IVF Diary: Inside Our Fourth Round of IVF

This is our fourth, and hopefully final, round of IVF. We had two unsuccessful rounds where we produced no embryos. Our last round was finally successful after I completely reworked my life in order to increase the odds of success. You can read everything we did here. The result was six healthy embryos — three girls and three boys. We want to bank a few more before our wedding next year just to give us a safety net. You can read all of our prior IVF rounds and updates at the links below. Here, we present you our IVF diary from my fourth round of IVF.

This morning, I went to the Doctor to get all of my vitals taken to see if we can start the next round. They take blood work to make sure everything is in line and also do an intravaginal sonogram to check the follicle count (as of right now, 5 on each side) and make sure there are no cysts that can interfere with the process. Doctor says everything looks great and that I can begin shots tomorrow!

Day 1: 

AM: This morning we get up and rewatch all of our old videos on FreedomMedTeach even though we are pros by now. The fiance injects me with Menopur before heading off to work. We are going to a gala tonight, which means that I need to bring my Gonal for tonight to work, and it needs to stay refrigerated. I put it in its carrying case and get to work. As I put it into the fridge, I realize I forgot the needle attachment for it, so will have to go all the way back to work tonight to get it before going to the gala. I am a little nervous about taking my shot tonight in a public place bathroom, but don’t want to completely give up my social life for the next two weeks, so we are giving it a try.

PM:  We get to the gala and I have an ice pack and Gonal carrying case in my purse wrapped in a plastic bag. I try to keep the top of my purse open with my arms all night so people don’t see it. At 7:50pm I find the bathroom and attempt giving myself a shot in a semi-public place for the first time (The last three rounds, we did ALL of our shots at home).

I went into a stall and got out the Gonal pen and opened up a needle attachment and proceeded to give myself a shot. Usually my fiance does this, so unfortunately I squirted out some of the medicine into the air on accident before injecting myself, but I am hoping it wasn’t enough to affect my results. We then went back to the party and enjoyed the night.

Day 2: 

AM: We stayed out late last night, and even though I don’t drink during IVF (and have given up alcohol most of this year because it hurts egg quality), I have a hard time getting up in time for my shot. But, I roll out of bed just in time for it before heading to work.

PM: I get home after work and have so much time between work and bed because I can’t go to the gym during IVF. So, I read a ton of the book series I am obsessed with (Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels — cannot recommend them more highly), and do some cleaning and other chores. I start getting really tired around 10pm, so get into bed and sleep until our 8am shot.

Day 3: 

Am: I am still exhausted from the night before despite getting like 10 hours of sleep. Luckily, this is the only side effect I am having to the shots and pills (Clomid and Dexamethasone) as of right now, so I’ll take it. After my shot, I then got back into bed, because I was still so tired even though today is a work day!

PM: Get home from work and do a little straightening up at the apartment before my Gonal shot. Then, we head out to dinner with some friends at 8:30 pm to get out of the house.

Day 4: 

AM: We get up early to do our shots this Saturday morning, then hop on the subway to go to my Doctor’s office for my first check up. It’s still early days, so she only took blood and urine, no sonogram. After the doctor, we head to see my nephews for the day.

PM: We head back from my brother’s house on a 6:30pm train that gets us into Manhattan for 7:30. We get to the apartment before the 8pm shot. I give it to myself and then we watch a movie called Adrift. Still no side effects besides being very tired.

Day 5: 

AM: We get up for the Menopur injection and then get back into bed for nearly another three hours. I am totally giving into the need to sleep this round and loving having lazy weekends. Fiance and I lounge on the couch all day doing meal prep, working on our various projects and booking our flights and hotel for our wedding!

PM: After we cook dinner, we get the Gonal pen ready with a new vial of medicine. This is the easiest shot of the four different types I will be taking over the course of this round. It comes pre-mixed in a pen-like needle that is super easy to inject.

Day 6: 

Am: I go in for bloodwork and an ultrasound and the doctor finds around nine eggs on my right ovary and about six on my left. If you were following along from our prior rounds, this stage last time (which was our only successful round) the doctor only saw about seven eggs total, so I am pretty happy with these results. The Doctor calls later in the day to say that my bloodwork looks good and to start an additional shot tomorrow morning called Cetrotide. Cetrotide stops me from ovulating so that I don’t lose my eggs. (You’ll recall last round I made a big mistake with my Cetrotide but luckily we still got eggs!)

PM: I get home from work and begin prepping dinner for tonight and tomorrow night, because a girlfriend is coming over for a lowkey dinner ta my place since I am still on shots. Fiance gets home and we go the Gonal pen before working on the couch.

Day 7: 

AM: I drag myself out of bed (still tired) and give myself the Cetrotide shot. I like this shot because it is premixed and already in the needle, so I feel comfortable doing it myself. FIance prepares the Menopur while we make breakfast and then administers my shot before going to work.

