I had my follow up consult with the doctor on Monday. I fully expected for her to either tell me to do donor egg or give up altogether. She told me money being no object I should do at least another 2 rounds of ivf seeing as I'm "such a good responder"....What!!??...She said Gem, there's no rhyme or reason as to who gets pregnant...she can't predict. She said the embryos looked good and my lining was "beautiful".... Heard this phrase before from Dr. B. I told her I'd been expecting to go straight to donor and I was torn and that money is an object as I'm single and not rich though I would wish of course to be a millionaire. Ha ha..joke when nervous. Now this chick is one of the top fertility specialists in the country as well as a top cancer specialist. She was actually recently on the Katie Couric show and this is what she said: "You see all of this? All of this around me (she gestures at all of her awards and there are many).....my job ...everything I worked for? This is nothing compared to my children. Nothing at all. The best thing I've ever done in my life, the greatest thing is my children. You have to keep trying if you really want them. It's something you'll never regret". I tell her how I feel that I will regret it if I don't keep trying. I tell her I think I've made up my mind to go with donor eggs. She says that that's a rational decision and that the statistics are much higher. We talk a bit more and we end the meeting. It lasted all of 10 minutes. As I'm walking to the elevator I realize that now I haven't made up my mind. Now I'm not sure that I want to go with donor eggs. Now what the fuck do I do? I think it would've been easier she just told me to go with the donor, I wouldn't have so many questions in my mind. Now I'm just confused. If it wasn't that it would cost me so much money to try my own eggs and then donor eggs if that doesn't work out I'd be more willing to just risk it but altogether if I do two more cycles of the IVF and it doesn't work and I decide to go with donor eggs I would end up spending more than $40,000.... money that I don't have. It would mean I would have to take out mega loans, borrow against my pension, against my retirement account, tap myself out completely financially in terms of savings, and be completely freaked out by it all. I have a significant mortgage as well as a significant amount in student loans, and I also pay a large common charge for my condo complex. If it wasn't for all those factors and I just rented a place I didn't have the student loans perhaps I wouldn't be so worried. By the same token, I know that I make decent money and that my job is relatively secure. What do I do? I don't know. I really don't. J tells me do one more, R doesn't say either way but she's married and I get the impression she's okay financially, Kay doesn't say either way either, Jo-Ann says Gem just do it. I'm torn.
I want to go with donor because I'm tired, tired of all the physical shit ivf puts you through and I believe I mentioned the illness I have that I don't talk about...it makes it worse and it hurts. I know though that there will be a part of me angry that I wasn't resilient enough....tough enough to hang in though the rational part of me says, "it's been 3 IUI's and 4 ivf how much more shit can you take"? On top of this my meds from after cancer were changed and I'm having heart palpitations....not a good time to decide but I'm not getting any younger. Fuck and ugh..
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Friday, March 22, 2013
Another one down
R got her results yesterday....negative. Not sure if I mentioned that one of her frozen embryo had died the day of transfer and so they had to take her last one for transfer. She's got none left that means.
Monday I go in to see the doctor for the consult.....they had initially told me it would be a phone conference but they called to say they wanted to see me in person. If I'm repeating myself, my apologies, I'm all over the place really.
I'm as usual scared to see what the doctor is going to say. I guess my fear is that she's going to say I'm too heavy, or she doesn't want to work with me, or she feels like it's impossible for me to actually get pregnant. J mentioned to me this week also feeling like she is fighting a losing battle and feeling like she wants to give up. She also said she doesn't think she wants to try donor eggs and mentioned going straight to adoption. I can't imagine ever just giving up on myself that easily....Its hard not to judge when you've gone though 2 years of torture....She's only gone through two cycles and her insurance covers six more cycles..... I just feel like that's a cop-out.. but what do I know and who the fuck am I to judge....(going to hell I tell you). Maybe she's on the fence about getting pregnant, or even scared, and I understand that; she is single like me and I can't tell you how hard it is to go through this alone so I really need to just shut up already. There have been so many times where I question if I really want to do this or not. Even though there's a part of me that can't imagine my life without children, there's another part of me that is so fearful of doing this. You think about what if something were to happen to you and the child ends up with no parents? I think about how little family I really have around me and how none of my siblings have children and how in turn, that would affect my child's future. Perhaps I'm overthinking everything but I'm a planner by nature and I never want my child to feel all alone in the world. Do I have control issues or what? I guess I can't plan everything in life and that should've been obvious to me by now.....a hard lessons to learn for me it would seem.
