Meeting our baby daddy...

This has been an exciting couple of days. First, we got the good news about our follicle count with our magic number. Then, we successfully shot Heidi up with human chorionic gonadotropin (very fancy words for HCG and yes, I do feel quite brilliant saying it). And now, we have officially gotten to the point in our journey where we will get to meet cowboy hat baby, in a round about way, via his sperm. Yes, my friends, this little vial, containing .7 ml of sperm, is the meeting we've been waiting for. Every day in this process has led up to this meeting, every doctor's appointment, every temperature charted, every ultrasound, every worry. Everything we've done up to this point was so we could transfer that sperm into little Heidi. And here we were...meeting our baby daddy for the first time. Hello, little cowboy hat baby, hello.

So Sunday morning was our first of two inseminations. We were very excited to be going to this appointment. When we arrived, there was cowboy hat baby, sitting frozen on the counter. Huh, frozen, a spermcicle if you will. Oddly enough, the sperm stays frozen until about twenty minutes prior to the insemination. We sat and chatted while our frozen sperm thawed. We were excited, nervous, amazed that something so small cost so much, and anticipating...

Dr. Welden came in to start the process...the first insemination. Whenever I think of these words, very dramatic music plays in my head. This is big! We're here! We're here! Time to knock my wife up!!!

Now, the process is relatively simple. A small catheter is used and placed into Heidi's uterus. Then, the sperm is slowly injected directly into her uterus. There is actually more sperm in each vial than needed so a smidge is placed on a slide for Dr. Welden to review under a microscope to make sure each of the spermies are active and swimming in the right direction. After the injection, Heidi lays on the table and marinates for about twenty minutes. Now, to respect my little Heidi's privacy, I'm not going into too much detail here except to say that Dr. Welden was awesome about letting me see what he was doing and explaining everything step by step. Interesting to say the least. Sadly, Heidi wouldn't let me take any pictures of this particular process to scrapbook later. I'm still a little sad about that. I mean, how many people can actually have a picture of their cervix!?!

While Heidi was marinating, Dr. Welden took me to check out our spermies under the microscope. I am proud to say that cowboy hat baby's sperm appeared to be the Michael Phelps of sperm; very strong, all swimming strongly and seemingly looking for an egg to crack. Go sperm! In one little tiny drop were thousands of sperm. That certainly gives me a huge boost of optimism when a lot more than a drop was put into the baby making chamber, I mean, millions of sperm are all working toward one goal...find an egg and breaking into it. And we probably have three eggs so how can we feel anything but extremely optimistic about this?

After the insemination, Heidi and I went home and took it easy for the day. While the doctor said nothing would happen, there's still that inate desire to feel like you have to lay down and make sure nothing leaves its intended receptacle. So, that's what we did...laid low. Heidi napped (it's exhausting making a baby, people!) and we made sure we were creating the ideal environment for fertilization.

Then today was the same process only a little longer. It took Dr. Welden just a little more time to get the catheter in because her glands were swollen from ovulation. Still, all of the spermies made their intended destination. Because she's ovulating today, she was a little more uncomfortable with back pain. We took it easy again today. She napped again and I worked...making sure I was here to take care of her if she needed anything.

So what's next? If Heidi doesn't get her period in twelve to fourteen days, we should consider ourselves pregnant. Then starts blood draws every three days to make sure. In between all of this, a sixty mile, three day walk. No...Heidi is not going to walk the whole thing! She's going to walk a little each day so she can participate but she is definitely going to take it easy. I mean, she has to...those are the days that the egg should be implanting into the uterus. We don't want to disturb that process!

So, fingers are crossed and we're starting to think of the future. What's next? Maybe baby names. Dr. Welden said if we didn't pick a name by six weeks, he got to pick the name and he's already used all of the good names for his kids so I guess we ought to get to it...concentrate...we would really, really like to use a boy name...concentrate...leave the stem on the apple, cowboy hat baby sperm!

