It’s day seven of my hormone injections and so far I haven’t managed to a) offend any newspaper-reading strangers b) be compelled to watch our wedding video or c) poke people who are in my way. Things are good. Today was always going to be a bit iffy because after 7 days of tear-inducing hormones it was time for the first scan. For “poor responders” (terrible term really) scans are akin to having teeth pulled whilst someone is telling you that you are a dud, a failure. This morning I was giving myself my injection and whilst counting to 15 (highly recommended with the gonal pens so that you don’t suck out all of the stuff when you take the needle out) I was staring at a magnet on the fridge “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” Looking on the positive side of things I figured I go with the “Courage to change the things I can” – meaning undergoing IVF to change my circumstances.
Fast forward 40 minutes and it’s 6.30am at the clinic. Whilst waiting for Dr M I was negotiating with myself the different reactions I might have depending on how many eggs decide to pop up on the screen. Remembering that my most recent cycle I got one egg (which did indeed fertilise) and the cycle before this was cancelled because of that poor response business. I decided that as much as more eggs would mean getting more bang for your buck that I really just needed to focus on getting to transfer. If one egg gets me to transfer then I should be grateful for this.
Transvaginal scans aren’t on my top 10 things to do before 7am but needless to say I was good to go. Having had many of these before I was looking at the screen with a fair idea of what I was looking for. Before checking in on my ovaries though Dr M decides to check out my uterine lining. What happens (or rather what he says) next is, I kid you not, the absolute truth.
I’ve mentioned in the past that Dr M is not one for a chat. So he gets his scanning probe thingy and brings up my lining on the screen. He then says (yep, this is TRUE!) “Your lining is gorgeous, it is as plump as Marilyn Monroe’s lips”. Some may be offended by comments such as this but I can tell you right now I wanted to jump up and kiss the man. My uterine lining positively glowed with this compliment and I was soooooo proud. Yay me! (A good lining is obviously very important for the embryo to implant). Then he says “Oh look at the shape of it, (my lining that is) it’s the shape of a smile.” Dead set this happened. My serious, no laughing-matter, conservative Dr M had just said my uterine lining, with the plumpness of Ma
rilyn’s lips was smiling at me.
In a split second I had to re-group and stay focussed knowing that the tricky bit was next. First ovary and lo and behold we have 3 good eggs, 12mm, perfectly shaped. Second ovary revealed possibly another one. So all up I have 3 maybe 4 eggs ready for harvest next week. In one morning I had gone from a poor responder to a 3 egg gal with a hollywood lining.
Today was a good day.
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