It's a struggle, when traveling halfway across the world, to figure out the right timing of meds and even the right count of how far I am past transfer. I had my transfer at about noon on Friday the 24th, here. But that equates to about 3 AM on the 24th at home. Which means right now, it is about 6:45 AM on the 27th here, putting me at about 3 days past transfer (or at least, I will be at noon). But it's only 9:45 at night at home, on the 26th, making it two days past there. Ay yi yi.... Also, I have to figure out my meds schedule on the way back. I take progesterone four times a day, estrogen three times a day, and a heparin injection once a day. I think I'm actually going to have to do the injection on the plane. YUCK. And it may end up meaning I have to start doing injections in the mornings instead of at night like I prefer, and oh, I really don't want to wake up to that. X.x I wonder if it would hurt to do one extra injection, about 12 hours after the first, so that I can transition back to a night schedule?
Anyway, here's what's been going down since the transfer. I got up the next day, got the rest of the money I needed from the ATM, took a taxi to Embio and picked up my meds (holy crap there are a TON), and took a taxi back to the hotel. Crawled back into bed for several hours, but went on a walk later that afternoon (about five or six blocks) to check out this amazing little toy store we'd passed on the way in. The store had beautiful vinyl dolls about four feet tall, dressed in little girls' dress-up clothes - some of the most elaborate dress up clothes I've ever seen, and I would have been DROOLING over them when I was a child. Anyway, the dolls were for sale (about 400 Euro, LOL). They'd been pretty well-loved already, most had marks on their faces and such, but they were so pretty! I would have loved to have one, but I think Kaitlin would find a four foot tall plastic child a little creepy. Anyway, then I walked about halfway back to the hotel, but made myself stop and sit at a Starbucks (with a decaf macchiato) for about an hour to rest before going all the way back. Back into bed, back to Netflix and websurfing (and freaking myself out about the possibility of triplets, OMG). Took a little walk a few hours later to eat dinner at a TGIFridays that I'd passed on my earlier walk. Ate an entire plate of ribs, and had lemonade WITH ROSE SYRUP IN IT that was unbelievably amazing. Gave myself the heparin injection after, which was awful. The needles are so much bigger than the Lupron ones, and they don't slide easily in. I have to like, stab... and keep stabbing hard... until it gets in where it's supposed to be.
Anyway, I started feeling cramping at bedtime. And somehow I just had this feeling it was implantation. In fact, I had this certainty that it was boy/girl twins and I was pregnant for sure. :P
Then yesterday, I got up, had breakfast at the hotel buffet, got dressed all cute and did my makeup and everything, and went back to Monastiraki to blow the remainder of my Euro. Bought a bunch of really cute jewelry, some small gifts for Kaitlin, and then found this place that sells pre-decorated fake nails in the Asian style (with 3-d flowers and jewels and stuff attached to them) for 2 euro per set. Bought like six sets of them because they aren't in the States, and are so cute. I might have to get some different nail glue, though.... not sure I trust the nail glue that came with them. And I might have to save them until after I get through a first trimester safely. Also, there was this enormous flea market going on, with people lining the streets with booths full of their jewelry-making and art and woodcrafts and so on, and they didn't have this the last time we were here, so it was pretty fascinating. But, it was a LOT of walking, and I kept having to stop and rest for an hour or so in between, both because my feet hurt and because I was really tired. Finally had to throw in the towel and get back to the hotel. Had dinner at the hotel restaurant, though I did go out for just one more block of walking so I could pick up one last dessert at the amazing bakery around the corner (which I put into my mini fridge and forgot to eat last night, so I ate it first thing this morning. Chocolate dessert breakfast, mmmmm.) Was feeling a lot less certain I was pregnant by last night.
Did have to pee like three times in the middle of the night, though. Yay, hormones.
So, today is travel day again. I'm going to go have breakfast in a bit, finish up my packing (somehow I've managed to get all those meds into my suitcase, but it was NOT EASY) and get to the metro so I can get to the airport. In for a LOOOOONG day of plan flights (about sixteen hours' worth) and three hours or so at JFK in between. But I am looking forward to seeing my honey and my puppy and sleeping in my own bed with my own comfy pillow tonight.
Not looking forward to the rest of the TWW. When I get home I have to set up a blood test for my beta, on May 6th. In the meantime I'm supposed to return to work. But, I'm not going back until Wednesday at the earliest... I need at least one day at home to deal with jet lag. I might just take two. It's not like I don't have the leave time saved up.
I don't know what to think about this round. It's been kind of nice, having this impromptu exotic foreign vacation as a part of the IVF experience. I do wish Kaitlin could have come... it's a little lonely by myself... and yet my little introvert heart has been kind of thriving on the alone-time. I am vacillating between terror of triplets, apathy about the whole damn TTC circus, certainty that we'll get a flat out BFN, and hope that this is finally it. The hope seems the most fragile of all, this shiny veiled dream sequence playing out behind a curtain, that I'm not actually going to get to touch. And there are moments when my imagination does take me there, and I live in that fantasyland with my BFP and heartbeat on the ultrasound and a joint pregnancy alongside my sister-in-law and a healthy baby (or two) at the end... but I don't know if my heart dares to actually believe it. It keeps telling me the scenario is (as my parents used to describe Santa Claus and the tooth fairy) "fun-pretend". Not something that's actually ever going to be mine, but I can enjoy pretending for a while if I want to.
Sigh.
I keep reminding myself that two weeks isn't that long. I waited much longer for this opportunity to come around again after the miscarriage. I can make it two more weeks. Not even that, because the beta is actually set in 12 days post-transfer. I got my BFP on day 8 post transfer last time. And I know I'm not going to be able to resist testing around that time this round, although I dread how scary it will be if that second line doesn't show up on day 8, because I know what my brain's going to do with it.
Anyway, have to get up now and get dressed and moving. See ya'all when I'm stateside again...
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