When I was a child, my grandmother used to tell me about being a mother. “the true happiness of a woman begins when you becomes a Mother. It is when you’ll feel miracle that there is a little creature in your womb waiting for his time to see the world. But once you hear the baby’s first crying, held him in your arms, a feeling of excitement and joy is there. After all the pains and sufferings, you will say…IT IS ALL WORTH IT!” she said.

Being in a developing country, people are poor and chance for one to own technological equipment is very slim since the big companies think people cannot afford by the fancy things while filling up their stomachs is already hard. I remembered winning an Apple Ipod at my company ceremony several years ago; my co-workers and my friends were looking at me as if I have won the greatest gift in life. The envy looks and congrats from other people around me that day gave me a great feeling even though I knew have won a wonderful gift.
We had been trying to conceive for 3 three years utilizing all methods that we knew how including help from specialist. Now that I finally got my papers that allow me to join my husband in the country that stands for many wonderful things where freedom is everybody’s God given right and Apple Ipod is easy to own even if one don’t have enough money to pay it off at once. We have decided that it time we get serious help from the most advanced institution in the region. We picked Shady Grove IVF facility to start our IVF cycle. After all the tests and preparation works were done, we started our first IVF cycle with all the hopes and strongly believe in a positive result since all the tests’ results came back normal.
We began with preparation for the eggs retrieval procedure with the process called the FSH (follicle stimulation hormone.) The happy thought about having a child helped me overcome the fear of having shots administered on me. I gathered all my courage as I went through this period since 4 shots need to be administered every single day. It scared me every time I think of it till these days. My first reward after days of suffering the hormone shots and trips to Shady Grove facilities for ultrasound monitoring is the number of eggs retrieved. Doctor told us that we had 19 viable eggs on the day of retrieval.
A little bit of discouragement few days after the eggs were fertilized that only 4 of the eggs reached the mature stage and met the growth rate expectation. However, hope kept me going through the next period with more shots. My hope was shot with another discouragement when doctor pronounced that my first IVF cycle failed with the first 2 strongest fertilized eggs transferred; only 2 frozen eggs to try second IVF cycle.
I was rewarded with terrific news after all my sufferings that I was pregnant with one of the last 2 transferred eggs. The news came after another month of doctor visits, smelly prenatal vitamin and hormone shots. The next reward for me was the news from my OB doctor that the baby seems to grow normally, and finally the true and greatest reward came on April 22, 2010 when my daughter was born. The sound of her first crying and the first look at her from the operating table vanished all my sufferings since we started the IVF procedure. I believed that the joy is far more than any word can describe and that being a parent worth any trouble one might have to go through. I still smile every time I look at my daughter despite all the D&C procedures I went through after delivering my daughter.