Ultrasound Chronicles: 8 Days and Counting

Still another 8 days to go before we have our ultrasound! I think this wait is MUCH MORE nerve-wracking than the 2ww wait! Since you can cheat and take hpt's during 2ww you have an idea of what is going on before your beta, but not this wait. Short of running to the emergency room with some feigned tummy issues, you are not getting a sneak peak at what is going on until that ultrasound appointment! I am ticking the days off on my calendar and doing busy work in attempts to pass the time! Once we get a heartbeat confirmation, I am starting the protocol to induce lactation and I will be blogging about that experience as well. I am hoping it will be a great resource for others out there that are thinking about trying this but are afraid to or apprehensive for whatever reason. I am hoping that I am successful with it, since I have read that if you have breastfed before your chances of success are better and even though it was almost 19 and almost 17 years ago, I have in fact breastfed before, LOL! Hey it still counts even if it was ions ago! I will start off by taking Prometrium (a form of progesterone and taking a drug called Domperidone, which is also used to treat motion sickness) I will be doing this for around 60 days OR until I notice significant breast changes (i.e, increasing about 1 cup size OMG!) after that, I will stop the Prometrium, continue the Domperidone AND pump for 20 minutes EVERY....THREE...HOURS... Yes you read that right!! I am also adding in several herbs that are known to increase milk production. According to all the literature, the sooner you start the better your chances and the better chance you have at making and adequate milk supply and since I am planning on being the primary food source, I'm gonna get started ASAP! So here's to me having success with this! More on this to come after we get past the ultrasound! Come on April 4th!!!

Beta Day Part 2! 11.75dp5dt

Final beta was today! The nurse said she was looking for the number to be around 540 since it was 3 days later. At 48hrs it should have been around 300 she said.. Well our number was good.. Really good..... SIL took a FRER last night because she is amazing and sweet and probably knew I was thinking/wondering/hoping everything was ok and this is what it looked like:

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812!!!!

Our doubling time is 27.8 hours!! Next up, ultrasound April 4th, to see how many buns we got baking in her oven!

Beta Day! 8.75dp5dt

Nurse finally called with our beta! I thought I would die from waiting!! I think she wanted to know as much as we did.. So at ALMOST 9dp5dt our first beta is..........
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135!


YAY!!!! We go back Monday for 2nd beta!!! It's finally happening!!! Enjoy the weekend everyone, I sure plan to! :-D :-D :-D!!!!

POAS Chronicles: 8.75dp5dt

OK now she's just showing off...:

Better shot of FRER:

 See what I mean? LOL.. Blood has been drawn and now we wait.. Should be hearing something any time now... Next post will be... THE RESULTS SHOW :)

POAS Chronicles: 8dp5dt When Surrogates go ROGUE

OK, I know y'all have already read the post with the digital test. SIL emailed me when she got home from work with the subject: Just now. I was like "WHAT! She knows that last digital is for tomorrow!" I click the picture and this is what I see:

Ahemm... She does not listen very well does she? LOL! Someone sound the alarm, we got a rogue surrogate on our hands!!! :-D :-D!!

OK for serious y'all, we are NOT testing again until the last digital of the morning.. Well unless she had 3 tests in that box, then methinks I might get a few more emails,LOL!!! Atleast I will sleep well tonight! 

POAS Chronicles: 7.75dp5dt Digital Says....

Rough night... Last nights test was FAINT again... SIL had a bout of morning sickness after dinner, so she felt crummy and drank tons of water... Tested before bed, but I didn't realize she was drinking a bunch of water, so I freaked all night after seeing the faint test. This AM she tested with a Answer strip test, that I got free in my ovulation kit (those tests SUCK!) and it was a freakin SQUINTER! Let the tears ensue... Meanwhile, SIL was freaking out too, so she had a friend bring her a digital and she hurriedly texted me a pic of it....

Even though it is blurry I KNOW y'all can see what it says!!! In case you are blind as hell, it says PREGNANT!!! So ummm, yeah... We are DONE with "Fun with HPTs" this ride sucks and I want to get off now, kthanks. We have a digital that we will use tomorrow AM, just cuz and that will be as she heads out the door to her beta. We will be 8d17hrsp5dt when she has it drawn, so no idea what range we should be looking for... As long as it's over 50 I think I will be happy.. Tomorrow can't get here fast enough!

POAS Chronicles: 6.75dp5dt + Bonus

OK, so today I have a treat for y'all! I have TWO tests! One from last night and one from this AM! The one from this AM is DEFINITELY DARKER than the one from last night! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!! The progression one is not as clear since BIL didn't take the pic (this dude's camera is amazeballs, for realz) He is officially hired as the baby picture taker! Anywhoodles, here is what we are looking at:

6.75ddp5dt (this was this AM around 8AM CST)

And these are them all together, including this mornings:

 YAY!!!

