A yes {so far}

I decided to do a thing I hadn't done before-  called "testing out the trigger."

As part of my IVF medication protocol, I did a one-time shot of HCG (also called a trigger shot) a week before our embryo transfer.

HCG is the pregnancy hormone. I'm sure there's a more technical explanation of what that means but I don't care enough to figure that out. When you take a pregnancy test (blood or urine), your level of HCG is what is being measured. 

If things are going well, it should keep gradually increasing until the second trimester.

I guess injecting HCG before an embryo transfer helps your chances of success- maybe it's commanding your body to get ready to be pregnant? Not quite sure lol.

So even though you are not pregnant, you would have a positive pregnancy test if you take one after an HCG shot. If you want to be sure to not get a false positive (meaning from the shot and not from a successful embryo transfer), you need to start testing before the transfer, watch the line get lighter as the shot leaves your system... and then hopefully, if the tests start to get darker you know it's because you're pregnant.

I have no idea if that makes sense to normal people- I'm so used to stuff like this by now.

For my previous 2 embryo transfers I didn't do this because I thought it sounded stressful to test early and often. But at this point I'm completely out of all patience and I felt a need to know how things were going as soon as possible.

I did the trigger shot on 4/27.

I took my first test on 5/2, and it was still pretty dark.

The embryo transfer was on 5/3.

I repeated tests on 5/4 and 5/6, and the line continued to get lighter.

And then on 5/8, 5 days after the transfer, the line was slightly darker! That meant that my body was producing its own HCG and the embryo had implanted! So this was technically my first positive test.

Then I was a crazy person for a bit and started testing every day. Which was not a great decision. HCG is supposed to double every 48-72 hours, so there is not always a noticeable difference if you test every day. Which makes me stressed. 

My blood test was 9 days after the transfer on 5/12. I knew the blood test would be positive because my home tests were but I had no idea what the level would be.

I was thrilled that it was 101!

For reference, for my last transfer it was only 51.

Home tests and analyzing how dark the lines were continued to stress me out. I had to wait 5 days for a repeat blood test to see how things were going, and during that time I alternated between being really happy and planning for the future and being really depressed, grieving that this baby was dead too, etc.

Thankfully, we had amazing results from the next blood test, which was today! My HCG only needed to be in the 300s for things to look good- but it was 1038!

I feel incredibly relieved and cautiously optimistic.

It's so hard to just let myself be happy because I want this baby more than I can say. I'm worried that I wouldn't be able to handle it if this doesn't work out. But at the same time I don't want to miss out on enjoying it.

I'll have another blood test next week and an ultrasound the week after if that goes well.

I don't know how things will turn out, but today I'm happy and that feels good.