After 34 hours, we found ourselves dragged out of bed at 6.30am to make it through to the hospital before the early morning traffic started. We reached the hospital at 7.15am - forty five minutes earlier then appointed. So i accompanied Dino dad breakfast with simple fried beehoon and eggs while i just sit and read my favorite book - The Twilight - through my half opened morning eyes. I was fasting for eight hours.
By 830am, Dino dad was led to that private room with dim lights to produce his sperms in a tube while i was led to the ward to get dressed in the open-backside-robe. It was quite chilly when i stepped foot into the little operating theatre where a warm smiling middle-aged woman in green surgery robe greeted me. Her smile sort of calmed me down a little for i haven't been in a operating theatre a long time, and no idea what to expect next.
This lady cooed me softly into position on the surgery bed and fumbled expertly with the top side of my left palm. I instinctively knew that she needed to insert an IV. Do i need that, i thought quietly, careful not to bring my inquisitive personality into this room. Trying to be smarty wouldn't help me relaxed, i told myself. Then she said "Can call the boss in already."
I turned to look at my left side and observed my embryologist was preparing something on the other side of the mirrored room and the next thing i'd awared of was me waking up in a bed on the ward floor. Huh? What'd happened? So fast? I didn't even remember loosing consciousness.
When i woke, a nurse was busying herself by my side. In my half drifty consciousness, i immediately remembered to remind the doc i want boys for my babies. I didn't get to say it in the operating theatre. The nurse assured me she will relay the message to my doc and then i lost consciousness again.The air-conditioning was so cold it made me shivered down to my bone. I felt my right arm being squeezed tightly and i opened my foggy eyes to see a BP machine being attached to me. It released pressure to check on my BP at half an hour interval. Then i started to realize my lower abdominal was cramping. It brought back memory in a flash of how i'd felt the time after my first abortion some thirteen years ago. Ohhh....uncomfortable - the cramping, the overly cold air-conditioning, and strapped with a pad!
In foggy brain, i informed the nurse of my condition and asked for a cup of hot water. She returned with a warm water instead! With my low tolerance to pain, my temper was rising. I politely insisted for hot water. Yay! she made it back correct the second time but, later i found out she did not lower the air-conditioning. I sipped hot water so fast it kinda burnt my tongue a little. Fortunately i was too numb to feel the pain. I held on to the mug to warm my hands and drifted back to sleep.
Sleep for the next hours was fitful. Tossing around - pain on my left hand with the IV still intact with no medicine attached and the BP strapped to my right arm while my body continues to shiver. How can this happen? Someone must get me answers. I flagged down a nurse and again told her that i am still very cold. "Is this a normal post op?", i asked. She replied "No." I puzzled. Then i asked for another hot drink and to have my IV be taken off with heavy frowning set on my forehead and my long hairs dropping everywhere. Now to think of myself at that moment i could have looked like a vampire in rage...hoho.
The nurse returned my a hot milo instead. Hmm, better. Again, i sipped too quickly and it burned other parts of my tongue. Sigh...still cold. But feeling a little warmer. Thinking i was good to go home, i dialed for Dino dad to pick me up. When i sat up on the bed, boy, the room was spinning. I had to pee and i couldn't see clear. The nurse offered to bring me a pee-pan. Eww! pee on bed, no way. I'd rather walked and knocked my face on the wall then to lie back and pee in front of the nurse. As obstinate as i was told since young, i slowly got up off the bed, disrobed the surgery clothing, pulled on my T-shirt and shit....the stupid pad has a death-knot. While waiting for the nurse to bring a scissor, i fumbled with the knot and stood exposed my naked lower body in front of the other nurse standing nearby to assist. How embarrassing now having to think back.
Stubbornly i pulled on my jeans. The nurse brought a wheelchair and wheeled me to the bathroom. I stumbled to the door stupidly while my head continued to spin. The i was wheeled back to my bed and Dino dad arrived. He was shocked to learn of my complication and he was already up onto the second floor by my side in just a few seconds. I told him my conditions and he immediately understood. He'd relayed the message to the nurses and this time, the air-conditioner really did switched off. Huh! i knew it. They didn't take me seriously the first time. Thanks for my half-functioning brain, otherwise they would have gotten a nice rap from me. Don't blame me, the doc sure did not pre-amp of this possible post-op symptoms. They didn't even acknowledge my symptoms as if mine was the first in their list of cases. Apparently, the doc had missed that procedure. He didn't even advised me to abstain from sex! - with me so horny from all the FSH jabs! We could have had sex the night before and reduced the chances of good volume. Bizarre!
Next, out of no where, my favorite petite embryologist appeared by my side. She instructed to take some reading to check if i had a temperature. It was tough catch - because i just had two cups of hot drink. So my embryologist assured me that she would try to pick 'boy' sperms for us but no guarantee that there wouldn't be a 'girl' sperm that strong enough to pass off to reach my eggs. I told her its fine if i should get a girl among the three babies. She congratulated me for producing a strong fifteen band of oocytes. And Dino dad's sperms were healthy to be utilized up to 90%. Again, i grimace - why couldn't we just conceive naturally?
When the cold subsided to a tolerable level, i was able to communicate with my embryologist better. She said the lower abdominal cramping was normal and some would experience it up to three days, with some lasting to two weeks. Bizarre! She shoved a pack of progesterone tablets and instructed to insert twos every night and twos every morning till i am to be due back for embryo transfer on Friday Jan 15, 2pm. The progesterone will work to form a conducive environment for my babies prior to have them transferred back into my womb two days later.
I was wheeled down to the parking lot and Dino dad drove me home straight only stopping by a petrol station to get me two 100-plus. I felt liked i was extremely dehydrated. The dizziness did not stop. The cold did returned. With brain half-conscious, i dashed for an amazingly fast 2-minute hot shower, gulped down a strip of gardenia rosemary flavor bread - just to fill my fortheen-hour empty stomach - washed the bread down with 100-plus then coiled up beneath my comforter to drift off into a restful sleep. Nothing beats the comfort of home-sweet-home.
It was about 4.30pm when i woke up after a two hour rest. Aduii......my whole body feeling just not right - muscle aching all over and my lower abdominal continued to cramp. Feeling lethargic but not sleepy, i coiled up in my TV sofa to read on Twilight. Dino dad returned home about 6pm and my condition hasn't got better. Having to subject him to stress seeing me in pain and nothing he could do about, he was so tired, he dozed off after shower right after dinner at 8.30pm. Poor him.
The rest of the evening was spent in a vaguely mood. I continued to suffer in silence, the self-inflicted pain to so wanna be a mom; the constant mild cramping of my lower abdomen, the nasty progesterone oozing stickiness on my panty-liner, the on-off feverish symptoms of chill and sweat, muscle aching and the unexplained stomach congestion that made breathing laborious.
In my quiet between pages, i couldn't help wandering my mind to the lab in the hospital imagining my babies were growing in the small incubating lab plates or whatever it is called. Have they turned four-cells yet? Smiling, i drifted off to fitful sleep again with the chilling and sweating symptoms.
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