It’s only been three days and so much stuff has happened! First and foremost, the package finally arrived! Sarah was pleased with all of the goodies that we sent, and I really hope that they help her to relax both before and after the retrieval. The picture below is everything that was sent before I boxed it up. The only thing that didn't actually fit into the box was the Brookside chocolates which Andrew wasn’t mad about! Also, Sarah loves plants, so we ordered her one and it arrived today!
Yesterday, Sarah went into the clinic for another check-up, and they said that she is ready for the next step! The last shot during the process is Lupron, which has to be taken at a very specific time (36 hours prior to the retrieval) to allow the eggs to finish maturing and get ready to release. She took the shot last night at 7:45pm, and the retrieval will be at 7:45am tomorrow. This 36 hours will be enough time for the eggs to mature, but will not be enough time for them to actually release. This allows the doctor to retrieve the eggs from the follicles and get as many mature eggs as possible. As of yesterday’s appointment, Sarah had 25 follicles that were in the desired size range, so things are looking fantastic!
So what’s next? Sarah will do the retrieval tomorrow morning, and then the embryology team will go to work examining the retrieval fluid for mature eggs. At this point, Dana said she will call us and let us know how many mature eggs were retrieved. After about four hours, the mature eggs will be inseminated using the ICSI method (as I described in an earlier post) and they will go into an incubator for 24 hours. Once the 24 hours is up, the embryology team will go back to the incubator and review the eggs again. This time, they are looking to see how many of the eggs are fertilized, and we should receive a call from the embryologist telling us how many of the mature eggs achieved this milestone. Once this is complete, the eggs that fertilized go back into the incubator for another 96 hours. On Day 5, the embryology team will pull the fertilized eggs from the incubator and see how many of them have split enough cells to be considered a blastocyst. The ones that have achieved this milestone will be considered to be “high quality” and will be frozen.
We will get a call from the embryologist again at this point to let us know how many blastocysts we have. There may also be some that are not quite ready yet. These will go back into the incubator and be checked on Days 6 and 7. If they split, there is the potential that they could also be frozen and used as well. However, before any of the blastocysts are frozen, a small biopsy will be taken and sent off to the lab for DNA testing. This testing will look for any genetic disorders that the blastocysts may have and will also tell us the sex associated with each one.
I’ve mentioned this before, and I’m just going to mention it again: I’m not a scientist. I just really think the entire process is extremely interesting so I have done a ton of research. I can’t guarantee that everything is 100% accurate, but I think I’ve researched via some pretty reputable sources. My goal here is really just to give you all an idea of how complicated the process is. I always thought that Andrew and I were going to be adopting kids because the process of having children of our own was going to be so difficult. Don’t get me wrong, this journey has not been a walk in the park so far; It has had it’s ups and downs already and I’m sure there will be more in the future. Now, I wouldn’t want it any other way. I also can’t imagine going on this journey with a better team of people supporting us. We are truly blessed with great friends, family, advocates, and agencies who have made this the most exciting time of our lives.
I told Andrew yesterday when we found out that Sarah was ready for her retrieval that he was lucky I wasn’t going to be the one who is going to be pregnant. This has been an emotional roller coaster, mostly filled with happiness and excitement so far. I find myself just sitting and thinking about the future a lot more than I used to. It’s crazy to me to think that about this time next year I am going to be a father. I’ve had a lot of great days so far in my life, and I know that will absolutely be one of the best.
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