Well, it finally happened. Our first transfer. We were beginning to despair it would never happen. A Day 6 transfer. Rescheduled twice! On Day 3, I was ready, and I mean ready, to go – pants off, bladder (excruciatingly) full. We had been waiting for about 40 minutes. I had already snuck to the bathroom once, wearing a T-shirt and a large piece of paper, to pee about one-third of the half gallon stretching my bladder to its absolute limit. I did this upon the urging of my husband who was getting frustrated with my tears—yeah, I had to go THAT bad. He thought as long as I could stop myself halfway (an ability that men lack) that it was worth the risk of getting caught and in trouble. BOY was he right.
Anyway, doctor comes in (for the third time – the first time, he actually started reading a chart that made no sense to me: wrong number of eggs, wrong number fertilized, when we both realized he had walked into the wrong room and I was not who he thought I was. He was thoroughly embarrassed, left immediately, and stuck his head back in the room a few seconds later to assure us that everything was okay, back in the lab. We laughed nervously.) Anyway, when he did finally come back in, he started talking about a Day 5 transfer and given my age (28), blah, blah, blah, we could home and I could PEE!
So, on the morning of Day 5 they called (which was better than going all the way to Rockville again) and said that they wanted to wait until Day 6 since they were not quite yet blastocysts. This was a bit upsetting, especially since we had the whole day laid out nicely (hubby could play the first half of his soccer game, acupuncture appointments in place, etc.). But, we adapted rather well. I went grocery shopping, did the church thing, took my parents to lunch as a distraction, got the house ready for my bedrest.
Today at the transfer, they tried to assure us that the difference between Day 5 and Day 6 was ‘negligible’ but I can Google—I know better. There is basically one study comparing the two and the rates for Day 6 were abysmal, in my opinion. An 11% chance compared to 38%. Not negligible to me. AND we know our friends at the same clinic were urged to only put back one AND there is even a little sign in all the offices with their ‘single’ embryo transfer policy. There were four criteria and we fit every single one. And yet they recommended transferring two. Hmmmmm. SO we kept pressing for an answer. The doctor said ‘I don’t want to imply in any way that there is something wrong with your embryos,’ and ‘if you had hit the mark exactly on Day 5 we would be telling you to transfer one.’ So basically he was talking in circles. Does he not know this is maddening??? That we infertiles hang on their every word?
AH well. Am now resting comfortably. Not sure I buy this whole bed rest thing. It is not normal and people get preggers all the time without laying supine for a day and a half but the paranoia wins and here I am blogging from the couch.
PS – One blast was fully hatched and the other was partially hatched when they put them in there. Anyone know anything about this?
June 14, 2006 at 12:32 am
goooooood luck! and enjoy the bedrest if you can. make your partner feed you grapes.
i don’t know about the hatching, but we’re sort of in the same position. we didn’t do a fresh transfer (long story, check my blog) but we froze four embies at 5 day (blastocyst) and they were letting the remaining three develop a little further before freezing. hmmm!!
June 14, 2006 at 4:04 am
Sorry can’t help you with the stats. Good luck with the bedrest–I’ve been on bedrest for 3 weeks because of a moderate case of OHSS. Thank god the World Cup is on to break the monotony of watching movies, napping and blogging! Good luck with your cycle and hope that your 2ww goes by quickly.
August 27, 2007 at 9:54 pm
Hi, sorry this is so late in response. Did you end up w/ bfp or not? We just did a day 6 transfer and they coded our blastocysts w/ letters. Does anyone know the meaning of this?