I Think We're Doing IVF Ya'll

So as many of you know I went to my "Next Steps" appointment today with my questions in hand. Basically I think Rob and I -together made a choice to at least start the ball rolling for IVF. 

Here's how it went down-

I met with Dr. S who was very honest and said he doesn't know why I am not pregnant. While I do have PCOS I do respond very well to medication to induce follicle stimulation and ovulation. He doesn't have an exact answer for whats going wrong and he isn't going to pretend and try to give me one. For what its worth I respect this far more than someone feeding me lines of crap. His inclination is that there is either an issue with the egg descending to the uterus such as scar tissue or Rob's sperm just aren't making it to fertilize the eggs. (He called them "lazy sperm" lol)

So why move to IVF without those answers? Because no matter what the answer is to those two questions IVF would end up being the ultimate answer to achieve a pregnancy. Our pregnancy. 

When I asked about the laproscopy he said that he has no problem with me going through with it, but he also doesn't think its necessary. He pretty much said that the risk may out way the reward. There are additional complications with laproscopy -such as infection. And if an answer is revealed, such as you have endometriosis, ultimately you will end up down the same road leading towards IVF. 

He also said if we were not ready for IVF we can peruse more IUI's or the laproscopy. His professional opinion is to move onto the IVF, but he isn't going to pressure us into it if we aren't ready for it. 

He also put it like this for us- Say he has 100 patients that present just like my husband and I. Some issues with egg production, but good sperm counts and healthy relatively young couples that respond well to medication. Those 100 patients all start with 3 Clomid or Femera IUI cycles. Out of those 100 patients 50 normally end up pregnant by the end of the 3 IUI's. 

So now you have 50 patients left not pregnant and those 50 move onto 3 injectable medicated IUI cycles.At the end of those 3 cycles of those 50 patients 25 more end up pregnant. 

Now you have 25 patients out of the original 100 patients who are not pregnant. Those 25 patients move onto IVF. Of those 25 patients 63% end up pregnant after the fresh IVF cycle. Since I suck at math lets just say around 10 patients of the original 100 are now left not pregnant. 

Now those 10 patients move onto a frozen transfer and 30% more end up pregnant. Basically yes our luck is pretty craptastic these days, but the odds of us being one of the 3 people or so out of 100 original patients that don't end up pregnant are very very low. 

So what about getting a second opinion? There are additional issues with this that Rob and I are faced with. The main issue is that the next closest clinic that I would feel comfortable with would mean an hour farther drive. This would disrupt my work schedule even more and would not be feasible without multiple schedule changes. The other issue that neither of us want to deal with is redoing all of our testing and starting back at one. We want a baby… like yesterday like 3 years ago..

Rob and I haven't come to a definite decision on this just yet. I think we are both pretty confident that IVF with our current clinic is a great option and the numbers really are in our favor. We plan to think about it and pray about it as well. 

My IVF coordinator should be calling me sometime this week to start talking about financial and insurance coverage as well as where/when we start. I'm thinking we will be ringing in the New Year with our first IVF cycle. I can't believe I just wrote "My IVF Coordinator". If you would have asked me 3 years ago about an IVF coordinator my head may have detached from my head and  spun around in circles. I never thought we would be here. 

But, here we are. Faced with decisions that we never thought we would be faced with. Ultimately we have amazing insurance coverage right now. We have no idea what 2014 will bring us. What I mean by that is we still may be moving. We still maybe changing our jobs and thus changing our insurance. Here we are with coverage that so many people do not have and I think ultimately that helps us move forward comfortably in our decision. 

My IVF coordinator will be in contact with my insurance. IVF cycles are covered for 4 cycles lifetime. Cryopreservation of our embryo's is not covered and so we will have to pay that out of pocket up front. We were quoted with a $700 fee- give or take. All in all that is amazing and I know so many of you are not that lucky. I wish that everyone had the coverage that we do. I wish I could share it with you all. If we didn't have this coverage right now this wouldn't be an option without pulling money from one of our retirement funds or going into debt with loans. Not that we wouldn't do that, just that having the coverage helps us with our decision. 

Dr. S recommended that if my insurance will cover it that half of my follicles go through ICSI. Basically inject the sperm into the follicle to insure that they become embryo's. He feels I will respond very well to the medications and that the ICSI will cover all basis if Rob's sperm don't meet my eggs during conventional IVF, rather than finding this out at the time of embryo transfer. My insurance should also cover this as well. 

We are still on a break. I am not taking any medications other than vitamins right now. I am already down almost 10lbs in a weeks. Primarily water weight from the bloat, but I don't care its still 10lbs. I am hoping for an additional 10lbs before we move forward with anything. 

We are going to finally tell Rob's parents what we are going through. The thought behind this is that we will need positive support from all directions. My parents are pretty much already in the know, but I also plan on telling them about IVF and getting their take on it too. 

In real life I don't think we will be sharing the news. At least not on any public forum such as FaceBook. That is unless you read my blog. Then if you could respect our wishes to not share our news please until we are ready to share it ourselves. 

So the next thing to happen is for my nurse coordinator to contact me to set up a second consultation. This is where we will get more in depth about our specific treatment plan and have a meeting with our IVF team. We will also be able to ask any questions we have, so if anyone has any constructive questions that you think we should ask please let me know. 

This is a major choice. I don't know if this is the right choice. I still need some time to process what I am feeling. But, after talking with my husband this is our choice. We still have a lot of hurdles before this is definite, but it looks like we are moving towards IVF and hopefully towards our baby… a baby we want so very badly.