The numbers game :)

Friday 11.11.11 was our collection day. It is a peculiar date. Everybody in our clinic seemed to think it would bring us good luck. And overall, I think it truly was lucky for us.

Let me explain....The procedure went very well, despite the fact that it is quite painful, and very definitely something I would rather avoid in the future.Actually that may be somewhat understated: it f***ing hurt. Luckily, DP was right in the OR with me, holding my hand and reassuring me every step of the way. He was really great.
The sedatives they give you do help to take the edge off, but they do not spare you from the very real pain. All in all, it lasts about 15 minutes so, it it over pretty quick. So, I will not dwell on this part....
The recovery was quite fast and by the next morning I was already feeling like my reproductive organs did not want to jump out of my body.

We got a call from the lab on Saturday announcing that from the 3 eggs they had effectively retrieved (the other 2 were not mature), one of them was not fertilized because it was not mature. So we had 2 mature eggs and BOTH fertilized! YAY (I guess??) !!!

Sunday we received the second call with the embryologist report. Of the 2 that had fertilized, both were growing well, they have now began splitting and they are both 4 -cell embies:
- a GRADE 1  (Grade 1: even cell division, no fragmentation)
- a GRADE 2 (Grade 2: even cell division, small fragmentation).

We are told both of these embies are good quality. So, I guess this is good news, as long as one doesn't fall for the numbers trap.....When I read other blogs and I see that there are women capable of having a dozen eggs retrieved and more than half a dozen fertilized, transfer several and s then spare some for freezing...I sincerely can't get my head around that!We are content with the 2 little ones we have.... :))

So, let's recap, for those (such as myself that can get lost in all the details):
- 13 antral follicle count
- 5 potential follicles after stims
- 3 eggs collected
- 2 eggs fertilized
- 2, 4-cell embies @ DAY 2
- they will do SET (single embryo transfer, as per local law) on DAY 5

That is a lot of math! So what does all this math compute to??? Where are we now??

I guess we are exactly at the same point we have always been...hoping that in the midst of all these numbers, we end up with.... a baby!

It would be really cool to be able to tell him/her that he/she was conceived against all odds, amidst a mess of numbers, on a very lucky day...11.11.11

What else is possible?

:)))