A...B…C...are healthy...

We received wonderful news when we went to see Dr. Ismail, an expert in high-risk obstetrics on Tuesday, August 23.  We had the choice to go to his Chicago or Indiana office.  After talking about it with J we decided to go to the Indiana office since it was easier to get to instead of dealing with the traffic and parking downtown Chicago.  We were happy with our decision.  My taxi driver and husband, Brian, took off work and we headed out at 7:45 a.m.  to make sure we got to our appointment on time.  We made it with plenty of time to spare.  That's a first!  :)   J brought her best friend, Sarah, with to the appointment.   The ultrasound was first and then we met with Dr. Ismail.

The ultrasound was amazing.  A little emotional, but amazing.  Jon Pierre was our ultrasound tech.  What a nice guy.  He was wonderful.  Jon Pierre (sorry I don't have that option with the accent over the "e") wasn't your run-of-the-mill ultrasound tech.  He had that French Italian black slicked back hair in a pony tail look and accent with a warm personality.  We all agreed we would request our next appointment when he is working.

On to our ultrasound…it was amazing to see A, B and C wiggle around and move.  Once I saw their movement, I lost it.  I couldn't control my emotions.  We have been waiting so many years for this day and it finally happened.  I have been on a roller coaster journey between failed attempts at getting pregnant on our own, IVF, surgeries, and bumps in the road at the beginning of our journey.  My emotions were a mixture of joy and happiness and a little bit of sadness.  Don't get me wrong, I am thrilled to death that we have a positive pregnancy on our first attempt with our surrogate and we are not only having one baby, but THREE!  Mixed with my joy and happiness that my vision of a big family is coming true, there was a little bit of sadness that I was not the one carrying the triplets or feeling their movement.  That feeling of sadness lasted a moment or two and was overpowered by the joy and happiness these three little babies have brought  and will bring to our lives.  Sarah, J's best friend, and Brian, had a tear or two in their eyes as well.  John Pierre was great.  When I lost it, he came in for a group hug with Brian and I.  What a guy!

I think there our a few loved ones upstairs looking over us…my mom ("yia yia"), my dad ("papoli"), Brian's grandma ("Grandy") and my uncle ("Toto").  Our next appointment is at 14 to 16 weeks.  It doesn't look like B and C are mono/mono, but Dr. Ismail wants to make sure before J gets too big and risk any problems.  Until then…thoughts and prayers please!

What a Surprise!

We ended up going to Kankakee and having both ultrasounds done at once on July 30th.   J and I thought it was crazy to do an ultrasound to find out how many sacs there were and then the following week go back and do another ultrasound for the heartbeat.  We didn't need to incur any extra expense with taking off work and having two ultrasounds.  So, Brian and I were patient for another week.

We received a call from J and M, who invited us down for a cookout prior to going to the hospital for the our ultrasound.  We enjoyed a nice lunch and met J & M's three children.  Two of the three enjoyed climbing on Travis and wanting piggy back rides.  Travis might not admit it, but I think he enjoyed the attention. :) Their oldest son, who is 2 years younger than Travis, had the same love as Travis of building legos and playing WII.  So that was nice that they had somethings in common.  J likes to decorate like I do, so that was also nice to have that in common.  I knew their was that inner feeling when we first met back in October that all of us just clicked and knew J and M were the ones whom we wanted to share our journey.

After lunch J, Brian, Travis and I headed to the hospital and left M to be Mr. Mom and take their kids to a festival fundraiser.  Before we walked in the hospital I asked everyone if anyone wanted to place a wager (not literally) how many we had snugged away in J's belly.  Brian, of course, quickly said "one".  J and I said "two" and Travis said "five"!  We all laughed at Travis' response.

After blood work was completed, we walked down to the radiology department and anxiously awaited our name to be called.  The time finally arrived and to our surprise they would only allow one of us back at a time.  So, of course, mama went back first.  We saw one sac and then another.  J and I were not surprised to see twins.  The ultrasound tech, Bonnie, and J were explaining to me what the "yolk" was and where it was located.  I was like "what yolk?"  Had no clue.  After measurements, we went back to do the heartbeats.  As Bonnie was doing the heartbeats (no audio, just visual), she had placed the ultrasound in between the two sacs.  As she did that I had asked what a spot was on the screen that was below the confirmed embryo.  She was short with her answer and told me "Don't worry about that side, we are done with that side.  We are working on the other side".  So I just left it be.