POAS Chronicles: 6dp5dt

So "C" my SIL took a few more tests since I last posted and things are looking good! The tests are definitely getting darker! I can't wait to see what tomorrows looks like! Here is a good progression of the tests so far. My BIL has an AWESOME camera! As the tests get darker, I start to feel a little more excited and breathe a little easier! This might just be the real deal!!

POAS Chronicles: 5dp5dt

Today we are halfway through our 2ww.. We are getting to cheat since 10dp is a Saturday, the clinic is letting us do our beta Friday. We of course had no intentions of waiting until then, in fact we have been POAS since 2d17hrsp5dt (yep, totally figured it to the damn hour!) and of course they have been negative thus far. We tested Saturday AM, Sunday AM (3d17hrsp) and Monday AM (4d17hrsp) and of course tonight since as of 3PM CST (4EST) we officially hit 5dp5dt! This test is technically 5.5dp5dt and it is: 

POSITIVE @ 5.5DP5DT!!! OMG, WE DID IT!!!

Final Frozen Embryo Count

Got the call that the last two embryos were not able to be frozen. One arrested and the other continued to grow, but started to have abnormal cells, so it had to be discarded. The good news is the FIVE that were frozen were of HIGH quality! My clinic will NOT freeze anything graded CC or lower (boo for them because we all know lots of babies are born from lower grade embryos!! annywhoo) So we have frozen:

(3) 5BB
(1) 4BB
(1) 4CB (this dude juuuust made the cut y'all!)

So now my posts will be focused on the POAS Chronicles, stay tuned! 

Transfer Update

Transfer went VERY WELL! RE said "Don't be surprised if you end up with twins!" We said "We will take it!" He also said he would give us a 60-70% chance of success. And of course the only thing he has no control over is the actual embryo, such as abnormalities, etc. We know that, but that doesn't change the high we are riding! We also have FIVE blasts frozen today and the last two embryos were a bit behind so they will possibly be frozen tomorrow or Friday! SO let me introduce you to.... THE TWINS!:

T-Minus 5 Hours

Transfer is in FIVE HOURS!!! I am anxious, nervous, excited and a few other emotions.. This has been such a long time coming and now that it's here, it's kind of surreal.. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers that we have excellent blasts to transfer and even a few to freeze and that this IS IT FOR US! Will update y'all as soon as I can. Love you TONS!!!

Day 3 Update

Just got the call from embryology, ALL 9 are growing great still today! I asked her what cells they are and she said they are 8-12 cells today! She said that was great and we are definitely on track for day 5 Wednesday. I am so relieved, these waits are so brutal!! Now we need to make it to transfer and then beta! Atleast I can have some wine now! :-) Will update after transfer! Thanks for your continued support and prayers everyone!!!

Fertilization Report

I got the fertilization call today and it was pretty dang good! Out of the 17 eggs, 14 were mature enough to be fertilized (a few were just not up to snuff) via ICSI (we ALWAYS DO ICSI) and of the 14 they fertilized, NINE fertilized normally!! (the other 5 fertilized abnormally, that did make me kind of sad) So we are doing a day 5 transfer on Wednesday at 2PM! So I will try and update after transfer and after I get my SIL situated in her nice comfy bed in the suite we booked! We will get another call Monday morning early, so there is still a chance we will have day 3 transfer if they weren't growing properly but they are confident we are doing day 5 so I am claiming that and praying to God that we can transfer 2 grade AA blasts and, have some left to freeze! So will let y'all know something when I do! SIL is ready to go and just waiting for them to call her to the "stage" :-) In other news, we are SO thankful to have wonderful friends. I have been able to meet people (like Krystal!) finally and spend some time with family and see old friends. The day of egg retrieval, we stayed at a good friend's house and they set up the nicest room ever for us and have been pampering us ever since. We are so grateful to them for opening up their home to us and for catering to our every need, it has been amazing.. I keep trying to get up to help and I am promptly shuffled back to my "throne" they are the best.. I do have a bit of ohss as I can tell I have some swelling, but I am downing the gator.ade and salty food like nobody's business to keep it at bay..

Egg Retrieval Update

Won't be a long post, since I'm hurting pretty bad.. Egg retrieval went AMAZING! Out of my 21 follicles, they got 17 eggs! Tomorrow we will find out how many of those 17 fertilized.. We are praying it is a great number so we have plenty to choose from for our transfer. We are hoping we can go to day 5 and also have a few to freeze. Will update tomorrow with the fertilization report! THANK YOU FOR ALL THE PRAYERS AND SUPPORT!!!