May 13 - Retrieval Day

Today is the day our donor has her egg retrieval surgery - this is the toughest part of the IVF process.   She has been in for ultrasounds every other day (including Mother's Day) to see how her egg follicles are growing, then the doctors adjusted her medications to be sure the existing growing follicles kept growing instead of encouraging new follicles to mature. 

(TMI Alert)  The surgery is outpatient - she is put under, then the literally use a long needle to go through the vaginal wall and suck out the eggs on each side.  Thank goodness for general anesthesia and heavy duty pain meds for afterwards. 

So Dan got to use his VIP membership to the "Collection Room" again this morning on the way to work.  I guess it's not a bad day when you can start it out with some good porn - right?  He informed me that they got some new DVD's since his last visit - but "once you've seen one, you've seen them all."  He also was a bit disappointed that they have not upgraded to any 3-D movies yet.   I hope we dont see that day!  We both hope this is his last trip to the collection room.

I will get a call to see how the surgery went and how many eggs they got.  Also they will do the ICSI procedure this afternoon, where they inject a sperm into each of the good eggs and wait til tomorrow to see what magic has happened. 

I had to start the progesterone shots yesterday - which is the one that goes into the rear-end with the longer needle.  Nikki love to watch Dan jam the needle in - not sure why!  Progesterone is the hormone that women need to keep early pregnancy viable.  When the placenta develops fully, then it takes over and progesterone is no longer needed.  I inject it daily through the first trimester,  I forgot til today that it makes my skin red and itchy around the injection site - so I end up scratching my butt all the time - nice visual hey?!?

I am hoping that because everything is happening around Nikki's birthday that it is some sort of good luck - God knows that she is truly a miracle herself.  My original due date for her was May 13....