The magic number!

So, yesterday was day 11 in Heidi's cycle and we were due for another ultra-sound to see how many follicles she made this month. She had been taking half the dose of Clomid this past cycle in hopes that her little follicle making machine would produce a more realistic number of follicles (not nine!). Before we left, I told a friend that the magic number was going to be three...I just felt it, it would be three. We wanted three to four and for whatever reason, I was convinced it would be three. I should warn you, I tend to always be right. I'm not bragging, I'm just saying, for the record. Despite Heidi's advice to the contrary, I tend to like to point out when I'm right. Which is always. I digress.

Back to our task at hand, at the doctor's office...Dr. Welden came in also hoping to see something a little less "over-achieving" than nine. He asks about any side affects, minimal this month. Good sign. Then the ultrasound process starts...uterine lining a little thin but still thickening. Check. Right side...two large follicles, measuring almost 20 mm each and a smaller follicle, only about 13 mm that wouldn't amount to much when ovulation actually happened. Check. Left side...one large follicle. Oh baby, check, check. Yes, my friends, two plus one equals what? Three! Sidebar here...Heidi had spent this week significantly more anxious than other weeks in anticipation of the ultrasound and her hope that this time we would be able to finally inseminate. On the way to the doctor, she was more nervous than usual. I wasn't. I knew there would be three follicles. Strange thing, sometimes, you can just tell something. I don't know why, but I was pretty sure about this. I wasn't even a little worried. I just knew we were ready. We had taken so long to get to this perfect point and we had done everything right that I knew the stars had to be aligned and the gods of follicle making were in our corner. I just knew it. Felt it. I was sure. Even when the doctor asked what we thought we'd see, I said three. I felt like I played the lottery and won.

We were finally able to hear the magic words...we'll be inseminating when you ovulate. I seriously almost cried...I'm almost crying now as I type this. We were finally at the next step. Then he began talking about HCG and how that will force the ovulation and then more HCG will induce the creation of progesterone and this is good because it will first make her ovulate and then help prepare the uterus for the egg to implant. He kept throwing that word around until we both asked, "well, how does she get the HCG? Pill? Shot from the nurse? What?" And here, my friends, is where the fantabulous, amazing great feeling of success got just a hair scary...shots. Clarification: shots that I had to give her. More clarification: three shots that I had to give her in her boom-boom pow (butt for the Lawanna lingo challenged). The look on both of our faces said about the same thing - I'm not qualified to shoot her up and she's not really interested in seeing how fast I can become qualified.

Well, the nurse, God love her, gave us some instructions and let me practice on Heidi's boom-boom pow without the cap off the needle for a few tries. Heidi's arse was the center of attention while both the nurse and I measured out where to give the shot, how to measure it, how to give it. If Heidi's butt was a crime scene, there would have been finger prints all over it. We have to do the first shot Saturday night at 10:45 p.m. sharp so that Heidi will ovulate in time for the Sunday 11:15 a.m. insemination. Uh, hold up...10:45 p.m.?!? We have tickets to see Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang! Is my first experience shooting up my wife seriously going to take place in a stall in a public bathroom? I have to give her a shot in the boom-boom while watching bang-bang? Oh my...

So, there will be two inseminations, one at 11:15 a.m. on Sunday (after church for the doctor...hope he prays for us!) and the next at 10:45 a.m. on Monday. Then, another shot in the boom-boom pow on Tuesday and the last one on Friday. Whew. What an exciting, busy, scary, inseminating week we have to look forward to.

Oh and just so you know...since we were worried about the first shot and how we would explain ourselves if someone turned us in for shooting up in the bathroom, we've just decided to leave early and do it comfortably at home. Well, as comfortably as you can have a really long needle rapidly inserted into the muscle of your boom-boom pow by a completely shaky and unqualified shooter-upper. Don't worry baby, it will be fine...just close your eyes and hold your breath. We're one step closer to making a baby and yes, this might hurt a little.