Fertility Part 1.5

So here are the funny things about embryo-making:

• The "Production Room" and all that it entails. The fact that the nurse gives my husband a cup and a sharpie marker to write his name on it with so it doesn't get mixed up with the dude in production room #2 s junk. 
• The fact that he accidentally put marker in his mouth while trying to figure out how to screw on cap of cup, only to realize his grave mistake and spit the pen across the room. And then bleached the inside of his mouth with hand sanitizer. 
• The fact that my husband videotaped me when they woke me up from anesthesia post-retrieval and i was completely stoned and trying to get a saltine in my mouth. We never get tired watching that brilliant cinematography. 
• The fact that the ultrasound probe is so obscene. And it comes with its own XXXXL condom. Ouch. 

That pretty much covers all thats funny in IVF land.

Here are the un-funny parts of embryo-making:

• When you don't. After all the injections, ultrasounds (with the XXXXL probe), blood tests, retrieval, implantation, weeks of progesterone shots (more on that later)- you waltz in for your beta HCG test and they call you that day, before noon. Calls before noon are bad news. They like to get them out of the way so they call the negatives first. When the lovely nurse practitioner tells you "not this time, i'm so sorry". 
• When it does work and you keep doing those dreadful progesterone shots and you graduate from your "Baby Lab" to the land of regular pregnant women and you go in for routine ultrasound at 12 weeks and theres a little nugget in there- quiet and still. No flicker. No heartbeat. The ultrasound tech looks at you and says "the doctor will be in to talk to you". 
• When it works and anything goes wrong with that pregnancy you nearly killed yourself for. Or anything goes wrong with the baby that you painstakingly followed every single piece of medical advice for. When all the effort  and money and time and raw emotions were for nothing. Willy Wonka yelling "you get NOTHING!" in your ears. 

Then you turn on MTV and watch an episode of "Teen Mom" and realize without a doubt that life is exquisitely unfair.