Egg Retrieval

As I said earlier in the week, I'm trying to get caught back up with the blogging and despite giving a really brief update last week, I thought I would go into a little more detail on just how egg retrieval went mainly because when I was waiting for it, I spent hours reading blog posts about how other women got on during egg retrieval.

On Sunday (the 21st) I had my last Menopur at 8am, my last Metformin at around 5pm, my last Cetrotide at 6pm and my very final injection at 9:30pm. I may have slightly cocked up my last Cetrotide (the one which stops your body from releasing any eggs before the doctor is ready to collect them). The needle didn't seem to screw on properly and as I tried to squirt it into the vial it leaked out everywhere. Luckily we had a spare but it really freaked me out for the trigger/booster shot.

The booster shot (also called a trigger shot by some clinics) consisted of three vials, one syringe and two needles. The vials were glass and needed to have the top snapped off; a job which I gladly passed on to Mr Click. This injection needed to be administered exactly thirty-six hours before egg retrieval so timing was really crucial and I was paranoid that if we messed it up, we'd ruin the whole cycle.

We didn't.

Though it did really hurt. I may have pushed it in whilst crying ithurtsithurtsithurtsithurts!

Monday was a strange day. No need to take any more medication, winding myself up to that evening when we caught a ferry and checked into a hotel in Greenock because there was no way we were going to rely on CalMac getting us over in time first thing in the morning.

It wasn't exactly the best night's sleep though. Nothing to do with the Holiday Inn we were stopping in; it was all nerves. Tuesday morning was a very big day for us.

I had to fast from midnight and we got up and on the road really early. To add insult to injury, as we were checking out the hotel we were told that if we wanted to wait a little while longer breakfast was just being served. Mr Click went without breakfast in solidarity with me.

We arrived at the hospital at 7am only to find that the unit didn't actually open until 7:45am! We hung around a bit and then, once we got into the department everything moved pretty quickly.

First up we were taken through to the (extremely hot) Quiet Room where we met with the doctor (who ran through the procedure, the risks and the consent), then a nurse (who brought me a glorious cup of water to take two paracetamol with), then the anaesthetist (who explained the sedation process) and finally the embryologist (who told us what would happen to the eggs once they were collected).

And then he lead Mr Click back to the waiting room and took me through to the pre-op area. I clock watched for a while before being led to a bay where I changed into a fetching gown (which didn't tie up at the back), dressing gown, blue booties and, when the time came to go to the operating room, a stylish hat.

I'd been given a card with my details and Mr Click's details on, which I had to hand to someone through a little hatch in the operating room. These are used to keep your embryos from being confused with anyone else's. From there you hop onto the bed and lose any remaining dignity you've brought with you.

The gown is undone at the back, your feet go in the nice padded stirrups, the gown is then rolled up to somewhere around your belly button and someone may or may not peer over you to frown at your nether regions for a moment (I suspect they were looking at my rather fantastic bruises from my injections).

While all this was going on, a rather nice male nurse was saying reassuring things to me and the anaesthetist was putting a cannula in the back of my hand for drugs. Honestly, I was more concerned about this needle stick than about any of the other stuff they were going to do to me; I knew I would be unconscious during egg retrieval, but I would be awake when they stuck the big needle in my hand.

It wasn't that bad.

First up was something to relax me. Then a painkiller. Then the anaesthetist said something about the next one being the sedative and it wouldn't hurt but might be a bit cold in the back of my hand. I have no idea if I felt it going in though because at this point I looked at the clock on the wall and realised that my head was starting to feel a bit swimmy.

And the next thing I knew I was murmuring 'I was dreaming I was in a hurricane' and being wheeled through into recovery. I was woozy for a little while but a very nice nurse brought me water and tea and toast so I soon recovered, though I felt slightly light-headed and sleepy for the rest of the day.

Then came the best bit; the doctor stopped by and told me we got nineteen eggs! Two more and I would've had to freeze all due to hyperstimulation, but nineteen was within the threshold. Mr Click had done his thing and everything was being hooked up right then.

Once I'd gotten up and dressed I was reunited with Mr Click and we were given our list of instructions. I was told that I had to keep my fluid levels up to help prevent hyperstimulation and take it easy, then we were told we'd get a phone call from the embryologist the next day to confirm how many had fertilised.

Which I'll get to tomorrow.