Eeek - our first ever...!

First, thank you so much for the concern and interest that my three remaining readers have continued to show despite my lack of updates. It really does mean a lot to me!

Well, what a couple of weeks it's been. We had our transfer two weeks ago tomorrow. For the first time, we were given a photo of the embryos. I felt very emotional when the embryologist showed it to me just before the transfer and said I'd be able to take it home afterwards. Somehow, it just made the whole thing more real.

The first two embryos that they defrosted survived and were doing well, so they didn't have to defrost any others. These two were expanding blasts, and the embryologist said that after the thaw they had started to reinflate very well. And here they are, looking plump and beautiful - and I've barely been able to stop looking at this photo since.

After the transfer, we were sent away with an HPT and told to test in two weeks (ie, tomorrow). We didn't go home for a couple of days, and then we were pretty busy, but last Tuesday I had every intention of updating you and posting that photo.

Before I could do that, last Tuesday evening I started spotting. It was only a tiny amount, it never turned red and it never increased, but it was there on and off from Tuesday to Saturday, and I was completely freaked out by it and convinced that we had failed yet again - and just too depressed to tell you about it.

Then the spotting stopped altogether, and other things started to happen. I noticed that a few things smelt a lot stronger than usual, and that some odours were making me feel a bit... peculiar. The AF feelings in my stomach didn't subside, but nor did they lead to any bleeding. I started to be hit with crushing waves of exhaustion which would actually leave me feeling dizzy for a couple of minutes. And my nipples were a little bit tender and so prominent that you could practically see them through my duvet.

I started to have a faint little shoot of hope, but I didn't want to jinx it by saying anything to anybody, so I stayed away from my computer and just prayed like mad.

I also had an incident where I pulled back on my gestone syringe, as you're instructed to do to make sure you haven't hit a vein, and it filled with blood - so I had to discard that injection and start again. That meant I was one injection short, and when I called the clinic to tell them, they said it would be OK if I tested a day early. I didn't tell anyone, not even DH, figuring that if I got another BFN this morning, I'd be able to lick my wounds for 24 hours before I had to tell anyone else.

Yesterday evening I was peeing every half hour, and just before I went to bed I felt very peculiar - exhausted, dizzy, slightly nauseous. And I just had a feeling that maybe we might have been lucky this time.

So this morning, while DH was pottering around getting ready for work, I took my official HPT into the bathroom, carefully pipetted (is that a word?) three drops of urine into the sample area, and waited. The control line came up straight away, and I stared at the test area in disbelief as it stayed stubbornly white... for about half a minute. Then something else started to happen, and after another minute, it looked like this (apologies for the crappy photo from my phone):

I've subsequently gone on the bulletin board for this clinic and seen loads of people say that the tests the clinic gives out are unusually insensitive, and that most people get very faint lines on them.

So it would appear that after 3 years and 3 months of trying, 2 years of fertility investigations and treatments, 3 failed IVFs and endless months of not even being able to get started with treatment because my hormones weren't right, I finally have my first ever BFP!

We still have a huge long way to go, and I know a line on a pee stick in no way guarantees that I'll have a live baby in my arms in nine months' time. But that moment when I went downstairs, showed the test to DH and said, "This line means I'm pregnant" and saw the look on his face as he gradually realised what I meant is one that will stay with me for ever as one of the best moments of my life.