ATTAIN

This past week S and I learned of a program called ATTAIN. It is basically an insurance program for people going through IVF (fertility treatment). Basically we pay they $18K and they pay for the price of IVF ($12K) up to 4 times until we get a baby. We found out about the program the day before our deadline to sign up. It was a tough decision, but we decided to go for it. Again, taking another financial leap of faith.

I start taking my 5 injections per day tomorrow. Here we go again....crossing my finger...and eyes...and toes....

Questioning

What the heck is wrong with my body? Why did I not respond to the IVF medications?
Why was my estrogen level so low? What is WRONG with me???!!!
Will it work next time with the new "super dose" of medication?
If not, and I still only produce 1 good egg should we attempt it anyway?
Should we have just gone through with it in Idaho while I was there and everything was set up and ready to go?

Oh, I learned 2 minutes ago via facebook that Jane does bartending on the side. Wow, that is great to know.

Abort mission

I just experienced one of the most frantic difficult decision-making hours of my life.
I had an ultrasound in utah this morning in which I found out that I have only 6 small to very small eggs. I went directly from this appointment to Boise as I needed to be there for appointments the following morning. JUST as I arrived in Boise my doctor (in Boise) called and said she recommended that we quit this cycle and try again. She said her best guess would be that we've have 1 possibly 2 embryos to transfer (60% pregnancy rate with each transfer) and we'd have none to freeze for back-up, miscarriages, or future children.
It was so tough to make the decision because I've already been through so much to get this far. I was there in boise, I'd already taken my kids to utah to be babysat, Steve had a plane ticket in and out of boise tomorrow, I had 4 nights of non-refundable hotel rooms.

Choice #1: Just go for it. Proceed as planned and possibly get 1-2 healthy babies. Risk having no healthy babies in which case we'd have to spend another $15K to try it again (which would mean we couldn't do it for a long time).

Choise #2: Go with dr's advice and try again later. Say goodbye to $6000 in medications, flights, hotels, ultrasound and lab fees. Risk having surrogate change her mind or not getting all of the pieces perfectly in place as they are now. Risk having the same exact problem with not having enough eggs next time.

TOUGH decision but I finally went with option #2 and I feel good about it.

I guess I'm some freak of nature that doesn't produce eggs in reponse to medications like I should. She told me my estrogen level was 34 when it should have been at least 4000. I wonder if that has any relation to my hyperemesis.... anyway, hopefully it will work next time.

New plan: Surrogate will come to Utah for the process and the whole thing will be done in utah in october.

Almost ruined chances

I had my baseline ultrasound a few days ago. They check things out before they start me on the "big-guns" meds. So as the NP was doing the ultrasound I decided to verify dosages with her just to be safe. Good thing I did too. As it turns out they had given me written instructions to take 7 amps of 2 different medications when it was only supposed to be 4 amps. The NP made some calls and verified that I couldn't possibly be taking that much and she was right. Typ-o. She said that a dose of 7 amps would have hyperstimulated me (and thus hospitalized me) fairly quickly. I'm so glad I verified the dose!

Side Effects

I don't want this posting to sound like a complaint, I just wanted to document some of the side effects of my meds. So, keeping in mind that all of these side effects are manageable, here they are:

Loestrin FE (birthcontrol): Moodiness (PMS-like), weight gain, ACNE, nausea unless I took them before bed with food, nausea if I ever was awake very long during the night.

Doxi..(antibiotic) a tiny bit of upset stomach

Lupron: Extreme grumpiness for the first 2 days which turned into severe grumpiness afterwards. Weight gain, bloated feeling, tender abdomen.

I take my last BCP tonight which I'm hoping will lift my mood a bit. My poor family is sick of me.

Sad Day

Today (August 5th) was the due date for my baby. I was forced to abort the baby back in January because of my health. Tonight I'm having a hard time with it (to be expected I guess). I keep questioning whether I could have somehow avoided aborting the baby. I go through it all in my head over and over. I was so sick/medicated it was just a huge terrible blur. I have nothing profound to blog about it-- I just wanted to tell the blogger void that I'm sad and I wish I would have had a baby today.

I am, however, grateful that this surrogacy is planned and happening soon. I know for sure I would feel 10X worse had that pregnancy been the last chance for having my own children.

Meds

Jane starts her meds today. I'm all anxious because she is currently on vacation. I hope she rememberd to take them with her. She is such a laid back person and I am so type-A personality I'm always worried about what she is doing.
All of my meds arrived today. I start next week.
I went to pick up my birth control pills (part of my med regimine) at my local pharmacy today). I had my 2 toddlers with me. I'm not sure if I imagined it or not, but the pharmacy chick looked at me with my 2 busy toddlers (unloading shelves) and though "yep, you need this birth control". I laughed inside. Little did she know...