extraction

i drove to los angeles at night to avoid traffic. got to the beverly hilton. checked in. the room was huge! there was a flat screen television and the entire wall of one side of the room was a window with huge curtains. there was a sofa and a couple tables and stuff. nice room. $200 a night. the lobby itself was really fancy pants. the entire place just screamed "we have too much money"

i wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything after midnight, so i rushed to order food. got a couple of salads. cost $40. for 2 salads. it came with bread and butter on a table with a vase and orchid. the salad kinda sucked. total rip off. for $20 each.

then we tried to check our email, and internet wasn't free. it cost $50 for 24 hours of internet... there is free internet pretty much everywhere else in the world expect for this stupid hotel. that was kinda shocking. and then i took a bath, and the soap smelled like a solid bar of cologne. it was sooooo gross. i'd feel a little more comfortable in a motel 6. with free internet mild soaps and cheap food. lesson learned.

got up super early to drive down the street to the appointment. when i got there they put me in the patient waiting room. gave me a bag labeled "patient belongings" told me to change into the open in the back gown, putting all my stuff in the sealable bag. they gave me socks to wear. socks with traction. i love those socks. so i changed and then sat on the hospital bed thing in my gown tied closed in the back. the nurse told me to get comfortable. and she turned on the flat screen television hanging from the wall. news about michael jackson's family and the funeral procession.
the nurse gave me a sturdy denim blanket and kinda tucked me in, took my blood pressure and heart rate with that machine they clip on a finger that somehow knows your blood's oxygen level too. asked me when i ate last and when i gave myself the trigger shot. then left me alone with the michael jackson news.

a couple doctors began arriving for work and passed me walking through to the IVF lab. smiled and said hello with their coffee in hand. then the anesthesiologist arrived. greeted me and looked at my paperwork and set up a saline solution IV drip thing, putting a flexible needle in my vein on my left hand. taped it really really well onto my hand.
i never feel at ease until they tape it securely like that. but he did a very good job. it felt cold when he finally got it going. he didn't put anything in the IV yet. just set it up. then i waited there for a while. maybe 5 minutes. he came back and messed with the IV thing. maybe put something in there? i remember last donation, they put a drug in the IV before walking me to the operation room. maybe he did that. i didn't see him though. i was too busy with the michael jackson memorial news on the television. i loved michael jackson growing up. he was my david bowie.

a couple more people arrived and began arranging things in the operation room. the surgery was supposed to begin at 7:30 on the dot. i noticed a clock in the room said about 7: 25.
then a nurse helped walk with me into the operation room. she wheeled the IV behind me as i walked. there was a bed next to the ultrasound machine. instead of stirrups, there were knee rests. she helped me onto the bed and undid my ties to my gown so i could lie down on the bed without lying on knots. i was completely careless. not at all embarrassed about my nakedness under the gown. she pulled the gown out of the way, so it was more like a blanket with armholes than a gown.

i scooted down as to her directions, until i was in the right spot. and she put my knees in the stirrups. and strapped them there with a velcro tie thing. as she was doing that the anesthesiologist asked me how much i weighed, i responded, to which he began pushing an entire syringe full of some drug into my IV. i started to feel a little disoriented, so i lay back down and the anesthesiologist put an oxygen mask over my nose and put 3 sticky things on my chest to read my EKG i guess. then the pulse rate monitor and blood oxygen level monitor went on my finger and began beeping with me.

the fertility doctor arrived and put on the gloves and started up the ultrasound machine, there was my ultrasound guided needle that would suck the eggs out with the juice in the follicles, it was already out of the autoclaved bag and attached to the ultrasound wand. the bag wrapper had my name on it on a tray of gloves and tools next to the doctor's stool between my legs.
The doctor turned on the light and directed it towards my crotch, ready to begin the procedure, there was a point where i feared the anesthesiologist wasn't doing a good enough job, because i think last time i had passed out by now. So i thought about saying something to let them know i was still conscious, but i decided that would sound alarmist and stupid. so i began actively, but casually, looking around the room. i decided that would make it obvious that i was alert in case they thought otherwise.

i became aware of a conversation going on across the room between the nurses and the doctor, they were looking at a chart on the wall and discussing whether it was 15 or 16 follicles, and the doctor was asking them 16? and i raised my head and asked,

"is that how many follicles i have ready?" and he looked at me and asked,

"how many follicles did they say you had?" and i thought about the 2nd ultrasound and responded,

"i think she said 8 on one side and 6 or 7 on the other??" and he said,

"hmmm. i thought you had more that that."
I found that conversation strange. and comical. i mean, i was talking to this doctor between my legs and the doctor has the mask on and a light on my vaj. it was almost a monty python scene. or maybe it wasn't that weird, maybe i was just feeling high.

so i made a face that said, 'we will find out i guess' as i put my head back down i really started to feel drugged and weird. out of the corner of my eye i noticed the anesthesiologist put another bit of something in the IV. i decided to relax and let things happen, in a sense, thats when i surrendered any attempts to stay alert. i lay back and lazily stared at the hot air balloon mobile they had hanging from the ceiling. i just enjoyed the sensations i was feeling from the drugs. i remember thinking how appropriate that mobile was. light. airy. looks like how anesthesia feels. flying. floating to some distant land while some fertility doctor puts a sucking needle through your vagina and into each of your swollen ovaries. thats the last part i remember about the operating room.

