{FET Cycle: TWW and a Piece of Heaven}

 There’s a term in the infertility world—Two Week Wait (TWW). 

The first time I got on infertility blogs and online boards, I kept seeing FET, IVF, TWW, FET…..what in the world?? Weird to be so familiar with all of the terms now.

So that’s what happens after the embryo transfer. The Two Week Wait…except that it’s only 9 days for a Frozen transfer. Lol  Since the embryo is already 5 days old when they put it in, that takes up 5 of the 14 days you would normally have to wait. 

So I took off the 3 days of work so I could be as stress free as possible. I did full-on bed rest for two days and then was up and down on the third and fourth days.  My friend Kristin came with her twins (courtesy of IVF! J) on the third day to keep me company and be excited with me. It was so much fun. I loved it!

I ate like a true-healthy person! Lots of veggies and fruits and cut way back on sugar and drank water like a maniac. I was pretty proud!

The day came for the pregnancy test. Holy. Cow. We. Were. Excited! ….

And really nervous. J

It’s just a blood draw, so I drove to the Frisco office on April 19^th. She asked if I had taken at at-home pregnancy test and I told her proudly that I had resisted. We wanted to know for sure. No playing around!

We had a conundrum because they would be calling us with results and I couldn’t stand the thought of getting them without Bryce right there with me. But they had to call between 2 and 4 and we both had to be at work 45 minutes from each other. So after talking with my nurse, she said “OK, when we call you, just don’t answer your phone. Let it go to voicemail and we’ll leave the result as a message and y’all can listen to it together as soon as you can.”

Let me tell you, it was SO HARD not to answer that phone and EVEN HARDER to just see the little icon on my phone for 3 hours and not listen to it!

But I knew that if it was negative, I couldn’t handle that news without Bryce next to me and if it was positive, we’d both die that we weren’t together…..so I resisted. J

(Bryce told me later that he thought, I would for sure give in to excitement and listen to it. I Sure Showed Him!!!)

I got home and we just looked at each other….. tension!!

I changed my clothes and Bryce set up our camera to film us listening to it. We figured if it turned out to be negative, we’d automatically delete the video but if it was positive….priceless!

The second before Bryce was gonna press record so we could listen, the fear got the best of me, “I can’t! I can’t listen to it Bryce!”….stopping my foot…. I’m real mature when I’m scared.

He’s a good man and convinced me…ordered me to just sit down and we’d press play and find out. So we did.

We held hands as we sat on the end of our bed huddled over my iPhone and pressed play on the voicemail. (We didn’t know if it would be the doctor or which nurse it would be..)

The voice that came over was one of our favorite nurses, that had been with us from day 1, Amber.

“Hi Cherise and Bryce, It’s Amber. I am so proud and lucky to be able to be the one to call and give you your pregnancy results. I hope y’all are ready for this.

Congratulations! You’re definitely pregnant! Your numbers look fantastic! We hope for this number to be about 100 and yours is 246.9! Fantastic! I’m so excited for you guys, oh my gosh! Keep on your medications just the same and we’ll repeat this next Friday. So give us a call on Monday and we’ll get you scheduled and message me on Facebook or something! I’m so excited for y’all!! Congratulations!!!! Have a fabulous weekend!”

I started sobbing as soon as she said congratulations. Bryce was teary and smiling like a little kid. I wrapped my arms around his neck and cried. After we turned off the camera, we just kept looking at eachother and shaking our heads in amazement. We were pregnant. It was crazy and awesome and … unreal.

 That’s when we both admitted we had fully expected a negative result. We’ve been getting negative tests for 4 ½ years. It’s really hard to truly expect a positive! Yes, we hoped and hoped it would be positive but….it’s a hard thing to imagine. J

We went out to eat with friends that night just as a date but really, we were celebrating in our hearts. We stopped at Babies R Us on the way home and got to walk around wide-eyed and wonderfully overwhelmed with what was ahead.

We had told everyone we would be finding out on the following Monday or Wednesday (to give ourselves time to enjoy the news together and let it sink in). We’d waited over four years for the news and we wanted the option. But by the following day we felt ready. We started calling my parents and siblings (we told Bryce’s family in person the next day). We tried to get them on skype of iChat or Facetime if possible.  It was the such an awesome couple of days telling everyone. We had a couple different ways that we told them.  They all cried and laughed and screamed with us. It was seriously awesome. When we told Bryce’s family, we did it by Bryce saying in the dinner prayer, “….and we’re grateful for modern medicine and that Cherise is pregnant…” Bahaha! It was awesome!

Over the next few days, I downloaded 7 different pregnancy apps on my phone…. Yes, 7, and proud of it! I continued to eat healthy and drink a ton of water. No heavy lifting or exercise etc. We just were happy and excited and grateful. We prayed for our little one every night and Bryce always prayed that we could keep my body healthy and strong and that we could keep our baby safe. I love when Bryce prays. It makes me love him more and more every time. He’ll be an amazing father!

I was even excited to feel like crap eventually....

I took a couple at home pregnancy tests after, just for fun. I'd never seen two lines before! That was a huge deal. 

We really did feel like we had a piece of heaven surrounding us. I’ll forever be grateful for the experience of being pregnant. As short-lived as it was….it was a happy time and we just were SO blessed. I cannot say it enough.  The Lord is mindful of His children