I've been shootin' up since last Saturday. The shots have gone really well so far. My meds are more high maintenance this time as the menopur and HGH needs to be mixed for each shot. It's pretty easy to do though - just somewhat time consuming. The shots themselves are pretty easy to take except for the Menopur. That one stings a bit but I found that going extremely slow helps a lot. No real side effects yet except I've had a persistent headache since Tuesday which might be attributable to the meds.
I had to go in for monitoring this past Tuesday and then it was off to New Jersey that night! We arrived yesterday evening and have settled in nicely. The trip was exhausting but not too bad. We drove 4 hours on Tuesday night and drove the rest of the way yesterday. Kellen was an angel despite drawing all over his arms and legs with a stray pen that was left within arms reach. LOL whoops! When got to our hotel we were given a room that was filthy and reeked of curry. Nasty. So they gave us a new room. We walked in and realized that they gave us a 2 bedroom suite. Sigh...I figured we'd have to move again - but no, they upgraded us without us even demanding it. Whoohoo! So now mommy & daddy have their own room and Kellen can be in his:)
Today we did not do much. I had monitoring this morning and an acupuncture appointment this afternoon. As expected, this clinic is all business. Felt like a cow this morning and the staff were droid-like but oh well. Not here to make friends I guess. The woman I had for acupuncture was very nice though. She had me do a laser acupuncture session and it was pretty crazy. The needles were hooked up to jumper cables essentially. It was really intense - could literally feel my ovaries vibrating! Hope it works. I am on day 6 of stims and all is on track I assume as my dosage hasn't changed since I started. They had me start ganirelix yesterday and HGH tonight so now I have a total of 4 shots with the gonal and menopur. The acupuncturist had my chart and talked to me about how I was progressing which was very nice as I very rarely converse with my nurse. All I get is a daily email from her that says everything looks good and the dosage of meds I should take that evening. So the status update was very nice to hear. I have 4 larger follicles around 13mm and 10 at around 9mm. Pretty good. Compared to my previous cycle I had more follicles but they were smaller on day 6 of stims. So, we shall see. She said I had a bunch of smaller follicles as well that might get larger with the addition of HGH so it'll be interesting to see what my ultrasound on Saturday shows. She also said that she wouldn't be surprised if I triggered this weekend for an ER early next week.
Anyway, I'm certainly getting anxious and nervous about the outcome but I'm still pretty hopeful. Just trying to take it one step at a time. This whole thing won't be over until mid-late June so I might as well settle down. The portion that I am really dreading though is the wait between ER and getting the CCS testing results back. Once we know how many blasts made it to day 5, they will biopsy them and then freeze them. The biopsies will get sent to be tested for chromosomal abnormalities. It will take 2 weeks to get the results back. So the total wait will be about 3 weeks to hear whether or not there will be a frozen transfer in June.
But tomorrow will be a day that we try to be tourists. Pat has an appointment for the lab to freeze his sperm at 5:30am (!) but the rest of the day is wide open. So we will go in to NYC and bum around. It's supposed to be a damp day though so we'll see how long we last! No telling how Kellen will be either. But either way, it'll be nice to have some fun exploring. New Jersey has been pretty unexpected though. It's really hilly and actually very scenic. There's a lot we could do close by to our hotel so we might do that too on one day that we are here.
Friday, April 29, 2016
Saturday, April 23, 2016
4th IVF cycle has begun!
Good ol' aunt flow arrived right on schedule yesterday morning! For once, she was a welcome sight. I called my nurse and we nailed down our dates. Baseline was this morning and I was given the all clear to start stims tomorrow night. I will get monitored again on Tuesday then will be due for monitoring again on Thursday. I'll have to be in NJ for that appointment. So plan is to leave Tuesday evening after dinner. We'll drive 4-5 hrs then stop for the night. On Wednesday we'll drive the rest of the way. It's a 10 hr 20 min drive to our hotel in Somerset, NJ. So not too bad but our son has never done more than 5 hrs and he is an incredibly active 2.5 year old so a bit nervous on how he'll deal with it. Hopefully he'll be fine since we're breaking it up.
Right now my thoughts are less than serene. My brain is jumbled up with things we'll need to get done or arrange before we leave. Biggest thing was to book our hotel. We got one that is pretty affordable and has a separate bedroom and full kitchen so we can minimize our eating out and Kellen can still have his own room to nap in. This weekend we'll start packing, getting arrangements finalized for our dog and cat, and I'll need to do some work so I'm ready to leave. I'll be out for 1.5 weeks so I have a lot to wrap up or hand off to people while I'm gone.