Well onward....We will see what the doctor says on Monday and really just how I feel about whatever she has to say. I have no doubt that I will use, or try to use, donor eggs. No matter the cost I feel I have to at least give myself that one opportunity though it does scare me financially and otherwise.
Monday I go in to see the doctor for the consult.....they had initially told me it would be a phone conference but they called to say they wanted to see me in person. If I'm repeating myself, my apologies, I'm all over the place really.
I'm as usual scared to see what the doctor is going to say. I guess my fear is that she's going to say I'm too heavy, or she doesn't want to work with me, or she feels like it's impossible for me to actually get pregnant. J mentioned to me this week also feeling like she is fighting a losing battle and feeling like she wants to give up. She also said she doesn't think she wants to try donor eggs and mentioned going straight to adoption. I can't imagine ever just giving up on myself that easily....Its hard not to judge when you've gone though 2 years of torture....She's only gone through two cycles and her insurance covers six more cycles..... I just feel like that's a cop-out.. but what do I know and who the fuck am I to judge....(going to hell I tell you). Maybe she's on the fence about getting pregnant, or even scared, and I understand that; she is single like me and I can't tell you how hard it is to go through this alone so I really need to just shut up already. There have been so many times where I question if I really want to do this or not. Even though there's a part of me that can't imagine my life without children, there's another part of me that is so fearful of doing this. You think about what if something were to happen to you and the child ends up with no parents? I think about how little family I really have around me and how none of my siblings have children and how in turn, that would affect my child's future. Perhaps I'm overthinking everything but I'm a planner by nature and I never want my child to feel all alone in the world. Do I have control issues or what? I guess I can't plan everything in life and that should've been obvious to me by now.....a hard lessons to learn for me it would seem.
Well onward....We will see what the doctor says on Monday and really just how I feel about whatever she has to say. I have no doubt that I will use, or try to use, donor eggs. No matter the cost I feel I have to at least give myself that one opportunity though it does scare me financially and otherwise.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Relief
Did you ever get to one of those points in your life where you just can't find a way to make yourself feel normal again; like you're crawling out of your skin and you don't know what to do to temper that feeling? I'm in between wanting to smoke, wanting to drink, wanting to drug myself just a little, and wanting to just slip into some sort of peaceful coma...just for a little while..just to rest my brain and my heart for a little bit. None of those things would help me...maybe combining a few of them but that could also kill me and I don't want to die but I do want to rest; just to be able to get rid of this ache in my chest from too much of everything in life. It's really just too much sometimes..too much for one person really. I wonder if it's different if you're going through life with someone else...a partner sharing your grief..I don't know. I imagine it has to be in some ways.
I had a phone call today from my Godmother's neighbor Javier. He and his wife babysat for my Tess one day as they have a tiny dog too. They are also having fertility problems. His wife can get pregnant but she miscarries. She actually got to 6 months along one time and miscarried in her bathroom, the babies little feet dangling from between her legs. Torturous. We have from time to time touched base though the wife is super shy, super sweet but super shy. He's older and I'm guessing has a drinking problem...he has a drinking problem. Anyhow he called me out of the blue to ask me how the fertility shit is going so we talked for a bit. It was good to talk to someone about it who wasn't directly going through it but knew the struggle. I at times wish I could really just freely talk to someone about what it is I feel...not just the process but the actual emotions going through my soul and body. It's not good. It's really not good. My edges seem to be fraying this time around. The clinic told me to call the doctor's assistant to set up a phone consult but I haven't done it yet. I'm building up the...what?..courage? I'm not sure what I'm building up but maybe it's just getting my bearings. Just putting this all together..my brain together.
I'm having trouble at work...getting the work done. My job requires thinking. Lots of fucking thinking. Thinking, planning, strategizing. None of these things are really my forte...I'm more of a talking kind of person...more social service type shit. Anyhow, I'm struggling. Struggling not to just say to people, leave me the fuck alone! My brain is shit! But of course I can't say that. I have to go through the shit..the meetings, the bullshit, the staff crap, and of course my asshole director who is the type of person who asks you a question but already has the answer she wants...you know...the type of person who thinks her brain cells are the best...good..fuck it..fuck you lady...don't ask me and make me think just to tell me that's not the answer..answer your own fucking question...just tell me where I'm going and what to say.
