dumb and dumber still

Hi from Kansas City.

First things first: our last ditch cycle was canceled. Mostly due to lab errors (LAB ERRORS, WTF) but also because I'm done. Done. For real this time.

Being done was a hard place to get to. And here's why:

The photo above is a screen shot of my chances of having a "take home baby" through IVF (based on SART's IVF success predictor). If you click on it, you will see that my chances are very low. But they are not zero. So, of course, my immediate reaction is this:

It would be easier to walk away if my chances were truly zero. But my ultimate desire is to be a mom, not to be in perpetual fertility treatments. And so I am walking away.

We paid our $16.5k. Six frozen eggs belong to us now.

The donor is anonymous. I know her medical history, have a glimpse of her personality, and I know what she looked like as a child. It was her eyes that drew me in. It's only fitting that I have found 50% of the genetic ingredients of our future child in an online database. That's how I found my soulmate, Laney, afterall. I saw her picture on the animal shelter website and it was her eyes that drew me in. That's also how I met my perfect-for-me-if-only-perfection-truly-existed-husband. Online. Again, it was his eyes that drew me in from the start. And so why not my future child? Let's keep things consistent, shall we?

Current feelings: relieved and a little bit excited, even.

Current fears: how many embryos will we get from this batch of six? I really want to have two children from the same donor. Two children who have the same story. I know this donor is "proven", meaning, her eggs have turned into children for other families, That gives me a little bit of relief. I also know that there are other families who used frozen donor eggs who have gotten two children out of a batch of six eggs. But there are also many who have gotten just one. Or NONE. While donor eggs will certainly give us the best chance of having a child, it does not mean that it will be a guarantee.

In just over a week I will be heading back out to Hong Kong for work. I'm hopeful that I will use that time away to really dig in and process my thoughts more over here. I am still debating whether or not to share this blog with family and friends and make it publicly searchable. On one hand, it's easiest for me to express myself in writing. I also feel a responsibility to add my experiences to the IF and DE communities.

On the other hand, privacy.
I like privacy.
A lot.

Anger and Courage

I'm not sure which daughter is responsible for our latest decision.

We picked our donor. We were thisclose to parting with $16k. And then we got cold feet.

I went in for baselines on April 1. My hormones all came back in a pretty decent range (for me, anyway). And so we made the last minute decision to try again this cycle before moving on with donor eggs. There are a million reasons why this won't work. And why this is tantamount to throwing both logic and money out the window. But hope is not often logical. And we have grown accustomed to losing money. And maybe this time we will get lucky. And if not, then maybe this will be what we need to feel truly confident about closing the door on this method of family building.

P.S. I realize I never finished my last post. One day I will. But not today.