In the back of my mind of course are thoughts of anxiety, doubt, nervousness for the actual cycle. I really hope this works! My RE said based on my history we are hoping for 2-3 CCS tested normal blasts out of this. I hope he's right! With CCS testing, that will screen out abnormal embryos so they will likely recommend a single embryo transfer at the FET.
Thursday, April 14, 2016
I was "misinformed"
This week was somewhat busy. Meds were ordered, insurance pre-authorizations were put in place, I had a follow-up with my doctor, bloodwork was drawn today, and I started estrogen priming today.
My bloodwork showed that I ovulated so that allows me to start the estrogen priming phase. This is just to even out follicle growth and reduce the likelihood of a cyst. So all is good there.
On Monday, the rest of my meds were ordered. The pharmacy called me and told me that I had exhausted my $10k lifetime max for meds. Huh?? I wasn't expecting this news since the insurance rep told me way back in January that I was starting with a clean slate as far as infertility expenditures were concerned and that I was at $0 for both meds and medical amounts. It wasn't that big of a deal with my pharmacy - they were just going to order different variations of the same thing to make it cheaper for me and closer to what I was expecting. One thing was for sure though - I had depleted my meds max. Ugh.
So then I got on the phone with the insurance company. I spent an hour (45 minutes of which I was on hold) trying to verify the amount applied toward my med max and trying to figure out how the infertility medical benefit was managed. I told them about the conversation I had in January regarding my lifetime expenses and was told "Ummmm...unfortunately ma'am, you were misinformed". W.T.F.?!?!?! I was told that my meds had indeed reached the limit and my medical would likely have a similar issue. I asked for a review on the med amount and they will get that back to me in 2 weeks. At that point I had to get back to work.
I called them back later and spent a similar amount of time on the phone again - I do NOT have unlimited minutes on my cellphone, mind you. Grrrr! So in terms of medical costs, the rep told me that she showed $0 applied toward my lifetime max BUT if I knew that to be incorrect, then it would probably be incorrect once the claims were run. Huh?? Lol...just LOL!! The lack of information that these insurance companies give it's customers is just unbelievable. "Well this is what we 'think' it will be, but we could be totally wrong." That is asinine! So they are doing a review on the medical amount too which will also take 2 weeks. The thought of waiting 2 weeks while being on stim meds to see how much of my $15k+ IVF cycle was going to be covered combined with the fact that the rep told me in January that I was ALL GOOD and had a ZERO BALANCE was just too much. I flipped out on the rep. 2 hrs of pent up frustration and anxiety for the future came spilling out. For some reason the rep decided to help me research the issue a bit more in depth. She looked up all my claims dating back to 2012 and came up with a number just short of $5000. That just doesn't seem right to me at all. But she said that those were the expenses that she was seeing and costs applied toward infertility depend on a couple things (hence the reason for it taking 2 weeks to figure out). When they say a cycle costs $10k, first there is the in-network discount, then there is the coding. So for my last cycle, only a fraction of the $10k cycle fee was actually paid - the rest was an in-network discount. Then there are things like ultrasounds, bloodwork, anesthesia, other lab fees, that are not technically infertility related. So I don't know. I bet the amount on my tally so far is like 3x that $5000 number - but hey - it's under $25k. The worry I have is that my max now includes diagnostic services as well. So back when we were just starting to figure out what was going on - all the HSGs, hysteroscopies, doctor consults - that will all go toward the max amount. So I just have to sit tight and wait. At least whatever response I get in 2 weeks will be official and indisputable. Pretty bummed about all this though and it REALLY stressed me out on Monday and Tuesday. Hubby says I should talk to my HR dept about it since they decide on the med insurance plans and options. Maybe they could fight for me. I may do that but I did not have the time after spending hours on the phone with the insurance company. Hubby also kept reminding me that outside of talking to HR, I can't do anything about it which is true. But still - I want to KNOW how much this will cost! It could be way more than we bargained for. All in due time I suppose.
So for now, since we indeed cannot back out or anything at this point, I'm trying to focus on the bright side and starting to plan our trip. If my period comes when it should, we will get to NJ on the 28th and stay until the 3rd or 4th. Our doc thinks we have an excellent chance for success. Meds are all here and ready to go. Started estrace today and expecting my period to come Wednesday or so next week. Then on day 3, it'll be go time!
My bloodwork showed that I ovulated so that allows me to start the estrogen priming phase. This is just to even out follicle growth and reduce the likelihood of a cyst. So all is good there.
On Monday, the rest of my meds were ordered. The pharmacy called me and told me that I had exhausted my $10k lifetime max for meds. Huh?? I wasn't expecting this news since the insurance rep told me way back in January that I was starting with a clean slate as far as infertility expenditures were concerned and that I was at $0 for both meds and medical amounts. It wasn't that big of a deal with my pharmacy - they were just going to order different variations of the same thing to make it cheaper for me and closer to what I was expecting. One thing was for sure though - I had depleted my meds max. Ugh.
