Waiting on Pills and Needles

This is my new morning routine.  I'm trying to get a bubble butt.  This is the before picture.  Next, 'roids baby! Wooooo!   Guys, I'm totally joking!  That there is a shot of progesterone in oil.  Less bubble butt, more bubble tummy. Not to be confused with bubble guts...

Listen, I'm usually pretty private.  Facebook didn't know I was pregnant until a week before my baby was born.  I had private emails I shared with my girlfriends.  As part of wanting to live fully, empty of my stories (good, bad, whatever category this falls under) I want to make this more public. 

We are hoping for baby two.  Here's a question I've been asked -  will guys try naturally?  Very good question.  Here's the answer. No.  Here's why.  We were lucky to get 24 eggs and from that 9 embryos.  So we had 7 left to be used.  We want to use those already fertilized eggs (embryos) instead of "trying naturally."  

I started on pills and shots in December.  Last night I had my last two glasses of  Islay single malt scotch (Bruichladdich and Kilchoman) in anticipation and faith that I won't be drinking again until baby is here.  Today, we got an embryo put in.  Read that sentence again.  We had an embryo put in.  No baby conceived in scheduled consummation.  No baby after some wild and passionate encounter.  Instead, it was calculated down to the hour.  A call to say the embryo thawed okay (hooray!), drink water so I have a full bladder, take valium at 10, be at doctor's office at 10:30 and by 11:30, the nurse, doctor and embryologist were in a low lit room and the embryo slipped in via catheter.  Whole thing took 10 minutes.  Korean food for lunch and then back home to relieve Grammy from watching Coco.  Keep taking shots and pills and find out results next week.  I'm currently watching This Is Us.   Tuesday. 

This time feels different from the first.  It feels better.  Easier.  Am I still dreading the phone call about the blood test results?  Oh for sure.  No doubt.  But, look at that picture again.  Beyond the needle in the forefront, is my shadow.  It's the rest of me and my life. That goes on.  In that life going on, are other people having babies "naturally." It's cute pregnancy announcements and adorable gender reveals.  And you know what?  I'm happy for you and (this time) only slightly jealous.  Like being genuinely happy when your friend gets engaged and you're single.  Or when your friends eat glutenous deliciousness and you can't.  I mean, it sucks a little but it's not terrible.  It's just what your life looks like in comparison.  

I can't even say that I am helpful to other women (and men) struggling with infertility.  I truly can't.  Because I have a baby.  Because I have a supply of embryos.  Because it didn't take me many years or several egg retrievals or didn't bankrupt us.  But I hope I am.  If you are in this boat, or if you're on a float with a puncture in the middle of the sea, I hope something here is helpful to you.  

 I am proud of myself for being able to still myself in the butt and for shamelessly asking if there was any way I could accidentally squeeze the embryo out - she assured me I couldn't.  Major sigh of relief there! 

It's weird that there could be a baby in there.  Or not.  The wait begins.  What do we do in the in between? What will I do? I know what I hope to do but only time will tell.  Or maybe that is fully up to me. 


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