CD2: Pre-Op Appointment

I met with one of Dr. Persian's "fellows" for my pre-op today. A really nice Indian lady. Lots of instructions were doled out. I'm on a liquid diet tonight .... only clear liquids, nothing red or blue (as in gatorade). I also need to drink down this wretched magnesium-citrate crap to clean out my intestines, which is to be followed by the even more humiliating pre-bedtime enema. I was also instructed that I won't be able to eat solid food until I ... pass gas? Gosh, is there no dignity in this surgical procedure? Usually before surgery, I've always been told to not eat after midnight the night before. But during this surgery, they're throwing in the added bonus lower GI, bladder scan, and hysteroscopy. It sounds like they're not going to leave any stone unturned.

So one thing that the nice Indian lady doctor did for me was to do a very thorough U/S scan. I have a special dislike for U/S during the first few days of my cycle for obvious reasons. Ick, ick, ick. She did the routine check of my uterus and ovaries. Verified that I do have fibroids and then said, "You have a very normal looking right ovary but do you see these dark spots? These are small cysts like what you would expect of someone with PCOS."

Hot damn.

So a possible key to my problems might be adding in metformin? Hmm...

I hope that she is really skilled with that wand. I would hate to get all in an uproar over my gaggle of RE's not being able to find something that this doctor found in, 5 minutes?

So she pulls out the wand. Starts to go over the details of the operation tomorrow. She mentions that they'll be doing an endometrial biopsy. I asked her if they would be able to look for adenomyosis while they are in there. She replies that she can check for it with the doppler ultrasound right now. Back on the table I go, wand back in. She quickly locates my uterus.

I see a few "reddish" areas on the screen.

"Do you see those red marks?" she asks. I tell her I do and that's when she says that they are indicative of adenomyosis.

My uterus isn't chock full of the stuff, but it's there on the sides of the uterus. She seemed to think that having it didn't mean that I couldn't get an embryo to implant and pointed out that the embryo implants into the lining and not the uterine muscle itself.

So then why did Dr. Indian at CU tell me that adenomyosis was a known problem for implantation success?

I'm so confused.

I hope that he can confirm or deny the presence of adenomyosis and PCOS tomorrow so I will know what to do next.

3 on board

Today was transfer day. Full bladder I laid on the table and waited for the transfer crew to arrive. Dr. Indian wasn't there but I had the nice Italian or Spanish doctor that did my retrieval.

He said they had two embryos of very good quality to transfer (my heart literally did backflips with the words "very good"). I asked what happened to the 3rd. He said it only had 5 cells but I said "Let's just put it back. No sense freezing it or anything." And so they agreed. All 3 went back in.

Stats:
2 8-celled embryos, grade BB (very little or no fragmentation!! Yay!!!)
1 5-celled embryo, unknown grade

I told the doc I'd done an ultra low carb diet for two months prior to this cycle and he said that there is an insulin pathway in oogenesis that might have been helped in my case by cutting out carbs. I think it's the same path/reason that they put PCOS patients on metformin. I've always wondered if I was a wee bit PCOS because I used to make loads of follicles and I've got excessive chin hair (which is really odd since I'm blond). I'm not heavy, but I'm not svelte either at 5'10" and 170 lbs (I'm usually 155 - 160 but I'm carrying loads of steroid weight from these last 4 cycles that I've done since October, oy!)

Off to ride the couch for the day. I hope they're firmly planted in that uterus of mine and snuggling in for the next 8-8.5 months!