I started this journey with the plan to share with everyone the GOOD, the BAD and the UGLY side of IVF. This week's journey became as Bad as it can get with IVF. Since our friends and family have been so supportive of this Journey we are on, I felt you all should know what has happened this week vs waiting for my usual end of the week post.
What should of happen this week...
I should of received updates from the
embryology lab on Day 1 (Monday) and Day 5 (Friday) on how many eggs
fertilized and turned into to embryos and how they where progressing.
What actually happened this week.....
As I was sitting at my desk on Monday I received a call from the New Hope Center. As I saw their name come up on the caller id, I knew it was the embryologist with our update on our egg to embryo progression. I grabbed my phone and headed to the bathroom for a little privacy. I was so excited to hear how our embryo where doing. When I answered I heard Hi this is Katelyn with the New Hope Center embryology lab out of the 5 eggs retrieved on Sunday we where only able to inject 3 of them and non of the 3 have fertilized. We will continue to watch them for 24 more hours but if they show no progression we will have to discard them all. I will call back tomorrow with an update, but it is very unlikely they will progress.
I was stunned by what I heard on the other end of the phone. As I choked back the tears and my voice started to crack I asked you will call back tomorrow right. She says yes, I will call back and how sorry she was to share the news with me and that she was surprise by the out come. I thanked her for her call.
I stood in the bathroom for a few moments gathering my thoughts, thinking did that really just happen. I knew that there was no guarantee with this process, but I never thought I would be out of the IVF process this early in the game. I expected to make it past the stage where the embryos where transferred back at least. Now I had to wait 24 hours to hear the more than likely same bad news I had just heard.
I went back to my desk and started to process it all. What do we do next if the news remains the same?
I had told Don all along My plan was . . . we would try IVF one time and depending on the embryos that we would get, we would work through those, but when they where gone, we where done. Now we where here with no embryos to show for it.
My first thought was we could do it again, we could start over, but then I remembered the $8,000 for just the medicine alone. How insurance does not cover IVF? How I had already put close to $13,000 on credit cards. I could not and will not add more debt to our lives in an effort to conceive a child.
Next thought was to find an insurance policy that does cover IVF and we start over once the current IVF debt is paid off. This is something that is still an option, but after some research and talking with an insurance agent the earliest I could get a policy to cover IVF is Jan. 1, 2018 and I am not sure this is the best option. There still more research to do.
Their a holistic approach to opening up blocked Fallopian tubes with a company called clear passage. Its not cheap but maybe it could help me and then we would not need IVF another time.
There is the option of adoption.
All theses thoughts went through my mind in that 24 hour period. Friends and family where asking how I was doing and talking about the process all unaware that our journey was more than likely over and at the time I did not want to share what was going on as I had one last glimmer of hope.
Tuesday arrived and by 3pm that day so did the call that I knew was going to be the same as the day before. The eggs had shown no progression and had been discarded. I actually missed the call and a voicemail was left relaying the message. I called back to ask Katelyn did she know why this had failed. She did say she felt like it was an issue with the eggs and to keep my follow up appointment with Dr. Robins so that Dr. Robins could share more on what to do next.
My next appointment is 3/13/17
Monday and Tuesday where tough days, but we are coming to terms with this and are moving forward. I will continue to seek out the positives from this experience, like since the process failed so early, we should get some money back from the clinic which will help pay back the money on credit cards.
The next step is to wait for my next appointment and to hear what Dr. Robins has to say and then make a decision from there on what to do next.
As the journey continues, I will come back to this blog and submit updates, but as of right now the weekly updates will end.
Thank you to all who have read, prayed, sent good wishes our ways. We truly do appreciated your support.
