Harvesting

The more we get into this surrogacy process, the more I'm amazed at the things that our medical advances can do nowadays.  Athena went in for egg retrieval today.  I was extremely disappointed that I wasn't able to go with her (dumb work obligations). I feel like I failed her at not being the moral support in the waiting room.  Nevertheless, it went great.  The doc was able to get 18 eggs, though at this point we aren't sure how many will make it through fertilization, and after that how many will grow into viable embryos.  The goal is to end up with 5 ish embryos that are good enough for transfer.  We will NOT be transferring that many.  This will not be the Octomom re-run.  I'm a waiting duck for now.  I'll start on my medications for the transfer cycle soon, and we'll be well on our way to some baby growing!  I'm getting more nervous, but a good nervous, not scared nervous.  The last 4 months have been so surreal.  Athena and I talk/text every day and it starts to feel really strange if we go a few hours without "talking".  Sometimes we don't really have anything truly important to say, but just knowing she's there as a friend, buddy, and partner in this brings a sense of calm in this crazy journey.  We laugh, we joke, we talk about the tough decisions regarding pregnancy that we hope we won't have to make.  It's really a strange kind of awesome when I think of how our relationship has progressed.  It's almost like a platonic marriage.  I have a bond with her now that I will never share with another friend and it's been really cool to enjoy that.

Antonio and I haven't sat down to talk with the boys about this yet.  At first, we didn't want to bring it up too early in case it didn't work out and because there would be several months until there was an attempt at a pregnancy.  Now that we are getting closer I think it's time.  I'm not worried at all about their reactions.  I think they are at the perfect age to be pretty neutral about it all.  Rocket won't remember it, and Gambit and Ninja are very logical thinkers which will bode well when we are explaining.  My intention is to put it as simply and matter-of-factly as possible.  They see Lincoln and Mouse at church every Sunday, and I don't think they'll have a hard time understanding that the baby growing in mom isn't *our* baby, but it's Lincoln and Mouse's brother or sister. 

So, things are still moving.  Aside from the surrogacy taking over our lives (in the best way possible), we don't have much else going on.  Antonio is busy at work with year-end reports and all that corporate business garbage.  My job at the hospital is wonderful.  I love the actual work, and I've pretty much figured out a good routine of balancing work, family, and church. Except for the fact that I can figure out when or how to potty train Rocket.  He's ready. I'm not.  I don't feel like dealing with it yet so I keep buying boxes of diapers.  Oh well, someday.

Keep Your Day Job

My reproductive doctor told me I should be a uterus model yesterday. I wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. Let's back up a bit....

Things are moving right along with the surrogacy. I just finished my "mock" cycle and everything looks great. The mock cycle, in short, is when they have me take all the medications and the docs monitor how my body is responding and if its doing what they want it to do. That way, they'll know if they need to tweak a med or make little changes for the real "transfer" cycle.

I had the joyful opportunity of giving myself estrogen injections in my hip. It took me about 15 minutes to muster up enough courage to do the first injection. I kept picking up the needle, looking at it, and then putting it back on the counter in fear. I don't actually have any kind of needle phobia. It's not a big deal for me to get shots or have my blood drawn. But, there's something very different about doing it to yourself. I finally picked it up and before I could think to much, poked it into my hip. I was a title surprised to find it didn't even hurt at all! Despite the needle being 1 1/2 inches long, I didn't feel it. After I got through the first one the rest were no big deal.

One major side effect of the synthetic estrogen is being moody or emotional. I didn't think I was having issues until I saw Athena at church and she asked me how I was. For no reason at all I started bawling! Poor Athena felt so bad and didn't know what to do. I had a few other moments like that, but overall, the side effects have been mild. That might change when I have to start some mo medications next month.

Yesterday I went to the doc to have an ultrasound of my uterus. They were measuring how think the lining got and making sure everything looks normal for when we do the actual embryo transfer. She kept saying, "Wow! Your uterus looks amazing! You should be a uterus model!" Ahh....what every woman wants to hear :-)

I am really happy that everything looks good. My estrogen levels were so good that I didn't have to take my last dose. All of this just increases our odds of an embryo sticking! Athena is getting ready for egg retrieval in about a week. She's a little bummed that she's only got 13 follicles growing, but I'm confident we'll get some great embryos.

 

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A boy and his trains

Nearly every gift Rocket received for Christmas had to do with trains, specifically, Thomas the Tank Engine. That boy will sit and play trains for hours. He will also sit and watch episodes of Thomas for hours if you let him.

 

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Camping. In the snow. For reals.

Antonio went snow caving with the boys of the Boy Scout troop he's a leader of last weekend. I'm pretty sure I stood agape for several minutes when he told me their plans. Hike a bit up the mountain, dig little caves in the snow, sleep in said caves, come home next morning. Who in their right mind would ever think that sounds enjoyable? I can barely tolerate camping when the weather is good. Dispute my protestations that this was the dumbest idea ever, they all went and if the reports are accurate, they all had a good time.

 

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