Dreams and False Alarms

Sparky and the Panda's

A wise British psychoanalyst once said "there is no baby without the mother". Since he was an analyst, we could imagine that he wasn't talking in a concrete sense, but that the baby exists because in some sense, the mother has created the baby in her mind.  It is starting to hit me that the babies I've had in my mind, those babies waiting for a body, aren't to be.

Sparky was real, he had a body for a precious few weeks.  The Pandas, what I started to call the last set of embryo's, had cell bodies for about 5 days, and then they were gone. But for me, these are my children. The only children who will ever share that precious mix of my husband and myself.  These children carried within their cells a mix of us that will never be expressed.  My blue eyes, his dimples, his congenital scrawniness, my impossible to fit feet, our big teeth and small jaws and on and on.  They also carried within them that indefinable, and indescribable hope of humanity--the hope that the love of our bodies, and the love of our minds will be expressed in flesh. These are the children that will never be, and yet they are so real to me I can see them running through the house, sleeping contentedly, making paper Mache models of the planets the night before the science fair.  I can see them growing up, and growing shy about their bodies, suffering the slings and arrows of first love, finding careers, finding love and becoming parents, and bringing home their own babies for us to love.  And yes, there will be children who will do this, and much much more. And we will love those children fiercely, aware of how close we came to not having any children to love at all, and yet, at this moment, it is my Sparky and the Panda's that I want.

When my husband and I were on the cusp of dating, I was trying to get him to kiss me and he said "I can't kiss you, because if I do, we'll have grandchildren, and I'm not ready for grandchildren yet."  In that moment a life flashed before my eyes, a life where we would make love, make children, and grow old together.  In some ways that vision hasn't changed, we do make love, we will make children, and we will grow old together, but this morning when I woke up, I just felt so so sad about the loss of...I suppose the loss of every piece of him going into our child.  Please don't reassure me that everything is going to be ok once I get 'the baby'.  I actually really know that. This stands alone; this loss is irreducible. 

So Sparky and Panda babies Mama loves you, and daddy loves you. And thank you for every precious second you were here with us.

And then there were none

Dr Calm just called and gave us the news: they stopped dividing. 

I feel sort of numb and relieved, and very sad. As much as I wanted a transfer, and the hope of one last chance, I am also relieved to know now.  It is going to take a few days for my body to catch up--these sore breasts won't go away immediately.

But somehow, it isn't the affront that it was in December--I guess it is pretty obvious, it isn't necessarily my eggs. We knew once we heard that the donor got all the dud eggs that our chances for success this cycle were pretty low.

We meet with Dr Calm on Friday, and depending on when my next period we'll do a donor sperm IUI in May. 

Thanks so much for all your good thoughts and support.

A bad case of the "yes, but's"

Hello all 'yall.  I thought that I should post something about why I have turned into a "help rejecting complainer** in my responses to your good luck and good wishes comments.

I find being hopeful in the face of terrible odds extremely painful, and some how it makes me feel invisible, as if the reality of this terrible situation can be overcome by good feelings. It can't. I don't even think you think that. I imagine you offer me you hope and good wishes in the spirit of a life line. The pain surrounding this reality can be touched by your good wishes, and I need all the good wishes you can muster for my own psychic survival, but the fact of the fucked up chromosomes is unmovable, and hope just feels like salt in the wound.

So yes, it is good that we've made it this far, maybe even to a day 6 transfer, but the likelihood of these, or maybe just this, embryo turning into a viable human being is so low as to be laughable. That isn't to say that it can't happen, or even that I don't believe it could happen, or that I don't want it to happen. But it is very unlikely to happen.

Anybody remember NBHHY?  It was started by Getup Grrl at Chez Miscarriage (best fucking blog ever). She had DES exposure, and had a t shaped uterus. She endured many miscarriages, and had a doctor who kept hope alive for an unbearably long time.  When she would get pregnant, or even when they finally moved on to a surrogate, and when there was a positive development, one could comment NBHHY, which stands for "nothing bad has happened yet". Some days, that is about all the positivity I can bear.

So say what is in your hearts, and offer me your hope, but know that there will be times when it is hard for me to be gracious.  And if you are stuck, but want to say something, try out "NBHHY". It works wonders.

**someone who asks for help, like has a blog, but who when you attempt to help them says "yes but"

And then there were 2

Dr Calm just called and said that we have two morulas. We're going to wait until tomorrow to see if they continue to develop and become blastocysts, and if so, we'll do the transfer. 

I know that a day 6 transfer is not the kiss of death, but now that we know that we are dealing with a translocation, I must say that I don't feel terribly reassured by this development.

