I cheated

Today is Mother's Day - appropriate, yes?  It's also 6dp5dt (6 days past our 5 day transfer) and still 2 days away from my pregnancy blood test.  I came across this link which I felt gave me a solid argument that today would be a fine day to start testing at home, if I was going to.  So I decided to cheat and test early...  Any cheating I opt to do must be first thing in the morning since it's "first morning urine" which is the most concentrated and the most likely to have a presence of the hCG hormone.  The hCG (Human Chorionic Gonadotropin) is what a pregnancy test is searching for in order to show a positive.  So that means at 7:15am on a Sunday morning, when I woke up and had to pee - I had to test.  I was lying in bed wondering if I could fall back asleep instead of getting up, cuz I knew once I got up I'd have to commit myself to doing the pregnancy test.  Ahh, cheating is never easy!

Cheater, cheater!!

Perhaps my body was giving me hints, but as soon as I got out of bed and started walking I got so dizzy.  Almost light-headed.  Probably just needed more sleep, I thought... or perhaps this could have been the reason:

Very faint but it's there on all 3!!  6dp5dt!
Top: First Response Early Result
2 Bottom Ones: cheapies off Amazon

Yes folks... those are VERY faint positive pregnancy tests!!!!  WE ARE PREGNANT!!!

I read all over those IVF forums (the ones I cautiously take with a grain of salt, but they do still provide some level of info) that the best early detection pregnancy test is the First Response Early Result.  So I picked up a 3-pack yesterday just to be prepared.  I had left a dixie cup in the bathroom the night before in preparation for this groggy moment too.  I dipped the FRER test tip in for a few seconds, put the cap back on and let it sit on the the counter.  Some people say waiting the 3 minutes for the result takes FOREVER, but I think I kinda fell asleep for a little bit, so it was all good.

I was really not expecting to see anything since it's still pretty early for me to start testing.  My blood test isn't for another 2 days!  But after about 2 minutes I squinted and... OMG that looks like a second line!  As another minute or so passed the faint positive line definitely got (faintly) darker.  "Hey OMG I think this is a positive!!!"  I had a couple other random pregnancy tests around - cheap ones I'd ordered off Amazon months ago - even before we'd started seeing Dr. A.  I wasn't expecting these to show anything since they're so cheap but since I still had my (um) Dixie cup of pee I dipped each of those guys too.

Yay! A dip in the Dixie cup!

The lines are even fainter but I can definitely see lines!  (everything looks even the taddest bit darker in person, than in our photo).  This is really GREAT news because it means our hCG levels are high enough, this early - to trigger a positive test!  Even those cheapie tests!!  When I go in for my blood test on Tues, not only is it important to detect hCG, it's important for it to be over a certain level otherwise it could be a bad sign for the pregnancy.

Fortunately Hubby was already slightly awake and I went back to the bedroom to tell him.  After playfully reprimanding me for "cheating" he was definitely happy.  And then I dragged him into the bathroom to ask his opinion of my tests.  He concurred that there are definitely faint lines appearing so I felt much better having a little validation!

I emailed the above picture to Dr. A and asked if what I'm seeing is in fact what I want to be seeing?  There's no chance of a false positive, right?  She emailed me back quickly and told me Congratulations!!!  She said it's definitely a positive and was just as happy as I, that it is registering this early - a GREAT sign of things.

I'm to keep doing what I've been doing - no moving the blood test up or anything.  We'll get my hCG levels on Tuesday and hope that they're right where Dr. A wants to see them.

By the way - since I'm writing today (I was originally going to wait until tomorrow but got so excited about the news) I'll go ahead and tell you how I've been feeling:

6 Days Post Transfer:
Felt very dizzy and lightheaded this morning until I ate breakfast.  The dizziness was never as bad again, but came and went through the afternoon.  Cramping seems to have lessened, breasts are not noticeably sore and today was the first day I didn't see a bit of pink or brown when wiping.  To be honest, if I hadn't gotten the positive on my test this morning I'd be pretty bummed at the lack of symptoms and expecting the worst for Tuesday.

***Now I want to just drop in a word here for all you ladies FREAKING out about this time - if you test this early and still get a negative that DOES NOT mean you're not pregnant.  There are all sorts of false negatives just before your blood test - if just means that the hCG in your urine is not strong enough yet to register on a test.  DO NOT LOSE HOPE.

It's also important to note that I could take a home pregnancy test with no risk of false positives since this was a frozen embryo transfer - therefore I had NOT recently been given a trigger shot (which contains hCG).  If you are doing a fresh transfer (it'd be about 5-6 days after your egg retrieval) then you can very possibly get a false positive due to the hCG from your trigger shot still being in your system.***

OK, off my soapbox.  Happy Mother's (and future Mother's) Day to all of you!!

:) :) :)  Yay!!