From midnight Sunday night/ Monday morning I needed to be nil by mouth. I needed to arrive at the hospital for 7:30am with nothing but myself, a dressing gown and slippers leaving my valuables at home. Nick drives to the hospital. We walk very slowly through the hospital campus, as I cannot walk very quickly without it hurting. I ask Nick to slow down a few times, he turns around and says "If I was walking any slower, I'd be going backwards."
We eventually arrive at the steps, the entrance to the IVF department and another lady arrives just before me. In the interests of social distancing, I gesture for her to go up the stairs first. She practically skips up those steps. These injections have clearly effected me differently than other people. Then again I have been on them a week longer than most people. I kiss Nick goodbye and slowly make my ascent up the steps. We are soon allowed in once a nurse arrives, and we are asked to wait in the foyer. We wait there until around 8am and then a nurse comes down to escourt us to the ward.
We have to walk up a staircase lined with stained glass windows, that remind me of church, and keep me comforted. My tortoise style steps must be annoying to the lady in front, as she holds each door open for me. The long winding corridors to the ward that feels so far from from the foyer we just left. We arrive at the ward and I am shown to my bed first as I am going down to surgery first.
I enter my curtained area with a hospital be and chair and I get myself settled. One nurse came to check my details and they had my D.O.B wrong. She explained how things would go and that a gynaecology consultant and an anesthetist would also speak to me before surgery to explain things further. It was now around 8:30 and she said I would go down for surgery around 9am. The gynaecology consultant came not long afterwards and explained the procedure: they would insert a needle, similar to the ultrasound probes I've become familiar with, into my ovaries and extract all the viable eggs that have been stimulated. She asked if I had any questions, I didn't at that point.
After she left I got into my hospital gown and put my dressing gown over the top. The the anesthetist came in and explained that there would be around 5 or 6 people in surgery, and not to be alarmed as this was normal. He said they would put a cannula in my hand and give me one dose of anesthetic and that should turn me unconscious, but should they need to they would administer a second. He asked about my allergies. (I was asked this question a few times as I had written in my paperwork that I had once had a mild reaction to root ginger). Ironic really, considering I am ginger.
About 8:50am I was escorted to the surgery, and the anesthetist wasn't wrong when we entered the room there was 5 people and then 2 others through the hatch into another room. They asked for my details again name and D.O.B. I was then asked to remove dressing gown and slippers and put them on the bottom of the bed. I get up on the operating table, there are two anesthetists. One tries to find a place to put a cannula, I am covered in bruises from all the blood tests.
He ends up putting it in my left hand. Simultaneously the other guy is putting monitoring sensors on me so they can keep an eye on me during the procedure. He asks me to lift my right arm, guy one asks me to make a fist. Guy two makes a joke about testing my multitasking skills. They take my glasses and put them with my gown and slippers. Guy one flushes my cannula with a cold liquid. Then he attaches the anesthetic and asks me to count down from 10,
... 9
... 8
...
During this time Nick has to give his sample too ready to fertilise all our eggs!
...
...
... Next thing I'm aware of, is I'm lying down in the recovery room about 20 minutes later. A nurse is with me and she passes me my glasses. I feel OK, still a little dizzy from the anesthetic, but that's to be expected. I am given a sip of water and the bed is moved into a more upright position. I sit there drinking my cold water, grateful that I didn't end up in surgery.
I am then moved back to my ward. The lady that was next to me has gone for her procedure and the lady opposite will be going soon. I am asked if I would like a hot drink and toast - I jump at the chance - I have tea and toast. It feels like the best toast I've ever tasted. I sit up further and start to move around a bit.
The consultant gynaecologist comes to visit to tell me the good news that they managed to retrieve 15 eggs. (I wasn't sure how many I was expecting, but that sounded pretty good to me.) We were going to have a frozen cycle. She also tells me that Nick has been and they his semen sample. They have eggs and sperm. One add one makes two, right?
After a while I started chatting to the lady in the bed next to me. We talked about our experiences, this was her second egg retrieval and on this occasion she had 7 eggs. (Again this confirms our 15 is pretty good.)
They will look at all of our eggs later on that day and inject all the good looking ones with sperm. Then we will see how many survive the night and those will be frozen for our later use during the frozen embryo replacement treatment. I am told this is much less invasive and easier on the woman. This is good news, as at this point, with the bloating and pain my body, it needs to relax a little.
I am told we will have an appointment with an embryologist within the next few weeks to discuss discuss frozen embryo treatment cycle. One of the nurses starts that part of the paperwork and tells me when we go for the appointment to tell the embryologist this is done before he repeats it.
I am starting to feel better after the food, but the pain relief is starting to wear off and I'm still bloated. I get dressed and I am told Nick has returned to pick me up. I am escorted back down the long winding corridors and grand staircase lined with stained glass windows. Nick is waiting outside on the steps and he supports me down them and we walk slowly back to the car.
On the drive home I ask Nick to drive carefully, as I can now feel every bump in my womb and rhe pain is getting worse. We arrive home sometime after midday I take some paracetamol and ibuprofen and go straight up to bed for a few hours rest.
Later that afternoon we have a phone call that tells us they have fertilised 11 embryos and they will how many survive the night. Next day we are told that 9 survived the night and those will be fast frozen ready for us to use a later date.
The next week feels long and is filled with pain, but eventually that subsides and I return to work the next Monday.
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