We are now at the end of round 5. The round we hoped and were fairly sure could be our last. And we have nothing to show for it. 0.
All 3 embryos made it to Day 5 and were still growing. This was better than I expected since we had that 1-cell embryo on Day 3. I thought that one was not going much further, but it did. That gave me hope. Surely this is good enough news to allow us some confidence in the 7-cell, right? Wrong.
We were strung out to Day 6, yet again. Michelle reiterated not to get too hopeful for the 1-cell, even though it was still somehow in the mix. Than she called around lunch time on Friday. I was at my desk, and everyone else around me was at lunch.
"Kelly, I'm not calling with good news," she said, "None of the embryos made it. They all degenerated overnight. I'm so sorry."
I said something in response. It included "Oh no," and "Thank you for hanging in there with us, Michelle."
"I have told Dr. S. He will call you soon, I'm sure. Try to have a restful and good weekend, ok?" she said. We hung up. I sat there a second, realizing how much I had both wanted and even (a little) expected this round to work out. We had figured out a formula. We had like 7 follicles! Shouldn't that have made it ok to assume the odds were good.
IVF = Isn't Very Fair
Yep. That about covers it.
My eyes pricked. I called Michael. He had taken the day off and was at home. He knew by the sound of my voice when he answered the phone.
I still had meetings and a couple things that had to get done at the office before I could leave. No one would have blamed me for chucking it all and just going home. I went to the restroom and cleaned up my eyes in the time I had left before my meeting, which wasn't long. I pushed it all down. Got my emotional shit together and buckled down for the next 3 hours.
As I pulled out of the garage, I pictured Michael's face waiting for me as I came through the door. The tears started streaming. He was right there when I pulled in and wrapped me in a big warm hug. I cried hard and long. Didn't have to hold it in any longer.
I didn't know how much this round meant and how much I thought it would work out until that point. My gut reaction to myself when Michelle told me of the total failure was something to the effect of:
"No, this can't be it.
I'm really not ready to call this the end for my ovaries.
2 might not be enough. I can do it again.
Can I do it again?
I just told Michael SEVERAL times this week through tears that I CAN'T do it again.
Are you crazy? Masochistic? Maybe.
I bet I can do it again.
Will Dr. S let us do it again?
Should we just stop? Oh, God, is this really it?
I can't think about this right now.
I'm just not going to think about it until I get home."
So that's the current question. And I don't know the answer. What will we do? What's next? I don't know and it's a little scary. In so many ways, I don't want to quit, but I'm also exhausted. Thankfully we have lots of options. We'll meet with our doctor sometime in the next week or so to talk about it. Meanwhile we're dealing with the loss of hope from this round. The loss of our 3 little embryos. We've lost so many in this process and it's never easy.
For all of you who are checking in frequently, thank you for your patience and prayers. I'm sorry I didn't keep up this week. It's been a doozy. I don't have anything snarky or any memes to make it easier. Not there yet. More to come soon, though.
We are tentatively attending our first IVF support group on Monday night. Not sure how it will go, and it would have been much easier to go with a recent success vs. our now very real failure. But maybe that's the point of going.
I love you!
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