So then I got on the phone with the insurance company. I spent an hour (45 minutes of which I was on hold) trying to verify the amount applied toward my med max and trying to figure out how the infertility medical benefit was managed. I told them about the conversation I had in January regarding my lifetime expenses and was told "Ummmm...unfortunately ma'am, you were misinformed". W.T.F.?!?!?! I was told that my meds had indeed reached the limit and my medical would likely have a similar issue. I asked for a review on the med amount and they will get that back to me in 2 weeks. At that point I had to get back to work.
I called them back later and spent a similar amount of time on the phone again - I do NOT have unlimited minutes on my cellphone, mind you. Grrrr! So in terms of medical costs, the rep told me that she showed $0 applied toward my lifetime max BUT if I knew that to be incorrect, then it would probably be incorrect once the claims were run. Huh?? Lol...just LOL!! The lack of information that these insurance companies give it's customers is just unbelievable. "Well this is what we 'think' it will be, but we could be totally wrong." That is asinine! So they are doing a review on the medical amount too which will also take 2 weeks. The thought of waiting 2 weeks while being on stim meds to see how much of my $15k+ IVF cycle was going to be covered combined with the fact that the rep told me in January that I was ALL GOOD and had a ZERO BALANCE was just too much. I flipped out on the rep. 2 hrs of pent up frustration and anxiety for the future came spilling out. For some reason the rep decided to help me research the issue a bit more in depth. She looked up all my claims dating back to 2012 and came up with a number just short of $5000. That just doesn't seem right to me at all. But she said that those were the expenses that she was seeing and costs applied toward infertility depend on a couple things (hence the reason for it taking 2 weeks to figure out). When they say a cycle costs $10k, first there is the in-network discount, then there is the coding. So for my last cycle, only a fraction of the $10k cycle fee was actually paid - the rest was an in-network discount. Then there are things like ultrasounds, bloodwork, anesthesia, other lab fees, that are not technically infertility related. So I don't know. I bet the amount on my tally so far is like 3x that $5000 number - but hey - it's under $25k. The worry I have is that my max now includes diagnostic services as well. So back when we were just starting to figure out what was going on - all the HSGs, hysteroscopies, doctor consults - that will all go toward the max amount. So I just have to sit tight and wait. At least whatever response I get in 2 weeks will be official and indisputable. Pretty bummed about all this though and it REALLY stressed me out on Monday and Tuesday. Hubby says I should talk to my HR dept about it since they decide on the med insurance plans and options. Maybe they could fight for me. I may do that but I did not have the time after spending hours on the phone with the insurance company. Hubby also kept reminding me that outside of talking to HR, I can't do anything about it which is true. But still - I want to KNOW how much this will cost! It could be way more than we bargained for. All in due time I suppose.
So for now, since we indeed cannot back out or anything at this point, I'm trying to focus on the bright side and starting to plan our trip. If my period comes when it should, we will get to NJ on the 28th and stay until the 3rd or 4th. Our doc thinks we have an excellent chance for success. Meds are all here and ready to go. Started estrace today and expecting my period to come Wednesday or so next week. Then on day 3, it'll be go time!
Sunday, April 10, 2016
Starting up soon!
Next week will mark the official begin of our IVF cycle! My cycle payment has been made. Meds will arrive on Tuesday. I have a final phone consult with my doctor on Wednesday. Then on Thursday I will have bloodwork and if all is clear, I will start estrace until my next period (sometime around the 21st). 3 days after my period I will go in for my baseline ultrasound and bloodwork and start stims. There is a chance that I will have a cyst in which case they may push me back a month, but for now the plan is to go this month.
It seems unreal that we will finally be starting up again after 5 looooong months of waiting. My hubby is on-board but has mixed feelings now. A month ago when we needed to finalize our cycle date and we talked about it, he was totally on-board. Now however he says we should wait. Of course as soon as I made the cycle payment and arranged for med delivery, he told me this. Lol! Too late bud! Still no job (...sigh...) but at least we don't have to worry about him being able to take time off assuming he doesn't have an offer between now and the end of April. He'll come around I think though. He better...! It will be pretty annoying driving all the way to NJ, staying that week in a hotel room, only to have him bitching the whole time and not wanting to be there. That will only add to the stress.
