My opnion of The Daily Beast Article

After reading the article that was posted on The Daily Beast I was so mad I think there was smoke coming out of my ears. First off to call wanting to have a child an "obsession" is completely wrong! There is nothing obsessive about wanting to have a family, that is a basic human desire for some. I can think of nothing better to spend your time or money on, its a baby for goodness sake- not a pair of shoes.

To put others down for their decisions when they do not effect the lives of others is so wrong. My decision to pursue IVF does not in any way impact any one else, only me and my husband are affected. There were several people in this article that had medical issues that were causing issues and just because they used assisted reproductive technology (ART) in order to have a child that is wrong. I didn't know that having Hepatitis or HIV banded you from having children. If someone has a disease and they use ART in order to not pass a horrible disease onto their child that is smart, not wrong.

I do not wish infertility on anyone, but in this case- the author needs to walk a mile in our shoes and see how it feels to be disappointed month after month because you cannot get pregnant, then maybe she will have a different opinion about using whatever method necessary to have a baby. I am happy that we have the technologies available to us. This is an instance in which if you do not have anything nice to say, do not say anything at all!

Where did my mind go?

Fiirst off I have to say that the internet is the single greatest invention ever! Thank you, Bill Gates, Al Gore, or whoever freaking invented it. But it can also be my worst nightmare. We literally have oddles of information at our fingertips and today it broke me. I started researching different fertility problems and before I knew it I am diagnosing myself with things that I don't even know they are. By the time I left my office for lunch I sat in my car and had myself a really good cry. I just cannot beleive that we are at this stage in the game. I have such mixed emotions, in a way I always knew we would be doing IVF, I was told back in October of 2007 and again in January 2008 that that's what it was going to take to get pregnant, I just cannot beleive that we are doing this. I always thought IVF was for old rich people who couldn't get pergnant on thier own, boy was I wrong, I know so many young couples who are going through this.

So after I calmed down and made my poor husband feel bad I got my shit together called my doctor and insisted that they rerun all my blood clotting labs and my recurrent pregnancy labs, so I can be sure that everything is okay and that I am property taken care of. I do feel better now about everything. I am a control freak so for me I am putting a lot in others hands.

On the up side my extra dose of Follistim come in the mail today, so I am offically ready. Here we go, ready or not!!

SHG done!

I had my SHG today and it was super duper easy, nothing to it! It was SOOOO much better then the HSG, oh god was that painful, I feel so bad for anyone who was in the waiting room while I was having that done, because I was screaming my head off.
The hardest part of the SHG was having to have a full bladder and holding it. I normally do not wake up and drink two bottles of water. So we are off an running- next time I will be at the RE's office it will be to start Lupron, YEAH!! We are so excited.

Step one for IVF complete!

To me IVF is such a process, its many many weeks of injections, meds, and doctors appts all leading up to the egg reteival and then the embroyo transfer. Today was step one, complete and I couldn't be happier. I got my period today! I never thought I would be happy to say that, but now I can start birth control pills which I will take for about 3 1/2 weeks to shut my system down. I also have my first day of blood work tomorrow morning to make sure everything is good to go. I am just going to take this day by day and not get ahead of myself. I'm so excited toget this party started!
Keep your prayers with us as we embark on this journey!

The Final Countdown!

I bet you were all waiting for me to jump into a song by Asia, but no, that's my life, the FINAL COUNTDOWN to our insurance. We have officially gotten our sign up papers for our new insurance, which DA DA DA gives us $10K that we can use for fertility treatments. So IVF here we come. I am super duper excited, I am way pumped for something that is going to give us a 60% success rate, as opposed to a measly 15% shot with IUI.

I also feel less stressed because its being covered under our insurance, so its not like we are spending our life savings on this. But it is still a stressful time in my life, I want so badly for this to work on the first shot, but we are in for about 35 days of preparation for IVF so I need to take it one day at a time, and one shot at a time. But I do think I need to look into Yoga or something that I can do to keep myself calm.

Going through infertility is stressful, then add IVF into that mess and it gets really stressful. However it has been shown that there is no link between stress and the success of IVF.

Researchers in Swedan have assessed stress levels among women undergoing their first in vitro fertilization treatment and found similar pregnancy rates in women reporting high levels of anxiety and depression and women who did not.

"This is a positive message we can give our patients to help decrease their stress at this time," says researcher Lisbeth Anderheim, who is a midwife and PhD candidate at Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg, Sweden.

The only variable linked to successfully achieving a pregnancy was the number of good-quality embryos transferred back into the uterus. Some studies have reported that acupuncture, which can help reduce stress, increases pregnancy success, I strongly suggest acupuncture, its my saving grace, I LOVE it!

