Tidbits and February ICLW

It’s been interesting around here the last few days.

Bryan was making dinner on Sunday while I played Super Paper Mario on the Wii. We had nothing planned but a nice relaxing evening.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t in the cards.

Suddenly, I hear a “WHOOSH”, and flames are shooting out of the pan in the kitchen. I, not realizing its a grease fire, don’t honestly think much of it, figuring he’ll throw some water on it and it’ll be done. He, knowing it IS a grease fire, picks the pan up in attempt to avoid burning the house down and directs it towards the sink. Grease is shooting out of the pan. He throws the pan into the sink and I, still not knowing its a grease fire, turns the water on.

Oops.

It re-lit, but luckily there was a wet washcloth in the sink so I covered it with that and it went out no problem.

Bryan on the other hand, was not so lucky. The shooting grease had made a few direct hits to his face and arm, meaning a trip to the ER was in order.

I’m speeding to the VA hospital with my emergency blinkers on. I just KNOW I’m going to get pulled over, but Bryan assures me it is fine, the cop will just escort us to the hospital. We are ALMOST there and I get pulled over. The cop takes my license and offers to escort us. We get to the hospital and Bryan runs in. I meet up with the cop and he hands me back my license…..and a speeding ticket.

@$$hole.

Bryan is ok. Hurting, but ok. He has second degree burns on his cheek, lips and upper arm. He’s been hanging out at home on painkillers. So I apologize if I haven’t been commenting much recently…..which leads me to:

February ICLW

An update for those of you are are new stopping by: In January we had decided to move forward with an IVF next cycle with a hopeful transfer mid-April. Then, Bryan’s VA endocrinologist  decides to add another hormone shot, swearing this will help us get pregnant naturally (we have mild “female factor” and more severe “male factor” – only enough sperm at last count for IVF). After much thought and now with this recent incident, we are probably going to put the IVF off until late spring/early summer. His next SA is April 1.

Finally, though it’s been posted on numerous other blogs, I wanted to add my support to Mo, who, after suffering 3 miscarriages, made it to 23 weeks and her water broke. At last update they were inducing her, and things aren’t looking good. I was really only a lurker of her blog and not nearly as close to her as some others, but my heart absolutely aches for her. Please send her, her husband, and her baby thoughts and prayers.

I can’t even begin to imagine.

To anyone who has suffered a loss or situation like this……I wish there were something I could do or say.

Show me a Sign

I think we all look for signs.

That’s not what I meant (pinterest.com)

I think regardless of religious beliefs, when we are faced with a tough decision or a fork in the road, we look for signs on which direction to choose. Do I turn left, or right? Do I go back to school at 35 and change careers, or stay where I am? Do I buy a house or keep renting? Do I take job A or job B? At some point you prayed or otherwise asked the universe for a sign.

That’s not quite it either (pinterest.com)

A week has gone by since Bryan dropped his “my endo thinks this is going to work” bomb. This decision is proving more difficult to make than how to pay for the IVF, because at least the financial part could be figured out with a plan. Part of my brain screams why NOT try to see if you can save the money and get pregnant naturally? And part of my brain (the negative, though I like to refer to it as realistic) screams stick with the original plan because statistically your chances aren’t great and IVF gives you the best possible chance.

Sigh.

I’m not going to lie, I’m not typically a big pray-er (i.e. the act of praying, not to be confused with prayer), but my issues lately have been the opposite of concrete and logical (and impossible to solve with a spreadsheet) and more along the lines of flipping a coin or playing rock, paper, scissors. I’m having to do things like trust my instincts, have faith, and believe in things I can’t necessarily prove. (HA!) It’s messing with my usual order of things and it’s messing with my plans.

I mentioned this in my Valentines post briefly, so if you’ve read it already, sorry but you get to read it again (the option of skipping ahead is also feasible). Bryan cooked dinner for me and we had planned to eat outside on the patio and enjoy the nice weather. We don’t make a habit of praying at meals.  We talk about finding a church but continue to sleep in on Sunday mornings (well, he sleeps, I run). Our efforts have been lackluster. But for whatever reason Bryan starts praying before we eat. When he’s finished, I throw in my own “please help guide me in this decision” (he’s left it up to me). Bryan cheesily goes “send us a sign!”. I laugh at him, thinking I’m pretty sure that’s not the way it works. I get up to get salt and come back out. Not two seconds later, it starts to rain.

