Meet our Little Ones

We transferred two "perfect" Grade 1 blastocysts to my uterus this morning.  The picture above is an actual image of the two blasts that are resting in my uterus right now.  AREN'T THEY BEAUTIFUL?!!!  We have given them the nicknames Jem & Scout.  A LITTLE QUIZ:  Does anyone know where we found those names?  I know they are odd names.  We do not plan on using them for our actual offspring.  We just thought it would be fun to have nicknames.  I will explain the names a little bit further if anyone knows where they came from.

This is the ultrasound picture Dr. A took immediately after the transfer.  The majority of the picture shows my uterus and the arrow is pointing to a little white dot.  Can you see it?  It is tiny.  The blastocysts are in a fluid that shows up as the white dot on the ultrasound.  

Before we spoke to Dr. A this morning, the nurse coordinator, Mary came in and told us that we had three "perfect" Grade 1 blastocysts.  She explained that we had the option to transfer all three of them if we chose.  I expressed that I was leaning towards two and Dave was considering three, if  that is what Dr. A recommended.  What was he thinking??  She told us that we should talk it over and discuss it with Dr. A when he comes in.  

I proceeded to try to persuade my lawyer of a husband that we shouldn't even consider transferring three.  He, of course, used his litigation skills to discount me.  (That is how I felt.  I am sure he will say that is not how it went down.)  I then told him that if we had triplets, I would be forced to quit my job.  He thought that was ridiculous.  Will anyone back me up here?  

Dr. A settled the disagreement.  He said we were going to transfer two.  He gave us no option.  He is a sensible man.  They froze the third blastocyst today.  There were several other blastocysts that they referred to as "early blasts".  That means that they haven't completely matured.  They will look at them tomorrow and if they look good, they will freeze as many as possible.  

The procedure was uncomfortable, to say the least - both physically and from an exposure standpoint.  I am now officially on bedrest until 10:30 Sunday morning.  I am typing this on the laptop in bed.  I think I will lay around most of the day tomorrow and continue to do very little physically Monday and Tuesday.  Wednesday it will be back to work for me.  

I just want to complain for a moment.  I hope you don't mind.  I currently (and for the past two weeks) have the appetite of a 16 year old boy.  Dave is completely surprised by how much food I am throwing back.  I am not even pregnant yet.  The steroid and hormones are causing this.  I typically have a sweet tooth, but I am craving fried and cheesy melty foods.  

I have eaten more fast food in the past two weeks than I have in the past six months.  I can't get enough.  Dave is picking up our dogs right now and he is going to pick some Taco Bell up for me on his way home.  I just ate enough leftovers to comprise a full meal less than two hours ago.  

The other complaint (I know you can't wait) is that I haven't been able to exercise AT ALL since the egg retrieval on Monday, March 30th.  I will not be exercising again until at least April 13, maybe even the 21st, possibly longer, if I do become pregnant.  This is not a good thing for my mental health status.  I LOVE to run.  

And, in fact, if we get a big fat negative result with this cycle, I will be running my first half marathon on April 19th in St. Louis.  Therefore, I will have no opportunity for anymore long runs prior to the race.  Of course, if I am pregnant, I will not be running the race, so I am hoping that I can't run it.  I am sorry about this rant.  Dr. A did tell me that he thinks I can resume my normal running routine if I don't have any complications during my pregnancy.  I was happy to hear that.  My normal routine doesn't include training for a half-marathon - just short runs.

By the way, I will have two blood pregnancy tests.  They will be on Friday, April 10 and Monday, April 13.  They do a quantitative hCG test and the number should at least double every two days.  So, we will know if I am pregnant the day after Easter.  I know that the typical protocol is not to share that you are pregnant for the first trimester, but we will be throwing that out the window, because it seems cruel to drag you all into this and then withhold that little bit of info.  

I'm sorry this post is so long.  I had a lot to share.  Thanks for thinking about us today.