Tuesday, February 28, 2012

I haven't forgot .... I am just at a stalemate.

So yeah....I have a bunch of conflicting thoughts....feelings ..and opinions on fertility ....pregnancy....and other people....so it has left me with writers block. I think mainly because I don't want to come across as ungrateful ...mean....or spiteful. So there has been a post I have been trying to write since February 15th. It has been an open window on my internet browser this whole time.
I will buckle down and get at least the fertility facts/process post out...as far as this hurdle of a post....ugh...not too sure.

We will see.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Valentines Smalentines...blah blah.

Frustration, disappointment, and irritation is at the forefront of my emotions today on this "love day".
and my husband had nothing to do with these feelings today....he is a gem.
Last night when I was out with my sister, I got a phone call reminding me of my appointment today at 7:20 with my gyno. I was a bit confused because I was for sure my appointment was Thursday.
Despite my lack of understanding, I went ahead, got up, went to the appointment this morning....
my car messed up all.the.way.there. ARG!
Got there, and while checking in, the receptionist informs me of my insurance benefits....apparently my insurance does not cover this kind of treatment, and will ONLY cover Artificial Insemination (aka IUI) so anything beyond that is my responsibility at 100%. She then asks for $140 up front. This is not in my budget right now....and I told her that. The receptionist then told me she will just collect the copay, and I can call my insurance company and speak with them to see if I find out any different, and if I don't, then I will need to come back and pay for the last two appointments in full.
I called my insurance.
Sure enough, AI is only covered after getting it pre authorized.
I called my doctors office and spoke with his nurse.
Rene said, she is not sure about any of the infertility treatments and I will have to speak with Debbie (the nurse I have been seeing through this whole process), she is better equipped with knowing what to do with AI and how to start the process.
Now I am waiting.

So, talking with Rene, she gave me the results of my fasting blood test shows that my A1Cs are still elevated (still have diabetes) and my cholesterol level is 132 and it is supposed to be under 100. Fail. And she said that I need to get all this under control before I have a baby. Well yeah...these are things I honestly put off on the back burner, despite the knowledge I have about their dangers....why I do it, besides being lazy, is I guess denial...I don't want to have it so I guess I make myself act as if I don't.
I am working on myself.....

So.....as a recap

Bad News:
1) My car is messing up REALLY BAD!
2) My insurance won't cover all this treatment I have been doing and now I will owe the doctor at least a few hundred dollars...
3) I still have diabetes and cholesterol issues.


BUT  there was a little good news.....

While I was at the appointment this morning, Debbie went ahead and did an ultrasound to check my progress, and as she was viewing it, I had two really good eggs that had developed on my right ovary, and with that, she said she was very hopeful and excited and expects them to do well....

So, I am checking everyday to see if I am ovulating, and today was a no.....but that's ok.....if I don't have a positive ovulation surge by Saturday I am supposed to go back in the office to see her at 8:00am Saturday.

I will keep you updated....If I don't just go crazy before then....

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Infertility Lingo

So instead of writting words like "intercourse" and "Ovulation" and words that may be uncomfortable to my male readers......and maybe my husband....I will use the basic infertility abbreviations to cut down on my typing time, to save face to those who know nothing about infertility and who are not that interested in finding out.....and so the young adults we are working with won't mention to my husband again when the next time we are going to be "busy"...ha. True Story.

Lingo I will use on a pretty regular basis...

TTC - Trying to Conceive
BD - Baby Dance...aka getting it on...aka doing the deed.....aka.....well you get the point.
CD - Cycle Day - meaning what day if the monthly cycle I am on. It will reset every time I have a period.
U/S - UltraSound
HPT - Home Pregnancy Test
OPK - Ovulation Prediction Kit
O'ing - Ovulating
AF - Aunt Flow/Menstrual

Saturday, February 11, 2012

"Sonogram" for tubes.......

So Thursday was the big sonogram day....and it was rough.

I get there...luckily, I had no copay, but I am sure some of it will apply to my co-insurance, so a nice little bill will be sent to me (last time I had a sonogram of this nature, it was about $180 I had to shell out.)

Then I get called back to go change.

I was instructed to empty my bladder and then got to the Xray room.......

XRay??

I thought I was going in for a Sonogram....

ugh.

So. After I get debriefed about the procedure, I lay on the XRay table and they take a test Xray. The doctor comes in. He was not my doctor, but the lovely man who was going to be inserting my catheter. yay. this all sounds fun huh?

