10 and a half weeks!

Today marks 10 weeks and 4 days pregnant. So far this pregnancy has been a total breeze! I’ve had very little morning sickness, especially since I discovered that if I eat half an hour before I take meds, that really, really helps. If I forget and take the meds first I get super nauseated. Some evenings I am a bit nauseous too, but most days I am totally fine, all day long. I barely even feel pregnant. It’s a nice change from my pregnancies with my own kids, when I had terrible, all day sickness, that lasted most of the whole 9 months! I am still cautious – my doctor thought that the reason I was so sick last time was actually from the heartburn, so there is still plenty of time for it to come on. But so far I’ve barely noticed any heart burn either, which is amazing too, because it started at 8 weeks with Braeden and 6 weeks with Caitlyn. The biggest pregnancy symptom I am having these days is HUNGER! I feel like a hobbit – I could happily eat breakfast, second breakfast, elevensies, lunch, etc. I can go from being full to being insanely hungry in about 5 seconds flat. The intense exhaustion I was feeling for the last few weeks has started to fade. I’m still tired, and would be thrilled to get a daily nap lol, but the bone-crushing exhaustion has stayed away for a few days. 

My belly is starting to grow – insanely fast, actually! But of course, it’s still mostly flab.  Here I am looking insanely huge after eating too much supper!

  
I’ve got my own fetal Doppler now, for both my own and IM’s reassurance. I’ve been able to reliably pick up the heartbeat every day since 9 weeks, although sometimes it takes some hunting. Most of the time I can hear my own heartbeat loud and clear, but have a hard time hearing the baby’s heartbeat, although the numbers on the display show that the machine is picking it up. My heartbeat should be between 60-90, and baby’s should be 120-180. Most of the time the Doppler seems to pick up a mix of the two beats and reads between 100-125, but you can clearly hear my heart. Then for a few seconds I’ll get a reading between 140-165, and I know that even though I still hear my slower heartbeat, the machine is reading the baby. Tonight I could clearly hear the much faster pulsing of the baby’s heartbeat, although the monitor still mostly showed a mix of the heartbeats between 110-135, or sometimes showed nothing at all. Here’s a quick little video!

   
 
Oh, and the last bit of exciting news, we are almost done meds! I have 4 doses left of the Crinone and estrace, which is a 2 day supply, and then I am off meds! The placenta should be nice and well developed enough now to take over producing the hormones needed to sustain the pregnancy now. 

So that’s my update. 10 and a half weeks down, 29-30 left to go! We are already a quarter of the way there!
 

The Baker

9 weeks down, 31 to go!

Today I am 9 weeks pregnant. Today marks the day that Emby is officially no longer an embryo, but a fetus. S/he is the size of a green olive… And tonight I found the heartbeat on a Sonolone B doppler!  

 It’s not the best recording – in fact, I had the heart beat registering in the 140’s, ranging from 144-149 for a good 10 seconds, but when I hit record I must have jiggled the probe and lost it. But there’s no doubt about it, Emby is growing away! Mostly I am feeling pretty good. I have had a lot more nausea lately, but very little actual vomiting, and the nausea doesn’t last too long. My boobs are sore, and I am oh so tired. Like can’t remember ever being this tired in my life kind of tired. But that’s a great sign, so I will take it! IM has asked me to start eating organic, so I will be making sure to buy a little differently on my next shopping trip. Not much else going on right now. Good night 😊

The Baker

Beautiful Heartbeat

Today was our long awaited ultrasound. At first I didn’t see a thing, which scared me, but then the doctor explained that he was checking my ovaries and Fallopian tubes first to rule out an ectopic pregnancy. Then he finally got around to my uterus, and we saw this sweet little Emby:

  
And a beautiful little heartbeat of 146 💓💓💓  the doctor took a quick peek around to make sure there wasn’t a twin hiding somewhere (there’s not). Emby is measuring at 7 weeks and 1 day, which is a little behind, but the doctor said that at this stage they are talking about being off by a fraction of a millimetre, and it’s almost impossible to get an accurate reading. He is not the least bit concerned. 

