Hurry Up and Wait

I was a nerd in high school.

I’m on the top left

Actually, I’m still a nerd, but that’s totally not the point. That picture up there is my senior year of high school colorguard. Luckily, we were not required to wear those hideous uniforms all 4 years, but wore them for “senior day” and performed part of our freshman halftime show. We nicknamed them the smurf suits if I remember correctly. (They were this weird pants suit with a half skirt that we often held over our heads as a ridiculous semi-cape) We were a competition band and I loved it (nerd). Marching band consisted of a lot of “hurry up and wait” i.e. hurry the heck up and make sure you are totally ready, but we aren’t actually performing for 2 more hours, so then you have to wait.

This is what infertility is starting to feel like.

Who am I kidding? Starting to is the understatement of the decade. I’ve been “ready” forever, but somehow it feels as though I’m never done waiting. For the next RE appointment,for the next time to ovulate, for the next time to count down the days hoping but trying not to hope too hard so you won’t be too disappointed when you find out you have to keep waiting.

One of the things I’ve sort of “prided” myself on has been my ability to maintain somewhat of a sense of humor through all of this madness. I’m finding it harder to keep in touch with recently. I felt positive about news of our tax refund and its’ ability to help us finance this IVF, but it appears that we have hit yet another financial roadblock. I know I’ve mentioned previously my tendency to have “catastrophe brain”, and it seems to be working on overdrive.

What doesn’t make sense to me is the fact that it was *my* decision and *I* decided to wait.

Welcome to the Wide World of Ridiculous Infertility Emotions, starring: me, directed by: my crazy emotional brain.

Act One/Scene One:

Yes I understand emotionally, financially and logically the benefit of waiting

Act One/Scene Two:

I’m annoyed, impatient, bitter and jealous and I don’t want to wait anymore.

Act Two/Scene One:

It’s not a big deal

Act Two/Scene Two:

It is a big deal.

rinse/repeat

The End

No autographs, please.

Also, I am officially diagnosing myself with Infertility Induced Bipolar Disorder. (IIPD)

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.

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.