IVF and other fertility procedures carry a certain level of stress that is unavoidable. But when that stress disrupts your daily life, it may be time to look into counseling.

What desperation leads to:

It has been in the news a lot, and has a lot of people talking, its IVF, In Vitro Fertilization. Because of our favorite mom, the octo mom, the ethics surrounding IVF has been tested and discussed in the news to no end. It is very easy for newscasters, writers, and american citizens to say that transferring 6 embroyos was irresponsible. Now, while I do not disagree with that and I feel that both octo mom and her doctor made a bad decision, I feel that until you are placed in that situation you cannot make comments or pass judgement. We do not know what octo mom's diagnosis is and what was stopping her from concieving on her own. No one is talking about the Duggars- and they have 18 children, but because they were all concieved naturally every turns a blind eye and tunes in every Tuesday night to watch their show, 18 Kids and Counting.

What people need to understand is that when you get to the IVF stage, its certainly not the first round of fertility treatments for most people, you are in a stage of desperation. You want to have a child so badly that you will do whatever it takes and pay whatever the cost. IVF is not cheap, the average cost of one IVF cycle is $13,000 and that does not include the medication that is necessary, which can cost thousands of dollars. Most fertility treatments and drugs are not covered under most insurance plans, unless you are lucky enough to live in a state that mandates fertility coverage by insurance companies. It is up to each individual employer if they want to cover fertility treatments.

So when a couple is looking at spending tens of thousands of dollars to have a child they may take more risks and allow their doctor to transfer more then one embroyo, now not 6, but certianly more then one, which does raise the risks of a multiple pregnancy. Most couples only have one shot at IVF, becasue of the cost- so they want to get the most bang for thier buck.

There are some cases where a doctor would transfer 6 embroyos, but its unlikely. Lets put it this way, the patient would be over 40 and have several failed IVF attempts. Transferring 6 embroyos is by no way the norm. The norm is usually 2 embroyos for someone under 35 and 3 for someone who is over 35. But again each patient is different, becasue each case is different.

You may have noticed that I have used the word transfer and not implant as it is been so used in the news. Its an embroyo transfer, not an embroyo implant. There is no guarantee that any of the embroyos will implant, they are simply transfered into the uterus in hopes that they will implant and grow into a healthy pregnancy.

So the next time that you start rattling on and on about fertility treatments, you may want to stop, because you do not know what you are talking about until you have been in those shoes.
I hate getting asked if I am going to have 8 babies because we are going through fertility treatments, I really want to scream when I hear that. People please get a clue!

We can thank octo mom for new legislation!

Well, it has started, my worst fear! Federal legislation mandating the number of embryos that can be transferred. Now, its in the infant stages and its been started in the state of Georgia. This is all stemming from our lovely octo mom and her irresponsible doctor!

I agree that there should be some mandates on the transfer of embryo's, however it needs to be in conjunction with mandating the states to pay for IVF for couples. With only 12 states having mandating fertility coverage with insurance companies that leaves many states and couples out in the cold trying to figure out how to pay for IVF.

Just to care for the octuplets, born in January, it will cost the state of California millions of dollars in medical bills, not to mention the millions that will be spent to care for her other 6 children. This has scared the state of Georgia and they do not want this happening to them.

Senate Bill 169,sponsored by president pro-tempore Tommie Williams and several other Georgia legislators, would limit the number of embryos that may be transferred woman to a maximum of three for a woman age 40 or older and two for a woman younger than that. The bill would also limit the number of embryos created in one cycle to the number to be transferred.

Many IVF specialists feel this is wrong- in some women it makes more embryos to create a pregnancy, and this legislation could potentially hurt some women's chances to achieve pregnancy. It is not the governments right to dictate what a woman can do with her body. It's the choice of the couple or woman going through the procedure and their doctor to make decisions based on their diagnosis and their specific situation.

While I am advocate for fertility coverage in each and every state and I feel that states need to do what is necessary to help control the amount of high order multiples this is not the way to do it. The octo mom is an isolated incident, we need to have doctors who are responsible and ethical doing these procedures, we also need to educate the people that are going through the IVF procedure. Through education we will create educated consumers and smart patients who will make good decisions. The octo mom made a bad decision as did her doctor, not everyone should be punished because of her bad decisions.

Thanking God every day!

When I go back and read the posts that John has posted I literally get tears in my eyes. John and I are getting ready to celebrate four years together. It was four years ago on March 4th that John and I met and if someone had told me four years ago that I was going to move to Vegas and meet my husband within the first three months that I was here I would have told them they were nuts!

