One of the hardest things is that it is very difficult to compare yourself to someone else. Every body reacts differently. Both my FSs have always indicated that a good number of follicles is around 12, so 6 each ovary, and assuming that they are all around a similar size and will all be mature at EPU and will all contain an egg. My FSH level was 12 on my first IVF cycle, and I was on 225 FSH injections, but I responded too well, had 25+ follies and this cycle was cancelled by day 9 of injections because for estrogen levels were off the chart (something like 25,000). I think they work out that at maturity each egg equates to approx 300-500 of estrogen. So despite having a moderately high FSH, I have been able to produce a good number of follicles on subsequent cycles (my FSH says I do have PCOS tendencies). I have found that it has taken quite a lot of trial and error to get the right FSH dose to get some good number and good quality embroys. My next cycle my FSH was reduced to 125, I still over responded, but went to EPU, and due to high estrogen levels again my embies were all crap quality, very slow growing and moderatly fragmented. I did 3 x day 3 FET with these, a waste? I don't know. I have however gone on to get lower numbers and better quality, but have done 3 subsequent blastocyst (day 5 transfers) and all BFN.
I would say that 4 + 4 follicles is an ok result, day 4 of injections is a very early scan, sometimes it is too early to tell. I have had day 5 scans where there has been lots of little follies around 5-8mm, which have all subsequently picked up and ended up mature. Ideally you want the majority of your follicles to be around the same size, so you might have a few larger and a few smaller, with the majority in the middle.
Each scan I write down how many follices, what size and also record the estrogen level. But I have been at this quite a while and feel more in control if I know what is going on.
The other thing I would mention, and I am sure you have hear it before, is that it is very much about quality and not quantity. I can't count the number of cycles I have done where I have had great follie numbers, and others have had much lower numbers, but they have ended up with the BFP not me. So please don't be disheartened. I know it is hard but you will just have to wait it out.
Also, I think in the majority of the case, from what I have seen those women that are doing IVF because of male factor, tend to get their BFP much earlier, which makes sense as IVF is overcoming this challenge.
I wish you all the luck and look forward to hearing how you go.
The thing is that it doesn't really matter how many eggs you have collected, it very much depends on their quality. My first EPU was three eggs (FSH 9.7) and I got one blastie on day six, my second was only two ( FSH 15.7) with one fertilized but that grew to a blastie and I am now in the TWW.
If you have 8 follies that is not a bad response on FSH of 12 - as long as the four bigger ones are close together and contain eggs you should be okay. I don't want to make you afraid but I had actually a very good follie number in my second cycle where I only had 2 eggs - most of the follies did not contain eggs - my FS says it could have possibly be prevented by giving me a larger dosage (1000 instead of 250) of the trigger and using Pregnyl for the trigger.
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