something to lose.

As happy as I am over yesterday's unexpectedly good news, I'm also feeling a little...well...scared.

I mean, I was fully expecting to be told that Mr. Hope's and my embryo didn't make it to Day 3. I was pleasantly enough surprised when I thought ours was hanging on at a grade C. But to learn that my presumed-rotten egg had managed to produce a grade A embryo? 

I don't even have the words.

In a split second, I went from expecting the worst to hoping for the best:

• Our embryo makes it to blast
• We transfer it on Day 5
• It sticks
• We have a baby that's half Agony, half Hope

I keep thinking about the dream I had early in my stim cycle, the one in which I was holding our Agony/Hope baby and thinking, "I almost missed out on this. I almost gave up on this." Could this actually happen? Could we end up with a bio baby after all?

Even if our embryo makes it to blast, we still plan on transferring the best of the donor embryos, too. So I keep chewing over this wacky scenario in which both stick and we have fraternal twins from entirely separate parents. How wild would that be? 

So, yeah, there's a part of me that's thinking about these things. And then there's this other part of me - the realistic part of me - that knows there's still a good possibility that our embryo won't make it to blast. How would I feel Friday morning if I got that call? Would I be devastated? To come so close and yet not quite make it there? IT'S A GRADE A EMBRYO. That means cells of equal size and no visible fragmentation. 

This thing that I never dared think possible? It's not impossible. It's just not. 

I don't even know what to do with that.

Plus my overthinking brain is going in all kinds of crazy directions, like, "What if the embryo from the last transfer was good but my toxic, broken body killed it?" I think about this a lot, actually. And yes, I know plus-size women carry healthy babies all of the time, but I'm not basing this on my weight alone. There's the psoriasis. What if that has caused bad inflammation in my body? What if, even on this EZ Diet, I'm eating too much saturated fat? I won't do low-fat dairy because I know that can have adverse affects on a woman's fertility, too. Will the half of an avocado I've been chowing down at breakfast each morning counteract any negative effects from the full-fat cheese?

You see how this works?

On Tuesday, even before we got the happy grade A update, I told Mr. Hope that we were going to get pregnant this cycle. I just knew it. And then I immediately regretted saying the words, because it was like tempting fate to come along and kick me in the teeth.

But then I think:

We are in a good place, Mr. Hope and me. We're in a better place physically, emotionally, and financially than we were even nine months ago, during our first IVF. I am ready to be a mother, no matter how I get there. Nine months ago, it was still more about being a mom to a baby Mr. Hope and I created together. Now it's about us being parents together, period.

Maybe I had to go through all of that to get here, to where we are at this very moment in time. 

Or maybe it's all just completely and utterly random. Who knows?

The problem with having hope - genuine hope - is that in some way, it sets you up to be let down. Hope has given me something to lose. In some ways, expecting bad news, and being okay with getting that bad news, was easier. You don't get a sucker-punch to the gut when you're ready to hear the worst.

I'm rambling. And it's Thanksgiving! There are so many things I am truly thankful for. Like my excellent health care coverage, and a top-notch clinic, and a husband I love who loves me back. 

I guess I need to spend more time thinking about those things than I do wondering about the what ifs.