We were getting discouraging readings from the clinic here in Boise (by the way, we use the clinic here for all my general blood work and monitoring because it would be way too expensive to keep flying down to California which is where the doctor is that Lori fell in love with. You've got to love your doctor to make all of this work smoothly). After a lining check left us confused and not too confident in the clinic in Boise we decided to make a trip to California to have the doctor who would actually be doing the transfer check out my female parts. Not only did we trust her 100% to give us an accurate result but we also thought it would be great for me to actually meet her prior to transfer and become familiar with the clinic and area where we would be staying for a few days after the transfer.
We left for the Oakland airport on March 12 and would be flying home on March 14. It was just Lori and I. I will be honest, I was slightly nervous to be alone with her for that length of time. (She's going to laugh now when she reads that.) Loving someone doesn't mean you truly know someone. At this point I had already committed to give her myself in the most vulnerable of ways i.e. childbirth but we really didn't know each other on a personal level. This relationship was still "budding" and I was just praying there wouldn't be a lot of dead air between us. I laugh now because I was pleasantly surprised (yet not totally surprised) that this ended up being one of my most memorable trips ever! We had so much fun and we were only really on "vacation" for a day and a half. The rest was spent in the airport.
We flew into Oakland in the early afternoon and decided to grab a quick bite at Panera bread (which we don't have in Idaho so was a must on our trip) before heading straight to the doctor's office in hopes of getting an early appointment. We were quite delighted to be able to pretty much walk straight back and instantly have our ultrasound done. Right away I fell in love with our doctor. She made me feel like I was her number one priority and did everything herself! The clinic here in Boise uses a lot of nurses and other staff to do most of their "dirty" work but Dr A did my ultrasound and drew my blood herself. It's the little things that mean so much to a surrogate who has no idea what she's doing.
We walked straight back to the little ultrasound room and I was told to undress from the waist down. This time was different because Lori was with me. Great way to start the bonding trip! I thought my bladder was pretty empty but Dr A assured me it was not by pressing on it with the ultrasound wand. Ouch! I may have given birth two times but I'm still a chicken to anything slightly uncomfortable. Her first words were "You really do have a thin lining." My heart sunk. She then quickly came back with "But I'm getting a read of 7.1. And over here I'm getting a measurement of 8. Yes, we have a solid 8. Things look great and we can set a transfer date for whenever you like but let's transfer two embryos instead of one." Up until now Lori and Josh had only wanted to do one embryo because we only had three embryos to work with. (Again, another long story that maybe Lori will eventually fill in.) Dr A left the room to let me dress and prep for the blood draw. As soon as she left Lori jumped up and said "Can I hug you? I don't even care that you don't have pants on!" Yay! Our first inside joke :) We were so excited. And so relieved that weeks of pills and discouragement had finally culminated into some amazing news. We were finally going to set a solid transfer date and Josh and Lori had a high probability of twins!!! We had my blood drawn to verify my hormone levels were good then left the office on cloud nine. I still don't think it had totally sunk in for me. I guess it never really does though when it comes to baby making.
From the doctor's office we headed to our hotel to check in and decide how we were going to spend the rest of our trip together. The area of California we were in has some beautiful vineyards so we decided that first thing we needed to do was loosen up a bit and go on a tasting. We drove by a few vineyards and decided on the one that didn't look quite so sketchy or have an advertisement with a shirtless man playing a guitar. It was the perfect way to follow up our good news. We celebrated and laughed and just completely relaxed with each other. We talked non stop all the way back and didn't stop talking until finally at 8:30 we crashed at the hotel. It took everything we had to keep our eyes peeled open until 9:30. An emotional day and lots of flying had left us both beat.
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| Celebratory Champagne Toast (and my last alcohol for a while) |
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| San Francisco Ferry Building |
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| Me, Lori, and our cousin Michele. Those tortilla chips!!! |
Friday morning we flew home excited to make plans and arrangements for my hubby and I to go back to California for the transfer. We decided what would be easiest on myself would be for Paul to come with me to San Francisco (he also had an existing airline credit from previous failed uterus lining reads) and leave our kiddos with Josh and Lori. Calendars were cleared, tickets, a car and hotel were all booked and we anxiously awaited the day we would finally get to bring the babies to Idaho.
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