Ever since then I’ve been trying to figure out if that was some sort of sign. I’ve admittedly googled “rain and fertility” and “rain and signs from God” and have kind of fallen short. Some sites say rain is a sign of fertility. But I’m still not sure what that would mean in terms of our situation. Does that mean we are becoming fertile on our own? Or that IVF will increase fertility? Part of the problem with “signs” is that you can find ones for almost every situation and twist them to what you want them to mean. I’m trying to not do that. Heck, it simply could have meant “the earth is thirsty”, or “maybe you should drink more water”, or “you might want to go inside and eat instead”.

It could have meant nothing. Could be completely coincidental.

Truthfully, after the week has gone by I have the feeling more and more that I’m going to cave and agree to wait it out, with a time limit, and probably a relatively short one. A friend of mine asked me recently if I get a pang in my heart every time I see a pregnant woman.

I do.

That pang is what keeps me from making the commitment. Though logically I can explain to myself that it’s only for a couple more months and that it doesn’t mean IVF is off the table. Those extra couple months might actually put us in a better financial situation with hubby becoming self employed. And in fact, while doing the original research on the FSH, I found a study where it didn’t help sperm count, but DID result in a higher pregnancy rate for those pursuing IVF. Bryan’s next analysis on the FSH is scheduled for April 1 – about 6 weeks from now.

I have one more week to decide.

I still don’t know if that rain was a sign, but I think it was. I think it means something, I’m just not sure what. If I think about it, I remember connecting rain to fertility. And I found some evidence of the belief that rain is a sign of fertility. Maybe not on our own. Maybe the FSH will merely assist in the success of the IVF at a later date. I guess in a time of needing to trust my instincts, instead of researching and analyzing, I should go with my first feeling in response to the rain:

Rain is a sign of fertility. I feel like I’m being told to wait.

I’d be lying if I said that didn’t make me sad. At first, it broke my heart a little. I was starting to see pregnant women and NOT feel the pang, knowing we would be en route soon. Since this latest issue, it’s returned.

The logic part of me is screaming at me right now. The part that knows the statistics and the studies. The part that thinks about the 65% chance vs who knows what chance. I’m testing my read of my own instincts here, because logic won’t work. I suppose that in the grand scheme of things, evidence for or against that doesn’t matter. Googling for hours isn’t going to answer my questions of what the rain means. Researching IVF success rates isn’t going to make it work.

What matters is what the rain means to me.

I still have a week left, but I think I know what I’m going to decide.

I will probably keep looking out for signs

P1nt3r35t.com 

Slave for a (half) Day

In an attempt to save money, hubby and I agreed to keep this Valentine’s Day cheap.

I came home from work tonight to a box of chocolates (YUM), flowers, a bottle of wine, dinner cooked, and a clean house. (love – and all fairly inexpensive) One thing I love about Bryan is his willingness and ability to clean. Well, except for one thing:

This is how he puts the silverware away

I guess you can’t have everything.

We started to have dinner outside. We prayed. We said thank you for the food and our time together. And while I’ve been mulling and praying about it silently for the last several days, at the end I threw in some guidance to decide what our next step should be. Bryan asked for a sign. Almost immediately, it started to rain. Weird. Except I have NO idea what that might represent – other than rain.

Anyway, back to the gift:

Bryan loves to  play this game with me that I HATE. He makes stupid bets with me (I bet the mail is out there right now) and whoever loses owes the other x number of minutes of “slavery”.

The concept is cute. I hate it mostly because I hate to lose. And because I’m not always a very good sport when he cashes his time in.

So this year I made 4 “tickets”, each representing one hour of slavery and each with 4 hearts representing 15 minutes.

He wasted no time telling me I was not allowed to complain when he decided to use one.

Barely 5 minutes after I gave them to him, he went into the living room and started to make a list.

Oh boy.

Sorry the picture is kinda cruddy. It says 15 minutes brush Chance and give him a pill, 15 minutes trim the plant, 30 minutes shampoo upstairs carpet. Not bad, could be much worse, but there are still 3 hours left.

During dinner I can see the wheels in his head turning. At one point he asked “if you’re mad at me for something, am I allowed to use 15 minutes to send you to the corner?”

Perhaps I should have included rules.

All in all though Bryan loved it, and it didn’t cost me anything.

Except maybe some future dignity.

Sometimes Ignorance is Bliss

I thought I had it all figured out.

It took me months to really wrap my head around the IVF and accept the fact that the next large chunk of money was going to be put towards this. Not new floors. Not a vacation. Not to paying off my car.

