A First Time

I have been giving Evelin injections now for a while (albeit not continuously). The first was the hCG shot for the first cycle we did at the fertility clinic; and then there were Gonal-f shots and hCG injections for both IUI cycles; Lovenox injections for the second IUI cycle; and a-million-and-three injections -- Gonal f, Repronex, hCG, Lovenox, progesterone -- for this IVF cycle. Every time, I follow the standard procedure: set up in the injection, clear any air bubbles, make the jab, pullback on the plunger, and then inject the meds.

The idea with the pulling back of the plunger is to make sure the jab is going into fat or muscle (depending upon the type of injection) instead of into a blood vessel or the liver or something. Usually, it just pulls a little air into the syringe and everything is ready to go. Last night, with the Lovenox injection, I hit a vein or something. I pulled back and a bit of red mixed in with the medicine. No big deal, I just pulled out the needle and prepared another one, and it only bled a little bit for Evelin, probably because the Lovenox is an anticlotting agent. (Her nightly progesterone shots now have to be covered with a Band-Aid otherwise that little dot of blood that the jab causes will take a long time to clot up.) I have gone through a vein or something before (making for a nice bruise), but that was the first time blood ended up in the syringe. It was kind of weird.

Other than that, Evelin says I have been very good with the injections. All the horror stories on the IVF message boards and the materials from the clinic and pharmacy and the tales from friends made it sound like each one of these injections was going to be super painful. But that hasn't been the case, thankfully. At first I was worried that I wasn't doing them right (how can the meds be working if they don't hurt?), but I guess we're just lucky...