Once we were done Bonnie and I went out to the lobby area and got Brian so he could go back for his surprise.  Even after he pressed me for an answer of how many, I was proud of myself for keeping a straight face and told him "I'm not telling you.  You will have to go back there and find out."  Left out in the lobby waiting, Travis started begging me to tell him.  So, I couldn't keep in the excitement anymore and told Travis.  I think the surrounding area must of heard me.  :)

Travis and I waited and waited and J finally came out with Brian and Bonnie trailing behind.  My first response to J was "About time, what did Brian pass out on you?"  Brian heard me and said "No, but you may pass out".  My response back was "Brian, I already know we are having twins."  Noticing he had copies of the ultrasound in his hand, I asked him to see them.  He said "Yeah, take a look at these."  I looked at the first one and then the second picture and my mouth dropped to the floor….A, B, C and the number 3 at the bottom!  I couldn't shut my mouth and slowly looked up from the picture and said "What do you mean we are having 3?"  They all started laughing at me.  I looked at Bonnie and said "See, See I asked you about that second spot."  She had found a third heartbeat when Brian went back there.  I don't know if she did that on purpose or not so we could both have a surprise since the hospital policy wouldn't let us back there at the same time.  What a shock to the system.  Especially when the Embryologist at transfer said the chance for one of the embryos to split was slim.  I had asked her at the time "How do you know ahead of time if they would split?" She stated that you could tell by the shell of the embryo.  Boy, was she ever wrong.

Here I was trying to let Brian be surprised and they pulled a surprise on me!  All of us couldn't stop laughing with joy.  Our surrogate was a trooper with hearing the news of 3.  She had asked me "How do you feel with having triplets?"  My response back was "Me?  How do you feel about carrying triplets?"  Still with all of us still laughing, she said "What are you going to do?  You work with what you were given."  I completely agree.  God had a hand in it ( and maybe my mother and father up in heaven too) and he keeps on putting me through the test.  As they say,  he gives you only what he knows you can handle.  I hope he is right!

Hcg Levels Still On The Rise...

On July 18th, 5dt14dpt,  J went for her second Hcg test.  Hcg still on the rise!  Yes!  It brought tears to my eyes!  It was one step closer to having our dreams come together.  Lisa said they would like her Hcg level to be at least 1,788.  J's Hcg came back at 2,092!  Wow!  I couldn't get over it.  When Brian came home from work we did our "happy dance" dancing around the kitchen, while Travis looked at us as if we were crazy!  lol :)

We don't know as of yet if their our multiples or not, but I was told it was a strong positive pregnancy.  We were to have another ultrasound on July 21 to find out how many sacs there are, but J and I agreed to wait and do the ultrasound for the number of sacs and heartbeat at the same time.  We go on July 30th for our first ultrasound!  Cross your fingers!  Until then, keep us in your thoughts and prayers!

Exciting News!!

On July 14th, 5dt10dpt, our J had her Hcg level drawn.  I received a call in the afternoon from Lisa at FCI that the pregnancy test came back POSITIVE!  How exciting!  FCI were expecting Hcg levels of 50 or above.  J came back with 447!  I was lost for words.  We have been through so much.  Of course I was excited, but then after it sank in,  reality kicked in and I had to take a step back and caution took over.  I didn't want to be too excited and then my bubble get popped.  I, myself, have medically, traveled a long road and have been through so much to get to this point.  It was like when I first found out I was pregnant with Travis.  I took the first pregnancy test and it said negative.  Four days later I took another and it said "positive".  I still wouldn't believe it so I made a doctor's appoint to get my blood drawn and the results didn't change.  It was definitely a "positive".  When I got sick with leukemia when I was 18 years old, one set of doctors said I probably won't be able to have children and then two months later another set of doctors told me I had a 50/50 chance.  Travis was definitely my miracle baby!  …and now another miracle!

It finally happened...

