Eggstravaganza.

First cycle done. In the can. Or the incubator, as it were.

I went for an ultrasound on Monday. My ovaries were the size of oranges. The specialist said they were growing fast, and that I needed the blocker injection stat. So I had it stat.

A couple of days of two injections (one blocker, one grower) later, at the second ultrasound, I had grapefruits. My ovaries would be ripe for the plucking on Friday. Seven eggs, she said.

Wednesday night was the trigger injection. Chorionic Gonadotropin, ie the pregnancy hormone. That was rough. Sore sore boobs, sick, sore pelvis. All the symptoms of pregnancy, but no pregnancy.

I went out for a coffee, the other day. 8 women sat beside me, probably a mother's group, with babies around the 3 month mark. All looking good and breastfeeding with apparent ease. Just the thing you want in your face when your ovaries are swollen with hormones.

Today I went for the collection. Seven eggs, she collected. How bout dat?

I watched all the other women go in for their egg collections. They all looked hale and hearty. Young, healthy. Wealthy. Like they should be strolling around in their active luxe and beachy waves with a chubby baby in a bugaboo, or gracefully lifting the baby out of their Audi 4WD.

Some of them were in for their fourth or fifth go.

The operation itself went fairly well, insofar as I was knocked out for it, and I am not in a lot of pain. More of a pressure when I sit down.

My little oocytes got whisked off to the lab where they will get fertilised. Tomorrow I will get told how many get fertilised.

It's a bit of a game of attrition from there. A certain percentage will fertilise, of those a proportion will get to blastocyst stage, of those a proportion will pass the genetic screening, of those a proportion will survive the freezing and thawing. Of those embryos which are for transfer, on average, 30% will proceed to a live birth. Attrition. Let's hope my oocytes do crossfit too, and they are super good quality.

People say, when I am doing IVF, "oooh how exciting". They haven't considered the attrition above. I find it hard to be excited as it all seems rather improbable. Sometimes it's not good to know the facts. For now, I am just focussed on getting through this one, on recovering, on getting back to crossfit, on getting back into work. I have not thought about whether I will do any more cycles.

I had an exciting work related email the other day, which turned out to be a furphy, but it gave me a bit of food for thought for how I want my career to proceed. It's important not to put all my eggs in one basket (pun absolutely intended), life goal wise.