IVF Talk

Today’s appointment was called “The IVF Talk.” Before going, I read the 30 page booklet on the Shady Grove website all about IVF and everything that happens so that we could ask questions and it wouldn’t be the first time we’d be hearing certain things. I honestly hadn’t done a lot of research about the actual steps because I was hoping to never have to know. Oh boy do we know things now! There are different versions of cycling, but here’s the basic rundown that we’re following.

-Approximately 1 month of birth control pills (I know what you are thinking. I have that birth control thing down PAT. However, while they will act as birth control the real purpose here is to get all the hormones under control so they’re starting with a blank slate.

-Approximately 7-12 days of “stims” – lots of lots of shots. I sure am glad I got to practice on myself a couple weeks ago. Sounds like we will be REALLY good at it by the time we’re done here. The first meds make lots of follicles (hopefully holding good eggs) rather than the 1 that your body normally produces in a month. Then they add meds that keep your body from releasing the eggs (anti-ovulation meds.)

-Daily bloodwork and ultrasound to keep track of what is going on

-Trigger shot – instead of the tiny belly shot we did during the IUI, it’s a intramuscular shot in the butt. I’ve heard it sucks. Unlike IUI which is just sort of timed to the procedure, this one is timed to the minute. (No chance to wimp out!)

-Egg retrieval – This is the big one, the actual operation in a hospital. They knock you out (yuck, IV!) and then use a needle to go pop all the follicles and retrieve the eggs.

-Petri Dish – They put the eggs and sperm into dishes and let them do their thing

-Day 3 or 5 after that – They put the embryo back in. Until semi-recently (they’ve been doing IVF since 1978, or longer than my life!) they could only keep embryos alive for 3 days outside the body and then they had to put them back in. Unfortunately, at 3 days, it’s hard to tell which ones are going to be viable. That’s why they would put a bunch in and IVF got the stigma of being an irresponsible way to get pregnant and lots of people had multiples. The reason they did that is that the chances of pregnancy went up with each embryo they put back in. Now, they have the technology to keep them alive for 5 days. Only the strong ones survive to 5 days. If you do a day 5 transfer, the chances of getting pregnant are only 1% different if you put back 1 or 2. That’s pretty fascinating, and comforting to know because even twin pregnancies are pretty risky for the babies and the mom.

-Post Transfer Medicines – No shots! Whew. There are other protocols that use injectables for this time frame too, but our office said that patient compliance is higher with non-injectible medicine and that research has shown no difference in results. Fine by me.

-Blood test – a couple weeks later

So today we got a calendar and they called our meds into a specialty fertility pharmacy. It was really hard for us to get to the mental place where we were ok with these extreme measures, but now that we are left with no choice, we are ready to get the show on the road.

BFN, again

Big.

Fat.

Negative.

Turns out it’s a good thing that I asked them to file that paperwork, because we will be needing the IVF cycle after all. L Again, it wasn’t a surprise when they called because I tested at home, but it is still really depressing. I hate this. In reality, this only had a 10% chance of working each month, but still. UGH.

IUI #2 In The Books

IUI, Take 2, complete. So far this time I’ve had much less cramping. Both months I took the morning off and went to school, but this month I’d never know I had something done this morning. A nice change! Now, to wait. Again.

I did ask the doctor’s office to file the pre-approval paperwork for IVF today as well. I don’t want to be pessimistic, but I need for there to be a plan just in case. If this doesn’t work, I want to roll right into the next step and not be stuck waiting for a month or more just for paperwork.

Fingers crossed that it won’t be necessary! J J

Trigger Already?

Last month, I started my monitoring on day 11 and it took 4 days of checking before the two follicles were big enough to take the trigger medicine to release the eggs. After the trigger, there was 36 hours until the procedure. (Everything is timed, not exactly to the minute, but down to a few hour window.) This month was vastly different. Today as soon as they started the u/s, a giant blob showed up. The doctor thought maybe it was a cyst, but they called a few hours later and said my bloodwork did point to it being a ready-to-go follicle and that I should take the shot ASAP and schedule the IUI for tomorrow morning. This worries me. I called back (since it was a message on my cell while I was teaching) and asked if this was just a hail Mary pass. I don’t want to be playing catch up if we missed the best window, since this is the last insurance covered IUI we have. (Seriously – why do insurance companies think that Infertility stuff is all just a bunch of random elective surgery?? After our measly tries, it’s covered the same as elective boob jobs. That annoys me. Anyway, I digress.) She said that we were still in the ok window and that my bloodwork says I’m fine. I asked about the oddity of last month having 36 hours between shot and procedure and this month having 18 hours between shot and procedure and she said that’s fine, there’s multiple ways of doing it. I have no choice but to believe them.

Then came the next situation. My husband wasn’t going to be home until after dinner. They said to take the shot as soon as I possibly could. That meant only one thing – I had to be a big girl and do it by myself. Ugh. Luckily, it’s only been a month since the last one and I remember that it seriously didn’t hurt, it was just the fear that was bad. That helped a lot. I did get a little ribbing from my husband though when I called him to tell him. He did offer to come home and do it before he went to the gym, but I said that was silly and I’d be fine. Then, as I was having a mental image of driving to the gym with a needle in my hand for him to jab in me, he said “If you show up at the gym with that thing I’m going to point and laugh!” J In the end, all was well. I did it on the first try. Even though a few people who give themselves shots had warned me that skin has more resistance than you’d think, I was still surprised how much I really did have to push the thing in. But I am proud of myself now. J

Beginning the Clomid, Round 2

Round two of medicine started today. I had to do some math to figure out when to take it and set a phone alarm because I’ll switch time zones again before I’m done with all of them. Here we go again! At least I'm on vacation - everything is easier on vacation! :)

IUI #2, Baseline Appointment

Hooray! For once, my body cooperated. I was able to get in and do the cyst check this morning and we don’t leave until tomorrow! I’m not usually a drinker, but I think in Vegas I’m going to have to partake merely because I can.