Uh-oh

On Friday afternoon I started spotting. Just pink loo paper, nothing too much to worry about, but by last night it had turned into light bleeding. This morning I was sure something was wrong. I've had post-implantation bleeding before but this was bright red and more like a period.

Checking in

This morning I got a call from S at the clinic's lab, just to see how everything is going and to wish us luck for Tuesday's test. I had no questions but it was nice of her to do that!

Letter from the lab

Dear A and D

Thank you for having IVF treatment at [clinic]. I'm writing on behalf of the laboratory team with a brief summary of the embryology from this cycle.

We've got a frostie!

We just had a call from C at the clinic's lab. She told us that of our remaining embryos, one had developed into a blastocyst and has been frozen. This is great news. It gives us some backup in case yesterday's transfer isn't successful. Of the others, one had developed into a blast but its outer walls didn't look too good and the rest had not progressed well. We are happy with this news!

Transfer complete

This morning we went to the clinic for the embryo transfer. I had to drink a lot of water beforehand so that my bladder was full for the procedure and I was absolutely busting by the time we'd finished!

Day three numbers

This morning S from the clinic's lab gave me a call. We have four eight-cell embryos and one four-cell embryo. I'm happy with that.

More numbers

I have just had a call from A at the clinic's lab. She told me that of the six fertilised eggs, two have grown to four-cell embryos, two have grown to two-cell and one has grown to three-cell. The sixth more immature one isn't doing as well and should probably be discounted. One of the two-cell embryos has multinucleation (one of the cells has two nuclei), but this almost always resolves itself.

Numbers

This morning I woke up feeling exhausted. I hadn't slept very well, and then my gut decided to play up. I've had this happen before, perhaps half a dozen times over the years. I'll go to the loo early in the morning, then over the following few minutes a small twinge will turn into a fiery cramp and I'll start to sweat buckets. It's awful. All that can be done is to take off all my clothes, clutch a hot wheat bag to my tummy and wait it out. After 20 minutes or so, the pain starts to come and go. Each time it eases off I get a huge feeling of relief and eventually it stops completely, leaving me drained. It happens in exactly the same pattern each time, but because it happens so rarely, I've been unable to pin it down to anything. I should probably get it looked into! However, I went back to sleep for a few hours and now I feel much better.

Egg collection

This morning bright and early we showed up at the clinic for egg collection. We were met by Nurse L who took my vital signs and started to go through some details with us. Then she left the room and a few minutes later Nurse K came in and started to go through the same things! Then we talked to A, the laboratory technician, and we discussed what was going to happen with the eggs. We decided to do transfer two embryos and to try for a transfer on day five, assuming all goes well. A will call me in the morning to let me know.

Instructions and a final jab

Yesterday morning I went to the lab to have a blood test. Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. The lab did not have the form required, so I had to call the clinic and ask about it. They said they would send it through electronically right away, so I went and ran some errands for 20 minutes or so and then went back.