Day 1 / Recap / Looking forward

I am having an "Are you there God, It's me Margaret" moment. I've never been so glad to get my period.

They said it would take 8-12 days after starting Lupron. Well, today is 11 days since I started taking Lupron (Oct 6) or the 12th shot itself .... I'm not sure there's anything to be "relieved" about - but I'm glad. The more this goes according to schedule/expectations, the better.

So .... to recap.
- Oct 6 was 21 days since my prior period as started.
- They tested to see if I had ovulated, and I had. This was to ensure my ovaries were sorta done with their part for the month.
- I then started self-injected shots of Lupron -which shuts down my pituitary gland from making any hormones, essentially putting me into menopause.
- that's been going on for the last 11 days. I've discussed the various symptoms or lack thereof
- Now, 32 days since my last period, my new one has started. That didn't need any hormones to happen - I didn't start taking hormones until after ovulation, and in that time, my uterine wall had built up - so it had to shed eventually in the absence of a fertilized implantation.
- So, now on Day 1, I call NYU and let them know. I still take Lupron.
- On Day 3, I go in for bloodwork and an ultrasound (I need a whole post on the "ultrasound" - it's um .... and internal device
- If all is well, that day I start taking shots of gonal-f (there are other brands) to put my ovaries into overdrive, hopefully forcing lots of follicles to develop lots of eggs
- every other day or so I go in for more monitoring - they'll know how many follicles are developing - as will I. If too few or too many develop and they can't fix it with adjustments in hormones, they might cancel everything. (too many is dangerous, and too few makes the procedure not worth it given low survival rates of any one egg)
- after about 10 days of that, I take a big HCG shot which trigger ovulation
- 35 hours later I have surgery -light anesthesia - go home as soon as I can eat/pee/be picked up. By that time, they can tell me how many eggs they've gotten
- they freeze what they can and tell me what was good enough to freeze
- Years later, if I need them, I have to go through some more shots/prep and stuff, they thaw some of the eggs (not all will survive the thaw), fertilize them (not all will fertilize), watch them divide and grow for 3-5 days, and then implant the best 1 or 2, and then freeze any remaining embryos that are good enough to freeze.

So, schedule wise, we're taking Surgery Oct 31 / Nov 1 / Nov 2 - I think

Good retrievals get 15 eggs. I'm unrealistically hoping for 25.