Infertility, adoption, and kiddos (part 5)

If you'd like a refresher or just need to catch up, go HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.

So we'd finished the "tests" and headed to Texas. This was Spring Break 2005 and all we were doing was getting an initial consult and finding out how things would go that summer.

We met our doc and his nurse. Loved them! Got all of the info we would need on ordering our drugs from overseas. Easy shmeesy. And then began our wait.

(In the meantime we were following my cycles like they were the most fascinating show we'd ever seen on TV. If you've ever been there, you know what I mean!)

May came, school let out, and our plan was to stay with my sister while the first round was completed. I began the drug regimen and we once again headed to Texas. YEEHAW!

Now this next part becomes a little fuzzy. Maybe it was stressful? Maybe M's twins were such rambunctious toddlers? Who knows...

Before they can do IVF they have to take some of your eggs from you. In order to do this they give you twilight...not a full knock-out, but close (what they SHOULD HAVE given me for that dang HSG test!). They stick a fairly large needle into your ovaries and suck out the viable eggs from their follicles. Won't tell you how they get the needle into your ovary...don't want to scare anyone!

After they did the egg retrieval my doc very calmly told me that during the procedure I had forgotten to breathe. Hmmm...forgotten to BREATHE????? Yessiree bob, the twilight drugs made me stop breathing. SO they quickly grabbed the eggs and turned off the drugs. Whew! Who woulda known the egg retrieval would be so dangerous?

After they grab your eggs they mix them in a petri dish with a sample of life juice...The Rev's, um...you know...which he had so kindly given them. Poor guy.

Lo and behold we had embryos! Every day they would call and tell us how many had made it and what "grade" they looked to be until they became blastocysts and it was time to transfer.

This day I will NEVER forget.

The transfer was to take place at the Scott & White hospital in Temple, Texas. M's husband was a resident there so we knew the place well. It was a morning like most mornings in M's household...chaos reigned as the twins screamed for breakfast and wanted to be played with. M was fixing their breakfast, cutting a peach pit out of a peach to be exact, when the knife slipped and she nearly sliced her thumb off. (Okay, slight exaggeration. But just slight!)

The Rev and I are getting ready to go to the hospital for our embryo transfer. Doc is at work. And M needs stitches. AAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!

So, The Rev stays with the twins while I drive M to the emergency room. I take my valium I'm supposed to take an hour in advance and Doc shows me to the clinic where the transfer will take place. (He says I acted silly, but he can't prove anything. :o) ) M gets stitches and heads home to relieve The Rev, who rushes to the hospital to be there when the transfer takes place.

They transferred two embryos and we began the agonizing wait to see if they would take...

GO HERE FOR PART 6