Posts Tagged ‘IVF’

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What If?

Thursday, February 5th, 2009

What if I’m not a good mom after all?

What if our child has a disease?

What if our child doesn’t grow up to love us?

What if our child doesn’t have that perfect combination of our eyes, his red hair, my curls, his diligence and my creativity?

What if I can’t potty train properly?

What if I lose my mind?

What if my kid is a pickier eater than I am?

What if parenthood exceeds my wildest expectations?

What if I forget who “I” am?

What if I lose my nice ass and my hot boobs?

What if I never sleep in again on a Saturday?

What if I never sleep again ever?

What if motherhood isn’t all it’s cracked up to be?

What if I can’t teach my child to read?

What if we lose our first IVF attempt?

What If, What If, What if. These are questions that constantly plague me. Hopefully I’m not alone. More times than not I can’t wait to have a little wriggly body that calls me mom. There are times when I see how my girlfriends are exhausted, haven’t had a break in months and at their wits end – that I think, is it worth it? Maybe I’ve been given a free pass. I don’t have to endure all of this. I get to just be me, just be us. That’s not what I want though. I want to be tired, exhausted, frustrated and out of fresh ideas – the way all the good mommies I know are.

I’ve been reading Dooce.com for nearly five years, on a most-days basis. She’s irreverent, honest, real and on my level. She inspires me to write more candidly and to not think that my odd work-from-home lifestyle is, odd. She makes me want to embrace the good, bad and incredibly ugly of motherhood. This week, her little girl turned five-years-old.

Each month she writes Leta a note. A very public Internet style baby book. Exactly what I’ve always intended to do. This five-year post is why I want to be a mom. I want to realize that I can’t spell things in front of my kid. I want to realize that they are quite possibly smarter than I am. That they resemble the one person I love more than any other in the world. That they changed “the demension” of my life that I never knew possible, and for all the right reasons.

That my what-ifs turn into:

What if I can’t keep a secret anymore?

What if my baby is more beautiful than I imagined possible?

What if Shelton turns out to be the nicer parent?

What if my kid is funnier than I am?

What if parenthood exceeds my wildest expectations?

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Waiting for Daisy, an infertility memoir

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

Thanks to Jennifer P. for sharing the title ”Waiting for Daisy.” It looks like the type of infertility book that’s right up my alley. The full title is: A Tale of Two Continents, Three Religions, Five Infertility Doctors, an Oscar, an Atomic Bomb, a Romantic Night, and One Woman’s Quest to Become a Mother. It’s the story of a 35-year-old woman, Peggy Orenstein, who decides to get pregnant and then becomes “hope’s bitch,” her description of the infertility joyride. I’m going to check it out… and if you do…. drop me a note and let me know what you thought.

An expert from the book at Amazon.com:

”Clomid was my gateway drug; the one you take because, Why not—everyone’s doing it. Just five tiny pills. They’ll give you a boost, maybe get you where you need to go. It’s true, some women can stop there. For others, Clomid becomes infertility’s version of Reefer Madness. First you smoke a little grass, then you’re selling your body on a street corner for crack. First you pop a little Clomid, suddenly you’re taking out a second mortgage for another round of in vitro fertilization (IVF).”

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Here We Go

Tuesday, November 25th, 2008

So here’s some news. We’re ready to start this whole baby making business. We visited with our fertility specialist this morning, kind of a second “first time” appointment in which we discussed the schedule and procedures. I’ve been anticipating doing this in September 2009, but it looks like we’ll be doing their July/August cycle. All goes well and as planned, I should be pregnant this time next year!

The procedures that we’ll be using are ICSI, IVF, and MESA (microsurgical epididymal sperm aspiration, a surgical procedure to retrieve sperm). We had a long and informative conversation with the clinic’s insurance coordinator. She walked us through each and every expense, and the total bill is $18,407. That’s Shelton’s entire MESA (about $4,000 cash), all of my medications/Rxs (about $3,500 cash), the IVF procedure ($8,000 cash), all the sonograms, hysterosalpingograms, blood work, IVF class, tests for hepatitis and HIV in both Shelton and I, lab work and freezing (about $3,000 cash).