My IPs would like to do all the available screening and genetic tests, so I will be heading back to Vancouver again on Aug 7 for more bloodwork and another ultrasound. In the meantime, I have an appointment with my own doctor on Friday.

I am feeling pretty good right now. I get nauseous briefly in the mornings, and for a couple of hours each evening, but I’m not throwing up yet. And I’m tired. Really, really tired. But on the whole, I feel good. I am so happy for my IPs, and I can’t wait until they get to hold their precious little bundle!

The Baker

Morning? Sickness

I don’t have morning sickness… I have evening sickness! While some mornings I am a bit nauseous, most mornings I am perfectly fine. But sometime in the afternoon, the nausea comes creeping in, and by the time I have to make supper, the idea of food makes me want to run away! No puking yet though, just nausea, which isn’t half bad. Honestly, I really don’t mind the nausea either, it just lets me know that Emby is nice and snug and growing in there. I am 7 weeks pregnant today, and Emby should be the size of a blueberry! We have our ultrasound coming up in 5 days on Monday July 6, and I can’t wait! I’m going to head over to Vancouver the day before the ultrasound with my kidlets. We’re planning to hit Science World and Chuck E Cheese on Sunday. Damion’s (my 14 year old) siblings from his dad are going to meet us at Chuck E Cheese. Then Monday we have the ultrasound, and then I’m thinking we’ll try to hit the waterslides before it’s time to head back home. It’ll be a fun couple of days.

Happy Canada Day to you all!

The Baker

POAS addiction…

Hi, I am The Baker, and I am addicted to Peeing On A Stick… I just love seeing that line darken, and I wanted to see that magical 3+. Here it is!

  

The test line is so dark now that it’s stolen almost all the color from the control line.

Not much else going on to report. I’m experiencing definite nausea every morning and evening, but other than one regrettable incident when I puked in the daycare parking lot (sorry!) I haven’t been throwing up. Other than the mild nausea (that unfortunately lasts for hours) and the fact that I am super tired, I can barely tell I’m pregnant. I can’t wait for the ultrasound on July 6!  I think seeing that little flickering heartbeat will really bring it home for my IPS 💗💗💗

Anyway, off to bed for now, I am exhausted! Goodnight All.

The Baker

Officially Pregnant

Betas are back and it’s officially official! I am definitely Pregnant. This baby is a-growing. It has been a couple of very stressful days. The first beta, drawn at 9dp5dt was lower than we expected at only 40. That’s still a viable number, but on the very low end of the spectrum. The IPs and I were very worried about a possible miscarriage. But what matters the most isn’t the first number, it’s how long it takes to double. Ideally, the number should double within 48-72 hours. Today my second beta came back at 11dp5dt, it was 84. The number doubled in 48 hours! What a wonderful sign. The numbers doubling in 48 hours is a great sign that our Emby is growing and healthy. So what’s next you ask? No more betas. The clinic will call me back on Monday with a time and date for a viability ultrasound. They like to do it around 7 weeks, so they said it should be the first week of July. We can’t wait to see Emby and make sure s/he is healthy!  And in the mean time, I’m going to enjoy knowing that there is a beautiful baby growing inside me (we’re sure it’s just one with such a low beta). I am so happy for my IPs!

Keep thinking of us, and send lots of sticky dust for this Emby to keep growing 💗🍀🌈

The Baker

My Eggo is Preggo!

Today marks 7dp5dt (7 days post 5 day transfer). On day 5.5 I got the slightest hint of a BFP (big fat positive).

Today I got this.

There is no doubt about it, I am pregnant! IM is thrilled and shocked all at once. I don’t think she expected this to work. I am so happy for her, IF, and Big Sister. Of course this is early days still, and a BFP now does not guarantee a healthy baby in the end. So fingers crossed, send your good karma our way. For now we want to see a good beta (pregnancy blood test) number on Thursday. If all goes well beta will be repeated on Saturday, and numbers should double. Please keep us in your thoughts!