It took me a couple of weeks to finally decide that I wanted to go for the multi-cycle plan, just in case. I made phone calls about financing. I talked it over with Bryan. A few days ago, I paid off the balance on my credit card so I could use it to pay for the cycles. (Amongst all options, it turns out this was the best one)

I felt better. Not wonderful, but better. Still nervous but mostly ready.

Then Bryan comes home from his appointment with the endocrinologist at the VA.

For those of you who didn’t know, he has been taking HCG shots 3x per week in attempt to stimulate sperm growth from the 0 sperm count he had several months ago. At this point, he’s hovering between 6-9 million. Not enough for natural conception or an IUI, but plenty for an IVF. What we don’t know is if the HCG actually helped produce the sperm, or if it was the result of natural recovery.

First, the endocrinologist apparently asked Bryan if I was pregnant yet. With 6 million sperm? Hardly. He wants to add FSH shots to the mix, supposedly to skyrocket his sperm count to within fertile limits (HAHA, I write WFL to mean within functional limits on my kiddo’s evaluations, but this one makes WFL mean something totally different). Bryan hands me this study when I got home a couple of days ago on the effectiveness of FSH on sperm growth and ability to conceive, claiming the endo told him we could reasonably expect to be pregnant “by April or May”.

He expected me to be excited, but mostly I just felt overwhelmed. I had a plan in place. I was starting the countdown to the start of my next cycle and day one of the process. I would be excited if I KNEW it would work, its never that simple:

1. In this study, the median time it took to conceive was 2.3 years. Bryan claims his endo believes that he is at the same place as these men were at the 2 year mark. I am not sure what the basis is for this – except I guess that he has some sperm now.
2. This type of treatment is only effective if Bryan was fertile before he started the shots. We don’t know if he was because he never had an SA prior to starting testosterone way back when, and have no way of knowing at this point.
3. In this study, only 50% were pregnant at the 10 month point. Maybe it could work but I don’t have the patience for 10+ months anymore.  Plus that’s only 50%.
4. His hormone levels are currently normal. The RE told us that with hormone levels that are normal, adding more of the same hormone probably won’t make a big difference. However, his levels WERE low before.
5. Our issues are not 100% male factor. With PCOS, albeit mild, and a blocked tube, there are my issues to consider also.
6. It appears that the best response to sperm production was in the 2^nd cycle of treatment. If I read correctly, one cycle = 6 months. So while the endo thinks we are a mere couple months away, statistics seem to show a longer period.

The thing that sticks in my head more than anything is, when Bryan told the endo I wanted to pursue IVF, his response was “that’s stupid”.

I’m glad I wasn’t there, because I would have wanted to poke him in the eye.

Truthfully, I have so far put much more weight on the words of the RE. However, Bryan had a point I couldn’t totally refute: why hadn’t he put me on the metformin earlier, and not just right before we had planned to pursue an IVF? He does get paid to do these procedures. I’m not saying I no longer trust my RE, but it was something to think about.

Now, 2 weeks before we are set to start, I am back to square one. While Bryan has said he will do whatever I want to do (which makes him wonderful but also no help at all), I know he would prefer to give the FSH a couple of months. His endo seems convinced we are a mere few months away from achieving pregnancy on our own. I am skeptical. But it now feels almost financially irresponsible to not give it a shot. Logically, I understand that waiting a couple more months wouldn’t be a big deal. I’m young enough, and plenty of people don’t even start trying till they are over 30. Emotionally, I’m not there. Emotionally, I am still waiting for the IVF.

I keep looking for signs or something on what to decide. I remember once feeling confident we would eventually conceive naturally. I keep wondering what if the endo is right? What if my original confidence was really right? I keep thinking about the period of time when I somewhat crazily paid 3 online baby psychics to tell me when I would get pregnant. One of them said April, and said she noticed no issues with Bryan, which to me implies a natural pregnancy. I can’t help but think, if we waited, could that be true? I found myself dreaming of vacations and new floors again.

I don’t want to fail to mention that I paid two others (yes, I know, don’t say it) who both predicted this past July, and were obviously both wrong.

Seriously? I’m partially basing a life decision on a woman to whom I paid $12 to make a prediction based on a picture because it might be some sort of sign??

Just institutionalize me now.

Pic Credit

Sometimes I think waiting it out a bit longer isn’t a big deal. But then I see a baby or someones pictures of their newborn and then it feels like much longer. On the other hand, when we discussed IVF at Christmas, the start of the process felt like an eternity away, and the time flew.

Sigh. I think I’ll go for a run now.

