You’ve been waiting for it: here’s the third installment of Kyndell Harkness’ journey through IVF…

First off….wow, did you see how many people commented last time? Crazy. I’m glad people got a chance to talk things out. Thanks to all! And now, back to the journey.

After all the classes and paperwork, we were ready to get down to business. It was time to pump my body full of hormones and start growing eggs.

The biggest part of this stage of IVF revolves around drugs. Each person (woman) going through this has her own personal drug list of hormones, antibiotics and sedatives. We picked from the list of mail order drug companies and put in our request.

Before receiving our bundle of drugs in the mail, Jeff and I had to go through what I called Kyndell Poking Class. A nurse showed us how to mix the drugs, sterilize things, which needles to use for which drugs, etc. First though, there was the infamous info-video where they repeated everything at least five times. Yawn. Jeff and I took that time to tease each other. Then the nurse came in and showed us how you really do it.

Just so you know, there are two kinds of shots. One’s the subcutaneous. That’s the one that goes in the fleshy part of your tummy. The second is the intramuscular and that is the booty shot. I did the tummy shot but kind of screwed it up by poking myself too hard. It hurt and I felt silly. Jeff did the booty shot. Let’s just say it was flawless. As soon as the nurse told him it was like throwing darts, it clicked for him. In college he was the dart champion among our friends. Always coming from behind and embarrassing the lot of us.

We waited for our drugs to come in the mail. The timing was really tight, they arrived the day of the first shot. Let’s just say the box was bigger than a loaf of bread, way bigger. We opened it up on the dining table and it was overflowing with syringes and vials of all sizes. Jeff and I pulled out the bags and bags of drug paraphernalia in search of an instruction manual. Nothing. We were, well, I was in a panic because the amounts of these needles were different from the practice ones. I called the clinic but they didn’t call back until after Jeff had left. Noooo! I would have to give myself the first shot. The dart champion had left.

Yes, I am a choker, not with everything but some things. This was one of them. I prepared the needle like I was taught. I tapped out the air and swabbed my tummy. I stared and stared trying to talk myself into doing it. Shouting in my head: “Go GO GO!” Still nothing. It reminded me of when I tried to learn to dive off a diving board, feet on the edge, hands out in front, blue water below, and a complete paralysis of body and mind. It took me 30 minutes, but I did it. Jeff took over after that.

I was taking shots everyday and there was about two weeks when I was getting five shots a day. Some burned. Some felt like nothing. They all left me feeling somewhat woozy for a while afterwards but nothing serious.

The shorts are not the only time I get stuck through this process. Since the drug schedule is not an exact science, blood is drawn to test your estrogen levels. Every two or three days I’d go in and get my blood tested. Just my luck, I have little veins and they like to move around. It’s fun being me. It could take some time but after a while the nurses came to know.

They adjusted my meds and watched my ovaries grow and make eggs. I could feel them getting bigger and then I’d have an ultrasound and sure enough my ovaries weren’t hiding like usual, they were big and out for all the world, well, all the people in the exam room to see. It was working! Woo hoo!

As it got close to retrieval day day I was feeling uncomfortable. For the men reading this, ovaries are the female version of testicles and are similarly sensitive. Being internal organs, they don’t jostle around with each step, but still, imagine your testicles swelling to the size of lemons. Needless to say there was no bicycle riding for me.

Even though I was sore, I was ready for the next step, for the doctors to take my eggs and Jeff’s sperm and see if the Love Doctor can make some embryos. I was excited, a little nervous but happy. We were making progress and I was feeling good. Little did I know, I had a hospital stay in my future.

Previous installments: Making Baby (Part 1) and Making Baby: The, Uhm, Money Part (Part 2)

This entry was posted on Friday, April 20th, 2007 at 9:23 am and is filed under Guest Bloggers, Main, Pregnancy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.