Rather than trying to explain everything that has happened up until this point, I am going to just start from today. But here is a one-sentence review of the last four years:

Lotta sex, even some doctor-ordered, but nothing seems to happen nine months later.

On to today:

Today, February 11, 2009, was the day doctors sucked out 21 follicles out of Betsy's ovaries.

Prior to today, Betsy has been taking a load of medications. For the past week Betsy has been sitting by the kitchen table each evening mixing up stuff in little bottles and giving herself shots. Betsy first started taking injectable medication at least a year ago. The first time she took it, it involved holding an ice cube on her stomach for ten minutes, laying on a couch, covering her eyes, and then me poking her.

She has now progressed to having me pull over on the side of the road, and within a minute she is done giving herself a shot and is saying, "Alright Debertin, let's get going."

Sunday night she had to take a different medication that involved me giving her a shot in the butt! We were at the doctor's office on Saturday and she took a Sharpie marker to make two circles on her arse. (Sorta like "bullseyes" for me to use.)

Anyways, Sunday night at precisely 10:00 pm I was supposed to give her this shot. Her past needles have been pretty short and into the stomach. This needle was 2 inches long and I had to do it!

We were standing in her parents' bathroom at 10 pm and I said, "HERE WE GO!" (Then I was slightly scolded - she thought I was being a clown, but, in fact I was just trying to convey the significance of the shot at this moment in our lives.) (Sometime our styles of humor don't match when I have a huge needle in my hand and I am about to give her a shot in her bum.) (By the way, I went to school for public relations, not nursing. The closest thing to a shot that I have given is trying to get a straw into a Capri Sun juice pouch.)

This past Monday we had another appointment and went pretty well. We had been getting good reports, but on Monday the doctor was concerned that Betsy may have too much Estrogen. Having too much would mean we would need to postpone this IVF cycle. We were not mentally prepared for the news, so the next 7 hours waiting for the blood results were a bit stressful.

At 2:oo she called - no results. At 2:45 - no results. Then at 3:30 pm she called and the Estrogen was okay! I did some sort of hip-hop dance move on the kitchen floor. Betsy just smiled and said, "come here and give me a hug!"

That brings us to today - Wednesday. We went to the clinic - I skipped going to the gym. (That sounds arrogant, but my father-in-law, Al, invited me to join him at the gym every morning this week. (By the way, we are staying in Fargo right now with Betsy's parents) Anyways, we leave for the gym at 5:35 am! I've been to "a gym" twice in my life and I have no clue what I am doing! I mostly go around and try a machine for a few minutes, fake some stretches, disinfect my machine, then move over to the weights.)

So instead of sweating on a rowing machine, we went to the clinic where Betsy had surgery and I "visited my aunt."

(If you look at the title of this Blog, there is a quick explanation of "visiting my aunt.")

We went to our clinic and Betsy got to be the first person to get her follicles sucked out. I have very few details about how this happens, but I do know she is under anesthesia and there's a long needle.

After Betsy was in recovery, I got to go see how she was doing. A few weeks ago she had to have a minor surgery where she was put under. That time, when she was in recovery, she cried when she told me how good her peanut-butter toast was.

This time she didn't cry - she just introduced me to everyone in the recovery room. Soon the doctor walked in and he was wearing scrubs that had pictures of 5000 fish on them. We said, "Hey, nice scrubs."

He said, "Hey, have you ever been to Key West?"

I said, "Yep. All I saw were chickens."

He said, "Oh, there's also a whole store full of scrubs!"

Anyways, he told us they got 21 follicles and 16 of those were good!

That's good news! Unlike West Coast IVF where the octoplets were conceived, here they will only place 2 embryos. So, we will not have our own cable show when this is all done.

So, today the eggs will be fertilized in a petri dish, not a test tube. (Test tube babies are actually petri dish babies - "test tube" just sounds cooler.)

Tomorrow we will find out how many of those 16 actually got fertilized and then Saturday they will put two back into Betsy.

Well, that's all I got right now. I'll keep you up-to-date.
Kyle