An Ode to Mush Brain

Today, while working with one of my kiddo’s, I asked him to name as many animals as he could think of.

Kid: tiger……elephant…….worm…..

Me: A worm is not an elephant

And 5…4…3…2….

I mean, a worm is not an animal.

Yeah.

I’m thankful for the Speech Conference next week. Usually after a few weeks with no long weekends, I start to feel kinda restless and burnt out and feel like I need a refresher so to speak, but since I’m saving my PTO for the IVF, I don’t really have any extra days to take. Unfortunately, the stress surrounding this whole IVF mess isn’t helping, thus leading me to what I am affectionately calling “mush brain”.

After I had finished working with above kiddo, I took him out to talk to his mom and discuss his progress for the day. I started with “he did well today, we worked on…..”

And I drew a complete blank.

pinterest, you are my favorite

Luckily this child was not a first-timer, because I probably would have scared them away to a Speech Therapist with a better functioning memory.

On the way home, I may or may not have driven a couple miles with my left turn signal on. (What? I was going to turn left eventually). I honestly am not sure at what point in the drive it was switched on, I just noticed it at a stop light. Where I was waiting to go straight. Also, I have totally made fun of my mother for that exact same thing, commenting that the car needed a “hey you left your signal on, stupid” buzzing noise.
Thank goodness there are no plans in the near future to leave me home alone where I might leave the oven on. (I don’t iron, so that won’t happen either)

You know how computers or MP3 players will display “memory full”? when you try to add that one extra file or song and there isn’t enough room? That is how my brain feels right now.

This is your brain.

This is your brain on mush.

as always, thank you pinterest

An Ode to Mush Brain

I’m staring into space

For an insane amount of time

Because I just can’t seem to think

Of any words that rhyme

I’ll turn my signal on right now

While my hand is free

I’m not gonna turn for awhile

But I’ll do it eventually

Having pizza tonight for dinner

In its circular baking tin

Yay! The timer’s beeping

But I forgot to put it IN (that’s what she said)

(yes, that actually just happened….and no, I did NOT do it on purpose)

Mama Said There’d Be Days Like This

I’ve gotten many comments recently about my positivity (is that a word? It is now) and frame of mind regarding this IVF.

I feel like a bit of a fake, because I’m not always that positive. In fact, things have taken a bit of an unanticipated dip in the emotions department. Initially, when we decided to go through with the IVF, I felt better, more at peace, and even a little excited to be pursuing what is going to be our best chance at achieving pregnancy. I didn’t anticipate what a pain in the @$$ it would be to not only pay for the procedure, but try to decide which method would be best. And I didn’t anticipate this sudden, somewhat paralyzing fear of it failing.

And by failing, I mean more heartache.

I’ve read lots of blogs over the last few months. There is so much heartache in infertility, and not just in the inability to get pregnant, but the procedures, the ups and downs while waiting to find out if it worked, finding out it didn’t work, and worst of all, finding out it DID work, only to miscarry later. That is the heartache I fear the most. And I’m not going to lie, knowing that I have to pay over the next several years for these procedures, whether they work or not, doesn’t help much. Like a constant reminder of what didn’t happen.

I have seen and heard about one too many (all are too many) losses or complications in the last several weeks, and it’s been messing with my head. While I still 100% think that not trying would ultimately be more costly than trying, I really didn’t anticipate all this fear going into it. I know when all is said and done that it’s just money. But I feel like I’m handing a little bit of my heart over with the credit card, leaving it in the hands of fertility doctors, nurses, financial advisors, and God. I’m hoping that this is like the walls I hit while training for a marathon, where I push through it even thought I don’t want to, because I know that it won’t last forever and will be worth it in the end.

Please let it be worth it in the end.

I Run as Fast as a……(5k)

A couple of days ago I was working on figurative language with one of my kiddos. In trying to explain the concept, I gave him an example to fill in the blank, to see if he understood.

I run as fast as a ……”barefooted jackrabbit running through the desert!”

Maybe he DOES get it.

I ran my first post marathon race today – the first annual Ashley Ridge Foxtrot 5k, chosen mostly because of its’ proximity to my house. I talked running buddy Lynnsey into running this one with me.

we are awesome

I was more excited to learn that not only did I get a card for a free chick fil a chicken sandwich in my race packet, but that we also got a free chicken biscuit after the race. *drool*AND, the chick fil a cow was there. (yes, I love chick fil a)

The race itself was ok. It was three laps around the high school, part of it off road and I found it a bit hard to keep my footing. For the first race it was decently organized, and while I wasn’t super thrilled with the lap idea, the chicken biscuit made it totally worth it.

this is why we run

And of course, we had to get a picture with the cow

I am a cool kid

I am a cool kid too

We are in our late twenties going on ten.

