Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Blastocysts come home tomorrow!

Tomorrow is the big day when we go to collect our little blastocysts. Our appointment is scheduled for 11am at the Rockville, MD clinic location. We need to arrive at the clinic by 10:30am. On the trip in, I need to drink approximately 36 oz. of fluid, preferably Gatorade. It is necessary for me to have a full bladder for the egg (blastocyst) transfer. Once I am ready for transfer, the RE will insert a sterile catheter through the cervical opening and into the uterus. They will place the selected blastocyst(s) into the desired location in the uterus and then the catheter will be removed. I need to lay down for at least 20 minutes and then I will be released. I must remain on bedrest for a 24 hour period following the egg transfer. I plan to gather a good collection of books and magazines today for my down time. The 24 hours of bedrest are followed by two to three days of light activity. After this time, I should be able to go back to my normal routine.

My nurse will be calling on Monday of next week to let us know how many blastocysts were cryopreserved. Any that make it to this stage could be used down the road.

We are scheduled for our beta test (test to check for levels of beta-HCG, or pregnancy hormone, in the blood) on July 12th. If the test comes back positive, then we celebrate. If it comes back negative, we are already scheduled for a follow-up appointment with our RE on July 26th. At this appointment we would talk about any next steps that we might take, such as FET (frozen embryo transfer).