Progression of Pee Sticks

Some women who go through IVF choose not to POAS (pee on a stick) before their Pregnancy Blood Test, otherwise known as their Beta test. I, however, am not one of those women. In fact, I am an obsessive pee-er! I started taking home pregnancy tests about 3 days after my Embryo Transfer. I recall taking at least one or two tests that turned out negative, and it was very discouraging for me, but I just couldn't keep myself from taking more tests! I'm not willing to admit how many I took... let's just say it was a few. Ok, that's a lie. I took a TON. I bought every brand under the sun, and I made multiple trips to the drug store to make sure I didn't run out.

4 days after my transfer I started seeing VERY faint positive lines. When I say faint I mean you practically had to pull out a magnifying glass to see these lines. You also had to catch just the right light to see them! They were so faint that I actually convinced myself that they did not exist at all. Blake kept trying to reassure me by saying "Shannon it says on the box, a line is a line, and that means positive", but I wasn't having it.

So, the peeing continued. Day in and day out, sometimes multiple times per day. I have never had the pleasure of seeing a "positive" on a HPT (home preg. test) in my life, so I still had a hard time believing that these ones might actually be positive!

This is what they looked like...

Anyone see the double pink lines, and the plus signs?? Faint positives!

About a week had passed since my transfer and I got to go in for some routine bloodwork. They are constantly checking my Progesterone, Estrogen, and HCG Beta to make sure that all of the levels are high enough to have and maintain a healthy pregnancy. At 8dp5dt, I went in for this bloodwork. The nurse told me that they wouldn't give me a reading on my Beta (to confirm pregnancy) until 14 days after transfer. By this time we were dying to know if I was pregnant! We saw the tests at home, but only the blood would give us accurate results. Later that day I logged on to my patient portal where they post information specific to my case. Much to my surprise, they had posted my Beta levels!! My HCG Beta was 72.7, which pretty much means I'm PREGNANT!! I talked to the Nurse that afternoon and they did not comment on my Beta, but said that everything looked great and I was to come in Tuesday, 10/26 to finally confirm pregnancy.

By this time we were finally starting to think that this could actually be happening for us! But just to be sure, I continued peeing on sticks every day :)   Eventually I got CLEAR positive tests! What a relief!

That is a bold line if I ever saw one!

 And it doesn't get any better than this!

Was this really happening for us?? We would confirm everything on Tuesday, October 26th...