I'm drowning really. My father is really to shit. Really to shit. I saw him last night and I could have cried with how fucked up he is. Just a shell of what he once was.
On top of that I finally looked at all my credit card statements, savings and all that shit and it's not good. I have about 10K in credit cards, and not as much as I thought in savings. I get my tax money back and I'm hoping that's at least 4k and that's it. It's exasperating to think about paying the $20+K for the donor egg thing though at least with this idea, the donor egg idea, I've made peace. I've done all I can, all within my power to do my own eggs...it's just not happening. So for now I'm on a strict no spend budget and we'll see what happens. I figure I'm going to borrow the $10k from my pension plan (which they make you pay back in 5 years), 5K from savings, and I'll either borrow the rest from my other retirement account (I set this up separately) or put it on my credit card. That's that. I'll be fucked for 5 years as that's how long I have to go to pay back my master's degree as well and then it'll be a little relief.
I hadn't written because in truth I didn't want to speak. I think I stayed silent for two solid days...what's to say really except that it felt like it feels for everybody else; like my heart was literally breaking apart in two; a feeling I expected and was preparing myself for. It hurt any ol' way. How do you prepare yourself for agony? I don't know. I did my best and lived to tell the tale so I guess that's success. J from the 3 girls I met at the clinic was super cool about it and supportive, R tried to be but she's younger. She had her transfer yesterday. I believe I mentioned she produced 2 good blasts that she planned on transferrring individually as she wanted to avoid twins. One of them unfortunately didn't survive the thaw and they had to ask her if it was okay to defrost the other...so it's inside and she's waiting to see what happens. I hope it takes for her sake. The pain is too much really...too much for even the biggest asshole in the world to deserve and she really is a nice girl.
Anyhow, that's it for me. Had to put this all out there so it didn't swallow me whole...so I could breathe just a little. Thank you.
I had a phone call today from my Godmother's neighbor Javier. He and his wife babysat for my Tess one day as they have a tiny dog too. They are also having fertility problems. His wife can get pregnant but she miscarries. She actually got to 6 months along one time and miscarried in her bathroom, the babies little feet dangling from between her legs. Torturous. We have from time to time touched base though the wife is super shy, super sweet but super shy. He's older and I'm guessing has a drinking problem...he has a drinking problem. Anyhow he called me out of the blue to ask me how the fertility shit is going so we talked for a bit. It was good to talk to someone about it who wasn't directly going through it but knew the struggle. I at times wish I could really just freely talk to someone about what it is I feel...not just the process but the actual emotions going through my soul and body. It's not good. It's really not good. My edges seem to be fraying this time around. The clinic told me to call the doctor's assistant to set up a phone consult but I haven't done it yet. I'm building up the...what?..courage? I'm not sure what I'm building up but maybe it's just getting my bearings. Just putting this all together..my brain together.
I'm having trouble at work...getting the work done. My job requires thinking. Lots of fucking thinking. Thinking, planning, strategizing. None of these things are really my forte...I'm more of a talking kind of person...more social service type shit. Anyhow, I'm struggling. Struggling not to just say to people, leave me the fuck alone! My brain is shit! But of course I can't say that. I have to go through the shit..the meetings, the bullshit, the staff crap, and of course my asshole director who is the type of person who asks you a question but already has the answer she wants...you know...the type of person who thinks her brain cells are the best...good..fuck it..fuck you lady...don't ask me and make me think just to tell me that's not the answer..answer your own fucking question...just tell me where I'm going and what to say.
I'm drowning really. My father is really to shit. Really to shit. I saw him last night and I could have cried with how fucked up he is. Just a shell of what he once was.
On top of that I finally looked at all my credit card statements, savings and all that shit and it's not good. I have about 10K in credit cards, and not as much as I thought in savings. I get my tax money back and I'm hoping that's at least 4k and that's it. It's exasperating to think about paying the $20+K for the donor egg thing though at least with this idea, the donor egg idea, I've made peace. I've done all I can, all within my power to do my own eggs...it's just not happening. So for now I'm on a strict no spend budget and we'll see what happens. I figure I'm going to borrow the $10k from my pension plan (which they make you pay back in 5 years), 5K from savings, and I'll either borrow the rest from my other retirement account (I set this up separately) or put it on my credit card. That's that. I'll be fucked for 5 years as that's how long I have to go to pay back my master's degree as well and then it'll be a little relief.