The winner of the race was TWELVE, finishing in 18 minutes and 29 seconds.

I think he’s the jackrabbit.

I’m not complaining though. I haven’t hit my goal mark yet, but I was the third female to finish, won first in my age group, and PR’d at 22:11ish. Plus I won a free burrito at Moe’s during the raffle.

Run+friend+chickfila+PR+medal+future free Moe’s burrito + WIN.

I may not be a jackrabbit, but I get a medal!

Up next: Gift of Life 5k on February 25

A Second Date with Bob

Bob and I, perhaps unfortunately, are going to become good friends.

The first time I met Bob, it was a year go, at our first visit to the fertility clinic. Feeling a little bitter,and slightly overwhelmed, I didn’t really welcome Bob’s quick advances on our first date, and so didn’t even bother to learn his name.  I mean, I’m not THAT easy.

Today I went in for a re-draw of my Day 3 labs, to check certain hormone levels on the 3rd day of my cycle. Apparently, I also needed another baseline ultrasound.

Enter Bob, the ultrasound wand.

While seated on the exam table, naked from the waist down, I waited for the nurse to perform the ultrasound. For those who are unfamiliar, I’m not referring to the kind of ultrasound you see on tv that goes over the stomach, I’m talking about the one that has a face to face with my girly parts. (internal ultrasound)People always talk about the dil.do cam, and while I vaguely recalled chuckling to Bryan a year ago that it did, in fact, really closely resemble one, I sat with Bob today, and decided I needed to make peace with his advances on our first date, because today was going to be the second of many.

The nurse entered, and out of slight nervousness I uttered “has anyone told you that thing looks like a dil.do?” (because I apparently thought I was the first person to ask such a witty question). She chuckled anyway and told me “yeah, we call him Bob”.

I should have gotten a picture with Bob.

He still didn’t even bother to introduce himself before making his advance*. Men. AND charged me a horribly high fee for his intrusion. Not even a cheap date.

Till we meet again, Bob. Next time, at least kiss me first………on second thought, nevermind.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*Apparently, everything looks ok. No activity on the ovaries, since its so early in the cycle. 15 follicles on one and 12 on the other. Uterus apparently looks good. No cysts.  At least Bob was able to tell me something productive. Not much else is going to be done until my next cycle. I’ve been taking the Metformin for a week no with no issues thus far. We’re still mulling over the financial aspect and I’m going to run in a couple 5 k’s in the mean time. One on Saturday!

 

 

I’m not Infertile, I’m Reproductively Challenged

A couple of weeks ago, I had to have a conversation I never thought I would have to have.

I had to tell my (male) boss about our infertility and plans to pursue IVF.

I realize that it’s really none of his business, and that legally I don’t have to say anything. That if I have enough PTO there is no reason I NEED to share this particular piece of information. But, in the same respect, I also know that I could have to take an hour or two, a whole day or a couple of days without much prior notice, and that losing my job because of recent weird absenteeism would not help our financial situation.

The one bonus I had is that he is a lone male in 2 offices full of women. Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapists tend to be women more often than men. But, as a male with two kids that I’m pretty sure they didn’t have issues conceiving, he probably had no idea what an IVF even was. (he didn’t)

I racked my brain for a couple of days after sending the message requesting to meet with him for a few minutes later that week on how I was going to introduce the topic.

• Hey boss – despite all of the rabbit sex my husband and I are having, we can’t seem to get pregnant, so I’m going to need an IVF
• Um, so you know when two people love each other very much? And they decide they want children? And then they do this thing so they can have children? That isn’t working for us
• So while we have the outer parts working effectively, we can’t seem to get the sperm to meet the egg and therefore, need to do an IVF
• Bryan and I can’t have kids naturally because I have PCOS and he doesn’t have enough sperm so we need an IVF

All of those options screamed TMI!. And truthfully, I went into the meeting having no idea how I was going to start the conversation about our sex life and ability to procreate. Talk about awkward.

Oddly, I sat down with him and blurted out, without thinking (which for me is usually a bad thing): Bryan and I are what I call “reproductively challenged”, and went on to explain that we were unable to have kids naturally and therefore would need to have the aid of science in order to be able to get pregnant. And that I’d need to take a few days of PTO. And that I wouldn’t be able to give much notice before taking the PTO. I even whipped out a handy calendar visual to explain how long it would take and when approximately I would need said days off.

