Getting Pregnant as a Surrogate
It had been two long weeks since the embryo transfer and I was anxiously awaiting a call from the doctor in California (who had done the procedure) with my blood test results. Everything we had been doing and working toward for the past three months had come down to the results the doctor was due to call with at any moment. I was driving myself crazy with worry, wondering what was taking him so long. That morning I was the first person in and out of the lab in Houston for blood work, the results just had to be in.
Pacing the house, unable to sit still, unable to focus, I let worry and doubt sink in. What if the results were negative? I will have let everyone down, the doctor, the months of medication, the Intended Parents, and myself. I had never had a hard time getting pregnant, exactly the opposite in fact; I had a hard time preventing pregnancy. But, now that I was supposed to get pregnant I wondered if my body could do that on the first try? Just the thought of failing and having to start from square one all over again was enough to make me nauseous.
That large box full of medication and needles popped back into my mind while thinking of the possibility of starting over. It had taken so many different things to get me to the point of even being ready for the embryo transfer, and I was still on three of them. In the beginning, I was put on a month of birth control to get my cycle with where the doctor wanted me to be. Towards the end of that I started going to appointments with a fertility clinic here in the Houston area that was monitoring my progress and sending along to the fertility specialist in California. Every week, and then as things progressed, every few days I was at the Houston clinic to have the lining of my uterus measured by internal ultrasound. This is not a procedure for the shy. Things were looking great, time to start the first injection.
Injections?! You mean you want me to stick a needle in myself?! This was something I was going to have to get over quickly, as there were tons of injections ahead. My nurse from the California clinic called and walked me through everything; she was so sweet and understood all of my fears. After our conversation I was pretty confident I could get through the first shot, a tiny diabetic needle of Lupron injected into my lower abdomen. This was the easiest of all shots, a tiny prick and all was done. I was able to give myself this shot and took pride in overcoming my issue (as it was not so much fear, but just a dislike) with needles.
Two weeks before the embryo transfer I started a new injection called Delestrogen. With a 20 gauge needle to release the medicine and a 22 gauge to be injected into my backside I was terrified. Trying to remind myself that this shot was only twice a week, I set everything out on the kitchen counter while the kids were all in bed (so as not to distract). My wonderful husband David came in, held me for a minute, turned on the iPod and told me to get ready. Leaning over the counter I let my mind wander back to being in our first home at Camp Pendleton, wandering the beach, warm sand between my toes, breathing in the salty ocean air. A slight pinch later the injection was over, well that wasn’t so awful. David gave me a warm wet washcloth to put over it as the nurse instructed to better disburse the medication, and we were done. When we started Progesterone a week later, (which is a daily shot) things got messy at times. Mondays and Thursdays meant I had to endure two shots in the same night. Some days everything would be perfect, some days I wasn’t so lucky and the medicine would burn under my skin.
We packed up our van with our four kids and left Houston to get to California for the transfer a week after starting the Progesterone shot. That was an eventful drive I would not like to repeat anytime soon! Lucky for us, we stayed with family instead of having to be put up in a hotel and the kids had plenty of people to play with and be watched by while I went to and from appointments. The transfer went smooth, I was sent home on three days of strict bed rest. This was so difficult for me, I couldn’t pick up my 1 year old baby girl Peyton when she cried for me, I couldn’t play with my kids, I couldn’t even shower. The day I was allowed off of bed rest I made a beeline for the shower then off to another appointment. Back in Houston a few days later we count down the days until I can go for my blood test.
So you see how much we have all been through to get to this point, to be waiting on this one phone call that could change all of our lives forever. I felt pregnant. I craved food I only liked when pregnant I just had to be pregnant! My phone rings, I jump to grab it, it’s the doctor!!! We greet each other and as he proceeds to speak my heart starts pounding like it is going to burst through my chest. I was not prepared for what he was saying to me. His words echo over and over again, “Congratulations, you are pregnant!” Yes!!! “Not only are you pregnant, but from the look of your levels you are really pregnant. I am guessing that both embryos successfully implanted and you are most likely carrying twins.” Success… so far.
