Thursday, June 30, 2011

19

Today was trial transfer day. C was busy at work so he couldn't come, which was OK because I'd read the procedure wasn't that big of a deal. (My grandma came, though, to keep me company in the car and so she could be a part of the process, which was nice!)

The doctor (mine was on call, which was nice) inserted a catheter through my cervix and measured my uterus, and then he inserted an ultrasound wand as well and his assistant injected saline into my uterus while he looked at the ultrasound. He counted about a half dozen fibroids and measured them; but he said they were far enough away from the uterus that they shouldn't pose a problem for implantation. I have no idea how he could see them; I had a hard time seeing what he was looking at and I wondered why that black spot was a fibroid when this other black spot wasn't.

He also counted my follicles: 7 on one side and 12 on the other. I found a table of follicle counts and their IVF success; it looks like my 19 is a pretty good score!

It was over in 10 minutes, and then we talked briefly about the future. The doc asked if I had done all of my other screening, and I told him I'd brought the results the last time I was there; so he planned to start putting together my protocol. I didn't think quickly enough to ask when that would be ready, but I know it'll be in the next three weeks and I suppose it's OK not to know exactly when to expect their call.

Now I cross my fingers that this stuff doesn't get in the way of the renaissance faire I'm performing at next month!

Monday, June 27, 2011

FSH and Estradiol

A few weeks ago, I realized that a long-planned camping trip with my two best friends might be cut short by needing to get my CD3 blood draw for FSH and estradiol tests (measuring follicle stimulating hormone and sex hormone levels), and then the vitamin D was wreaking havoc so I thought maybe it'd come after camping was over. But of course last Thursday night, the night before we left, there it was. Luckily that meant that we only had to leave early on Sunday instead of late morning. So we had a good trip, and woke up early yesterday to tear down camp and run up to Portland for the test.

While the nurse (Annabel - she made sure to introduce herself to me and I realized later it was because I'd most likely be seeing a lot of her in the next two months) was labeling my blood vial, a woman poked her head around the corner and whispered "Annabel! I'm so sorry, but I'm going to explode!" Annabel went off with her to the bathroom and I could hear her telling the patient that she could only pee this much; and then she came back and smiled at me and said "that's going to be you soon!" Heh.

So the blood draw was over quickly, and then on Thursday I go back up for my trial transfer. I sort of know what to expect, but like any procedure you read about on the internet, reactions and pain levels go from zero to horrible. I'm aiming for zero. After all, C can't make it on Thursday so I'm gonna do it by myself! It mostly involves a trans-vaginal ultrasound, counting follicles, measuring the uterus and filling it with saline. Gonna be a spendy visit though; I thought for some reason that it was covered in my financing plan but it's not. And of course it's the last day before I get paid. So I'll be cashing in those savings bonds on Wednesday at the latest so I can be ready!

We also looked into Aflac today, for short term disability (helping pay for maternity leave) and another plan that helps pay for the delivery (insurance covers a lot of it but not all of it). It would definitely pay for itself by the time I'm done using it, but another $100/month is an awful lot when we're still paying off the car and about to start paying off the IVF loan, on top of all of our other monthly expenses. We'll make it through but ack.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Waiting already? But I haven't even started!

When my doctor sent my six vials of blood to the lab, he had them do a full workup, which included cholesterol and glucose and all that stuff, just for funsies. The day after I gave the blood, his assistant called and said "you have a Vitamin D deficiency, so the doctor put in a prescription at your pharmacy for some D." So off I went to the pharmacy, and picked me up a bottle of dark green pills, with 50,000 units of vitamin D in each one. Whoa. Guess I was pretty deficient.

