Bedrest, bedrest and more bedrest

Well here I am, just hours post transfer of two beautifully thawed 5 day embryos! Everything went very well, lets just hope these embryos stick (well, at least one of them:) The guys called me several times over the past few days to wish me luck and to share their gratitude and to send thoughtful hugs and words of encouragement. I truly am very blessed to have been their chosen one to carry their precious cargo. 

During our first embryo transfer, my bladder was a tad bit under-filled, and the tech. had a little bit of trouble visualizing my uterus on the ultrasound while the doctor worked his magic. This time, I wanted to be sure that I did not make the same mistake, so after breakfast, I emptied my bladder and then chugged about 20+ oz. of water on our way to the clinic. I was still worried that my bladder wouldn't be full enough, but BOY was I quickly mistaken on that judgement call! The nurse had me all gowned up and situated on the table, when she put the ultrasound wand on my stomach and said "wow, your bladder is pretty full", I explained why I drank so much this time and she gave me the option to either A.) go and empty it part-way, or B.) opt to be catheterized after the procedure so I wouldn't be so uncomfortable while I laid at an upside down angle on the table for 30 minutes afterwards. The vivid memory of having been cathed before, without any anestheisa...youch....made the decision to empty my bladder part way, an easy one :). I felt like such a pain in the ass already at that point because I had to get off the table and travel across the hall to the room with the bathroom, but it was definitely necessary. The embryologist asked the nurse if the embryos were girls or boys, I told her that the guys did not opt to do PGD testing (which also allows the option to determine the sex of the embryos along with any other abnormalities), and the embryologist said "well, I can tell you this, they will either be boys or girls", she was a funny lady, I liked her. All staff at La Jolla are very friendly and Dr. Smotrich is amazing as always.

Once Dr. Smotrich arrived in the room and prepped me, the embryos were implanted with ease in a matter of seconds. He said his prayer in Hebrew, and I caught an English word at the tail end of the prayer......it was "multiply"......so I really hope that doesn't mean that he prayed these embryos would multiply..........I'm sure it must mean something else. 

After the procedure, the bed was angled upward so I was at more of an upside down position for 30 minutes. I had to pee so bad even before those 30 minutes started slowly ticking away. Terry tried distracting me while I seriously contemplated yelling for the nurse to come in and cath me. After about 25 minutes of that agony, the nurse came in and said she knew I was probably very uncomfortable and she wheeled me into the bathroom where I proceeded to pee the longest pee ever known to mankind. Probably TMI for a lot of you, but I was actually laughing while I was peeing because it just wouldn't stop, and even the nurse was laughing at me because she brought my clothes into the bathroom and I was still peeing. 

Now, onto 3 days of bedrest!

 

Last lining check

Looking back at my last monitoring appointment, while I've been fretting all week about whether my uterine lining would be thick enough or not, last week the tech. told me that my lining was at a .7 and I couldn't believe it! After that, the clinic increased my estrogen in hopes of helping my uterine lining to fluffen up a bit. Yesterday was my appointment to check on this progress one last time before traveling to La Jolla for the much anticipated embryo transfer. If a surrogate's lining is not thick enough, the transfer will be cancelled, or even worse, she could be declined from ever being a surrogate again (if her body does not respond to the medications). I don't even think I let the tech. insert the ultrasound wand before I asked her what my lining was this time. She doesn't have much of a personality........so I usually try to just be quiet and let her "do her thing" while I'm there, without asking  too many question. When she said ".95"......I felt my heart sink. I could have thrown up at that point. I made the comment "oh wow, that's very thin, I wonder what's going on", she responded "no, that's pretty thick, that's like almost a CENTIMETER "wait a minute, rewind.....say WHAT?! So, you mean, this entire week (which has felt like forever) I've been under the assumption that my uterine lining was at .7 MILLIMETERS, while it was really being measured in CENTIMETERS?! Phew! In millimeters, my lining is actually about 10mm, which is wonderful and fluffy! Who woulda thunk it would only take the news of a fluffy uterus to make my week :) I've been on cloud 9 ever since! Now what will I find to worry about next?

We are bound for California on Wednesday February 13th, I have another appointment on Valentine's day at 9:30am (PST) at the clinic, and the transfer will be on the morning of the 15th. For Valentine's day, Terry and I will be going for breakfast, possibly to a movie, and definitely out for a nice steak dinner. I like my red meat very rare (I'd eat it raw, really) but that's a definite "no-no" for a surrogate during pregnancy, so I'm going to savor my potential last really great tasting steak dinner before the transfer, hopefully my last great tasting steak dinner for roughly 38 weeks :) I'll be on strict bed rest for the 3 days including and following the transfer. By strict bed rest, this means that I will only be getting up to pee and brush my teeth. It wasn't as bad as I thought last time, so I'm actually kind of looking forward to it this time! Terry has been getting more and more excited (although he won't admit it :) while he's making plans for what we'll do before the transfer while we're enjoying some nicer weather. Updates to follow :)