The Drama Never Stops

Well I'm sorry if I've left anyone hanging about monday's retrieval, it actually went pretty well.  We got there early as always and M got to make fun of me walking around in a that awful hair net they make you wear for the procedure.  Dr. Hot Shot advised us afterwards that he got 20 eggs from the retrieval, even though the last follicle count from Friday was only at 14.  I was in so much pain when I first woke up that the nurse gave me some tylenol (useless stuff that it is), and when that didn't seem to work very well she got me a prescription for Vicodin. 

After M and I left we were both starving since I at least hadn't eaten since the night before.  We went and got lunch, mostly because for some inexplicable reason I was trying to put on a brave face and pretend that I felt ok.  (Maybe I figured that I could talk myself into feeling fine if I acted that way.)  Of course as my reward for sucking it up I ended up feeling more and more uncomfortable as we sat through lunch and then drove home.  It got even worse as the night went on, and M finally insisted that we call Dr. Hot Shot to make sure my symptoms weren't a big deal. At first I didn't want to call the doctor, but when M pointed out that I had all but two of the symptoms on the list they gave us at the retrieval that were bad I finally caved in.  When Dr. Hot Shot finally got around to calling me back I felt like I was dying, and he quickly concluded that I had OHSS.  He told me that there wasn't really anything they could do but keep an eye on me and have me come in the next day.  Of course as soon as I hung up the phone with Dr. Hot Shot I started having the other three symptoms that are apparently very bad when you have OHSS (because there's nothing like puking, not being able to pee, and shortness of breath to freak me out even more.)

Dr. Hot Shot had given me the green light to take as much vicodin as I wanted, so I did exactly that.  It was enough to get me through the night but not enough to let me get more than three hours or so of sleep.  The upshot was that I was wide awake when M woke up at 7am to go to the clinic and get the OHSS diagnosis confirmed by the nurses.  It was one of the most painful car rides of my life, and I kept accusing M of aiming for the bumps and accelerating through them the entire ride (well it felt that way anyway.)  The nurses were nice as always, and the ultrasound tech found enough fluid in my abdomen to float small water craft.  The head IVF nurse met with me and told me that she had filled in Dr. Hot Shot, who recommended that I go home and drink lots of gatorade (unless my bloodwork came back bad, which I assume it didn't because they never called to tell me it was.)  So we got in the car and came home.  M went to the store and bought every bottle of red gatorade they had in the joint (the lemon lime crap gives me the dry heaves) and I managed to drink about three bottles of it. 

I'm feeling a lot better today, and I'm even going to drag myself to a second interview this morning (the same job I interviewed for last week).  I had assumed that the higher egg yield on Monday would equal more fertilized egg to work with for transfer, but the embryologist advised me yesterday that 5 of them were immature and that only 13 of the 15 left had fertilized.  I'm actually kind of pissed off that I went through all of that OHSS crap without getting more usable eggs out of the deal, but I keep forgetting that there is no reason when it comes to IVF.  I'll hear later today about whether my eggs are still chugging along, and tomorrow I'll find out if I'm having a day 3 transfer or day 5 transfer.  I'm going on the assumption that it will be a day 5 transfer, but then again we know how silly it is to assume anything during this IVF nonsense.

So that's my story.  Everyone keep their fingers crossed for my second interview.

Comments

[Emily]

13 eggs is wonderful! Keeping my fingers crossed for lots of little dividing. I hope you feel better soon and good luck on your interview.

Thinking of you and sending prayers your way.

xxxooo

[Nina]

Great news on the retrieval!! Good luck on the interview.

[Toffee]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I am going for my retrieval tomorrow and feel better about it after reading your blog. I am sorry you were hurting, but am glad you are better!

[Heather]

I'm with everyone else; thirteen fertilized eggs is wonderful. Best of luck to you in this cycle and the second interview!

[shannon]

Ah geez, that sounds just awful. Hope you're feeling much, much better and I hope all of the suffering pays off BIG. As someone said to me recently "triplets for everybody!"