Last May we did a day 6 transfer which resulted in Sparky, but he only lasted until 7 weeks gestation. Of course what I really want is a crystal ball--something to tell me if we are going to get our hearts broken again. 

On a brighter note, knowing that we are dealing with a translocation is a relief. For me it means that if these little embryos don't develop into a viable baby, we will have some sense of why. We can't know for sure, but the so much of what has been excruciating over the last 3 years has been all of the 'not knowing'.

2 Super Stars, 1 shy chorus girl and 3 annoying groupies

 

We got a call this morning:

We've got two super stars, grade two, but dividing really well.

One that is 5 celled, but grade one and 'perfect' but shy and slow to join the party.

1 that is 3 to 4 cells and then two that have progressed from 1 celled to 2 celled (these are the annoying groupies).

I think we know on whom to focus our efforts here people.

After the call, we just laughed. What else can we do? There may be 2 or 3 to transfer on Monday, or none, and if there are and one or more of them take, then there is the long road ahead to see if either my antique eggs or Husband's translocation derail the little mites efforts.

Off to lounge and nurse the belly back to health. The most exciting thing that may happen to me today is Korean Barbeque!

An update on the stupefying six (and then there were 4)

Okey dokey.  My clinic doesn't usually give day two updates, but given what happened last December, we want to know when to disconnect and let go.

With all that said:

2 are still one celled

3 are still dividing and "look good"

1 is still dividing, but is kind of fragmented, but she isn't too worried about that at this point, because I guess it can improve (? I think that is what she said...)

We'll get an update tomorrow morning--but no matter what, we aren't transferring on day 3.

Reassured? Relieved? Confused? All of these are pretty prominent emotions at the moment.

Still thinking DE and DS makes the most sense as the next step. Me want baby now, me getting a lot less picky about gamete origin...

Fertilation report (in which I am loyal to the husband, even in the lab)**Updated

None of the eggs inseminated with donor sperm fertilzied noramlly. It seems in the distribution of the eggs, the donor got all the duds, and husband got the good ones.  We're both a little annoyed about this, but it is also sort of romantic. However, the first person who commetns that "It was meant be" get's fifty lashes with a wet noodle. Biology people; we are dealing with biology.

Of the 7 dedicated to Husband's sperm, 6 fertilized normally. Dr Calm was circumspect and reminded me that I'd had blastocysts in cycles where we'd only had 8 fertilize normally, so, there is still hope.

Let's just hope that the sperm who made it were the ones with their genes in all the right places.

Weird.

**Did I mention that I was worried my wiggly right ovary had gone rouge? We went and saw Dr Calm who found the ovary nicely tucked behind my uterus, with good blood flow, but with a lot of fluid (possibly blood) pooled up near it. Ugh. So more and more bed rest for me. She did a blood count to see if I was anemic from it. Oy.  I'm pretty relieved to not have another Laparoscopic ovary relocation in my immediate future.

We'll get an additonal report on the stupifying six tomorrow. Hopefully they won't all make a suicide pact and off themselves!

Jitters

It's about an hour until I start staring at the phone waiting for Dr Calm to call. My mind is vacillating between hopfulness, and planning the next step.

My right ovary appears to be dislodged again. I'm not in excruciating pain yet, but I'm going to get an ultrasound to get the lay of the land. When this happened in September, it got worse and worse, and on the day of the 3 day transfer, I had surgery. This little problem is making me quite wary of ever cycling again.
More later.

7 of 11

We got 11, and decided to use 7 for husband's sperm, and 4 with donor sperm.

We were back and forth all day, and into the night about what to do, and finally when they said "11" we both felt like our IVF ship may have sailed, and we really need to know a little something about my egg quality. 4 isn't a great sample size, bit it ain't nuthin either.

My parents brought me chips and gatoraid, so I shall salt my way through the next 48 hours, just to be on the safe side.

Fertilization report tomorrow.

Pre-Retrieval Report

It's about a half an hour before we leave for the egg retrieval.

We decided, after much strung und drang, to not use any donor sperm this cycle. We are both completely aware that doesn't make much scientific sense, but emotionally, it makes sense.

So we are giving Husband's sperm one last chance to express themselves--lets just hope that we have a least a few good sperm that can make use of these lovely eggs and ultra plush lining I'm supplying.

If this cycle is a bust, the next step is an IVF with all donor sperm.  And then, in order to up the controversy factor, donor egg and donor sperm.  I know, we could adopt.  I promise to explain all our reasoning, but I don't promise you'll like it.

Thank you so much for all of your support and humor over the last few weeks.

In the words of Beth from Hoping and Trying: I'm off to "break a stirrup"!

**Updated to add: Husband decided to dedicate anyting over 12 to donor sperm.  We'll see!