Avalanche by Julia Leigh Page B

workings and saw follicles growing, sprouting out of my ovaries, each follicle a point of light. Lush, verdant, abundantly fertile .
    And something else about that nineteenth-century engraving: as I was doing IVF it felt like medical science was moving at such a fast pace that whatever the treatmentI was being prescribed it was already on the verge of being surpassed. This made for a substrata anxiety about “keeping up with the latest.”
    When I was in Bali a friend—successful in her treatment—had sworn by DHEA. I’d written to my doctor saying that a non-medical friend had recommended something called DHEA as a possible fertility treatment. What was it and did she think it suitable for me at this stage? The doctor replied that DHEA (dehydroepiandrosterone) was a weak male hormone that can be taken as a tablet three times a day. She said there had been a lot of work looking at DHEA as a way of improving egg quality and ovarian response to stimulation but the studies on the whole showed no improvement and as such there didn’t appear to be much benefit in taking it. Still, if I wanted to go ahead she would write me a prescription. Another quandary. I declined.
    If anyone says they chose not to have children because the world is already overpopulated, because the world doesn’t need any more children, I don’t buy it. I also didn’t buy it when my friend who has six children said the countryneeded more children because “otherwise who is going to pay for our retirement?” If a decision really is made, it’s telescopically micro, not macro. For instance, I did believe a different friend who said he’d never wanted to have a child because he thought it unfair—unkind—to inflict consciousness on another being.
    One mother said to me, “I don’t know how you can choose to be pregnant. Our kids weren’t planned. I wouldn’t have had the courage.” My response: “With IVF—you have to choose.”
    The titanium hook: I only need one and it could be the next one.
    I weighed myself down with more hormones. The scan showed nine large follicles. And a blood test revealed that once again my progesterone was high and the possibility of a fresh transfer was thrown in doubt. “I can only advise what I’d do myself,” said the doctor. “If you say you want to go ahead I’ll still treat you.” I chose to wait for a frozen transfer, as I’d done before. The run sheet: seven eggs were collected of which six weremature. Only three fertilized overnight. And by Day 3 of the countdown all three embryos were still going strong, which raised the exciting prospect that for the first time I might be lucky enough to get more than one embryo worthy of being transferred. How eager I was to fan the flame of hope. More than one viable embryo! Blessed bounty! I remember I received the good news when I ducked out of an actors’ workshop that I was auditing. Earlier in the day the acting coach—a man—had stopped a 20-something actress midway through her scene. “I can’t hear you! Speak up! As a woman you can have a voice, you’re not a child or a girl! Listen to this—women are allowed to have more power! Women are more powerful than men because they carry children!” I knew the coach was well-intended but his pep talk made my skin crawl. On Day 5 I called the lab for an update. An assistant said my results weren’t ready yet because “we’re busy assessing our patients.” How strange: I wasn’t sure if she meant the embryos themselves were her patients. Perhaps she did. That afternoon I got a call back: I had one early blastocyst, Grade B, and a morula that wouldn’t survive the thaw, and the third embryo had stopped developing altogether on Day 3. So they froze the blastocyst.
    I loved knowing the frozen blastocyst was sitting there waiting to be transferred. My icy jewel, my future.