General Update

Just a few things going on here in Ohio. My dad has been up to visit, he had a couple weeks off from work after he fell and broke 3 ribs so he decided to drive up to Ohio and visit all of us. Dan has a CT-Scan next Thursday as part of his normal follow-ups. Hopefully things continue to stay stable with his scans. My next appointment is next Wednesday, its a meeting with the nurse at the OB clinic with a group of other pregnant ladies. They are going over things like nutrition, how things are done at their clinic, etc at this meeting. It will still be a couple weeks until I see a doctor and have an ultrasound or heartbeat check I think.

Other than all the medical stuff Dan and I have mostly been catching up with new TV shows that are finally back on. We love our old favorites - Heroes, Dexter, Entourage, The Office. And have added in a great new show from HBO called True Blood.

Enjoy the final day of September everyone!

8 week 5 day ultrasound

Had a great ultrasound today. The baby had a rocking 173 heart rate and has grown very nicely. The baby measures right on schedule and I have officially graduated from my IVF team to the regular people doctors! I am no longer on any fertility drugs except vitamins which is very nice also. Well that's all from here, not sure when my next appointment will be I have to call the other clinic and set something up. I hope you are all having a wonderful day.

Cole's Visit

Who's having more fun in this picture - Cole or Ophelia?

She is just the perfect height for sitting on!

Mini-Update

Just thought I would post something since its been a week. I am a bit nauseous most of the day but nothing to bad. Also my breasts feel like they have lead balloons in them! I actually like having some symptoms. as they are somewhat reassuring. Dan is working hard at school and the dogs are laying around on the couches as usual. Been watching alot of football the last couple weeks and can't wait to finally start playing some SEC schools. But really not much exciting things going on here. October will be a bit more interesting as my father will come to visit and I am going to a wedding in Massachusetts.

We have a Heartbeat!

I am sure you can tell from the crystal clear ultrasound image that there is a small child in my uterus. From those who cant see I will attempt to break it down for you. On the main screen is my gestational sac like last week (black blob) and snuggled in on the left side of the black blob is a slightly larger than last week gray blob. Now if you were present for the ultrasound which I was and Dan just made it there by minutes after driving across town to the wrong clinic you would have seen the gray blob dancing all over showing off its 127 bpm heart rate. (bpm = beats per minute). On the right side of the picture is a zoomed in version so he could measure, he measures 0.59cm which is perfect for a 6 week 5 day ultrasound. The very bottom it says I measure 6 weeks 3 days plus or minus 2 days with a due date of 5/1/09 based on that measurement.

Needless to say, we are all pretty happy here. Next ultrasound is in 2 weeks, until then keep the good thoughts and baby dust heading my way!

Fertilty Humor

Just a little fertility humor mixed with Olympic glory!

Next ultrasound is Monday morning, cross your fingers we see a little person in there!

Prospectus Defense

I have successfully defended my prospectus. Since there appears to be some confusion, here is how the process works at AFIT:

1) Complete course work
2) Complete specialty exam written portion (qualifying exam or "quals")
3) Perform background/related research for topic area
4) Complete specialty exam oral portion (prospectus defense)
5) Perform core research, writing dissertation along the way
6) Defend dissertation
7) Graduate

I completed step 2 a few months ago, and today I completed step 4. I will now embark on the dissertation, which takes the following form:

Chapter 1: Introduction to the domain and problem area
Chapter 2: Background/related research -- current state of the art
Chapter 3: Define problem that will be solved and how success or failure will be measured
Chapter 4: Document results
Chapter 5: Conclusions and summary

Chapter 4 may in fact be many chapters. The prospectus consists (roughly) of the first three chapters, and mine weighed in at 102 pages including front and back matter. The average dissertation at AFIT is about 240 pages total.

The graduation date cannot be less than one year after the prospectus defense. I am officially considered a PhD candidate, and hope to graduate on 9-Sep-09 (9-9-09).

5 week 5 day ultrasound

The egg transfer was exactly 3 weeks ago, but technically I am called 5 weeks 5 days if going by estimated due date of April 29th, 2009

Well, the good news is there is a little gray blob (yolk sac) inside the black blob (gestational sac) They want to get another ultrasound in a week. What we would hope to see at that ultrasound is the yolk sac and a fetal pole (like this picture here). Best case would be a heartbeat, but that's a 50/50 shot this early.

They also saw tons of fluid in my belly and very large ovaries from my OHSS (which is much improved now since we lowered my medicines).

I hope the little guy keeps growing, keep praying and sending baby dust!