April 06, 2017

Moving on...

Here we are, a month later, and I figured I would give you an update on what’s happening. First of all, I wanted to thank everyone who commented or messaged me after my post, I definitely felt the love and support and I love this little community we have here. 

We are doing good. Just trotting along and passing the time. The initial weeks following our negative pregnancy test felt weird. I had it all planned out and all of the sudden it wasn’t happening anymore and I had to shift my mindset that there won’t be a November baby, and no pregnancy to announce. Ironically, the pregnancy announcement picture I had planned for over a year, was used earlier this month by one of my good friends. She obviously didn’t know of my plans and I didn’t know of hers, so I guess that idea is out the window and I will have to come up with something new. Oh well! I was excited to have our second babies close together, but it wasn’t meant to be. I’m happy for her. I’m in a much different place than I used to be after negative tests back in the days. I have my miracle baby (well, I guess child now) and I’m way too busy these days to dwell on bad news or be bitter about it. But truth to be told, it took me about a week to get out of the funk I was in after that phone call.

Before our pregnancy test, there was excitement in the air, anticipation, happiness, nervousness and all of the sudden, there was nothing. Just empty space waiting to be filled with something else. So I pretty much threw myself into my business and kept so busy, that I couldn’t possibly imagine being pregnant (and  tired and having morning sickness) at the same time. 

It was pretty clear to us from the minute we got the results, that we didn’t want to work with our clinic anymore. I called up my old doctor at his new clinic and basically gave up after trying to get an appointment there for a week straight. They kept promising to call me back, then lost my info twice, but never actually called me to schedule an appointment. It was the most ridiculous thing ever and it almost seemed like somebody was telling us to stay away. They finally called me back after leaving a review on their Facebook page, but I was already over it by then and had moved on.

After asking around for reviews of other clinics in one of my mommy groups, another doctor was highly recommended to me and I was excited to make an appointment. Unfortunately, he was so busy, that the appointment was three weeks away and I counted down the days to finally be able to get another plan in place.
We met with the doctor last Thursday and were immediately impressed how he had read our entire file, that was thicker than a Harry Potter book, and knew our history. He even did an ultrasound on me to check out any potential problems inside my uterus, which I didn’t expect at all during this free consultation we received. There were three things that shocked me during this visit:
  1. After the ultrasound, he immediately told me why I never got pregnant with all these IUI’s we did before we started IVF. While it didn’t matter at this point anymore because we decided to go forward with the remaining embryos to give Fox a full sibling, I was so happy to finally know what was going on, because I always kept wondering, questioning what was wrong with my body. Was there something wrong or was it just bad luck? Now I know. On the other hand it made me upset, that the three doctors before him never mentioned or noticed this before, but I guess we wouldn’t have had our sweet boy, if they did. 
  2. Remember how I told you that I questioned the nurse why I was on a different protocol for this last transfer than the one I did three years ago (and got no answer whatsoever)? During the consultation I was told that I needed to demand to have the same protocol because obviously it worked on me and the other one didn’t. It didn’t sound like I was on enough medication for this last try and that I needed to be back on shots. 
  3. But I really didn’t expect what he was going to say next. After he gave us this great consultation and answered a lot of our questions, he basically said that they couldn’t take us as patients, because their Insurance won’t allow them to transfer our embryos over to this clinic. Apparently there was a $1.5 million lawsuit (with another clinic) when the embryos were all damaged during the shipping process, which made it almost impossible for them to accept any embryos from another clinic. He said we could try other clinics in the valley, but since we already dealt with most of them and the thought of potentially losing our embryos was too much. 
Which brings us to today and the only option we have at this point, is to stay with our current clinic and deal with them for as long as it takes. The new doctor also told us that he didn’t recommend to have our embryos tested, because the risk was too high and based on the genetic testing Katie did, he didn’t see any red flags on why we should have them tested. I was a little disappointed about this news, because I was dying to know how many girls and boys were in our batch. Now we’ll never know, but my guess is 12 boys and 1 girl…haha!

He told us that based on the fact that we only transferred one embryo, there was only a 42% chance for this to work, so it might take a little bit, it’s like flipping a coin he said. He also said our risk of a twin pregnancy would be 40% if we were to transfer two embryos, but Katie wasn’t having any of that…ha!

I was hoping to have another transfer in May, but at this point it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. I sent two emails and left one voicemail for my lovely nurse and all I received back is silence. They know I got another consultation because they had to release my medical records and they’re probably pouting. Maybe not, but I’m sure they’re not happy about it. 

On top of that, we are going out of the country in June and my friend, who also did IVF, told me that her doctor didn’t allow her to fly in the first trimester, so if my doctor is the same, I won’t be able to try again until July. Which is perfectly fine, but also a bummer, because I had my heart set on May. I need to stop planning and just go with the flow. Easier said than done, at least for me.
And I can only imagine the upcoming discussion with my nurse/doctor, when I demand to be put on the same protocol I did three years ago. I’m assuming it won’t go well, although the new doctor told me, that we are the paying customer and we can request anything. 
So at this point, it’s another waiting game. Let’s hope that damn nurse will go me back this year…lol.

...

Before I could hit publish on this, low and behold, she called me back! The doctor doesn't recommend me flying when newly pregnant, so my next Embryo transfer would be in August the earliest. Maybe we'll have another May baby...!


1 comment:

  1. Wow Nadine, that's a lot to digest! I am sorry that you're kind of being forced into staying with the same clinic... but I hope that you're able to speak up about using the exact same protocol. The other doctor is right, you ARE the paying customer/patient and they need to listen to you. August will be here before you know it :)

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