My stomach has some tiny bruises from all of the shots going into it, but I don’t have any pain when I walk (I will a few days before the surgery because my eggs will swell to the size of a green grape). I also don’t have any flutters or stomach pains. The biggest difference between this round and our three prior rounds is how little stress I have. The security of finally having a good round of IVF that left us with six healthy embryos is a huge weight lifted off my shoulders, so I am much less stressed out that I normally would be, which I do believe is helpful for the entire process.

PM: I prepare dinner before my friend comes over. As she, myself and the fiance are catching up in the kitchen, our alarm goes off that it is shot time. So, we got the Gonal shot out of the fridge and administered it while still catching up with her. We have a great dinner and then I sleep for nine hours, which is the new normal for me.

Day 8: 

AM: I get up early to take my Menopur and Cetrotide before heading into my Doctor’s office for more bloodwork and a sonogram. The Doctor is really impressed once she inserts the sonogram stick because there are loads of eggs. She detects nine big ones on the right side and five on the left, but lots of smaller ones on each ovary as well. As of right now, we are pretty much on track with the last round, which was our best one. I now have ot go in for bloodwork and a sonogram every day until surgery, which is either SUnday or Monday of this week!

PM: After eating dinner, the fiance injects me with my daily dose of Gonal and I take my clomid pills. I read “Crazy Rich Asians” while he does some work. I head to bed about two hours earlier than he does because I am still so drained. I wake up throughout the night with the craziest nightmares. The first time I took clomid, I had nightmares the entire time, so I am surprised I’ve only had one bad night this time!

Day 9: 

AM: Wake up early to do our shots and head back to the Doctor for blood work and sonogram. When the Doctor insert the sonogram pole, he says “Well, if journalism doesn’t work ou for you, you can have a career as an egg donor!” This obviously makes me super happy given the two failed rounds of IVF we had earlier this year.

He detects 13 very plump eggs, and other eggs surrounding. Now, we want as many eggs as possible because they have to make it through fertilization and testing. It’s really all a numbers game.

PM: It snows, so I leave work at 2pm and head home. Normally, I would make use of the time with a good workout, but that’s prohibited. So, I clean the apartment, read some of my book and work on dinner before the fiance gets home. He gets home and is exhausted as I have been, so we do the Gonal shot at 8pm and get right into bed for an early night.

Day 10: 

AM: I am up bright and early because of our hibernation the night before. I get ready for work while the fiance prepares my Menopur. I then head to the Doctor, where she says the eggs look great but likely need a few more days to go.I am anxious just to get these eggs out so I can get back to my normal life. Planning Thanksgiving around surgery has also been a pain. We had to cancel our flight out to Florida and then reschedule it during a time that works better with our IVF schedule. At this point, I am just really hoping for another successful round like last time so that we can stop being on this IVF hamster wheel.

PM: Walking has begun to hurt, because my eggs are swolen on both sides of my stomach. Merely touching the skin on my stomach is painful because of all of the needles that have entered coupled with the pain from growing eggs. We give me my shot and I complain to the fiance about the pain I am in. In a sympathy move, he allows me to put an empty syringe in his stomach so he can see how it feels. We dont inject anything because that would be painful.

Day 11: 

AM: It’s a Saturday, so we sleep right until our 8am shot alarm. I quickly give myself Ganirelix while he mixes the Menopur. He gives me a shot and then I jump in the shower before heading to my doctor.

We get to the doctor and they take my blood and do an ultrasound. Because of the crowding in my ovaries due to the eggs, it really hurts now when they insert the sonogram device. There is a ton of pressure and just pain that feels like bruising. The nurse als ruins my left vein as she inserts the needle, so now it is all bruised and swollen. This happens at least once a round of IVF for me and I dread it. After the tests, we meet with the nurse to find out details of our trigger shot.

PM: Blood work confirms that we will be starting the trigger shot tonight and stopping all other medications. Definition.

Our times for shots are 12:15am for HCG and 1:15 am for the Leuprolide shot. So, it’s going to be a very late night. We set a bunch of alarms to make sure we dont miss our window and then head to Soho to see a film at a normal hour (no more 8:00pm shots!). It’s nice to have an impromptu date night even if I am wearing Lululemon leggings since jeans right now are out of the question. We get back home and still have a few hours before shots begin, so we make dinner, watch some movies on Netflix and hang out until 15 minutes before each shot. That’s when we watch the shot tutorials on Freedomedteach before injecting. It all goes to plan even though pin pricks kill my stomach right now.

Day 12: 11/18

AM: I get up early to head to the doctor for one last round of blood work and to sign my consent forms. Tomorrow is retrieval day!

We have one last shot today and then we are (hopefully) done with shots forever.  Stay tuned for a separate blog posts on our results this round.

 

Read More of Our IVF Coverage:

IVF Diary: My First, Unsuccessful Round of Egg Freezing

IVF Diary: My Second Round of Egg Freezing

IVF Diary: Egg Retrieval, Recovery & Embryo Results

IVF Diary: My Third Round of Egg Freezing

IVF Diary: Results From Our Third Round of IVF

We’re Pregnant! Inside our Embryo Transfer

The Supplements I Take To Improve Egg Quality

Improving Egg Quality With “It Starts With The Egg”

Eliminating Toxins & Chemicals for IVF