Saturday, May 28, 2016

IVF 1 - Day 20 3 day report

The embryologist called me this morning to report that I have 6, 3-day embryos.  One of the fertilized seven seems to have stopped after a two cell split and isn't expect to go any further.  Of the 6, four are very good and two are good.  Interestingly, from the thawed frozen eggs, the best looking 3-day embryo is one of the frozen, but the one that stopped after dividing is the other.

I discussed with the embryologist that we will wait until day 5 for a hopeful transfer.  He warned me that from these 6, I would be looking at 2-3 blastocysts comfortably, and that 4 would be an exceptional outcome.  Fingers crossed there is at least one.

I plan to transfer one blastocyst if I'm lucky enough to have more than one.  I really don't want multiples.  If it happens on its own, that's one thing, but I don't want to increase my chances by transferring two.

The laser assisted hatching will be done later today on all of the embryos.  The embryologist told me that if you do it on day 5 you risk injuring the blastocyst.  On day 3, the shell or zona pellucida is still thick and easy to nick with the laser.  It thins towards day 5 so becomes more difficult.  It seems a fairly routine procedure so I'm not too worried about anything going wrong.  Also, I asked, and it's completely fine and normal to freeze a blastocyst which has already had the assisted hatching.  I'm glad they said they'd cap the cost at £250 now!!  Otherwise that would have been £125 per embryo.  I would have spent it of course, but I'm glad for the discount with 6 to do.

I've been feeling pretty bloated and a bit crampy since the egg retrieval.  Looking online, this could also be due to starting the progesterone/Cyclogest.  I'm not loving that I've got to take a suppository twice a day for what I hope is something like the next 10 weeks.  I'll do it obviously, I'm just not loving it.  And I hope the bloating and cramps reduce.

I'm sort of amazed when I think about it- that eggs from my body have been fertilized with sperm and there is potential life in a petri dish at the clinic.  It's actually sort of hard to get my head around.  You spend so long focusing on trying to conceive, it's hard to imagine the jump to the next step. I'm not there yet of course, and all of this may not work and could go horribly wrong.  But a thread of me is still pretty hopeful and giddy with anticipation. 

3 comments:

  1. Thanks for posting all this information! I have been following your blog for a while. Fingers crossed for you xx

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