Change of Plans...

Just a little update. I went in on Tuesday and the doctor said he thought we'd have a better chance if we did ICSI instead of just IVF. The only difference is that instead of just putting the sperm and eggs in a dish and letting them fertilize themselves, he will actually inject each egg with a sperm to make sure it has a chance to fertilize. This also means more money (300 euro per egg). At this point, I don't care about the money anymore. If it doesn't work, yeah, then you will hear me whining. He checked my follicles (for those that don't know what a follicle is, it is basically a little house that each egg lives in until they have matured enough to move out... that's my vision anyway), and there are still 8. They are growing and I think when I went in today I heard him say the biggest was at 20 (whatever units they measure follicles by). I was a little concerned about the number of follicles because originally he told me that he wanted to see at least 10. But that was when we were doing IVF only. So "I think", now that we are doing ICSI a smaller number is ok. At least that was the impression I got from him. John is still away in Poland, so I was a little emotional this morning. I went in expecting to start the process all over again. But after talking it out a little more, I felt safe to say 8 was enough. If we started over and ended up with 15 eggs... I'd still have to make the decision whether or not I wanted to pay for all 15 eggs to be fertilized. And at 300 euro a pop... that's just too many! So I am betting my money on these 8 and hoping all of them make it to the final stages... pretty please! I was given another prescription of the Puregon hormone injections to use until Saturday. On Saturday night I will take a different injection which will induce ovulation. I am scheduled to go in on Monday morning for Ovum pickup! Since I will be under anesthesia, I was lectured on finding someone to drive me. Since John is away, my friend Claudia offered to take me. Boy am I nervous about all of the possible what ifs. What if the retrieval doesn't get all of the eggs and we end up with less? What if even less can be fertilized? What if the fertilized embryo's don't make it to implant day? What if all of this is for nothing? I know those are all risks associated with doing IVF/ICSI, but I can't help myself from thinking about them. It is going to be a long weekend!