The Baker

Stick Little Embies, Stick!

This morning two little embryos were placed into my care. We had originally hoped to transfer one, but the embies were a little slow to grow – although they looked perfect! So in the end we decided on two. Dr Havelock gives us a 50-60% chance of pregnancy and 10-20% chance of twins. All we can do now is sit back and wait, and hope that at least one (preferably one, but we’d be okay with two) of these little embies digs in and sticks around. I didn’t get any pics of the embryos – we were never shown any, and we forgot to get pics of me and the IPs together. But here’s a pic of me on the way to transfer:

 
Also, my lovely IM gave me this:

  

She has a matching charm on her bedside table 💜 After transfer my IPs took me out to lunch at Earls. It was so nice to get to chat with them for a while.

I really do feel so very positive about this. I really believe we will end this journey with a beautiful baby for my awesome IPs.  For now I will try to relax as much as possible, and think sticky thoughts. Happy transfer day!

The Baker

We have embryos!

The past week has been a roller coaster of emotions. The excitement and nerves of IM starting meds, and wondering what would happen. The deep disappointment of finding out that she was not producing enough eggs. The hope that they had agreed to reevaluate her in a couple of days, and then disappointment again when they still wanted to cancel the cycle. Every day IM went in to that clinic and had an ultrasound and bloodwork. Every day they told her it didn’t look good and that she should cancel the cycle. Every day she convinced them to go one more day. Until Tuesday. On Tuesday I got a call at work from PCRM. They were giving me instructions because they were proceeding with the retrieval procedure! Hurrah! The retrieval was scheduled for Thursday morning, and I know I was tense and worried for those two days, so I imagine that IM was more so! Then came the news. They had harvested 4 eggs. Not a huge number, certainly well below average, but also amazing considering we started with only two eggs. The next 24 hours were again full of suspense as we waited to see if any eggs would fertilize. This morning, I received this:

  
All 4 eggs fertilized! Amazing! I have heard of couples that started with 10 eggs and only got two embryos, so to have all four fertilize is amazing!! So now, we wait. Each day the lab will call my IPs to give them an update on the embryos. We are currently aiming for a 5 day transfer, which would be on Tuesday June 2, but there is a possibility it could be as early as Sunday May 31. Either way, in 2-4 days, we will be transferring. I am feeling great, and so positive. I have faith that this is going to work, and that 9 months from now my amazing IPs will be holding a gorgeous baby in their arms. I cannot wait to help them realize that dream. 

 I am all ready, let’s do this! And here’s a sneak peak of the little transfer gift I got my IM. I wasn’t even looking for it, just saw it when I was in a store one day and I knew I had to get it for her. It’s perfect 😊

  
So for now, please send positive thoughts that these 4 beautiful embies keep growing, and sticky baby dust for transfer day! It’s a good week to make a baby 💗🌈🍀

The Baker

Moving ahead against the odds

I am thrilled to share today that we are moving ahead. IM had been stimming to get eggs since May 15, and has not been having much luck. The RE kept telling her to cancel the cycle and try again with a different med protocol. But she persisted and it paid off! On Thursday this week – in two days!! They will do the egg retrieval. Currently there are two eggs that are mature, and three that are almost there and we hope they will be mature by the retrieval. So if all goes well we get 5 eggs out of this. My meds change on Thursday as well to prep for transfer. Estrogen goes down to two times a day, I stop lupron, start crinone twice a day, and doxycycline twice a day. Assuming that the eggs fertilize and continue to grow from there, transfer will be either Sunday or Tuesday, depending on if the lab thinks we should do a 3 or 5 day transfer, which will depend on the quality of the embryos. So what we need now is a successful harvest of 5 eggs, for them to fertilize and grow. I’m feeling really good about this, I know we can make it work! Please keep us in your thoughts 🙂

The Baker