Our donor passed the medical screening and was good to go.  That was great news after have gone through two prior donors.  After coordinating the egg donor and our surrogate, we were finally able to begin our IVF cycle in June.  Our donor started her medicines on June 6 and responded very nicely to the stimulation.  We ended up with 21 measurable follicles!  Out of the 21 follicles 17 were injected with Brian's sperm and 14 continued to grow to embryos.  What a GREAT number to work with!  Much, much better than when I went through IVF myself and only had one to work with.

Well, 4th of July was the date for transfer.  Five o'clock in the morning rolled around really quick to get ready and be downtown Chicago at 7:30 a.m.  Good thing we didn't have to fight traffic.  It was smooth sailing all the way downtown.  J & M were already there smiling and cheery as usual.  We couldn't have asked for a better couple to work with.  Our surrogate is always smiling every time you see her and M is so supportive.   Every time we talk on the phone or see each other we always share a good laugh and are so comfortable around each other.

We met with the Endocrinologist  and confirmed that we were transferring two embryos.  The two embryos were graded as a 2AB (the "Beauty Queen") and 2BB.  The men were sent out of the room and I was able to stay and observe the transfer.  The Ultrasound Tech was amazed how wonderful  J's uterus lining looked.  Two thumbs up!  :)   I told J "I don't whose more nervous me or you."  She responded that I was probably more nervous.  I have to agree.  J was so laid back like it was just another task in her day.  She is such an amazing person to give this gift of bringing a life of a child into this world for another person.  Such an unselfish act.  The procedure was over within 15 - 20 minutes.

We were planning on going to breakfast after transfer, but J was told to go home and rest and have M pamper her for the next day or two.  Oh, well, next time.

July 14 is the big day to check levels!  Let's hope it will be a 4th of July to remember!  Cross those fingers and toes for us!  Sticky thoughts until then...

Three is a charm...

Well, we are on our third egg donor.  I hope number three is the lucky one and we have no further setbacks.  Honestly, I don't know if I can handle anymore. ;)  As much as I wanted our donor to have some Greek heritage, we decided to get the next best and go Italian.  It took a lot of thinking and talking to get over that hump.  I just wanted all parts of the puzzle to fit.  After thinking about it, our children learn from their upbringing, so he or she will be a part of you.  As not to go through the expense again of having an out of town donor, we decided to go with a local donor, who has previously donated.  We are thankful that we found our third donor quickly and that she was available.  She just finished her 5th cycle and we are waiting on her results.  We will be her final cycle, as a donor can only donate 6 times in her lifetime.  We learned that 3 of her 4 cycles were with positive pregnancy results.  The fourth was no fault of her own.  One cycle resulted in twins.  She is a beautiful young ambitious lady from Illinois and has one child of her own.  Going back to the Greek heritage, the donor's first cycle was with a Single Greek doctor and her last will be with a Greek to complete her full circle of giving.  If everything goes as planned, meds will start in May with a June transfer.

Cross your fingers...

Back to the drawing board

As we thought everything was coming together to start injections/medicines for a February retrieval, they easily fell apart.  We were very excited that we were flying in our donor for her medical screening and everything was starting to come together.  Our surrogate passed all of her medical screening and psych evaluation.  Good news as we are really looking forward to working with J.  We rushed to have our donor fly in to meet the date our surrogate wanted to be pregnant by, to only learn that our donor did not pass her medical screening.  We were not only disappointed, but sadden that our donor was diagnosed with Fanconi Anemia C. Fanconi Anemia type C is an inherited disorder in which the body cannot properly produce a protein that protects DNA from damage.  The defective proteins results in an impaired ability of bone marrow to produce all types of blood cells, which can lead to abnormal bones and organs, as well as developmental delay.  A shortage of white blood cells makes the body more susceptible to infection and cancer.  1 in 100,000 people are effected by Fanconi Anemia type C.  


So, we are back to the drawing board...

Update

Since our last posting, we are excited that everything is coming together.  Our surrogate has been medically approved and our donor is currently getting her psych evaluation and genetic testing done.  We are hopefully that we will proceed with our retrieval and transfer mid February. 

This past Sunday I called our surrogate and we talked for over an hour.  I thought it may be awkward when I called since we haven't talked since our first meeting in September.  I was amazed by the connection I felt again with a person I only met once.  We talked and talked and talked about everything and anything.  I was reassured that J is the person I want to carry my child.  She has such a warm heart and really is a special person to help others in her job and in her personal life.