As much as I hate going through this fertility roller coaster I feel it has brought John and I closer together. John and I had a whirlwind before we got married, we moved in with each other pretty quick and then were engaged and married all fairly quickly, so I really like we are really getting to know each other and learning what the other is really made of. You really see a persons true personality when they are hurting. I have seen John cry and scream over this journey and he has seen me do the same. But in the end I we push on and we will succeed and we will be parents.

It was so funny the other night we were sitting at dinner at a casual dining restaurant that we go to all the time and I starting talking about IVF, and all the stuff that goes into it. ICSI, assisted hatching, PGD, PIO, and so on. His face was priceless he looked scared to death! Then I starting talking about twins and how wonderful it would be to have twins and what a blessing it would be. He looked very nervous at that time. As much as having twins would be a blessing I do think it would be difficult, can you imagine two of everything?!

John is always supportive and is my rock through all this, but I think the IVF talk was too much. I pretty much told him that I would just tell him when he needed to show up at the doctors office, and I think he is happier that way. Poor guy! I don't expect him to understand everything, that is my job! John is the type of person that wants to be shown two things and he will pick from there, so maybe I should show him two embryos and let him pick the ones he likes! HAHA
But my point is ladies, your husbands don't have to involved in every aspect of infertility in order to support you! It's just not their thing!

Embryo's all alone?

This morning I had to get my blood drawn pretty early- I had to go to Quest, not my doctors office, which is fine. But the hospital that I went to is right next to my fertility specialist's office. When I drove by it this morning, it was all dark (they weren't open yet) no cars in the parking lot, it was really weird- its usually really busy.

I started to think about when IVF is done, the embryos are kept warm in an incubator waiting to be ready to put back into the uterus. The embryologist watches over the embryos and takes good care of them. She always tells me she never had her own kids, so she treats the embryos like her children, which is really sweet.

But anyways when I saw the office all dark, I started thinking about all the lonely embryos in the office alone. It made me really sad to think about that. I guess the up side is that hopefully there is more the one embryo so they have their brothers and sisters to keep them company while they are growing and developing, hopefully getting ready to be sticky babies and snuggle in for a nine month stay.

I know this is so silly, that I would feel bad for the lonely embryos, John thinks I am officially crazy! But I think about they embryos as em babies, they are someones future children.
Sometimes I wonder where I come up with this stuff and why things go through my mind.

Myth #9

THE FEMINIST MYTH

I think every woman has these thoughts running through her head. Times have changed we are getting married later and getting more education and starting our families later in life. Gone are the days of getting married at 20 and having all your kids by 25. Now the average age that a woman marries is 25.

“We are in control of our reproductive lives. We can determine when, where, and how we will conceive and give birth.”God gives us wonderful freedom to make many choices, but we must never forget that ultimately we are not in control of our reproductive lives. God is. “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain . . . Sons are a heritage from the Lord . . . “ (Psalm 127 NIV).

We also must accept the reality that fertility declines dramatically with age. With women getting married later in life and starting their families later in life their biological clocks are ticking louder and louder. Most couples want to spend a few years enjoying each other and traveling and doing all the things that you cannot do when you have young children. So with the average age of marriage being 25, most women are not even trying to start their family until they are in their late 20's early 30's. Now while that is still young age, fertility is still declining and it's not going to be as easy as it would have been if a woman was in her early 20's.

We also live in a world that relies heavily on the media. There are always celebrities that are having children in their late 30's and into their 40's, Marcia Cross, Angie Harmon, Courtney Cox Arquette, Jennifer Lopez, Naomi Watts, Nicole Kidman, and Brooke Shields. Now some of these stars have used their celebrity status to inform people on fertility treatments, because many of them had to undergo IVF in order to conceive, some even used donor eggs. But many refuse to comment on how their conception occurred, leading many women to think that they have plenty of time and women are having kids into their 40's and not too worry about it.

Also, while I am very grateful in the advances of modern medicine and all the high tech ways that exist in order to help us infertile conceive. It gives women false hope, they think, "oh I can wait, I will just do IVF" what they do not realize is while IVF does help a lot of people achieve their dream of parenthood, it's success rate does decrease over time, it is not an excuse to wait to start your family. Not in a million years would I think that I, being 28 years old, would be looking into IVF in order to have a family. I mean I young, this should be happening on its own. So be aware, get your FSH tested early and know what you are dealing with. There is nothing wrong with waiting to get married and getting a great education, but do not take your fertility for granted.
Current estimates are that one in ten couples in their 20s experience an infertility problem, but the statistics jump to one in seven for couples ages 30-35; one in five for couples ages 36-40; and one in four for couples ages 41-45.

Advances in Infertility Part II

The 2nd part to advances in infertility discusses How in vitro works, egg retrivial, acupuncture, IVF, and frozen eggs.