Tuesday, November 11, 2003

Injection Report

Well, we have begun the stimulation injections. Originally, we thought the shots would start on Sunday night, but the fertility clinic called and asked us to wait until Monday night to begin so that things would stay on schedule. So, starting last night, I am injecting Evelin with 1.5 ampoules of Gonal-f and a half ampoule of Pergonal (Repronex). These two drugs will help stimulate Evelin's ovaries to produce a bunch of eggs that can be harvested in a few weeks for our IVF cycle. For a bit longer, we're also still doing injections of Lupron in the morning (albeit only about a quarter of the dose previously being used).

Mixing up the drugs is a fairly simple matter (well, it is now that I have gotten the hang of it; a while ago, during our first medicated cycle, working with the needles was a real pain). Because of half doses of each drug being used, I have to mix up two batches at once, use one syringe and then refrigerate the second for the next night. It also means snapping open four little glass vials and two vials of sterile water. Normally, this isn't that much of a problem, grip firmly with thumb pressed against the top of the bottle, apply pressure, and it snaps cleanly at the line. Something happened last night with one vial of Gonal-f, however, and the top basically shattered, dropping bits of glass into the medicine. I didn't get cut, but we did have to throw out that vial.

Other than that, the first of this stage of injections went well. Evelin is back to the clinic on Thursday to see how she's responding and she has an acupuncture appointment that morning, too.

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