A New Beginning

| June 8, 2016 |

Today is our first appointment seeing a new specialist (IN LOUISVILLE) at The Kentucky Fertility Institute. We are both very nervous, but excited. The fact that we only have to drive 30 minutes to get there is already a stress reliever. Our appointment was later in the afternoon, so we both left work early. We were expecting a pretty lengthy appointment since we had already received treatment else where. There was a lot of history to go over. I didn't care how long we had to be there, though. We just wanted to do whatever it took to get some answers!

Their office was decorated very modern, yet elegantly beautiful. The staff was extremely friendly and welcoming. Bud and I had to fill out some personal information first before we met with the doctor. That took us about 15 minutes and then the doctor came out to the waiting room, introduced herself to us and walked us back to her office. It was very personable, which goes a long way, I think.

After we got comfortable in her office, she asked us if we had nicknames we preferred to go by instead so she could start calling us by those names right away. Again, very personable, which was good because everyone calls us Lissa and Bud. We rarely go by our real names, Elisabeth and James. Then we began going over past records from the previous specialist and my Gyno. This process was not just blown through either. She didn't rush through anything, stopped and let us ask as many questions as possible, while also asking us questions. There were even times when she stopped and thoroughly explained a certain comment one of my previous doctors made in my records, or went into more detail about test I had done in ways that were not previously explained to me before. Everything was making a lot more sense to us. We were being talked to like we were people and with empathy.

We immediately felt very comfortable there and with this doctor! You definitely did not get the feeling you were "just another patient" there. I was so glad that we made the decision to look into other doctors. I could tell Bud was feeling the same! He was talking more and asking questions. Everything was going smoothly so far!

Finally we made it to point of discussing the five IUI procedures we did. She was shocked that we had done it that many times. When I asked why, she started giving us statistics and percentages when you do something like that, that many times. Especially doing them back to back like I was. After about the second or third failed time, you have about a 5% chance of it working after that. Our jaws both dropped! That was one thing we were missing from the other specialist...He was always so short, so vague with us. He never gave us percentages like that, as many times as we did the IUI. Saying that, the success at the practice in Cincinnati was obvious and it was always apparent that they had plenty of success with these procedures, however, Bud and I personally never felt at home there. We felt that if they would have explained these scenarios with us more in depth, we could have starting making changes then and not wasted anymore time and money on something that we did not have a strong chance at working.

She then starting asking us if we had these certain tests/ultrasounds done because she was not seeing notes about them in my records. Surprisingly, they were also tests/ultrasounds we had never heard of. This is shocking to her because they were steps she would have already taken with us. While I was happy she was bringing these things to light for us, I was also frustrated at the same time. Again, why was none of this discussed with us before? We even asked them several times if there were other things we could be doing to find out more or to increases of chances, anything! Very frustrating!

After about an hour of talking in her office, she came to the conclusion that my condition would fall under, UNEXPLAINED!

Great! No one knows what is wrong with me!

She then explained, this was definitely not worse case scenario, it just may take a little more work to resolve. In her opinion, she definitely did not want to put us through any more IUI procedures, which I was thankful for. However, she believed the best option for us at this point was IVF (Invitro Fertilization).

While part of me was expecting to hear this news, it still hit me like a ton of bricks. It was hard to wrap my brain around the realization that IVF was now the best option for me to be able to conceive moving forward. It was definitely a hard pill to swallow and I even teared up a little when she said it, but it is what it is. There is nothing Bud or myself can do to change this!

The doctor then went over the process of doing IVF, the costs (YIKES) and success rates. She strongly felt we would be successful with this treatment but wanted us to be able to talk it over and think about it before making a decision right then and there. I knew I could handle all the medications and injections again, our main concern now was...

HOW ARE WE GOING TO PAY FOR THIS? IVF treatment typically cost anywhere from $17,000 - $23,000. And if you think insurance is going to help you out with any of that, you're sadly mistaken! Not even a penny! I'd say we absolutely have to talk it over first. If it wouldn't have been so expensive, we would have said YES right then and there, but we had to figure out if we really could do this. We had forked out so much money up front already, I just did not know how we were going to be able to come up with this much money up front.

Oh my gosh, we are going to have to save for a couple years before we can do it, was my first thought. We were already years behind on our dreams, so that thought was depressing.

Anyway, after we were finished talking with the doctor, she took us to have some tests done. Not just on me either, but Bud as well. They ended up doing quite a few tests on us to rule out as much as they could. I never got the chicken pox when I was a kid, so they had to check and see if my last vaccine was still in my system as well. If it was not, I would have to go get the vaccine again before we started any IVF treatment.

It was going to take a few days to get the results back from all the blood work, so she told us to do some research, think it over and when she calls us with the bloodwork results, we could let her know then if we wanted to proceed with IVF. I did love how we were not pressured into making a decision so soon, but we also knew this option was really all we had at this point in time. That big chunk of money was the only thing that was holding us back. Ugh!

On our drive home, we talked about how much we loved it there and loved the doctor! We were both in a bit of shock, however, with the situation we were in. Bud asked me if I was truly okay with doing this type of treatment, knowing how strenuous it would be. It was obviously not something I WANTED to have to do, but was willing to do it no doubt if it meant we could have a family together. The only thing still was that we were at a loss on how we were going to pay for it.

We had a few days to weigh out our options, so we got right on it. Did our research and came up with a couple options we could try working out to be able to do this treatment. We did not want to have to delay our process even more and not be able to do this for a while. I wanted this struggle to be over with as soon as possible...if possible! It is kind of sad that you have to pay this much money to have a baby. Then again, in our case, after all we have done so far, it would be even more sad if we chose to not have a baby because of the money issue. We were willing to do whatever it took...so we were all in.

When the doctor called a few days later with both of our blood test results, which were all normal, I told her we wanted to do IVF. She was immediately excited for us and went through the steps I needed to take first before starting the actual process. I definitely need to get the vaccine for the chicken pox again. This vaccine was a 2 month process, too, and you cannot get pregnant until about a month AFTER you have your second shot of the vaccine. Awesome!

She also wanted me to come in once I got the vaccine to have a couple ultrasounds done. Again, she was surprised I had not had these ultrasounds done before, so she wanted to do them before ordering any medications for IVF. I was glad she was being so cautious.

We went in for these ultrasounds at the end of July. Bud came with me, thank goodness. The doctor had told us it would be a long appointment for us because she wanted to do two different types of ultrasounds, with a break in between so I could fill my bladder. Then we would go over IVF information packets. I was a little nervous going in because I did not know much about these ultrasounds she was wanting to do, but once we got in there they explained everything we would be doing and what she was looking for.

The first one was the only one I vividly remember because it did not go so well. The second one we did was fine and everything looked normal.

The first one was a little similar to that damn x-ray I had done, but not nearly as painful. They did have to insert a small balloon and inject water in it to get a good view of what was in the uterus. Everything was looking normal at first, until she found something that was not so normal....

http://kentuckyfertility.com/