First Sono 5weeks 5days

Yep, those two sacs are two babies! I cried and laughed and laughed some more. It is very strange to see them on the screen and know they are actually inside of me. I can not put into words what its like to see the screen and hear Dr. Keathley say  "two" it is very surreal. The first words out of Jake's mouth after Dr. Keathley said there are two were, "we need to get a bigger car" lol. We are both still in shock and it does not seem real. Good thing I am off today, I would not be very productive. Poor Jake's at work and has already called me twice since I have gotten home, does not appear he will be productive either.

The two circles in the middle of the gestational sacs are the yolk sacs for each baby. My next sono is on July 7th, we should be 7weeks and 1 day and should be able to see the heart beats.

HCG levels 2

I am so sorry, I am a bad blogger. Life has been on super speed. On Friday my HCG level was about 630! So everything is progressing as it should. It seemed that as soon as everything was positive that the tiredness and queasiness set in. I am not nauseous but just have this overwhelming queasy feeling after I wake up from bed or a nap. So here's to ginger ale and zofran. Tomorrow I will be exactly 5 weeks pregnant (i know that doesn't seem right but, the dating starts from your last menstrual period, even though we know exactly when we conceived) and the baby(ies) will be about the size of an orange seed. Crazy isn't it? We are in Colorado at the cabin taking it easy and enjoying the cool 70 degree breeze! When we get back on monday we will have our first sono, woo hoo!


Picture I took yesterday when we were hiking



HCG levels

Yesterday I had my initial HCG level drawn and it was 268, which means I am defiantly pregnant! I will have it re-drawn tomorrow. Normally levels should double every 48 hours, so we should expect to see the level to be above 500 tomorrow!!!!

Our Embryos

This is a picture of our actual embryos!! The embryologist took this picture an hour before they were placed in my uterus. This 5 day embryo is called a blastocyst. The one on the left is starting to "hatch" and push out of the cell which is the next step in development. The one on the right we are told is shy. They explained that the cells expand and contract and the moment when the picture was taken the cells contracted which is why it looks different than the one on the left. The actual embryo transfer took less than a min and felt like nothing more than a speculum exam. Following the transfer I had to stay laying down for 30 min. After, the nurse wheeled me out to the car where I continued to lay flat in the back seat. I have been in bed since and will stay in bed till tomorrow to allow gravity to help our embryos to burrow in the lining. We have to wait 10 days for blood work to see if I am pregnant. So here's hoping that June 16th comes fast!

Day 3 and 4

Saturday afternoon we received our embryo update. The embryologist said that 10 of our embryos were developing normally and had 7-10 cells, and 3 were still developing just not at the same rate, she said some are slow growers and will continue to monitor them for growth.

Day 3 Embryo: should have between 7-10 cells.

Day 4 Embryo: consists of 10-30 cells.

Tomorrow is our Embryo transfer at 2pm and we are both so very excited. We decided to transfer 2 embryos. The success rate for 1 embryo is 25%, with 2 embryos the success rate more than doubles with  a 30% chance of twins and 1% chance of triplets. After the transfer we will have blood drawn 10 days after to confirm pregnancy. Thanks again to all our family and friends who have been more than supportive during this journey.

Embryos Day 2

Picture of a 4-cell embryo on day 2 of in vitro development. The embryo has gone through two divisions and has four evenly sized cells.

We should expect to hear from the embyrolgoist tomorrow about the status of our embryos. They have scheduled our embryo transfer for Monday at 2pm. In a normal pregnancy the sperm and egg meet in the fallopian tube and start the trek to the uterus where it would implant in the uterine lining, this process takes about 5 days. This is why we wait the 5 days until the egg is at the same stage for implantation.

Embryos

The embryologist called this morning and of the 21 eggs that were retrived, 20 were mature enough to inseminate with sperm (ICSI). This moring we had 13 embryos still growning. Below is a picture from the Texas Fertility website that shows what our embyros look like today!

Picture of a fertilized egg observed in the morning of the day after the egg retrieval procedure or 17-19 hours following sperm injection (ICSI). The two circular structures observed in the middle of the oocyte are called pronuclei, which contain the genetic material from the parents. A normally fertilized egg should have two of these structures one derived from the sperm (paternal) and the other from the egg (maternal).

Retrival Day

This morning was a success! They retrieved 21 eggs from me and got the tissue that they needed from Jake! We are both resting at home and expect to hear from the embryologist in the morning about the status of our embryos!!