Egg Retrieval...

This morning was my egg retrieval and I was really...really anxious. I was given explicit timing instructions for everything - like, "Take your HCG trigger shot EXACTLY at 9:30pm - no earlier and no later" and "Be at the office at 10am for an 11am procedure - don't be late." It didn't help my anxiety that we sat in the waiting room until 10:20am...and then we were late getting back into the OR for the retrieval. It also didn't help matters that I had a tremendous fear that I had already ovulated. If you've ever tried to conceive, you know that you *know* that feeling - you know when ovulation is happening and you know when it's over. I swore it was over. As the nurse struggled to get the IV in and move it all around claiming "rolling veins" - total TMI - I started to cry. I concocted this scenario in my head - I'd come out of anesthesia to faces over me telling me that all the eggs had already released and they were too late.

Lucky for me they brought the anesthesiologist in quickly after the nurse's failed IV attempt. He got the IV in - in record time - and it was fast moving from that point. I'll spare you the details of the OR and the crazy contraption with stirrups and straps. Yikes.

I woke up in recovery feeling pretty darn uncomfortable. They told me that out of the 14 follicles I had watched leading up to the retrieval...they were able to harvest 9. It's hard not to be a little disappointed - but I have to remember that not every follicle has an egg. And 9 is not too shabby. And we really only need one good one. Out of curiosity, I asked the nurse whey I needed anesthesia for this procedure. She told me that it would be inhuman and barbaric to do it without. Alrighty then. I needed extra pain medicine as it got a little unbearable - and then we were sent home.

It was quite a shock to walk out of the clinic to a winter wonderland. The drive home was actually pretty scary with downed trees and slippery roads and ambulances passing us. Hopefully falling snow in October on the day of my egg retrieval was little messages from Heaven telling us it was going to be alright. Sounds poetic enough to be true!

Since I've been home my pain has been intense. Ed took over with the boys and I've been propped up in bed with a heating pad. No one warned me that the pain would be this bad! I was told to expect "mild cramping" and this is definitely far from mild. I've been googling non stop and am a bit reassured to read that the pain I'm experiencing isn't uncommon...but wow. If you've gone through an egg retrieval I'd really appreciate hearing your post retrieval experience. How you felt, how long it lasted, what you did for it, etc. I am struggling!

So now the hard part begins. The long and torturous wait. They will call me tomorrow to let me know how many of my eggs were successfully fertilized. Then I will get updates throughout the week with their progress - which ones are growing, which ones are not, which ones are out of the running. Then, probably on Thursday or Friday, I will go back for the embryo transfer.

I. Am. Stressed.