Home from Egg Retrieval

Recovery lineup... believe it or not my lap and legs/feet are under there...

it's Bailey on my lap, then Lynx, Angel and Luna.

Bogey was sleeping on the back of the chair and doubled as my headrest!

Today went smoothly once I got over the stress of being 15 minutes late to my ER! The traffic on the fwy was a parking lot...




They brought Mario and I into a room in the office I hadn't been before, and showed me to my locker and a little basket filled with things for me to change into - the little cloth/paper (?) booties, shower cap and hospital robe, plus a real robe to cover up my bare butt. I then briefly met with the anesthesiologist who had me sign some papers and escorted me to the room where I would have the ER done. She got me hooked up to an IV and even managed to get the vein in my left hand (rather than my right arm where I've given blood from for the last 3 weeks!). As we were talking - er... I was babbling because I was wound up from the morning commute and my nerves... I suddenly felt a relaxing wave come over me. Ahhhh... that's better! The next thing I knew I was awake and it was over, with the nurse asking me what flavor juice I wanted. And then Mario was there at my side, I had a nice heating pad on my tummy, and a few minutes later I was able to stand up and get dressed and wheeled out on a wheelchair to talk to Dr. Sunshine.

He said that although I had 4 follicles, only 3 eggs were able to be retrieved. I am unclear if one follie was empty or if something happened to that egg, but I think it was empty? Of the 3 retrieved, he said they were of "variable quality" - not all were mature. He said they would fertilize the mature one(s) with ICSI (where they actually take a sperm and put it in the egg) and let the others mature and fertilize on their own. I will know tomorrow how that all worked out. I asked him if it was better to freeze eggs or embryos, and he said definitely embryos. Apparently eggs don't freeze well at all... whereas embies do pretty well. (Mario's good friend Sean's wife Jules just had her daughter from a frozen emby) He reiterated that he thought we could do better with another round and get better numbers and blood results. I think knowing how I responded this time around gives him more to work with for the next round.

I just remembered that the nurse told me the only issue with the retrieval was getting into my cervix - it was closed up tight and did NOT want to open. I of course didn't feel a thing, and I still feel pretty good with only light cramps. I kind of suspect my cervix has scar tissue on it from my cone biopsy and LEEP in the past -- because my HSG test didn't hurt either, and I've been told that can be excrutiating, especially when you have blocked tubes like I did. Ahh, thank God for those ironic blessings, right?? It does mean that I may have problems with delivery --- but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Mario took me home after picking up drive-through breakfast (the nurses made a big deal that I needed to go and eat ;)!, and I rested on the big chair - my old friend - for the rest of the day. He cleaned the house, made the bed, did some yardening and even got me an ice cream sundae! :) Thank you baby!

And thank you to my loving family who did a conference call (literally) last night to pray a rosary for Mario and I ... that was so sweet and thoughtful.