tarts, petite fours, mousse, cookies, creme brulee, cheese cakes, tiramisu, key lime pie, etc. Totally yummy. Jerry and I only had that one meal today, and I am still full.

We were going to go back to the Garden of the Gods but I was so tired. Cookin' these eggies makes me tire easily.

Tomorrow, my appointment is at 9:30am. I'm hoping and praying that my little follies catch up to the bigger ones. I compared this cycle with my last cycle at CCRM, and I'm a little "ahead" as far as the E2 level goes. Last cycle's E2 at this stage was 986, and this cycle it's 1052. I'm curious to find out what tomorrow's E2 level will be. Last cycle, my E2 jumped from 986 to 4086 at the next stim check. I wonder if it'll do the same this cycle.

4th Stim check on Halloween

I had my 4th stim check on Halloween, on my 9th day of stims. I have about 20+ follicles, 6 - 15 mm. My E2 was 464, LH was 0.97, P4 was 0.2. My nurse told me to continue on the 2 amps Menour, 300 iu Follistim, and Cetrotide until Sunday morning, when I go in for my 5th stim check at 7:15am. Yikes! For those of you who know me, I am so not a morning person.

I'm getting really nervous now. I don't feel like I'm producing enough eggs. Maybe it's the pressure I'm under to produce a lot of eggs. I looked at my July '08 cycle, and it seems like I'm having a similar response. Last time, they retrieved 30eggs. I'm hoping with all my might that I produce as many, if not more this time. The pressure that I'm feeling is immense. But I'm trying not to think about it, but the more I try not to think about it, the more I think about it. It's a vicious cycle.

On another note, our puppy (we still call her a puppy even though she's 7 years old), was the hit of the hotel last night. She is just too much for one costume, she had to have two!! The first costume is Buttercup as Snow White, and her second costume is Buttercup as a princess. Let's just say she got a lot of attention from the valet to the front desk check-in to the Club Lounge, even Elways here at the hotel. She was like a celebrity; everyone (the hotel guests and the people who work here) was whipping out their cameras and taking pictures of her. The LA Lakers are staying here at the hotel (they have a game against the Denver Nuggets tonight) and Buttercup got all the attention! How funny is that!