C: This light is here to keep you warm

Ah, another R.E.M. lyric appears and we're only a handful of posts into the calendar.

Here's a moment to stay in, as long as I can. This morning was our egg retrieval -- our second and, it looks like, final one. It seemed to come so fast. This cycle was only a couple of days shorter than the first one, but January has just been such a blur that it seems like New Year's was a week ago and the first injection was yesterday. But it's all been a haze of appointments and needles and timers and early mornings and tears of anxiety.

The process is crazy-making. I shudder to think how actually having a child will likely be more stressful than the process of making one has been/will continue to be, but so far it's been a nutty time that has wreaked havoc on Mel's senses. As it turned out it was probably the wrong time to switch medications as the new meds didn't really hold up as well against the influx of hormones as the old ones did, but perhaps that was a good thing in the end because it showed what was working when the chips were down. Also the new meds seem to have given Mel something of a persistent ringing in her ears. That's certainly not a recommendation.

So we found out on the weekend that Tuesday would be the day. After the running-around Saturday we had Laura and Jake over for lunch on Sunday, putting together a charcuterie board for lunch, which was a big success although there were a few elements we could have left out (and saved in so doing.) It was a fun day.

Yesterday was all about preparation for today. We got up a little after six, quickly got ready -- not being able to eat or drink anything helps one's focus I suppose -- took the relevant meds and were off. The weather being so mild and wet in January is something I have mixed feelings about but it sure has helped us with this whole thing. We got to the clinic right for 7 -- before sunup, even -- and were eventually shown to the preparation area. The crew for the procedure was actually the same as last time, which was nice continuity, except for the actual physician. Mel was going in relatively confident -- she hadn't had a hard time on the previous round, physically speaking, and although anxiety always exists in every situation, she was doing well and seemed prepared. She had an earbud in reading A Rainy Day in Paris to her. It did seem like there was more pain and discomfort this time, though -- possibly because the Doc barreled through to the sometimes-hidden right ovary -- and I worried about her state, keeping ne hand on her shoulder and the other clutching a baggie of crystals she had put together for the day. I watched the lab tech nervously, even suspiciously, waiting for the count to go up. I had no idea what to expect. Egg number one... egg number two... egg number three... pause... egg number four... pause... last time, we got a mere five eggs. It would be simplistic and a little sad to say that that was disappointing at the time, but I knew it was not the ideal outcome, as not all of them take to fertilization and develop to blastocysts, so when five gets whittled down, you end up with, well, a smaller number, and that was tough on us. To go through all of that stress and anxiety and financial hardship and pinning out hopes only to get the same outcome, felt, well... like a very real but undesirable possibility.

Switching sides, the lull continued, until... 6, 7, 8... okay, we're really in business now. Before we knew it, the whole thing was over -- about 22 minutes into the rainy day in Paris for those keeping track -- and we had collected a rather impressive eleven eggs. This was an impressive showing, and they told us normally they aim for 6-10 so we were ahead of the game. An even dozen might have been cool, but 11 had us walking on sunshine out of there once we were ready, around 9 AM.

So we've felt good. There's a real positivity and hope that we are on the right track. Cautiously though. Not to put too much pressure on those eleven, because I know that number will go down and down as the next five days go on. It's a sad fact that we're prepared for but will probably hurt a bit nonetheless. I have a number that I'm hoping for when this is all over but I haven't shared it, superstitiously. 

Anything bad could happen -- and if it does it will be sad to someday stumble back into this post -- but the feeling right now is so good, so in need of preservation. I want to live in this moment as long as I can before we know what comes next.

I hope for the best -- in my heart I truly hope all eleven make it to day five against all odds -- but if we didn't put ourselves at risk of losing something, then nothing would ever happen.

Eleven eggs in the dish.

The rest of the day was relaxing. Mel rested but didn't nap, I worked on comic blogging stuff. We worked out an issue with our voice mail because some random code hadn't been applied to our new accounts. That was necessary because there's going to be news starting tomorrow and then every few days. Once that was done, Mel expressed desire for a waffle with ice cream. I was thinking of something a little more... protein with melted cheese on it-y but her wish was my command, and hey that's what we eat almost every day. I was originally saying, oh, I guess I'll have to go out to the supermarket to get some Eggos, but I made some crack about "Too mad Demetre doesn't deliver," and the light went on. "Should we go to Demetre?" Well, who the hell ever heard of going to Demetre at 2 PM without having been to the movies first, but yes, for pretty much the first thing Mel had eaten in 18 hours, we went to Demetre and had an ice cream waffle. It was a nice outing, then we came home and chilled, watched Degrassi and eventually ordered dinner, Mel's previously-selected choice of Swiss Chalet. Then after a call with Mel's mom we finished the book we were reading and tucked her in, and now this.

I've got the whole rest of my week and hopefully I am able to enjoy it. It's scary, you know, this knowledge that this moment won't last and that we can only hope the comedown is gentle. That's part of the moment, the fleeting nature of it. But here we are at the start of it, and it's amazing.

"It only takes one."

Keep on rockin'

-Scotto

Addendum: This is just to say that this is my 1500th post published, a completely arbitrary milestone I wouldn't even have noticed, except that I happened upon an old post where I note that I had done >1300 posts, and I wondered how much I had done since then -- early 2011. Surprising that there were only 300 posts between then and now, but it tracks of course. They slowed to a trickle for the next two years before stopping entirely and then gradually ramping back up after a few years when things had severely changed, and now here we are again. I don't even think every post could be my last anymore. We're also coming up on the 20th anniversary of the blog this spring (I wasn't posting during the 10th) -- what a time, what a life.

KOR again -- SAW