The puzzle pieces are coming together...

Putting this piece of the puzzle in place was a challenge, but we are very excited to announce that we confirmed our egg donor on Wednesday, December 15th.  She is Greek, French, Russian and German.  This egg donor was a breath of fresh air compared to the run around we got from our previous chosen egg donor.  I think we got a little helping hand from above with my mother looking over us.  The donor is a 26 well-educated young lady.  She is single and dedicated mother of a four year old daughter, who is adorable!  We love her pictures.  Donor seems to be a fun, energetic, and caring individual.  She loves the outdoors and cares about animals. She likes to make people smile and is a great listener to her friends.  Donor is very determined and as a single mother at a young age managed to get through college with two majors and earned a scholarship with a beautifully written essay.  When looking for a donor these were a majority of the characteristics we were looking for in a person.  She has all of the same characteristics that I have with the exception of two majors and a scholarship that is. :)  


Our surrogate has been medically screened and waiting on final results.  FCI said everything looked good.   Our surrogate "J" is a 32 year old mother of three beautiful children and wife to a caring and devoted husband "M".  J seems to be very caring and responsible young lady with a great personality.  She loves to spend time with her family and caring for others.  Since we spoke of J and M in a previous blog, we won't repeat ourselves other than to say we are so thankful and blessed that J and M have come into our lives and look forward to our journey with them and a long and ever lasting friendship.

Starting to get frustrated...

Looking for an egg donor is stressful especially when you aren't part of the puzzle.  Well, not biologically anyway.   We have had some set backs since our last post. In a prior post in October, we thought we had matched with an egg donor, but she has shown to be not a good match.  We have been going back and forth with this egg donor (I will refer to as "L").    We thought everything was great and we would be on our way with our journey.   There were some issues of waiting until she had her IUD removed and weaning off a medication or switching to a different medication that was acceptable by the fertility clinic.  After numerous e-mails with the agency acting as the go between, we were receiving conflicting statements from "L" with regards to weaning off the medication.  One minute she didn't like how she felt going off the medicine and then the next time she went off cold turkey.  When asked for a statement from her doctor stating it was okay to go off cold turkey she stated she had been weaning off for over a month with her doctor's knowledge, but has shown no evidence from her doctor showing clearance.  It makes you wonder if she would be responsible in following the direction of the fertility clinic in taking the injections and medication needed to proceed to retrieval.

So in search again…  We have a few profiles in mind, but have to wait for a telephone conference appointment with one agency, which is on December 8th.  Wish us luck...

Our footsteps that pave the way to our journey...

On October 10 we had our phych evaluation in Glenview.  Passed with flying colors!  Did you expect anything less?  LOL  Met with our attorney in Chicago on October 11.  Travis had the day off of school, so we made a day of it in the big city.  We took the train down and met with our attorney downtown on LaSalle Street at 10 a.m.   We spent the rest of the day walking around the big city.  Started out with lunch at the Rain Forest Cafe and then walking to Michigan Avenue to the magnificiant mile.  Shopping...Shopping...Shopping.  We did a lot of window shopping.  We visited the Hershey store.  Never knew Chicago had a Hershey store.  We walked down to the Hancock building and Travis and Brian decided they wanted to go up to the observatory.  I was pooped from all the walking and told them to go and I will visit the the Cheesecake Factory.  I think I got the better end of the deal.  Yummy!  After we had enough shopping, we decided we were too tired to walk back to the train station so we decided to brave it out and take a taxi back to the train station.  Must say I think that was one of the better taxi rides I have ever had in the city.  Travis' eyes lite up when he would go fast.  He heard many of my taxi stories when I have been down town for conference.  We ended the day with fresh popcorn from Garrett Popcorn and Aunt Annie's pretzels for our train trip back home.  It ended a nice day in the big city!

Had our telephone conference with our third party nurse to get our testing done on October 14.   She coordinates the testing and makes sure the surrogate, egg donor and intended parents complete their "checklist" of tests and screenings.  Brian has his physical with the doctor on the 23rd and then we both have to get our blood work done.  Next is the surrogate and egg donor phych evaluations and screenings.