Exact dates for when all this will go down are unknown until my next period comes. Pretty sure I ovulated on the 7th. I usually get my period 13 days after - so 20th-21st. Then we'll know when we have to be in NJ, when I'm stimming, monitoring, etc. We have to be in NJ on the morning of my 9th cycle day and will stay until retrieval. Unknown when that will be too. My doctor's feeling is that I triggered too late in my last cycle so ER may be earlier - who knows! Luckily hotels are generally flexible regarding date changes and since we are driving we don't have to worry about changing flights. I'll have to rest and take it easy the day of ER, but we will leave the day after.
So we're still waiting primarily but things are starting to fall in to place and take shape. My cycle payment was so cheap too. I'm hoping there aren't any hidden costs that we'll have to pay for later. I am getting acupuncture done currently and will continue thru the cycle. They recommend 3 sessions before ER so that will be an added, but expected, cost. I'm trying to keep myself healthy and stress-free. Not succeeding too well with the latter. Actually not doing so great with taking the supplements - but some days I just can't stomach swallowing all of them. Work is the main source of my stress. Being on vacation during the busy time of the cycle will help a lot though.
Starting to feel anxiety regarding how many good quality embryos we will have. I am trying HGH this time to improve egg quality. There are some studies that show it working for some women. Also doing acupuncture should give some improvement. I didn't do that last time, but did on the cycle that we conceived Kellen on. Also I can't ignore that this is a very highly rated embryology lab. It actually says in the consents that they remove fragmentation from embryos. So we'll just have to see how it goes. ER will be likely the first week of May. They will culture the embryos until day 5, then take biopsies for CCS testing, and will freeze them in hopes that there are some normal embryos in the batch that we can transfer the following month. The results will take 2 weeks. That wait will be excruciating! But sometime around mid-May we will know how it went. Of course I have 2 deadlines around mid-May so I'm counting on those to keep me busy and distracted. The plan will be to roll right in to a frozen transfer cycle after I get my period (around 2 weeks after ER). Assuming we have normal embryos, we will have the transfer around 6 weeks after ER.
So that's what's been happening here. More later on Thursday!
It seems unreal that we will finally be starting up again after 5 looooong months of waiting. My hubby is on-board but has mixed feelings now. A month ago when we needed to finalize our cycle date and we talked about it, he was totally on-board. Now however he says we should wait. Of course as soon as I made the cycle payment and arranged for med delivery, he told me this. Lol! Too late bud! Still no job (...sigh...) but at least we don't have to worry about him being able to take time off assuming he doesn't have an offer between now and the end of April. He'll come around I think though. He better...! It will be pretty annoying driving all the way to NJ, staying that week in a hotel room, only to have him bitching the whole time and not wanting to be there. That will only add to the stress.
Exact dates for when all this will go down are unknown until my next period comes. Pretty sure I ovulated on the 7th. I usually get my period 13 days after - so 20th-21st. Then we'll know when we have to be in NJ, when I'm stimming, monitoring, etc. We have to be in NJ on the morning of my 9th cycle day and will stay until retrieval. Unknown when that will be too. My doctor's feeling is that I triggered too late in my last cycle so ER may be earlier - who knows! Luckily hotels are generally flexible regarding date changes and since we are driving we don't have to worry about changing flights. I'll have to rest and take it easy the day of ER, but we will leave the day after.
So we're still waiting primarily but things are starting to fall in to place and take shape. My cycle payment was so cheap too. I'm hoping there aren't any hidden costs that we'll have to pay for later. I am getting acupuncture done currently and will continue thru the cycle. They recommend 3 sessions before ER so that will be an added, but expected, cost. I'm trying to keep myself healthy and stress-free. Not succeeding too well with the latter. Actually not doing so great with taking the supplements - but some days I just can't stomach swallowing all of them. Work is the main source of my stress. Being on vacation during the busy time of the cycle will help a lot though.
Starting to feel anxiety regarding how many good quality embryos we will have. I am trying HGH this time to improve egg quality. There are some studies that show it working for some women. Also doing acupuncture should give some improvement. I didn't do that last time, but did on the cycle that we conceived Kellen on. Also I can't ignore that this is a very highly rated embryology lab. It actually says in the consents that they remove fragmentation from embryos. So we'll just have to see how it goes. ER will be likely the first week of May. They will culture the embryos until day 5, then take biopsies for CCS testing, and will freeze them in hopes that there are some normal embryos in the batch that we can transfer the following month. The results will take 2 weeks. That wait will be excruciating! But sometime around mid-May we will know how it went. Of course I have 2 deadlines around mid-May so I'm counting on those to keep me busy and distracted. The plan will be to roll right in to a frozen transfer cycle after I get my period (around 2 weeks after ER). Assuming we have normal embryos, we will have the transfer around 6 weeks after ER.
So that's what's been happening here. More later on Thursday!
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