I scoot to the end of the bed to get the Catheter, and all the while, the doctor was saying "oh it shouldn't hurt, and if it does, it isn't too bad" in a matter of fact, take it from me kind of tone....it was all I could do not to kick him.
Well....as I am in position, they inform me I have to hold my own legs at a bent position, as if there were stirrups.....AS IF there were stirrups......so, here I am, dealing with not only the insertion of the basic "tools" but also a catheter and a balloon that will be holding my uterus open.....but I am having to hold my legs at a bent position.....all the while feeling like I was on the worst day of my period because of the stuff going on. Then it was a magical moment.....they asked me to let my legs down, and then slowly and steadily scoot backwards on the table to let them insert the dye and take XRays. I.HAD.TO.SCOOT.BACKWARDS.
it was all very very painful
and very very dumb.
and did I mention painful??

Sigh.

It got done...they took what they needed, I had to scoot back down, hold my legs back up and then they took it out and I was done.

It was bad.
Not the worst.
Not as fun as going to Disney World.
BUT
If the end result is a baby, then it was so worth it.

The first glance decision was that my tubes are clear and that is not the reason for my infertility....but that is still to be determined by my actual doctor, whom I believe I will see here in the next few weeks.

yay, I guess.

So now, as of today, I am on my last day of Clomid, and I will soon have to start with the ovulation testing and getting "busy" .....the infertility lingo for that, - which I may start using to save my husband some embarrassment - is BD ( Baby Dancing)

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Valentines Questions - Link Up.

With the big V-day coming up, I thought I would join in with "From Mrs to Mama" in their survey and linky party....if you are so inclined, join in....


1. How long have you and your significant other been together?
Technically, or Offically? We started hanging out ALL.THE.TIME about October of 2005, and it got to the point in January of 2006 where I couldn't tell if we were boyfriend and girlfriend or not. So being the nervous person I am, I wrote him a 3 page letter asking him to basically "check yes or no" to see what we were doing....I knew I wasn't getting any younger, and that either I was investing in the relationship or not...on January 11, 2006 we basically made it offical we were "together".

2. How did you meet? {What's your "love" story?}
We had a mutual friend named Jennie, and she used to have people over at her house to hang out, and we both happened to be there one evening. We became friends, and we talked occassionally on the phone, or hang out in a group setting, and one time he came to my apartment to watch a movie...but it wasn't until he was in the hospital for a staph infection that he and I started to really hang out and get to know each other.....I came to the hospital to kill time to let the traffic die down, and then when he was released I would go to his house to help his sister take care of him.....and then the rest is history from there.

3. If married, how long have you been married?
We were married on Nov. 7th, 2009. So that makes it 2 years and 3 months and 1 day.
4. If you are married, where did you get married at? Big or small wedding? 
We got married and had the reception at a place called The Courtyard Villa, it was a little hole in the wall place, but it was gorgeous inside and I fell in love as soon as I saw it. We planned for about 125 people, but we ended up with around 150 (we ran out of food at the reception - embarassed was an understatement)

5. Do you have any nick-names that you call one another?
We have the typical, babe, and baby....I sometimes throw in a shnookems or he will call me sweetheart. We use these names so much that sometimes when he says my real name, it sounds funny!!

6. Name 3 things you love most about your honey.
He will do anything to make me happy (within reason)
His love for me is so deep, I can feel it in every touch, every glance, every kiss.
I feel safe and protected with I am with him, and when he holds me, I melt.

7. Tell us how he proposed?
After church one Sunday night he drove down to Fort Worth to the Trinity Park....we drove and drove around, he was looking for a particular spot...I sort of figured what was going on because we had talked about it already...he gave up on the spot, and we parked walked to a picnic table, and we sat there and he told me how much he loved me and how much I mean to him and how he would love it if I was his wife, and then asked me to marry him....then he said he didn't want to get on one knee because he might not be able to get back up, ha ha.

8. Is he a flowers and teddy bear kind of guy for v-day, or strawberries, champagne, and rose petals?
I am not the teddy bear type, but he has got flowers in the past...Valentines is sort of low key around here, but we do love each other.

9. Are you a sunset dinner on the beach kind of girl, or pop a movie in and relax on the couch?
Depends on my mood, but most the time it is stay at home because we have no beaches around, ha ha.