I hadn't written because in truth I didn't want to speak. I think I stayed silent for two solid days...what's to say really except that it felt like it feels for everybody else; like my heart was literally breaking apart in two; a feeling I expected and was preparing myself for. It hurt any ol' way. How do you prepare yourself for agony? I don't know. I did my best and lived to tell the tale so I guess that's success. J from the 3 girls I met at the clinic was super cool about it and supportive, R tried to be but she's younger. She had her transfer yesterday. I believe I mentioned she produced 2 good blasts that she planned on transferrring individually as she wanted to avoid twins. One of them unfortunately didn't survive the thaw and they had to ask her if it was okay to defrost the other...so it's inside and she's waiting to see what happens. I hope it takes for her sake. The pain is too much really...too much for even the biggest asshole in the world to deserve and she really is a nice girl.
Anyhow, that's it for me. Had to put this all out there so it didn't swallow me whole...so I could breathe just a little. Thank you.
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
1 positive....but none for you
We finally got a positive from one of the girls in the group....the oldest one of us...wouldn't you know....On her first try. She produced one egg in total...count them....one. They say you just need one good one. The email hit me like a ton of bricks...literally made me gasp. I did what I promised I wouldn't..ran to the bathroom to test.....Negative....big fat bupkis for me. I'm okay...A little bit of pain in my stomach...like the kind you get when you find out the boy you love is marrying somebody else but not as intense...the same though...hits you in the same spot.
I don't want to cry at this clinic tomorrow. It's not the homey caring place like my old clinic where everyone is rooting for you. This is very upper east side...designer handbag...nobody knows your name kind of place. Can't lose it there. I feel like tears are right there but really I've done all this shit before; this mass of emotions. What's the point really?
Right before all this at about 10:30pm my dads aide called...he won't settle down. I talk to him and he's all kinds of confused...."come get me" I hear him yell. I talk to him...calm him for a sec...it doesn't last but a few seconds.
Sometimes I wonder what this life is all about.
I don't want to cry at this clinic tomorrow. It's not the homey caring place like my old clinic where everyone is rooting for you. This is very upper east side...designer handbag...nobody knows your name kind of place. Can't lose it there. I feel like tears are right there but really I've done all this shit before; this mass of emotions. What's the point really?
Right before all this at about 10:30pm my dads aide called...he won't settle down. I talk to him and he's all kinds of confused...."come get me" I hear him yell. I talk to him...calm him for a sec...it doesn't last but a few seconds.
Sometimes I wonder what this life is all about.
Monday, March 4, 2013
1st (technically) HPT
I took a home pregnancy test this morning. I just couldn't wait all day to find out....It was negative..*sigh*. Today is day 6 post 5 day embryo transfer (a/k/a: 6p5det). Kay tells me it's still early and maybe it is but I just can't help but think negatively...I think it's negative for real. A part of me is having a hard time believing that and the other part of me accepts it. I cried for a minute this morning...unexpectedly cried while getting ready for work...just a little for myself. I feel so tired...just so tired of all this crazy running around just to get from point A to point B. Nothing, nothing in my life has been easy really and maybe that's true for everyone. It's just me and Tess here...just me and Tess for too long. I'd love to meet someone, love to lose some of this poundage, love to have a baby...all these things that seem to just eventually trickle into people's life with minimal effort...or so it seems. Doesn't really matter. It really doesn't in the grand scheme of things. I would just like something, someone to share my life with ...to make it worth the struggle. Maybe that's too friggin much. It's weird how little grief I feel really. I'm sad but more than that I feel tired...beat down and tired.
I came home to Tess happy and wagging her tail with her ass in the air like she does...she's so funny...she really is just a precious little thing and I'm grateful for her because she makes me happy. I'm grateful.
Maybe this is it....maybe this is it for me. I'm not sure. I thought to myself this morning...even if there was money left on my insurance..and there isn't a dime left...I don't think I could do it again...it's too much...not just the running around...the shots...those mother effin shots...too many and the progesterone with the huge needle in the ass is beyond too much every day....I must have given myself hundreds of injections and still nothing. Crazy. I must be crazy.
