Easter Eggs

My friend at work, Sandy came up with that one the other day. It's so dorky, I can't believe I didn't think of it myself!

They only got 5 eggs this time, which is less than what we were hoping for. However, the doctor said everything looked better this cycle (of course, that was BEFORE the retrieval...). She said that my estrogen was much higher, so she was hoping for more mature, better quality eggs. If all 5 are mature, we're close to where we were last time. (They got 8 eggs last time, but only 6 were mature.)

As we were reviewing the paperwork, everything looked the same except I noticed that "Assisted Hatching" was checked. Before all this fertility stuff, I didn't know this happened, so I'll share with you all. I don't know where I was during 8th grade health class, but THIS I missed. Apparently, when embryos are first created, they have a harder outer shell. They have to break out of this outer shell (or hatch) in order to implant into the lining of the uterus. Before fertility treatments, I never knew humans hatched! Anyway, sometimes embryos' outer shells are too hard or dense for them to get out of. If this was our problem, they would never know it, because all that happens in utero. I asked about it being checked on the form, because I know they don't like to do any additional procedures unless absolutely necessary. The doctor said since I had a previous, ahem, "unsuccessful" IVF cycle (being very careful not to use the word "failed"), they were planning to do assisted hatching as a precaution - in the event that that is the problem. Basically, they put a little crack in the outer shell before transferring the embryos back into me - giving them a leg up (so to speak) on implanting.

I met the doctor while Michael was out of the room. When he came back, I was telling him that in addition to the doctor, there was another doctor from NIH who was there to observe and that I told them it was cool with me. He said, "It wasn't Ravi, was it?". Which made me laugh out loud. For those of you who don't know, Ravi is one of my brother-in-law's best friends who is a doctor at NIH. We hang out on a somewhat regular basis. Ummmm - yeah, if the observer was a friend, I'd probably have a bit of a problem with that. There are just some things that friends don't need to see.

Anyway, they'll call us tomorrow afternoon with the fertilization report. Let's hope for 5! (Too bad I can't make a bad half-dozen joke here...)

Thanks again for all the prayers and well-wishes. I feel each and every one!