I struggled all day today with a sense of futility. Why am I doing this again? Do I really expect a different outcome? I’ve had a lot of BFNs, and a lot of bad news even with BFPs. I really can’t think about beta day without my breathing getting shallow. I do not get that hopeful, giddy feeling about testing anymore. I just get this sick pit in the bottom of my stomach, fearing more heartache.

It still stings when my friends get tons of embryos in a cycle. Sometimes I forget that I’m different… that my result is very much not the normal. Even IVF shouldn’t be this hard… but for us, it is. My eggs just aren’t right. And every cycle, over and over again, it’s a bit of a shock all over again. And I feel stupid for being taken aback, because it’s not as if I forgot. But in between cycles I can let it go a little bit… it’s not so important. Until you’re mid-cycle and needing every single embryo you possibly can get, then it hurts like a knife wound. Broken. Still, always.

Which is not to say this cycle is a disaster – it most certainly is not. I am still tickled pink by getting a 50% maturity rate. Whether that’s due to the lower number of total follicles, or in part because of acupuncture, or just one of those normal variations, 50% is absolutely amazing for someone with my diagnosis.

But still it comes down to 4 embryos. The best 2 will be transferred. What are the odds that the other two will be good enough to freeze? I mean, really, thinking logically here. What are the odds that all four of my embryos will be of top quality? Not so good, I’m thinking. In any batch you’re going to get some better than others. I think the best I can hope for right now is one frozen, but even that seems unlikely. Of course all the conjecture in the world won’t be able to predict the future… so in a week we’ll know the answer to this one. I just hope so much for a frozen. Even if I DO get pregnant there’s always going to be that fear now of losing it and having to go through it all again.

And then the choice to transfer 2. Oh. I don’t even know where to start with this one. Let’s put it simply: I do not, on any planet, want twins. Den does, I don’t. The thought of both implanting does not make me all warm and fuzzy inside, it makes me want to hyperventilate. Do you know how much riskier a twin pregnancy is than a singleton? And do you know how freaking paranoid I’m going to be with a singleton? I am transferring 2 embryos because past experience has shown that they really don’t like to stick in my uterus. (Last stims cycle, for instance: transferred 1 fresh, 1 frozen, 1 frozen. 3 top-grade blasts in my uterus, only one implanted, and it was in the wrong goddamn spot.) We figure by transferring 2 we will have a better chance of one of them sticking. I feel pretty confident in my decision, but sometimes it freaks me out still.

Regardless tomorrow is the day, unless the lab calls me to postpone to Sunday (which is highly unlikely). I will be bringing Den’s mp3 player with some of my meditation music so I can chill out for the 30 minutes after transfer before coming home. I have the day off work, time to just kick back and let the embies settle in.

Physically I am feeling a little better today, which I am very thankful for. Yesterday was just not a feel-good kind of day. I was keeping an eye on the weight gain (because oh I was gaining), urine output, and keeping an eye out for swelling and other kinds of pain. So I’d say I have another case of mild OHSS… mild enough to not need any interventions, and it’ll probably diminish pretty quickly, but really not a fun couple of days. I think back to the retrieval that gave us Devin – they got 13 eggs that time, and the next day we went on vacation to Boston where we walked on foot all over the city until we drove back for transfer. I got 12 eggs this time, and there is no way in hell I would be touring a freaking house on foot, much less traipsing all over a city. I wonder if it was the pregnancy that is making it worse, if I’m just getting more sensitive over time, or if the ectopic/tube removal surgery is adding to it. Maybe some combination. Maybe I’m just getting older. My poor ovaries. It feels like I’m lugging around two softballs in there. Two fluid-filled, sloshy, sore softballs.

I think I need more sleep. Definitely need more sleep.