Well That Was Interesting

This past weekend was quite eventful. Brandon and I left late Friday night to try and skirt around the hurricane and hopefully miss the evacuation traffic. Only one of those worked. We missed the hurricane but as we were traveling southwest to get to I-81 we were stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic at 1:30 in the morning. The New Jersey and Pennsylvania assholes thought it would be okay to do construction in the middle of the night during a hurricane evacuation! At one point we had a 3-lane highway down to one lane, and that was right after going through a toll which opens up about 6 lanes of traffic. It was frustrating to say the least. By the time we got to my sister's house I was exhausted but we arrived half an hour before my nephew's birthday party. He recently turned 2 and his party consisted of about 8 toddlers and two infants. It wasn't too bad but there were a few times I felt a bit overwhelmed. But we managed to get through the party and I went to bed early that night.

Sunday we drove to Fayetteville, picked up my meds at Womack, checked into the hotel, and promptly fell asleep. I told the embryologist at Carolina IVF that if none of my embryos survived then I wanted a phone call so we could just go home on Monday instead of Tuesday. No use in spending money on another night in a hotel room when there was no need. Since I didn't get the call I assumed at least one had survived. I woke up after a few hours and dreaded the time when I'd have to take my "new" meds that night. These meds consisted of taking two extra progesterone tablets, but not the Endometrin ones. These were short sticks that had the consistency of a wax candle. The second medication was an applicator of gel (Metrogel) that was almost as long as my hand. It wasn't bad enough that I had to shove all this in my pillbox but Dr. P wanted me to take it all at.the.same.time. It was the most disgusting thing ever and I just kept reminding myself that this would be the only time I'd ever have to do it. I tried to fall asleep without moving an inch, wishing I had bought myself an adult diaper because I knew these pads weren't going to do the trick.

Monday morning I woke up and Brandon and I met my friend G. for breakfast. G brought her 2-year old triplets and 7-year old son with her. More baby overload. Maybe I should limit myself to 3 babies per week. I tried calling Carolina IVF to check the status of the embies, as I've done the previous two cycles, but no one answered. Oh well. My transfer was at 11 that morning, only a few hours away. We showed up on time, with a full bladder. Of course the gang of doctors were late. I waited a bit, then emptied my bladder to start over again. There was a Hispanic couple in the waiting room who brought a spanish magazine with them. It was either about pregnancy or new moms. They were discussing in Spanish the various articles in the magazine. I know a little Spanish and one article had to do with decorating a nursery. I chuckled to myself, thinking this must be their first cycle. They seemed quite optimistic. Finally Nurse D shows up and takes me back. She's running around like a crazy woman and I stop her to ask about the embies. She paused enough to say they both look good, 8-cell grade 1's.

Ummm, excuse me??

We froze a 5-cell and a 4-cell, both grade 2's, the crappiest of our 11 frozen embryos. And we now have two perfect 8-cell embryos? What the what?? I didn't even know that was possible. I seriously didn't believe it. I asked Nurse D to check and make sure she had the right folder. She did, and then went to ask the embryologist if the information was right. I was told it was. Not only that, but these embryos didn't lose any cells when they were thawed, unlike the previous two FET's. I was completely stunned, and even felt a bit ashamed because I had assumed this transfer wouldn't even happen. I didn't think my embryos would survive, and I was so convinced that I didn't even bother to take prenatal vitamins or my Metformin this cycle. I know, I'm bad.

The rest of the transfer went smoothly, though Dr P needed an extra swab to get rid of the progesterone before inserting the catheter. I told him it was his fault, which he admitted it was (good ol' Dr P). Then Brandon drove me back to the hotel for another nap. That night we had dinner with my friend Susanne and her 4-month old baby. More babies! Maybe I should have rubbed her on my tummy for good luck. She was a cutie pie though.

But let's get back to the real issue here. The embryos. The 12-hour drive back gave me a lot of time to think, and I'd like to share those thoughts here.

First, we're a military family so we get military doctors. In a way, that's kinda good for infertility treatment. My doctor doesn't give a rat's ass about making a profit, or improving his statistics (well maybe he does a little, but not so he can get new patients or charge higher rates). All he cares about is getting us knocked up. So when it comes down to the final decisions, it's usually left up to us. Dr. P, as a general rule, won't retrieve a woman with less than 6 mature follicles, but he negotiates under certain circumstances. He almost always does a day 3 transfer but if you insist, I'm sure he'll let you do a day 5. In other words, he's a flexible guy. It's your embryos after all, and that's what it really boils down to. They are your embryos. I know ladies on forums and blogs whose doctors refuse to do day 3 transfers, or won't freeze an embryo that's less than a certain quality. Yet Dr. P froze these shitty embryos and miraculously they survived the thaw and turned out to be a better quality. Not just better, it's as if they completely transformed into a new embryo. I mean, seriously, who ever heard of freezing a 4-cell grade 2, thawing it, and the next day it's an 8-cell grade 1? I certainly haven't.

And that concerns me a bit. It concerns me because I know there are women out there who had the same craptastic embryos during their fresh cycle and their doctor probably didn't freeze those embryos for them. Part of me thinks it boils down to statistics. The docs want a good thaw survival rate, and they also want a good pregnancy rate. So they create quality standards for embryos and stick to those rigid standards.

I'm not saying everyone should question what their doctor's protocol is, but I do believe that in the end, it's your embryos and your money. If you want to freeze the embryos, no matter the quality, you should have that option and that right. The doctor can (and should) make his or her suggestions but in the end they shouldn't place standards on what they'll allow to be frozen or transferred.

Second, I wonder about IVF #2. These embryos came from that cycle. It was the only cycle that we managed to create an 8-cell embryo by day 3, so of course we transferred that one and a 6-cell embryo. We got a BFN. If we had transferred these two crappy embryos back when they were fresh, would they have eventually made it to the 8-cell grade 1 status they achieved on Monday? Or did it take having to freeze and then thaw them to get them to grow the way they did? In the end it doesn't really matter, but it makes me curious.

I have a few other things on my mind but I'd rather not talk about them. They're just more "what if" questions, mostly dealing with adoption, and there's no point in dwelling on them until the 2WW is over. Which, by the way, beta is next Wednesday and yes, I'm still paranoid that we got someone else's embryos.