Los Porchs

If it feels like this journey is taking forever, it's because it is! I have 1 more week of active birth control pills to take and then when my cycle starts, I'll go back into the blood work and ultrasound cycle to prepare for the frozen embryo transfer. The drive to the clinic isn't terrible, but it's about 20 minutes each way and with construction, who knows. My car gets amazing gas mileage though so it's not too detrimental to my fuel supply (or my budget).  My ovaries feel significantly better and the hormones aren't quite as ragin' as they were after the retrieval. I get restless when things calm down and sadly, I start to self-destruct at this point. The anxiety has resurfaced and I spend my days talking myself down, reminding myself that this too shall pass. The hardest part of the "hurry up and wait" portion of infertility is the waiting... it gives me too much time in my own head.  I'm trying to stay busy and to find ways to distrac

10 embyros frozen for future use (9 on day 5 and 1 on day 6).  now, we wait.

Reading:   Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis I'm still in the early pages of this book but can already tell it will be a fast read that is a repeat.  Some of the words seem like they are written directly to me. Watching: Fancy Nancy with Charlotte I just finished watching the entire Gilmore Girls series and am still grieving that loss, but Disney Junior just started a Fancy Nancy series and Charlotte has always loved the books so we're thoroughly enjoying this new show! Listening : The Minimalists podcast Hot damn this is good for my soul. It's a reminder that minimalism isn't all or nothing and I don't have to live in a stark house, but rather it's about finding what's appropriate for me and my family in this season of our lives and not living in excess. Enjoying : the dog park It's amazing to take Archer to the dog park and watch him run, run, run and seemingly crash when we get back to the house. I will admit it is very difficult to cr

what says monday better than, "hey, you should go to the er because i need to make sure you don't have a blood clot in your lungs." cool.  so not only did i have to leave work early, i then spent 4 hours in the emergency room (though i have to give crazy amounts of credit to the team at the ER, they were all amazing). good news though, you guys - i'm totally fine. just have a lot of fluid around my kissing ovaries. yeah. did you even know that's a thing? it's true. photo credit // encouragedegg.files.wordpress.com my ovaries are so large and fluid-ridden that they are touching, kissing if you will. have to take it easy to make sure we avoid ovarian torsion (in which they kind of fold over and get twisted, resulting in a surgery to correct). porch & i both laughed when we realized we had both been thinking how great it is that we've already met our deductible for the year; i mean, there won't be labor & delivery this year, but my goodne

we got our update on the embryos today (mychart is seriously a blessing) from the embryologist. of our 17 embryos, 5 are rated A, 5 are rated B, and 7 are rated C as of today. C quality embryos are not likely to continue to progress to become blastocysts so we're really looking at about 10 high-quality embryos. again, this is as of today - we still have 2-3 more days until we know the final number and quality of embryos to be frozen. so rest assured, there won't be 17 tiny porchs running around any time soon. though i am on board with getting a mini van!  the cup holders! the sliding doors! the captain chairs that charlie can get in herself without a boost! i digress. we'll keep you updated as our itty bitty embabies fight the good fight. thank you to all who have reached out, both publicly and privately, to ask about the process or to share their own journey. you're not alone! xo mama porch

i had my egg retrieval on wednesday (yep, the 4th) and we were fortunate enough to have 23 eggs. way more than the 8 we had our first cycle. got our report from the embryologist yesterday and of the 23 eggs, 18 were mature enough to use. still a ridiculous number, right? of those 18, 17 became embryos thanks to ICSI. waiting for a follow-up report tomorrow that will let us know how many of those 17 embryos have progressed! we will be freezing all of the embryos this cycle because i am at a very high risk for ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome and holy buckets - i feel it. this retrieval was more difficult than my first and i am still taking tylenol and ibuprofen to deal with the pain. hoping to do a FET (frozen embryo transfer) sometime in september... always a waiting game! not my favorite kind of shots!  gotta love filling up a sharps container! trigger shot! this is what tells the ovaries to let the eggs go after days of stimulating and telling the ovaries to hold on to them