What to Expect At Your IVF Baseline Appointment

The day has come! Our IVF Baseline appointment! I can’t believe it is already here. When you spend 5 years trying to conceive and feeling hopeless about being able to do IVF – it’s surreal to finally say “it’s here”!

I had to wait for my cycle to start to finally make the call to start our IVF. If you thought the two week wait was hard, try waiting for your cycle! The weeks seemed to drag on. It felt like being a kid around Christmas time. You think Christmas would NEVER arrive because time was going by so slowly. It was Thursday, March 28, in the evening when I started to spot. I never thought I’d be so happy to see Aunt Flo arrive. That Friday afternoon she moved in.

I made the call to my nurse at our fertility clinic and we were scheduled for our baseline that Monday morning!

What is an IVF Baseline Appointment?

When you’re doing an IVF cycle, you will call your clinic on day 1 of your cycle to schedule a baseline. The point of the baseline appointment is to draw blood to check the FSH levels during days 2-4 of your cycle. FSH (or Follicle-Stimulating Hormone) is a natural gonadotropin and regulates the growth, development, pubertal maturation, and reproductive processes of the body.

Essentially, FSH stimulates follicle growth in the ovaries so you can ovulate. So, naturally, they want to check these levels to make sure your cycle is normal. Along with FSH, they will check your weight and vitals as well. This is to determine medication dosages and treatment plan-of-action.

During an IVF baseline, an ultrasound will also be performed to look at the follicles in the ovaries.

My IVF Baseline Experience

My FSH levels were all normal and I actually lost more weight since my previous appointment (my nurse was happy about that)! My appointment with “wanda” went well.

My nurse mentioned they look for follicles under 10mm. I had some normal looking follicles along with a few little follicles which the nurse said may or may not produce an egg. We will see!

Starting IVF Medication

My scans were all normal so we got the green light to start stims! My clinic didn’t ask me to start any birth control and we actually did the first injection there on site. My nurse walked me through the medication process and showed me how to use the pen. That’s right… we’re taking Gonadotropins via a pen. It’s not Gonal-F, however.

Truthfully, I was so happy that it was a pen. I’ve seen other bloggers and YouTubers who document their IVF experience using the hardcore needles and mixing medications. That seems so intimidating! Kudos to those who are able to do it!

At the time of writing this, I’m on day 2 of stims. Currently, I’m experiencing some twinges and pressure in the pelvic area and in my hips. I’m trying not to think too much about it… but I am saying my Fertility Affirmations to myself and visualizing my follicles growing lots of mature eggs <3