Thursday, October 21, we confirmed our egg donor.  How ironic...when Brian and I were choosing a date for our wedding, Brian choose August 21 because two become one.  I guess in this scenerio the same goes here too...two become one.  Two special people to help make one dream come true...

Our pursuit of an egg donor...

We spent many days and nights looking at profile after profile agency after agency for the perfect match for an egg donor.  They say finding a surrogate is harder.  As we wrote in a prior post, we beg to differ.  It's harder to find that perfect match for an egg donor.  Especially when you know you aren't going to genetically be part of the puzzle.  At the top of our list for a characteristic was to find a donor who was at least half Greek.  Part of my ethnic background.  Let me tell you there isn't many Greek donors out there.  The ones that we did find either had a extensive family medical history or did have characteristics that matched ours. 

After looking at one profile after another we narrowed it down to three candidates.  The first donor was Greek and German.  We thought that would be perfect since Brian is part German and I am part Greek. She was a prior donor with positive result, which was a plus. The second donor donated once a year for the last 4 years.  She too, had four positive results.  Very fertile! She was Greek, German, Lithuanian, French Canadian and Native American.  The third donor was Greek, Canadian, French and Indian.   

Trying to eliminate and select our donor was a hard one to do.  Who do you go with?  You ask yourself so many questions.  Are you choosing the right one?  Will the child have any of our characteristics? All three had beautiful characteristics.  The first donor has reddish brown, but looked more German than Greek.  Neither Brian nor I nor Travis have a reddish tint to our hair.  We were concerned about that.  Now it was a choice between donor two and three.  Brian really leaned towards donor two and I really leaned towards donor three.  There was something about donor three that I kept going back to her profile.  When you search for your donor, you really take a look at the characteristics of a person and their qualities and beliefs.  It was something about her features that reminded me of my late mother.  She had that look about her that drew me towards her profile. 

We started asking more questions about each donor to help make our decision.  When we started asking questions of donor two and had been communicating with the agency, donor two decided she was going to go with the highest bidder and matched with another couple without blinking an eye.  When searching for your perfect match, you will find that money does play a role with some and then there are those special people who want to help intended parents with their journey of having or extending their family.  So it was fate after all.  It came back to donor three.  God answered our prayers. I think my mom had a hand in it too looking over us to make sure we choose our perfect match...

The pursuit of a surrogate...

We started our pursuit of a surrogate first, as we were told finding a surrogate was the hardest.  We beg to differ.  When we left Family Source Consultant's we were given a couple of surrogate profiles to review.  Shortley after a few more came.  It wasn't until the fifth profile that we really thought we found our surrogate.  I will use "J" and "M" to protect their privacy.  We really liked all aspects of J's profile.  We had the same beliefs and hobbies. We both liked the country living and outdoors.  M also bowls on a league too!  That was a plus! :)  M and Brian also had a lot in common.  Yep, you guessed it SPORTS!  Although they are Cubs fans! LOL  It was also a plus that they were from Illinois so we will be able to be there every step of the way (ultra sounds, watching the baby grow, etc.). 

We had our match meeting on September 19.  The minute we walked in the door and I saw J, a feeling came over me that I can't explain.  I know this probably sounds funny, but we actually had the similar shirts on and same colors.  We clicked right away.  There was nothing but laughter.  Before you knew it three hours went by.  Our jaws hurt from laughing soo.... much!  We had a lot in common and same moral beliefs.  Brian and I knew it right away before leaving the office that J would be the one we wanted to carry our child.  We knew M would take care and support J every step of the way. 

A few days later we received a call that J and M felt the same way.  Our match was made...

Starting our journey...

In July we decided to start our journey.  We thought if we were going to extend our family and give Travis a sibling we should stop talking about it and get started before we get to the point of not wanting to change diapers anymore.  We met with Dr. Jacobs from Fertility Centers of Illinois in July.  We left the office with a folder full of information to review and several calls to make.  Who knew having another child would be so complicated.  It's a little more complicated than when we pursued IVF ourselves.  A lot of baby steps before you see the big picture.

A friend referred us to an agency out of Hinsdale, IL to pursue our journey of gestational surrogacy and egg donor.  We met with Zara from Family Source Consultants on August 9th.  She cleared up a lot of our questions of cost and the steps of surrogacy.  We left with more confidence in pursuing our journey.

A lil' bit of history...