while i was under they had drained the fluid of each follicle. in the center of each follicle somewhere in the fluid was a ripe egg ready for fertilization. so after draining the eggs out, they would put the liquid under microscopes and find the eggs and isolate each one into different test tubes. this was all happening in the next room. the IVF lab. i dont know how long they wait until attempting to fertilize the eggs. there was nobody else in the office. so i didn't see the surrogate or the intended father.
they had also carried my unconscious body off of the operating table and transferred me to the hospital bed they wheeled into the room. then when they got me positioned correctly, they wheeled me back to the patient waiting room with my IV still attached and dripping saline solution into my hand vein.

i awoke and a nurse offered me cold apple juice. i drank it from the plastic bottle she held to my lips, i said thank you. it had only been about 15-20 minutes. i was drowsy. i noticed the news was still on with michael jackson's funeral procession. some jerky jerk helicopter was following the procession to the funeral, and there were interview clips with the mother of his children and a bunch of nonsense i wasn't fully aware of yet. the nurse was watching with great interest. as she took my blood pressure and sort of multitasked. i asked how many follicles i ended up having, the nurse didn't know, she said, they're figuring that out now. but i think she thought i meant eggs. or maybe i said eggs... they would have known how many follicles i had as soon as they looked with the ultrasound machine. the nurse asked if i had cramps. i hadn't even fully thought about how my body felt until that moment, then i thought about the cramps i might have, and there they were. so i said yes, she offered me 1 or 2 tylenol. i asked for 1 please. then they gave me the tylenol, and more apple juice. and they let my husband come in and hang out with me. he seemed amused by my loopy appearance.

the nurse put that finger oxygen pulse reader thing on again. i saw my oxygen level was only 96%. i began breathing deeper and it went up a couple percentage points. so i made a point of breathing deeply until it was at 100%. i drank the rest of the apple juice, and the nurse went over recovery info with me and my husband. i signed the form that i understood. i was supposed to call them immediately if i had any fever or bleeding or severe abdominal pain or difficulty breathing. she said there might be some spotting (from the 2 holes they poked in my vaginal wall) thats normal.

i had to hang out there for a while more until the drip IV completely drained into my body. we chatted about michael jackson and watched the news while waiting for the bag to empty into my veins. when i finally took in all of it, she took off all of the tape and removed the IV from my hand and told me i had to go pee before i could leave. so they helped me up. i made a joke about them putting vodka in my drink and i said i was fine, i was kind of clumsy and couldn't walk straight, so she didn't believe me, so she told my husband to come into the bathroom with me and i stumbled into the bathroom and i peed just fine. when i wiped i had some blood, so i grabbed a couple light pads. i didnt end up needing them, though. i got dressed into my clothes and they let us go. i wasn't allowed to drive for the rest of the day, but i could eat or drink anything i wanted now. so we went out to lunch. we got to leave by 9.

I had mild cramps all day. i didn't take another tylenol. they weren't bad. i had to walk slowly in the same way as before the donation, but this time, instead of feeling careful because i was protecting the ovum, i felt like it was just sore like i hurt myself (which i did). i felt like i had to shit the whole day. but when i tried i didn't want to push cause i was tender in my reproductive areas, so nothing came out. finally towards the end of the day i was able to go. it was all dense. probably from the fertility drugs and stuff.
and there was a spot i couldn't sit on somewhere if i slouched just right and tried to sit down, it felt tender and uncomfortable. i sat the wrong way twice. and then as soon as i repositioned myself i felt fine.

the cramps went away by the evening. and i began to forget about my healing insides. i was reading self magazine and there was a part about exercising and i decided to do a few keguls. BAD IDEA. that made my general vaj area hurt. i had totally forgotten about my surgery.

then in the evening i took my fist progesterone lozenge. it tasted bitter. like gross. and they tried to flavor it with mint, but it didn't work. i would think trying to mask the flavor with orange would go over a little better. but yeah. postage stamps taste a little bit better than the progesterone lozenges. I have to take them for 5 evenings straight to convince my body that i'm back to normal. and then i should have my period in 2 weeks exactly. and by that time, i will be healed enough for intercourse (WHOO HOO!!). i am a little terrified of getting pregnant now on accident after all those fertility hormones. so we'll be extra crazy careful.

this morning my case manager called to check up on me. now i get to fill out the reimbursements form. i bought a few amtrak tickets on my credit card. and the birth control pills i paid for. and gas getting up to appointments. and i had to put the rental car on my credit card (for insurance reasons). and the lunch we enjoyed the day of the donation. all of those things will be covered. but i have to attach receipts and all that to the reimbursements form, and mail it to them as soon as i can.

today i'm just resting. i got today covered from work. i dont think i would feel comfortable working yesterday after the surgery, but i could have worked today just fine. i'm going to work tomorrow.