Crossroads

I totally meant update sooner, but I spent the entire weekend in bed with a NASTY cold. What started as a slightly stuffy nose on Friday (I have allergies, so a stuffy nose is fairly common for me), turned into a full blown head cold by Saturday. It fucking sucks. Anyway, Friday was a very long day but I will try to do my best to break down each appointment despite the fog of my head cold.

A Little Secret
I began the appointment for my pap smear by arriving 10 minutes late. I'm typically the type to get there 20 minutes early, but the recent onslaught of storms has massacred the morning commute in the bay area. Fortunately I think my tardiness only resulted in less time that I'd spend in a paper gown. When my doctor came in we chatted briefly, but before she got started on my examination she noted on my chart that I wasn't using any contraceptives. When I explained to her that I'd been trying to get pregnant for two and a half years and just wrapped up six failed dIUI's, she shook her head, and looked down at the floor as she began to tell me about the four IVF cycles she had completed several years ago. She explained that she was older when she started trying so she knew it wouldn't be easy. Her first IVF cycle resulted in a chemical pregnancy which required a D&C. Just two days after her D&C she had to go back to work and delivered four babies over the course of two days. She said she bawled after every single delivery that weekend. Her next IVF resulted in her son. The one after that was a BFN. And the one after that resulted in twins, thanks to donor eggs.

I was astonished that she was so willing share her journey with a patient, maybe she just took pity on a fallen comrade. Whatever her reason I was, and am grateful for her honesty. Anyway, the appointment ended with both of us in tears although not necessarily sad tears.

Dr. Do Little
The second appointment was with the OBGYN, and Brian joined me. I'm still not sure what to say about this guy. I left the appointment kind of shaking my head. His only saving grace is that he works somewhat closely with the honorable Dr. Zouves, and even referred to him as his "mentor". Basically he thinks my issues may be immunological, and wants to run a boatload of blood tests to prove it. Fortunately he took pity on us and our crappy insurance situation and offered to file the blood tests under "Infectious Diseases", instead of "Infertility" so that our insurance would cover it.

He never really even got in to what our plan of action would be, he just did a lot of babbling about Natural Killer Cells. Which I'm not blowing off. I just don't much about it. I was impressed when he said that since implementing the immunology practices, his miscarriage rate has gone down from 33% to 20%. I still don't know about this guy though ...

Dr. Deja Vu
Despite being 20 minutes late this doctor was pretty awesome. He went over all of our test results and explained what everything meant. He also did an u/s "off the books" since our appointment was being paid for out of pocket. We were grateful for that. He wanted to take a look at my lining and check my antra-follicle count. Just like my test results, and just like we heard before - "Everything looks great" and "There doesn't appear to be any issues"... He did however suggest that Brian go to see a urologist. If not for fertility sake, just to make sure there are no other issues. He also said this doctor could confirm/define any chromosomal issues. Which is a whole other post in and of itself.

He wrapped up the appointment by telling us our options: Injectable dIUI's with a 20% success rate at $2,500. Orrrrrrrr. IVF with Brian's sperm, with a 40% success rate at $15,000. And this is where it gets complicated.

SERIOUSLY?!
This is literally, the exact same situation we were in last January. We need to make the decision between a moderately affordable dIUI that we could do as soon as we're ready (emotionally). Or we wait for an undefinable amount of time,(possibly a year) while we save up for IVF, but we should be able to use Brian's sperm.

The main reasons we decided in dIUI before were because:

A. IVF would be very difficult on us financially (Still is)
B. We were concerned about genetic issues that could be passed on to our children. Brian may have Marfan Syndrome, (we're going to get that officially diagnosed this week) He also has two very close relatives that are mentally handicapped. *This is something we were fully aware of when we started TTC, and just decided we'd be happy to have any child we were blessed with. But when Brian's SA's came back abnormal, our concerns about what could be passed on became greater.
C.Because IVF would be so difficult financially, we were having a difficult time justifying the 40-50% success rate over the financial risk. And it would mean we'd have to wait that much longer to get this show on the road.

I'll be completely honest and say that I am pretty lost at this point. The thought of Brian being the biological father makes my heart sing. But I'm still having a hard time justifying the financial risk and the time lapse. What if we take the next year off to save for IVF, and it doesn't work? Then not only we will we be extremely heartbroken and another year into this mess, but we'll be out 15k and have nothing to show for it... Part of me feels like if we're going to gamble on 15k we should just put it towards adoption - which has an exorbitantly higher rate of us coming home with an actual child. But I just don't know...

May I just say once again, just how fucking much infertility sucks.