Our Journey to IVF Part 2- The Game Plan
So in my last post I talked about our infertility diagonses from the doctor. This post is gonna take us from being diagnosed to giving myself tummy shots today.
We had our phone consult with the infertility clinic (#struggles of living 3, now 6, hours from the hospital) at the end of September. It was during this phone call that we were told that doing IVF would give us the best chance of having our own, biological, child. Typically there is a pyramid of sorts that people dealing with infertility work through. The bottom of the pyramid is medications like femara, metformin, or clomid. These medications are meant to help you ovulate/regulate your cycles. If that doesn’t work, then you typically do an IUI (which is just a new term for artificial insemination and it’s basically injecting the sperm directly where it needs to go at exactly the right time to connect with an egg). Because of the combination of issues that Jimmy and I have, we didn’t even qualify for those first two options. So that left us with the top of the infertility pyramid: IVF.
How IVF, or In-Vitro Fertilization, works (and this is putting it very simply), is that they give the woman different medications to grow follicles in her ovaries. These follicles are where the eggs hang out. Then, they go in with this awesome vaginal ultrasound wand with a needle attached to the top (sounds fun right, good thing I’ll be knocked out) and they suck out the eggs from the follicles. They look at the eggs, take the viable ones, combine them with the sperm, and make little petri dish embryos. Those embryos grow in the lab for 3-5 days and then they pick the best one to stick back in your uterus. Then the egg has to do its part and decide it wants to stay in said uterus and attach itself to it for 9 months. That’s IVF in a nutshell.
So our doctor told us over the phone that IVF is pretty much our only option. Then he said they had openings in their April and August cycles. We told him that August wouldn’t work because we would no longer be living in the country, so sign us up for April. We got put on the list and he said we would get a call sometimes in February to give us more information.
So while we started saving and, tentatively, planning for IVF in April, we also started considering adoption more seriously. I’ve always wanted to foster/adopt children and Jimmy has been on board with it, but I don’t think either of us imagined it being because we couldn’t have our own, biological, children. This was a whole new thing to process through. Adoption would also be about triple the cost of IVF and we simply didn’t (still don’t) have the money for it. I talked with a friend about the adoption of her little boy, we looked into an adoption agency, and we did lots of praying.
As November was ending, we needed to decide which option we were going to pursue, because we couldn’t afford both and we needed to put our full energy into one or the other. But, every time I brought it up to God, I kept getting the feeling that we should keep pursuing both. Okay, God, I’ll trust in your plan for us. So we kept both options opened. Then, God answered my prayers in the form of a phone call from the infertility clinic: “We have an opening in our January IVF cycle, would you guys like to be bumped up?”. To me this was God saying, “okay, right now I want you to pursue IVF” (but adoption still is very much in our future). They gave us some information, dates, and the cost (which you have to pay upfront), and told us to call them back after talking it over and coming to a decision.
I did have a brief moment of fear and hesitation; January was so much closer than April and it was feeling very real. But soon the thought of “this is exactly what you want and prayed for, of course you’re going to do it in January” overcame all doubts and fears. We checked our bank account and I quickly texted a friend to see if I could stay at her house throughout the whole process and then we called the clinic back. They told us that I needed to start birth control that day, they needed a little blood work from jimmy, and that we would be receiving an information packet in the mail. The ball was rolling.
Oh, and did I mention that this phone call came the day after we moved out of our house? 95% of what we own was stuffed in a storage unit, we were staying at a friends house, and later that week we were moving to Altus, OK. Life is crazy y’all and blessings don’t always come when it’s convenient, but we are incredibly grateful that this blessing came, no matter the circumstances.
The packet came, the fee was paid, I was taking my birth control, and the month of December became a blur of holiday craziness. After spending 40 hours in the car over Christmas break, I had two days to recoup at home before making the 6 hour drive from Altus to San Antonio (and of course, Altus had their first snow of the season that day,just my luck). Friday I had my baseline appointment where they did some bloodwork, counted my follicles, and taught me all about how to give myself injection shots, every day twice a day
Today is my first day of injections and to say I’m scared is a huge understatement. I’m scared I’ll do the injections wrong or that I’ll screw up the dosages, I’m scared that my body won’t react the way it’s supposed to, I’m scared of any number of things going wrong because everything has be done just so, I’m scared of doing it all without Jimmy physically by my side, and I’m absolutely terrified of not having a happy, healthy baby at the end of all of this.
But I’m also extremely excited and grateful. Grateful that we were bumped up to January because its gives us more chances to try, if this round isn’t successful, before moving overseas. Grateful for an amazing friend who is letting me move in for three weeks. Grateful for modern medicine and great doctors that are providing this path for us. And extremely grateful for an amazing husband who is supporting me the best he can even though he is six hours away.
Before hitting the road to San Antonio he made me say out loud “I can do hard things” and you know what, I Can! I can do hard things, and I can give myself shots, and I can take care of my body the best I know how to prepare it for the craziness that it’s about to go through.
It’s a wild ride my friends, and if you’re reading this then I’m taking you along for the ride. I’ll be sharing as much as possible on my Instagram stories, with periodic Instagram posts and blogs posts, so look up “jessigirl28” if you wanna follow along over there.
Also, you may be wondering why I’m even sharing our IVF journey or why you should even care and the reason is two-fold (well actually it’s three-fold).
I feel compelled to share it for reasons unknown to me yet.
I had a friend message me and say something along the lines of “I’m not struggling with infertility, but seeing your journey has made me be able to relate better to those in my life who are struggling with it”. If my story makes it easier for you to connect with someone struggling with infertility, then I am happy to share it.
I want people who are struggling with infertility to know that they are not alone and to maybe lessen their fear of the unknown when it comes to IVF. So many people struggle in silence and I want to disrupt that silence with my voice and my story. Will your infertility story look the same? No, but at least you’ll know that there is someone out there who knows what it’s like, who has experienced the emotions, and who has gone through the process. If you are struggling with infertility, I want you to know this “you are not alone and you can do hard things”.
Much love,
Messi Jessi
