Fertility Shots Day 1

Buying my fertility meds from London saved me a ton of money (about $3K) but it also means that the medication packaging is a bit old school. If you've had a shot in the past ten years or so, you've seen the nurse put the needle in a small vial with a rubber top. The needle goes through the rubber and draws out the medication.

The Brits do it different apparently. They sent me small glass ampoules, two used for each shot, that I have to break open at the neck, increasing the likelihood that I will cut myself or spill the medication.

My husband was helping, but he'll be gone a few nights next week so I'll need to do them solo or I'll have my six-year-old standing by to hold things. So for the shot, we open the vial of purified water, suck it up in the syringe, then empty it into the vial of HMG. Not unlike a slower, smaller version of the hokey pokey, we shook it all around until the HMG dissolved, then sucked it back into the syringe.

My clinic gave me two needles: a big one for mixing everything together and a smaller one for injections. We switched them too soon and still needed the bigger needle to draw up the mixed medicine. So we had to toss a needle and use another big one. Live and learn.

The injection needle is beautifully tiny and slips right in with any poking. I put it in, pushed the plunger, then waited for three seconds to make sure everything was in. When I pulled the needle out, a drop of the medicine came back out through the injection spot. Next time I'll know to stop squeezing my skin before pulling out the syringe

Then we noticed a bit of medicine left in the syringe so I did it again. Two shots, first night. No big woop, really, though I was pretty nervous leading up to it.