10. Tell us one thing you'd like to do with your significant one day. If you could do anything? Go anywhere?
We have yet to be on a vacation together by ourselves....we haven't had a honeymoon...nada...nothing....so anywhere is a good place to be with him. We have fun no matter where we go.

11. Tell us what you plan on doing on this Valentine's Day.
I make the kids a little basket with something small and some candy. And then I have my Valentines decorations out, and we will have dinner as normal I am sure....I have to babysit that day anyways. We might have a special date night the Friday or Saturday after Valentines...

12. Are you asking for anything this Valentine's day?
No

13. Give us one piece of advice of keeping a relationship strong and full of love.
Make time to talk...and make time to listen. Know when to speak up and when to keep quiet. Say I love you every day.

14. Show us a picture of what love means to you.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Baby or Bust.....(Infertility Journey)

WARNING......there are talks of womeny topics like sonograms and periods....if it makes you uncomfortable, stop reading now.

So here it is, out for the cyber world to know....I want a baby. I crave a baby....my body aches for a baby anytime I hold one.....and since I babysit my baby niece, it is almost daily.

With that said, I went to the doctor a year and a half ago and he told me I needed to lose about 30 pounds and my body would probably give way and get one made....I have lost almost 40.....and nothing. The doc said the next step was to do Clomid....and that was as far as I went with the doctor. I was afraid of taking the medicine, I have read several blogs of women who did  not have any luck with the medicine....I got scared and avoided even thinking about it.

Now....
Being 31 years old, I am thinking that I am going to be a 70 year old mother of a 10 year old.....and that just doesn't sound fun to me. I want to have a baby soon, and seeing as my husband is about 7 years older than me....we are not spring chickens....so the Clomid meds that scared me a year ago, seems like the only logical route, seeing as I haven't conceived on my own...

I changed doctors. My sisters ob/gyn does all the things the specialist was trying to do, but he does it in office, which makes my copay cheaper....and Veida had a friend who was having a hard time conceiving, and with this doctors office, she conceived quickly....sounds like a good record to me. I am on board.

Two weeks ago, I went in for my new patient/yearly check up, and I also wanted to talk about infertility..The doctor we will call him Dr.Magic (because hopefully he will make a baby appear out of no where like a magician would do) was not hesitant to help me out. We began a game plan and I went on my way.

All I had to do to start this plan was to have a period.
that's all.
but guess what.
According to the ovulation calendar I have on my smart phone, I was supposed to start two days after my doctors appointment....but I started my period a week late.....which gave me a week of agony, because I was trying to get on with this....was God playing a joke on me??? grrrr.

So Friday Feb 3 I started....and of course it was bad and painful and I wanted to cry every minute especially the minutes I had to be out of bed......sigh.
BUT
I was thankful for the period....I got to call the doctors office.
Infertility Nurse Debbie told me that I had to come in at 730am on Monday for a sonogram and game plan...

Monday (day 4 of my cycle) I got to the doctors, paid my copay and went in for an internal sonogram. She took lovely pictures of my uterus and each ovaries. She even asked me as she was taking and labeling the pictures, how old I was.....all I could think of is "why, how old do I look in there" but she didn't seem too chatty so I didn't bug her with that question.
She took me to her desk after the sonogram and proceeded to tell me the ins and outs of what I needed to be doing for the next few days.
I have a specific chart of things to do, such as...
Day 5-9 take clomid orally
Day 8 get sonogram w/ iodine to check fallopian tubes
Day 11 start using ovulation kit
Day 12, 14,16,18 have intercourse, unless I detected ovulation, then have it twice in a row.....and immediately call the office to report ovulation.
Day 14 have another sonogram done by Nurse Debbie to check egg development....

Now, two things come to mind during my explanation of all of this.
1)babies consume A TON of time even BEFORE they are conceived....
2)babies are EXPENSIVE even BEFORE they are conceived.

but at this point....it's whatever it takes.

I am going to be documenting my journey for a few reasons....
I want to remember what it took to get the babies I pray for...
I want to connect with some of you who are going through the same thing....
I want to be a marker for someone out there who is going to be going through this later, so they know what I experienced and paid for, and had to go through....maybe I can help others...

And if you are not comfortable reading this, I am sorry, but in the blog post title, I will do my best to remember to put (Infertility Journey) so you know that the post is going to be about....

Here I go.......consider this blog tagged with the shoe polish on the window... BABY or BUST.