CD12: Retrieval Day

Took the subway into NYC bright and early. So early it was actually dark. Retrieval was at 7:30AM, but they were a bit late as they had to haggle a bit over some information in my consent forms. That taken care of, we proceeded to the OR room.

They did a quick ultrasound to make sure that I hadn't lost the rest of my follicles, and luckily all four (on the left) were still there. So they gave me the lovely syringe of sleep and off we went. I just love that feeling of a chemically induced sleep.

They woke me up what seemed like seconds later to see how I was. One of the doctors stopped by a few minutes later with a grin to tell me that they'd retrieved 4 eggs. So a 100% retrieval rate. I was happy, but still a bit bummed that I didn't have more to start with.

Beggers can't be choosers.

Right?

"D" met me downstairs in a cab shortly thereafter as they required an "escort" to meet me and deliver me safely somewhere, a somewhere not specified. I dropped him off at work and then took the ferry home. Blew about $50 in cab fares today, but I won't gripe too much about it.

My box of IgG showed up today, courtesy of overnight FedEx. The guys at the Illinois-based pharmacy snuck in a baggie full of bite sized Hershey chocolates and microwave popcorn. It's sorta important to get some sort of sugar and fluids when infusing to ward off headaches. Cute and thoughtful touch. That's why I love to give them my business. I also met with the hematologist today (Dr. Russian) so that I can get started with my infusions before transfer. He didn't really know much about why I needed an IVIG infusion but he was open minded. I plan on photocopying loads of information for him so that he'll be up on things should he ever meet up with another infertile immune patient.

I get the fertilization report tomorrow about 1pm, so I'm going to postpone my infusion until Saturday. No sense wasting expensive IgG if the embryos don't make it through the night.

So here I sit, having just had a dinner of shrimp & lobster claw panang curry. (Did they say to take it easy today? I forget. Oh yes, and the part about the bland diet? I decided to purposefully ignore that one). So I sit here, tummy full of curry and cats crawling on our laps, imagining my little cells sitting in a warm cozy incubator filled with some sort of nutrient fluid...doing their best to survive.

I wish they knew how much I want them to make it through the night.