Congratulations, you’re pregnant. What are you going to do now?

Go to the Bahamas!

This weekend we’re headed down to Miami for a short cruise to the Bahamas aboard Norwegian Cruise Line’s Sky. It was a “last minute” thing, given the low rates (about $180/pp for 3 days). One of the advantages of living in Florida: easy access to cheap, last minute deals in the cruising capitol of the world.

We had actually planned on going to Japan this June, if the IVF cycle hadn’t worked out. My thought was that it might be good to get away: out of sight, out of mind.

Of course, we did have success.

So, I (happily) bagged that trip.

That wasn’t a big deal. I just cancelled the award tickets and hotel reservations and put a couple hundred thousand frequent flier miles / hotel points back into my account. Note: this is one of the few—but valuable perks—of traveling often and widely on business.

Travel Geeks

I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before, but we’re avid travelers. How avid? Well, for example, we’ve been to Europe on vacation about 15 times in our nearly 12 years of marriage. We have a goal to visit together all 7 continents, at least 100 countries, and all 50 states in our lifetime. (Note: it doesn’t count if only one of us goes or we’ve both been separately)

Travel—whether the good, bad, or indifferent—has brought us tremendous joy. Indeed, sometimes the misadventures (like the “apartment from hell” we rented in Venice, Italy) have made the best memories.

We’ve also always dreamed of taking our kid / kids to all 7 continents before they finish high school. Admittedly, we’re travel geeks… but really, how cool would that be?

It’s funny: the dreams parents (or want to be parents) have for their offspring.

After the whirlwind IVF cycle and anticipation of awaiting the outcome, life seems to have settled back into a steady (and rather pedestrian) rhythm.

Thus far, L’s pregnancy has been very uneventful. Some of the earlier symptoms, like nausea and cramping, have subsided more-or-less completely. The fatigue and swollen/sore breasts continue. Note: I’ll refrain from any editorial comments on the “swollen” part as that seems inappropriate to speak of someone’s mother as such. Note #2: A female friend / colleague of L’s did comment on her suddenly more ample cleavage yesterday: she wondered if L had a “boob job.” Note #3: Really, this isn’t a bad side effect. Enough said. Sorry. I’ll say no more.

The PIO shots continue as a nightly but now rather blasé ritual.

What a difference a month makes.

That’s right: we’ve been pregnant one month!

We still haven’t really told anyone in “the real world” about our success yet.

Of course, we hadn’t really told anyone about our struggles with infertility either. We made the decision to wait for a few reasons. We’re certainly not embarrassed by infertility. It’s just that we’re fairly private people (by nature, despite evidence of this blog to the contrary) who lead fairly public lives (by profession). As such, we didn’t want to have to make a lot of small talk about the status of fertility treatment.

On a more personal level, we didn’t want to involve our families, because we realized a couple of things. First, it would simply add stress to their lives (which in turn would add stress to our lives). Second, there’s nothing they’d be able to do to help resolve the situation. So, in the end, we opted to spare everyone the grief.

We intend to execute the “public relations campaign” once we get past the ultrasound, starting with our families and closest friends.

Today was the third and final beta. Another good score: 4,415. Everything remains on track.

We have our first ultrasound scheduled for Friday, July 26.

At that time, we’ll hopefully see a fetal heartbeat and learn that everything is still going well.

Twins?

Or, maybe we’ll see two fetal heartbeats. It certainly remains a possibility.

Of course, it’s impossible to say conclusively from these beta results. I saw this post at A Few Good Sperm today: she had a somewhat similar beta #3 score and discovered they were expecting twins today. (Many congratulations!). Likewise, Julia (of “Another Julia” fame) believes that we have two “popping fresh rolls” in the oven. (And, for the record, I believe everything Julia tells me, as she’s batting 1000% for us. Hint: lottery numbers next, please.)

Time will tell. Singleton or twins, we’ll be thrilled either way.

Tomorrow is beta #3. And, assuming all goes well (as one would expect), we’ll then have the first ultrasound approximately two weeks later.

The pregnancy train seems to be moving down the track.

Yet somehow I remain apprehensive. Can this be right? Like magic, it just worked? I just can’t seem to get my mind around it.

I think we’re still in shock. Here’s proof: we own zero books on pregnancy.

Knowledge is good.

Yet, we’re utterly ignorant. I can’t even make myself hit the “checkout” on Amazon.com.

This is very odd behavior… especially for us. We both love books. Indeed, I’m positively addicted: a bibliophile to the core.

I just did a quick survey: we have approximately 2,500 books in our home library on a variety of topics. We own the complete works of [insert almost any major author here]. We have “how-to” books on activities we’ve never engaged in (faux finishing!), as well as travel guidebooks on places we’ve never visited nor really ever planned to visit (example: Papua New Guinea – though I would like to go to Papua… now… behold the power of books).

Shit, I have no fewer than five (five!) books on the topic of the Irish Potato Famine!

I’ll even manufacture reasons to buy books, especially bargain books (“well, I might need to know how to build a wooden boat, starting from logs, someday”).

You get the point. It’s almost a sickness.

And, now you understand my concern. This needs to sink in. It has to start seeming “real” – something that’s actually going to happen, not just something that we hope will happen.

Yup, it’s time that we find out what to expect, now that we’re expecting.

Amazon: here I come.

L went off to the IF clinic this morning feeling a little apprehensive. Time for the next beta. And the results.

Turns out, she had nothing to worry about.

1660. That’s another strong number and a good rate of increase. What does it mean?

Most importantly, it’s indicative of a healthy pregnancy thus far. Excellent.

It could also be suggestive of twins. At least that remains a viable and perhaps increasing possibility. If that’s the case, it would be a pretty amazing outcome given where we’ve come from (to repeat: 7 mature eggs retrieved, 2 fertilized, both transferred on Day #3).

Talk about “doubling down” on the fatherhood bet.

In other news: Fertility clinics are no place for pregnant women

At our clinic, the blood collection area is setup to serve multiple patients. Today, L found herself there with another woman who was on IVF cycle #2. While doing whatever prep work is involved, it seems that the nurses were happily gushing over L’s beta score from Friday and suggesting that these follow-up betas were mostly a “formality” with such a good number out of the starting blocks.

They were also joking about how this must have pleased our RE, who’s exceedingly focused on her success statistics.

Anyway, in the midst of this convivial and congratulating atmosphere, the other patient burst into nearly uncontrollable sobs. It seems that our good news or her lack thereof was simply too much to handle this morning. L and the nurses did their best to calm and reassure her.

God knows, we could have found ourselves in the same predicament (a fact not lost on me).

In any case, it sure underscores why our fertility clinic is not a “one-stop baby shop” with services from pre-conception through delivery. Such “vertical integration” (to whip out my knowledge of marketing lingo) would seem like a natural fit, especially in such a large multi-doc practice.

However, on further reflection, I think it would be a very bad idea: pregnant women need to stay the hell away from fertility clinics.