3DPER

I caved in and called the RE's office this afternoon. I simply couldn't wait to check on my little embryos. The embryologist called me back after a little while and gave me a progress report.

One thing came as a surprise. Recall that in the end (after some in vitro maturation of 7 eggs), I had 15 mature eggs. All of these were ICSI'd. Of these, 11 fertilized: 10 normally and 1 abnormally. Well, today she told me that the additional 4 eggs did show signs of fertilization today. However, because of the delay, these 4 embryos are only 2 to 4 cells. They look more like 2DPER embryos rather than 3DPER embryos. She seemed to think that they could still potentially be viable, but didn't make any promises. I was actually pretty surprised because I assumed that they had been discarded on the day after the ER.

As for the 10 other embryos, the breakdown is: 4 "above average" (1 9 cell and 3 8 cell), 3 "average", and 3 "below average." After our conversation I started stressing about whether "above average" is really stellar, or simply just a bit above average, kinda like a B-student. She menioned something about 10% fragmentation. That sounded good at first, but as I googled, I realized that many studies divide embryos into <10%>10% fragmentation (not so good). So to me, suddently 10% didn't sound very good since that's "borderline." However, I'm now focusing on the fact that she said, "ABOVE AVERAGE" and hoping that our embies keep growing into nice healthy blastocysts.

My stomach is still bothering me off and on (worse after I eat), but it's a bit better today. My current biggest complaint is the fact that it hurts to sit on either side. Those PIO shots are NOT fun!

I did go ahead and make an acupuncture appointment. It will be tomorrow (Saturday) at 12:30 PM. I called the office and spoke to a woman who I later learned was one of the acupuncturists. At first, I told her that I will be undergoing ET this Sunday, and asked whether she thought it would benefit me more to come either Saturday or Tuesday (after bedrest). She thought that Saturday would be more beneficial as the acupuncturist could give me some treatments plus guided imagery, etc, for the transfer itself. She then found out which RE's office I work with, and then said that the acupuncturist J will in fact already be at my RE's office on Sunday morning, as she will be working with another client there. She asked me if I wanted to be treated that day too.

The only thing is, the Saturday-type appointment (at their office) is $100 and incorporates more modalities of treatment, whereas the treatment at the RE's office would be $300 but actually seems to include fewer services.

I thought about it for a while and realized that I think I will be either distracted by hearing about the embryos' status or zonked due to Valium on Sunday. Plus, I don't want the acupuncturist to feel torn between dealing with two patients on the same morning. Thus, I decided to go with the Saturday appointment instead. If I really really loved it, I could always add Sunday or perhaps sometime next week.

It was kinda fun filling out the questionnaire for the acupuncturists' office. There were all sorts of questions about the color, frequency, duration, etc of my periods, and a long list of symptoms divided into the categories of fire, earth, wood, metal, etc. I really am skeptical, but I am willing to give it a try. Plus, maybe they can help my stomach/digestion and or sore glutes! If nothing else, it at least gives me something else to think about.