Luckily, he was understanding, but as expected had no idea what an IVF was. Or how much one cost. When I told him, his jaw dropped.

Yeah, my thoughts exactly. And that’s for a 65% chance.

Since that conversation, I’ve decided I kinda like the term “reproductively challenged”. Infertile, literally meaning not fertile, does have a bit of a negative connotation. Not so negative that I’m going to contact my congressman and demand the term be changed to reproductively challenged in order to fight the discrimination of infertile people everywhere, but you know what I mean.  The “challenge” part in particular fits for me because of my competitive nature, and so I picture my PCOS ovaries with their multiple follicles attempting to produce one healthy egg, fighting over which one is going to grow its egg faster. The winner becomes the dominant queen follicle, reigning over all of ovary land, and the left side gets so angry at losing that it spits out a bunch of eggs and causes a tube blockage, rendering itself useless.

The right ovary and tube, celebrating its victory, merely laughs at the left side. Bryan’s sperm, thanks to too much testosterone (go figure), fight each other to the death on their way out, and so there are only a few healthy ones left at the end. Thus, making procreation challenging. And leaving a lonely queen egg.

Whoops, wrong Queen (pinterest.com)

In all seriousness though, most of the time a diagnosis of infertility doesn’t mean we CAN’T reproduce, obtain or sustain a pregnancy, just that we need help doing so. So the next person stuck in the weird awkward situation of explaining to a male boss why you’re going to need several days off of work with little notice you can stick your chest out a little and proudly say “I’m not infertile, I’m reproductively challenged!” Make sure to stomp your foot for good measure.

The competitive nature in me accepts that challenge. And plans to WIN.

Show Me the Money

I thought the hardest decision to make regarding IVF was the decision to do the actual procedure.

Wrong.

Turns out, that was the easy part. As I previously mentioned, our clinic offers 3 options for us out-of-pocketers:

1. Pay cash. Ha, Credit card. Who am I kidding?

2. Multi cycle discount (no refund)

3. Multi cycle refund program (no baby in 3 fresh and 3 frozen cycles = refund of 70% of your money)

I basically decided not to even worry about the refund program. Personally, I feel like this program is made simply to make money, and doubt that if I were to qualify, that it would be worth it for me. Why would I qualify if chances of it working before 3 fresh and 3 frozen cycles weren’t really good?

So that leaves us with option 1 and 2.

Bryan is leaning more towards pay out of pocket. I vascillate between OOP and going Multi cycle. A friend of mine who has been through this suggested a graph with all possible scenarios and what it would mean financially:

The cost of one out of pocket IVF+ICSI at our clinic is 11,848 + about 2,000 for meds. The first cycle would actually cost about 15k total because of pre IVF testing that needs to be added, and freezing sperm. The cost of a multi cycle (2 fresh, 2 frozen) is 21,450 + 2,000 per fresh cycle for meds. From what I understand, meds for frozen cycles are minimal, so I didn’t add anything for those.

Plusses are what we would pay extra, minuses are what we would save, based on choosing the multi cycle plan.

• Cycle                              Out of Pocket             Multi Cycle           Difference
  

• One Fresh cycle                      15, 000          23,450                 + 8,450
• Two Fresh cycles                   28,848            25,450                 – 3,398
• One Fresh/One Frozen          18,500           23,450               + 4,950
• One Fresh/Two Frozen         22,000            23,450               +1,450
• Two Fresh/One Frozen         32,348             25,450                – 6,998
• Two Fresh/Two Frozen         35,848            25,450               -10,498

(Sorry for the poor spacing, I couldn’t get it to format correctly. )

At the most extreme ends, basically if we paid for the multi-cycle and it worked the first time we’d be paying an extra 8,500 (or saving 8,500 if we paid cycle by cycle). If we needed 2 fresh and two frozen cycles and paid out of pocket, we’d be paying an extra 10,500.(or saving 10,500 with the multi-cycle). Its that second fresh cycle that’s really the kicker, and where the money really starts to make a difference.

Just for a comparison, for the price of 2 fresh and two frozen cycles, you can buy a Lexus.

I hate that there is no way to know how my body is going to respond. That there is just simply no way to KNOW which choice is the smarter one. It’s making my anxiety ridiculous, and the calmness I felt about deciding has been replaced with a desire for several glasses of wine. I need to decide, and be ok with the decision.

Rock paper scissors, anyone?