It's been four days since my egg retrieval and I am still having discomfort in my lower abdomen. If my bladder is even somewhat full, it's like I can feel my ovaries crying from pain. During my long twelve hour shift, where I am constantly on my feet running to each patient's room, my ovaries have their special way of punishing me. This morning, I woke up feeling a lot better. But, exerting myself with little to no rest, is definitely causing me pain. I came home after my 12 hour shift, walked passed my husband's open arms, and headed straight for the medicine cabinet to grab a 1000mg of Acetaminophen, since the doctor said no ibuprofen. Acetaminophen helped more than it usually did today, than the other days. I also took my last dose of Doxycycline today (prophylactic antibiotic).
On Sunday, I was pleasantly surprised to answer the phone from my fertility clean on Sunday. Sunday marked the THIRD day of the embryologist checking in on our embryos. It was also the call that would tell us the grade of our embryos. As a refresher from the previous post:
I'll explain why they call on days 1, 3 and 5:
Day 0: Egg Retrieval Day
Day 1: 24 hours after egg retrieval, the embryologist can determine how many matured and how many fertilized. They wait to call until day 3, because its important to limit the amount of times the embryos are taken out of the incubator to maintain a stable environment.
Day 3: On day 3, the embryo should have divided into about 6-10 cells and be symmetrical which indicates even cell division. After day 3, embryonic DNA takes over, including genetic contribution from the sperm.
Day 5: They call to tell you how many have successfully become a blastocyst. A blastocyst is a human embryo that has divided successfully and survived to at least day five. This is also the day the embryologist gives your kiddos (embryos) their first "grade". A blastocyst is graded by their degree of expansion, their inner cell mass, and the trophectoderm. The grading system rates the blastocysts from good to fair to poor. The grading system indicates its potential to implant only.
I had just finished seeing a patient when I saw my phone lighting up on my desk and noticed the caller ID was from the clinic. I dropped everything I was doing, and picked up the phone. The medical assistant sounded happy, so I prayed it was a good phone call. She stated that eight out of our eight embryos were doing well, and progressively perfectly. Our grading was as follows:
3 embryos: EXCELLENT
4: GOOD
1: FAIR
The grading of an egg doesn't mean how smart or beautiful a child will be. It grades how well it should impact for embryo transfer onto the uterus.
Tomorrow is DAY 5, so I should be getting. call on how our embryos are doing. I am keeping my fingers crossed that all becomes blastocysts.
1 comment:
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