Firstly, thank you so much to everyone who’s responded to my last post and gave their thoughts. You’ve all really made me feel better about how I’m handling being on this side of the fence. I did some thinking and what usually triggers me (even for a few seconds) is bump and ultrasound pics. I think those I’ll add to a separate page if anyone is interested to see (if I take any bump pics). My reasoning is mostly because this wasn’t intended to be a strict infertility blog. It was a “Life in my 30s” blog. Infertility just took over the last few years of it.

But please know that I will always try to be mindful of what I say and which words I choose. I hope that I can stay true to this blog and this part of the journey while still remaining sensitive and respectful. ❤

In this post I want to go into detail, with dates, about my TWW. I’m going to try my best to remember what happened both for myself and anyone who likes to compare symptoms. I also realized that I never posted my beta numbers and I enjoy comparing these to others as well.

Wednesday April 5, 2017: Transfer day.  Spent the day resting on the couch.

1dp5dt: Took this day off work as well and spent the day with my friend B and her son. I don’t remember too many details just that we watched Dave Chapelle on Netflix. No symptoms.

2dp5dt: Back at work. Spent most of the day Googling symptoms. Shocked at how many women have symptoms on day 2. Granted they could be progesterone but still. I had nothing.

3dp5dt: Still no symptoms. We went to our friends’ daughter’s 3rd birthday party and spent the day with them afterwards. It was a great distraction. Plus pizza and cake!

4dp5dt: Woke up in the middle of the night by what felt like a panic attack. I felt a strong wooshing feeling through my body. I could even hear it in my ears it was so weird. Then I got an instant hot flash (flash or flush? anyway) and had to throw the blankets off my and my heart was pounding. It was a little scary but I remember reading about this in one of the forums. Could this be it? The rest of the day I felt unrested and sluggish but no other real symptoms. Obsessively Googling. This was also the day N and I went on that quick hike and I was attacked by that tick.

5dpd5dt: Half way! Feeling normal again. Distraught. Decide to start getting into the Easter spirit with baking and food prep. I remember this being the worst day and being quite weepy.

6dp5dt: Another symptom-less day at work. On the drive home an extremely sharp pain runs across my abdomen and down to my lady bits. It took my breath away and I even had to take my foot off the gas and hunch over. Something clicked right then and I began talking to my child. “Oh my goodness, that’s you isn’t it? You sure took your sweet time but thanks for that, little one”. I’ll never forget this day.

7dp5dt: Tiny little lower abdomen twitches about every 2 hours or so. Absolutely no other symptoms. I rubbed my tummy and talked to my embryo all day. We were in this together.

8dp5dt: I couldn’t tell if this is nausea or if I was making it up it was so mild. But my boobs were starting to ache. Something like just before my period and it was almost period time. I was also having more discharge. Another “almost period time” symptom. I’m feeling despondent.

9dp5dt: Easter Friday. Day off work. N had to work. I had planned to visit B again but she fell ill. I was quite bummed not knowing how to distract myself for the last day. I ended up sitting in the sun and reading and then went to search for a bottle of sparkling sake (saw it on Instagram) in case the cycle failed. My nerves were shot all day and I kept switching between begging and pleading and planning our next… our last cycle. It was not a good day to be alone. I found a giant bottle of sake. It wasn’t sparkling but it would do the trick. Watching TV with N that night, I got up to use the ladies. Brown spotting. It’s a strange place feeling your heart break and trying to be positive at the same time. The day before’s symptoms were increasing including the nausea and an added headache. I didn’t know what to think. I came out and told N about the bleeding. He had a worried look in my eyes and just said “oh no”. I climbed back under the blankets and we held hands and remained quiet the rest of the night.

Saturday, April 15 – 10dp5dt: Beta day. I’m sad that most of this day, before and after the phone call, was a blur. I don’t remember what we ate for dinner or what the blood draw was like. But I know the appointment was at 7am. I drove up by myself and then N had to do a few work things so I drove around with him in his work van while we waited for the call. We went to a few boat yards and I was talking to my friends back home on Whatsapp all day. Everyone was on tenterhooks.  I remember stopping at Dunkin’ around 1pm and we got some bad food. We then went to his office so he could unload some stuff. I waited in the car for an hour just staring at my phone. I resolved to call them at 2 if I’d heard nothing. The closer we got to 2pm the more I was shaking. I ran to the toilet every few minutes for nervous farts and poops. Finally at 3 minutes past 2pm the call came through. I held my phone in my sweaty shaking hands until it went to voicemail. My eyes had tears in them already and I couldn’t shout to N to come because my voice would have cracked with emotion. He eventually joined me in the car and we took a few moments to collect ourselves. I told him I want to video tape our reactions. He reluctantly agreed. With his phone set on the dashboard he hit record and I hit play.
“Hi xxx, this is xxx from Dr xxx’s office just giving you a call with the results of your blood work today. Um, I am calling with good news. Congratulations, your result today was positive. So, we like to see the minimum level for HCG for this first test at at least 100, yours today was at 341. So a very good place to start. We always do subsequent blood draws to make sure that the level is rising so we do need you to come back in 2 days, that’s Monday morning for your next blood draw. I booked you in for 7:15 at the xxx office. In the meantime just continue your medication and we will see you in the office on Monday morning. If you have any questions we’ll be in the office until 2:30. Okay thanks. Bye bye.”

I didn’t really catch anything after 341 but I’ve listened to this voicemail enough times since. Most of the video is me with my mouth open and N laughing and then I just started crying and he hugged me and we kissed. Then we drove home in complete shock.

I on the drive home I sent the video to my family and my girlfriends back home and to B here and I was just in a daze for the rest of the day.

The day wasn’t perfect but close to it. N’s mom came over, she didn’t know that we had transferred this cycle and she was having a really tough time. One of her dogs, a black lab named Busta, had been really ill all week and he passed the night before our beta. She came over to drop something off but she was in tears telling us the story. It’s really heart wrenching. He was getting old and had hip problems. The vet gave her some medication for it but unfortunately the medication is lethal for some dogs. How this medication isn’t banned is another story. She was really a mess and we weren’t sure if we should give her some good news while she was grieving so badly. In the end N told her. She was over the moon so I’m glad we told her but I wonder if going from that sad to that happy that quickly is good. I don’t know if that makes sense.

12dp5dt: I spent this day with B and her son again. We went to the zoo. I think I was fine this day symptom-wise. My beta jumped up to 873. I was told that my next beta would only be a week later so I spent the rest of the week peeing on my wondfo’s every morning. My symptoms weren’t crazy so I needed other assurance. But so far so good.

19dp5dt: The before the the beta N and I went out for lunch and I had a virgin daiquiri. I’d never ordered one before and I was really excited. I think it was the first time I let my guard down a little bit and it felt good. My final beta before ultrasound was 11626. These betas were really reassuring, of course, but I did have that very scary bleed the next day so my guard was promptly reinstated. I remember the 3 weeks from this beta until the ultrasound being pure torture. I only started feeling real hard symptoms after the ultrasound. But getting this beta was a really good. I celebrated on this day.

And that’s the story of how I managed to allow a bottle of alcohol to go unopened for longer than a day.

It’s also the story of how my 10th embryo, my last embryo, found it’s way into my uterine wall and changed my life.