Eight is great

My sister went for her first monitoring b/w and u/s appointment since starting stims this past Monday evening and she's got 8 follicles - 6 on one side and 2 on the other. Not super fantastic, but it is what it is. The donor coordinator nurse (who's also been calling me directly with info) said the 2 were on the side where the cyst had been - "I think we told you about the cyst at her initial b/w and u/w appointment, right?" Well, no, you didn't. Apparently they did tell my sister but my sister didn't know it could potentially be a problem (and they didn't tell her it would be.) So, anyhow, Mr.Right and I talked it over last night and decided we would have in all likelihood gone forward with this cycle anyhow, even if we had known about the cyst (which was not producing estrogen). First, we've delayed and delayed (first because of my pregnancy, then because of my sister's breast biopsy) and we are just ready to get this thing done - both for our sakes (since putting it off runs us close to babygirl's arrival date) and for my sister's and BIL's sake (we feel we only want to drag out their offer/commitment to this just so long); and secondly while communication from our clinic is not always perfect we have come to trust the judgement of Dr.Dry and feel like if he thought there would have been a better chance in another cycle he would have let us know that.

And, really? Eight is great. It's more than I ever had on day 4 of stims and something must be going right because they decreased my sister's Gonal-f from 150iu to 112 iu per day. She's actually responding to the stims well. And I *never* did that. I mean, I was incredulous when they told me she'd only have to take injections once per day. And we've combined the Gonal-f and Menopur into one shot, so until she adds the Ganirelix/Cetrotide she's only had to have one injection per day! I was always on injections morning and night and was taking max dosage of everything - resulting in, at the most, 4 eggs retrieved.

So, we're hopeful those 8 follicles with have some nicely developed, not overly-drugged eggs at retrieval sometime the end of next week. Meantime, my sister and BIL are doing great with the shots themselves. They're both biologists so they at least have some familiarity with lab-type stuff - measures in iu's, even syringes and stuff. I'm just the drug-runner right now, getting Freedom Fertility deliveries to my house and running them over to theirs (an hour's drive) so they don't have to sit around and wait for the FedEx man to come.

Meanwhile, babygirl continues her gymnastics/soccer goal-kicking routine on a regular basis which makes me nothing but extremely happy. I have been worrying just a tad about my weight - in that I'm not gaining much. But Mr.Right tells me my belly looks bigger and bigger to him and despite the occasional (ok, becoming more frequent) soft-serve ice cream cone habit in the afternoon, I feel like I'm eating well (healthily) and I am walking 3 miles a day. And I have gained 15.5 pounds (or maybe 20.5 if you start from week 4 or so of my pregnancy since I lost 5 pounds from conception to then). And my OB said she's happy with more than 10 lbs and less than 100. :-) And I still have 8.5 weeks to go.

Luckily, we'll be getting a look-see at babygirl again on August 10 which, for some reason, seems like an exceedingly long way off.

Meanwhile, I continue to remind myself (despite my minor day-to-day silly worries) that we are extremely lucky to have this miraculous last-good-needle-in-a-haystack-egg-of-mine pregnancy as well as the possibility of a backup/2nd pregnancy opportunity with an egg of my sister's.