The official protocol

Today I received the official protocol from Doc's office. Because of my age, they decided to suppress me one week longer than originally thought - to get the best quality of eggs. So, here it is:

4/03 Baseline Monitoring: bloodwork and ultrasound
4/04 OCP Start: birth control pills and baby aspirin daily
4/15 Lupron Start: daily lupron injections, .2cc and OCPs
4/21 OCP Stop: take last birth control pill, continue injections
4/26 Suppression Check: bloodwork and ultrasound
4/27 Reduce Lupron to .05cc each morning
4/27 Begin Gonadotropin injections, 6-8AM AND 4-7PM
4/29 Blood Draw: office will call with instructions
5/02 Blood Draw and Ultrasound: office will call with instructions
5/03 Blood/ultrasound tests every 1-2 days until follicle maturation
5/06 Estimated Trigger Date: office will instruct on hCG injection
5/07 Blood draw
5/08 Estimated Retrieval Day: rest quietly at home after ER
5/09 Fertilization report: office will call with update
5/11 or 5/13 Day 3 or Day 5 Transfer: depending on embryo development
5/22 Beta blood test to indicate pregnancy

This is all so overwhelming, we are seriously not even thinking about the next steps as much as possible. Each one of the dates listed above is a milestone in and of itself; for example, on the day of suppression check, if I have any cysts they will cancel the whole cycle. If we don't get any great eggs, they'll cancel. If they don't fertilize, they'll cancel. If they don't make it to transfer, they'll cancel. I'm half blistering mad that this is what we have to do to have kids - that most of the world doesn't even give it a second thought and they don't have to invest thousands of dollars to become pregnant. I think about that, and I just want to throw up with frustration and, I hate to say it, envy.

But another part of me is excited to go through this process because there is no doubt that each step is a miraculous milestone, that the Lord is teaching Surfer and I to truly trust him daily, and we'll have the earliest baby pictures of all our friends, "Sweetheart, now, this is what you looked like when you were just an embryo...!"

My brother, Producer, told me yesterday a phrase that I'd never heard - that if everyone laid their problems out for others to see, and if you had to pick some problems off the table, most everyone would take their own home with them. God uses many things to soften our hearts, to tenderize them so that we can have compassion and empathy - and this struggle is, at least for me, causing such an ache and longing that I know I won't look at pain in others the same way ever again. I truly hope and pray that somewhere on the other side of this there will be another couple going through what we've gone through, and that we will have the unique priveledge of understanding their pain and helping them.