Our Embryos Have Arrived!

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After being frozen in Florida for over 10 years, On Wednesday, March 18 our eight precious embryos arrived at our clinic in Pasadena, CA. It was such a joy and relief to have reached this point in our journey.

We went to our clinic last Thursday for another ultrasound and blood work.  Our doctor said everything looked good and we were ready to start preparing my body for the transfer!

That day I started taking a prenatal vitamin (3x a day!) and a few other vitamin/supplement things they prescribed.  And then on Monday 3/23... the big one...the first shot of estrogen!

Estrogen shots like this need to be administered to a large muscle-y/fatt-y area...which as you can probably guess, is a little hard for me personally to reach. So, the nurse walked Donny and I through the the whole process, showing him what to do. I couldn't help but giggle when they were both kneeling down and studying my backside to show him exactly where to stick the VERY large needle.

Donny hasn't had the most confidence-inducing history with needles and shots, but I could tell he was totally rallying and was ready to do this for me. I was getting a little confused by the "use this one for extracting and this one for sticking" But Donny was totally tracking and I felt confident that he could manage.

But, we also agreed that maybe asking my dad, a hospital nurse for the past 30 years, to administer the first shot so Donny could watch, was a good idea.

So on Monday night, my dad came over with all the confidence of someone who has stuck people with needles literally thousands of times. He looked at all the stuff the pharmacy had sent me and said, "wow that's a big needle!" Thanks dad.

He read all the instructions (which is so typical of him.  Asking my dad for help on homework as a kid was always a last resort because he'd want to read the entire chapter in the text book to fully grasp the subject) and then we got started.

I had felt pretty ok with the idea of the shot until that moment. He started flicking the syringe (I didn't know they actually did that!) and he just kept commenting on how thick the oily liquid was. He was explaining everything to Donny and I'm not even kidding when I say the words "big needle" were used just way too many times.

The big moment finally came, he asked, "ok are you ready" I took some deep "pump up" breaths and said "yes! Let's do this!" and then...it was over.

I laughed, "was that it?" my dad said, yep, you're done.

I hardly felt it at all.  It was literally like a little pin prick.  I asked if he was sure he did it right and again, with all the confidence of someone who has administered thousands of shots he said, "yes, I know I did it right."

Whew! So one more hurdle/fear/anxiety overcome.

I have to do shots every 3 days until the transfer.  So today, Thursday, is shot #2.  I haven't had any noticeable side affects from the first one, so I'm hoping that stays about the same.  I kind of expected to be a sort of raging-hormonal-lunatic during this period - but so far, so good!

Regardless, it's all for the babies!

(I wonder if anyone googles "red head twin babies" more than me?)

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