Triggered

Alright, we are speeding forward in this process.  So, got a call after my Friday appointment and my E2 was at 1848 and I was told to stick with my same dose of meds and come in Sunday (aka yesterday) morning.

Sunday morning, CD 11, we went in for my appointment and met Dr. Rosen for the first time.  Basically, same old same old and I had so many follicles that we couldn't keep track while he was listing off their sizes for the tech.  He is a nerdier sort of guy than Dr. Tran - slightly less talky and able to tell me everything that's going on, but still quite nice and I trusted him inherently.  At some point he sort of exclaimed, "beautiful!" while looking at my left ovary, which kind of made me giggle because it was so genuine and so not for my benefit, but due to his own awe at my glorious follicles.

Dr. Rosen told us we were set to trigger that night for a Tuesday morning retrieval and we met with a nurse to go over how everything would work.

I was given this plan of action, and finally understood how I was supposed to know when to take all those other meds I still hadn't heard much about:

We had dinner plans with friends last night who we hadn't seen in ages (that's another topic to discuss - how much I haven't seen my friends in the last month due to this madness), so I ended up doing my last little Lupron injection in their house before dinner.  I got the phone call from the nurse, as I was told I would, and my E2 levels were 4405.  This is high, but apparently appropriate for the number of follicles I have and  meant I needed a smaller amount of the hCG trigger shot - usually they give a full dose, occasionally a half dose, and in this case I was to take just 1/3 of a dose.  She also told me I was scheduled for my retrieval on Tuesday at 9:30am and I should take my trigger at 9:30pm.

So, last night I did my last injections for this cycle.  The Lupron at 6ish, the trigger of hCG at 9:30 and then a superdose of the Follistim (that required two actual injections).  Apparently this makes for better results - I gave myself 450mls as opposed to my normal 75 or 150, but I can't find any information about why.  But the point of these injections is to get my eggs to fully mature before the retrieval.

I'm pretty low on energy today.  Has taken me like an hour to write this much and it seems boring and disjointed.  Primarily, the important facts are as follows:

* my retrieval is at 9:30am tomorrow, so we will be there from 9am on 

* we'll know how many eggs were retrieved before we leave a couple of hours later

* i'm taking most of this week off work so i'll have time to recover and be sure i feel good (for a change)

* we'll find out on wednesday how many eggs were fertilized and when the transfer will be

* but it will almost surely be on friday morning

* i am done with injectibles and onto oral and vaginally taken medications

* side effects might still be pretty rough

* i really really hope this works

Here is the last of my used up needles and the last belly shot unless/until I have to do this again someday.

Think of me tomorrow and wish us luck!  I am feeling scarily hopeful.  Hope = scary.