I'll admit, I was SO naive when I first went into the In-vitro (IVF) Dr last summer. I truly thought there would be a couple of appointments and then the embryo transfer would take place and we would know within a couple of days if we were pregnant. Not so, my friends. There is a WHOLE world of appointments, medicines, and charting of calendars that I would soon venture in to. So, here are all the dirty details for your reading pleasure :)
- Start Birth Control (on this for at least 2 weeks) to help control when the cycle will happen.
- At least 2 weeks into the Birth Control (up to 4 weeks if needed) start the Lupron injections (Needles. I. Inject. Into. Myself. Gulp!)
- Go off Birth Control and continue Lupron shots (this is when the dreaded monthly visitor comes around :)
- At this time, you start 3 shots a day of Lupron, Repronex, and Follistim (side note. The Repronex is PAINFUL stuff) In this time, I discovered I bruise EASILY. I really never knew this about myself, so I was surprised to see my body spotted with purple bruises.
- After a week and a half of this funness, you go into the dr every morning for ultra sounds and blood draws. You do this until they say your eggs are 'ready' for a trigger shot of HCG they give you. This has to be timed perfectly with your 'egg retrieval' at EXACTLY 36 hours before your procedure. The needle is HUGE but I had an amazing friend that did a great job and I didn't even cry :) (from the size of the needle, I really had worked myself up into a panic and thought I would pass out :)
- You then stop the previous 3 medicines and start taking an antibiotic the night before the 'egg retrieval'. You go in the next morning for the 'egg retrieval' and are put under. Coming out of the procedure just in time to take more medicine and then start Progesterone shots (that you continue until a pregnancy test. If pregnant, keep doing for 6 MORE weeks... Again, Gulp!) These are the same size needle as the GINORMOUS HCG shot, so I'm a little nervous about these...
- 5 days later you then go into the dr's office and FINALLY have the 2 best embryos transferred. Yeah!!!!
- About 12 days after the embryo transfer, you find out if there will be a 'little one' on the way in 9 months :)
Whew! Quite a few steps, right? I appreciated that they gave all those steps only one at a time, so you didn't get confused and mix anything up. This whole experience has been super educational with a steep learning curve. SO worth it though if the percentages work in our favor and we get to finally start our family.
