Playing catch up

There were so many things that I wanted to blog about during this, but just didn't feel up to it. I thought I'd go ahead and do it now to remember later.

The retrieval:
- The night before the retrieval I decided I had nothing to wear to it. Really? Who goes shopping for an outfit to wear to an egg retrieval? Oh yeah, that would be me. I ended up buying some gym pants and a matching long sleeve tshirt. (Both of which I had to remove when we got there anyways!) I did get to keep on my lucky socks though.
- I felt so bad afterwards that I didn't care much about anything. I wasn't expecting that at all. Turns out that I probably had blood pooled (based on some bloodwork they did and the fever) near my diaphragm that caused all of the pain in the shoulder and the general feeling of crappiness.
- Some pictures to remember it by: ready for my IV of fun drugs - excited and nervous about what was to come!


At home afterwards, drugged up and trying to stay in a 45 degree angle. (Later that became in a sitting up position because even the 45 degree angle hurt.)


The transfer:
- We were SO nervous going into it. (Or at least I was.) There was always a chance when we got there that we'd find out none of the embryos made it.
- Seeing the pictures of the embryos was one of the most amazing moments.
- I was completely awake and drug free during the transfer. It didn't hurt at all.
- I had to pee worse than I ever have before afterwards.
- I had to use the bed pan 3 times in about 40 minutes. Using a bed pan lying flat on your back isn't fun. Peeing while flat on your back isn't easy. Some pee felt like it was going down my back. Yuck.

Bedrest:
- It's not all that it's cracked up to be. I was so completely bored - you can only watch so many episodes of Gilmore Girls, play games of solitaire and snood, and play on the internet for so long.
- Google is not your friend. Or sometimes it is, but you really should stay away from it. Things I googled while on bed rest:
"Can you pee out your embryos?" (In reference to the bed pan experience immediately after the transfer.)
"Constipation after transfer." I was really constipated but was afraid to strain too much. Sort of along the lines of the question above, but with bowel movements.
"Should I be laying down for IVF bed rest?" I wasn't sure if sitting up or laying down made a difference.
"Pictures of 5 day blastocysts." I needed to see if mine looked as good or better than others.
"Success rates of blast transfers." This mostly got my hopes up.
"Failure of blast transfers." After my hopes were up I thought it would be best if I brought them back down.
-Thanks to Jen for bringing over dinner on Thursday night! My mom came and spent all day Friday with me, and provided our lunch and dinner.
A picture from my bedrest: Cali enjoyed it more than I did.

The 2WW:
- I tried to stay as calm and relaxed as I could. I did a pretty good job of not overanalyzing "symptoms" beause I knew most of them were from the progesterone shots anyways.
- I really didn't even have that many "symptoms" anyways. My boobs hurt most every day, and I was a little nauseaus on one day. And somewhat tired in the evenings, but I had been that way for 6 weeks so it wasn't new.
- The PIO shots weren't nearly as bad as I'd heard. The first 5 or so were a breeze, and then I had one that formed a knot under the skin. We ended up having to really be sure to move around (luckily I have a big butt) to make sure and not hit a previously injected area. Some of them bruised, some formed knots (I still have them), and for a few days I had to be careful how I leaned back against a chair. But overall they weren't that bad.
- I had a little bit of spotting - more of a brown mucus - on 9 days past the transfer. No explanation for that.

After the BFFN (big fat fucking negative):
- I threw my lucky socks away after the BFN. I toyed with the idea of cutting them up into tiny pieces first, but decided it would take up too much time.
- We had to do the PIO shots until Wednesday night.
- I got to take off the estrogen patches on Thursday.
- AF should arrive in 1-10 days from now.
- Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone's support this week. I have the best friends!

And that's it! Every random thought that I've had in the past few weeks and wanted to blog.