We had to wait almost three hours at the clinic, because we were almost two hours early for our appointment and they were running about an hour behind at the same time. I must admit, I was so jet-lagged and exhausted that most of the wait time was a blur and I kept fighting to keep my eyes open. the clinic is definitely really busy, we saw so many people coming in and out, and I confess I kept looking hard at the young ladies who were there, wondering if we might not be looking at our own donor.
Anyway, we got to meet Sotiria, the IVF coordinator I've been emailing back and forth with since the beginning... She's younger than I expected, and very pretty, and speaks English really well (though I kept having to try not to giggle at the way she pronounces "vaginally".) We met with Dr. Thanos who talked with us a little about my early menopause and said he would do an ultrasound to check my uterine lining. On the way to the scan room I had to use the bathroom. The locks in Greece and Rome are seriously old-school... Like, keyholes and big brass keys. So I had a bit of a conundrum getting myself locked in the bathroom, because the key kept turning in the lock but the door wasn't opening...
Finally Sotiria and another nurse got me out, though, and sent us to their ultrasound room. The little napkin they gave me to cover myself with was wayyyy tinier than the paper blankets at my doctor's, so that was awkward.... Dr. Thanos came in to do the scan himself (also awkward) and holy hell... He just grabbed the wand, stuffed it up in me, wiggled it around for all of about 30 seconds and pronounced that my lining, uterus and ovaries looked good, and left. After giving me a picture of the scan, by the way.
Kaitlin snapped a pic of me while we were waiting for the ultrasound...
The second he was out of the room Kaitlin busted up laughing. I suppose I am spoiled by my own doctor's office and their gentle, slow, somewhat laid back approach to ultrasounds, where they take a second or two to work the wand in, then take their time snapping shots from lots of different angles. That was the most abrupt and sort of weird experience... Anyway, after I got dressed again we met Sotiria back in the doctor's office, where she instructed me to increase my dose of estrogen and start taking loads of progesterone too... And set our embryo transfer date for Friday (the one day where we didn't have any tours or activities scheduled, yeah!) and said that our pregnancy blood test date would be Christmas Eve. Seriously, people, we get to find out if we're pregnant on Christmas Eve. If the results are positive it will be the best Christmas present ever. At the same time I think it's going to be awful if the results are negative and we have to make it through Christmas trying to smile and be happy.... Sigh. So thinking very, very happy thoughts right now.
Anyway, we find out on Friday how many embryos we have and have to decide how many to put in. I think that's the decision that scares me the most out of all of this. Until then, we have several days inAthens all to ourselves. We called the taxi driver back to take us to the hotel once all was said and done, and got checked in.... And went up the street just a little to get food... The most delicious gyros and pita I have ever had EVER. Then went back to the hotel where I took a lovely hot shower and went right to sleep. Woke up super early this morning, just waiting for breakfast time so we can go down and get some food, still trying to work out the dosages of these meds they want me on... And looking forward to starting the day. We have three days entirely to ourselves in Athens before all our activities start, and I intend to get most of my shopping done early. Also I am so excited about the food here. I will probably gain like 20 pounds on this trip alone, everything looks so delicious!!
I still kind of can't believe we're really doing this. Praying to every power in the universe that this works for us and we get our healthy baby at last.
No comments:
Post a Comment