For several years Brian and I have attempted to conceive another child so Travis could have a sibling and we could extend our family.  We have been trying to conceive another child since Travis was 4 years old.  He is now 10 years old.  


Looking back, it's amazing as a woman, what we put ourselves through to have another child.  As for myself, I was driven and wasn't going to take "no" for an answer.  It's hard to explain to others unless they have walked in your shoes the feeling you have of feeling incomplete.  It's not the urge to have another child, but the emptiness you feel.   


The history of what led to our journey of Gestational Surrogate and Egg Donor... 


We started by me taking oral drugs to increase my follicles to various testing of my Fallopian tubes.  In 2006 we decided to begin in vitro fertilization (IVF).  The process of  IVF entails the woman to take hormone injections to stimulate her ovaries to produce more follicles to better her chance for pregnancy.  The follicles are than retrieved through a laboratory procedure and placed with an unfertilized egg in a Petri dish to achieve fertilization.  The embryo is then transferred into the uterus to begin pregnancy.  (How about that for an IVF 101 class :) )  We made it through retrieval and were on our way to transfer and were 10 minutes away from River North (Fertility Center of Illinois is located for procedure) when we received a call.  On the other end was a quiet soft spoken nurse who calling to inform us that our one embyro stopped growing and cancelled our transfer.  You can imagine the devastation we felt being so close and having it all taken away from us within seconds…


Shortly after our first cycle of IVF, I started doubling over multiple times with excruciating pain and made a trip to the emergency room to learn that I had the size of a grapefruit cyst and it was not going to go away by itself and if it did, I would be in even more pain.  The cyst being too large for Laparoscopic surgery, I ended up having to have surgery with an incision from one side to the other on my "bikini" line to remove the endometriosis and the cyst.  After surgery, my Gynecologist visited me in my hospital room to tell me that they could not save my left ovary.  This was just the beginning of several trips to the hospital…


To prevent the endometriosis from coming back and so we could move forward with our second cycle of IVF, my doctor put me on Lupron injections once a month for 6 months.  After the last injection of Lupron I started having extreme anxiety attacks that came out of no where.  The first couple times they occurred, I thought I was having a heart attack.  I would shake uncontrollably and my blood pressure would sky rocket through the roof (we're talking 190/110) for about 20 minutes.  These attacks happened about 4 or 5 times.  Not knowing what was going on we made several trips to the ER.  My doctor thinking my blood pressure was out of control increased my blood pressure medicine and I ended up bottoming out from too much medicine and passed out on the bathroom floor for my husband to find me unconscious.  Another trip to the ER, but this time in luxury of an ambulance chauffer.  After meeting with our fertility doctor we learned that I was having an allergic reaction to Lupron.  Thank god it was that and nothing more serious.


Two months after the Lupron treatment, the endometriosis reared its ugly horns once again.  This time a cyst the size of a tennis ball.  Once again, an incision was done from one side to the other side of my stomach.  The only good thing that came out of this surgery was that we learned that they did not take my whole left ovary in the first surgery and the right ovary was still in tact.  


Once recovered from surgery, we attempted our second IVF cycle.  This time was different than the first cycle.   This time we actually made it to transfer.  I had one perfect grade A embryo.  The doctor said it couldn't be any better.  There was a good chance of becoming pregnant.  As I told my husband, I may get pregnant and I didn't even get kissed.  It was a joyous experience.  Days later after a follow up doctor's appointment, we learned that the embryo did not plant itself and I wasn't pregnant.  Yet another devastation.


We were told to rest my ovaries for 2 to 3 months before we should attempt our third cycle of IVF.  You guessed it, during that rest period the endometriosis wanted to decide my fate.  Once again, I doubled over in excruciating pain.  Unable to drive, my husband drove me to the doctor on Friday morning to get an ultrasound.  The endometriosis had returned.  My Gynecologist said I had no other choice but to have a full hysterectomy.  I left the office in tears hearing my doctor's voice over and over in my head saying "Okay, I will see you on Monday for a emergency hysterectomy."  


After our long and winding road in our attempts to extend our family, I learned my strength as a person.  As Forrest Gump's momma use to tell him, "Life was like a box of chocolates.  You never know what you're gonna get."  "You have to do the best with what God gave you."