I came home to Tess happy and wagging her tail with her ass in the air like she does...she's so funny...she really is just a precious little thing and I'm grateful for her because she makes me happy. I'm grateful.
Maybe this is it....maybe this is it for me. I'm not sure. I thought to myself this morning...even if there was money left on my insurance..and there isn't a dime left...I don't think I could do it again...it's too much...not just the running around...the shots...those mother effin shots...too many and the progesterone with the huge needle in the ass is beyond too much every day....I must have given myself hundreds of injections and still nothing. Crazy. I must be crazy.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Impatiently Waiting
I'm just waiting to be able to find out if this worked or not and though I know the odds are not in my favor there is always that annoying bit of hope waving it's hands in the back of your head, psyching you up for a let down. I have to prepare myself for this not working or maybe I don't. I don't know. R, one of the girls I met at the clinic is so positive this is going to work even though she's done several IVF's and IUI's before. I wish I could just abandon myself to hope like that but I'm a chicken shit. I've been waiting for the inplantation bleeding and it never came though I thought I saw an imaginary smudge of something last night. It just feels like my period is coming and rightfully so as it would have been calculated to come tomorrow. I so wish this would work which I know goes without saying. I can see how people do IVF over and over again. It's like sitting at the casino tables, losing but you keep throwing your money down thinking you'll maybe win one. That's really what it feels like except it seems to take forever for that roullette wheel to fucking finally stop and it's never on your number or even on your color..it's just a big fat loss.
I used to read a blog called Just Nesting. For whatever she privatized the thing so you can't read it any more...I had read her for years religiously. I don't know why but I just felt a connection. Actually my ceiling in my dining room is painted a color she suggested to me. Anyhow she was married and couldn't conceive...it wasn't the reason she started the blog as it had started way before that with another blog until she got married and did Just Nesting. Anyhow, I remember her wanting to do IVF and wishing her mom would help her pay for it. I think to myself now, little did she know it's not the magic bullet everyone thinks it is. I often wonder about her and if she ever got her baby. Heart breaking when you don't, really.
On the father front, they changed his meds and he seemed so much more alert yesterday. I think if they finally get his meds straight, his therapy straight, his eyes straight, he'll be able to pull all this shit together...not to the way he was of course but to a point where he might be able to function semi-normally. I was going to say to a point where he doesn't need 24 hour care but I don't know how true that would be.
Anyhow so that's that. I confess that I gave myself a home pregnancy test yesterday even though I know I'm not secreting any HCG or whatever it's called yet....I just had to get it out of my system and I used one from the dollar store...negative of course but it was 4 days after transfer. You hear that...that "but"...it's hope. Hope scares me. But there it is. When I used to work with addicts they used to say, "everything after 'but' is bullshit"...a double entendre there...but/butt. Yeah, classy I know.
P.S.: I'm adding this later as I just found her blog and am now following...psyched!
I used to read a blog called Just Nesting. For whatever she privatized the thing so you can't read it any more...I had read her for years religiously. I don't know why but I just felt a connection. Actually my ceiling in my dining room is painted a color she suggested to me. Anyhow she was married and couldn't conceive...it wasn't the reason she started the blog as it had started way before that with another blog until she got married and did Just Nesting. Anyhow, I remember her wanting to do IVF and wishing her mom would help her pay for it. I think to myself now, little did she know it's not the magic bullet everyone thinks it is. I often wonder about her and if she ever got her baby. Heart breaking when you don't, really.
On the father front, they changed his meds and he seemed so much more alert yesterday. I think if they finally get his meds straight, his therapy straight, his eyes straight, he'll be able to pull all this shit together...not to the way he was of course but to a point where he might be able to function semi-normally. I was going to say to a point where he doesn't need 24 hour care but I don't know how true that would be.
Anyhow so that's that. I confess that I gave myself a home pregnancy test yesterday even though I know I'm not secreting any HCG or whatever it's called yet....I just had to get it out of my system and I used one from the dollar store...negative of course but it was 4 days after transfer. You hear that...that "but"...it's hope. Hope scares me. But there it is. When I used to work with addicts they used to say, "everything after 'but' is bullshit"...a double entendre there...but/butt. Yeah, classy I know.
P.S.: I'm adding this later as I just found her blog and am now following...psyched!
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