Anyway, I took them twice a week like a good patient, and I got back into temping every day so I could gauge when it would be about time to call the fertility clinic to get my HSG/Estradiol test done. We also tried baby-making the old-fashioned way just for kicks, right around the time I usually ovulate. Except my temp didn't jump on CD17 like usual. It waited aaaaalll the way until CD23. I'm only 8 DPO now, but I'm already to CD31 which is a couple of days longer than my average cycle. I'm assuming it's the D, but I'm not completely sure. (I s'pose it could be stress from waiting for the dang cycle to be over so I can get the show on the road - how meta.) At any rate, I hope the RE doesn't judge all my cycles on this one. And I hope I get back to normal after I'm done with the D (supposed to be next month). And I hope it doesn't take too much longer for my cycle to end so I can get going on the procedures!

Monday, June 20, 2011

A Sign?

I like making signs out of things that probably aren't signs. Like, when things come together I say "oh yes, that's because this is supposed to be happening!" Of course, when they don't come together I just pout and don't usually say "oh yes, that's because this is NOT supposed to be happening!" I am such an optimist.

Anyway, when I called to get financing for the IVF, the account manager asked if I wanted to also finance the medications. I said no, because I was flustered and wasn't ready to commit. (I actually first said "can I think about it and add it later?" and the answer was no. So I said no.) After I got off the phone, I had a nagging feeling that I probably should have financed the meds, since they were going to be about $3100. I didn't want to have to try to foot that from our savings; we probably would be able to but I wasn't sure.

Then I remembered that my dad had given my sister and me about 50 savings bonds over the course of 14 years. I dug them out and did the online calculator, and the bonds that had met or exceeded their face value as of today are almost exactly $3100.

It's a sign! :D

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Signing the Contract

Even though we were approved last Friday, it took us until today to finally sign the contract for financing. Yesterday I was on the phone with Mom and during our chat she said "if you do have twins, you won't be able to work! All your money would go to daycare!" and the more I thought about that the more the snowball rolled down the hill and the more bills and payments and worries grabbed on until I got clobbered with it. I had a rough afternoon, panicking about the next three years. Then last night and today C and I (separately and together) made peace (well, as much as we could) with adding another $330 monthly bill to our finances.

So I think that the hard decisions are through for this cycle, and now it's just the physical stuff I have to work through. My FSH and estradiol test will be coming up in about 2 weeks. Scary, but exciting.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

$$$

Today, I called ARC, the company that my doctor recommended we go with for IVF financing. (The financial counselor recommended we wait until after we started our FSH, which went into effect yesterday.) And it tried to ruin my morning!

I'd called mostly expecting to get more information about my options, and figured that the questions the lady was asking me were mostly just to get me into her system, but about halfway through I realized she was filling out the credit application for me. She was pretty brusque, not really answering my questions very well and not sounding happy to be working at all. At one point she asked if I wanted my medication to be financed as well, and when I asked her if I could think about it and add it later she said "no, it needs to be on this application now; I have to send it right now." Then she asked for my annual gross salary and C's. Of course, C was out sick, and the HR manager was in an off-site meeting, so I apologized, put her on mute, and frantically tried calling C and trying to figure out how else to get that information. After a few minutes of checking in here and there with the lady and apologizing again, she asked if I wanted to call her back with it (uh, yeah, that's why I asked if I could!)

C had been asleep, which is why he didn't answer his phone, and when he woke up and called me back awhile later I was all flustered, and he was groggy and not feeling well and didn't really welcome my request to IMMEDIATELY GET ME INCOME INFORMATION, so we ended our phone conversation about as brusquely as the lady at ARC did with me.

But then I called back and talked to another lady and she was all sweetness and cheerfulness and made me feel much better. She offered to email me the form (why didn't the other lady do that?!) since apparently those forms can't be saved partway through the process, and now I'm sitting at home with signed applications ready to scan and email them back.

Too much excitement for one loan application, I say.

Oh, also, I got my bloodwork results back from last week's dribbling-into-the-vial visit. Everything looks fine except for Vitamin D, which I got a HUGE prescription for (50,000 IU per pill, to take twice a week!), but no STDs and all up to date on immunities. So that is good!