All I can say is, this baby had BETTER love me! haha

We’re looking at doing the MESA in January, the class in the spring, I’ll start my cycle of birth control in June and then mid-July start taking my injections and then egg retrieval/IVF in early August. I know it’s going to come so quickly. I’ve been on the verge of happy and nervous tears all day long. So who knows, maybe on our seventh anniversary in August, we’ll find out we get to be parents.

The doctor was confident, given our health and young age, that we’ll have ample eggs and being able to transfer a single embryo successfully.

I know it’s been quiet around here for a while, but we’ve just been trying to decide the best time to try to start our family. We hope 2009 turns out to be that time for us and we’ll of course continue to update as things happen. It’s going to be one heck of a ride and we’re excited to take all of you along with us.

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Meet MyFertilityPlan.com and Their Infertility Haiku Contest

Tuesday, November 18th, 2008

This wasn’t supposed to be a last-minute announcement, but it has turned in to one. Entries are due no later than Mon. Nov. 24 at noon est. (Good thing those Haikus are so short!)

Some good friends of Baby Or Bust, My Fertility Plan, are hosting this first annual International Infertility Haiku Contest. Here are the contest details:
Why haiku?  Anyone can do it.  A haiku is a three line poem, made up of only 17 syllables.  The first line has 5 syllables.  The second line has 7 syllables. The third line has 5 syllables.  That’s it.

Your haiku must relate in some way to your family-building journey and it must follow the haiku-syllable rules. There are 2 categories – Serious and Light-Hearted.  Just make sure you label which category your poem falls in (even if you think it’s obvious).  If your entry relates to medication, it will also be considered for the medication-related haiku award.

It is free to enter – and you can enter as many times as you want.  Each haiku must be in a separate e-mail.  Please include your name and email as well.  The contest is open to international entrants, but the entry must include an English translation.

MyFertilityPlan.com just launched last month. They work with infertile couples to build a customized fertility plan, and introduce the best options that optimize their chances of conception. The company is owned by Angie Best-Boss and Evelina Weidman, two advocates for women’s health and infertile couples. They have a couple of books under their belts, and a new-release coming soon that we can’t wait to tell you about!

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Feels like the first time

Friday, May 16th, 2008

I was having lunch yesterday with a friend. Our paths cross occasionally and it’s always nice to catch up. She politely asked how things were going with BabyorBust and I got her up to speed on the site and our plans. She then told me that she and her husband had just found out the day before that due to male-factor, they were finding themselves in this infertility boat. I always hate hearing that. It’s like, ugh!, why one more?!

She and her husband are about the same age we are, so I’m glad they were able to catch this now instead of even five or ten years down the road. I feel like the options play to your favor a bit more when you’re younger. I’m already freaked out that my boobs are going to sag and I found my first wrinkle… let’s not talk about what else happens after I turn 30! (more…)

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Tip Toes and Egg Shells

Saturday, April 5th, 2008

We were told this morning that yet ANOTHER friend is having a baby. (He reads the site so Congrats!!) I hope you don’t mind me calling out your note like this- but it just made me remember that I’ve wanted to post about this for a while. Basically- told me they’d just found out they were pregnant. But hesitant to let us know because he didn’t know if we would care of if we would even want to know. And asked if it was dumb to feel that way.

Not dumb to feel that at all. You and everyone else do the exact same thing. It’s not necessary though.

I seriously love finding out someone is pregnant. Sure- I have a twinge of jealousy and that eensy little flash of “is this EVER going to happen for us?” It lasts for mere seconds and back to the YAYYYY!!!! Why wouldn’t I want to know? Shelton and I have had had the pleasure of being a part of so many close friends and family members pregnancies, births and raising children. It’s the most amazing and truly blessed gift- for both the parents to receive the baby- but for us to be a part of it. We’re like the unofficial aunt and uncle to 3600 kids! That’s an exaggeration- but I’ve never claimed to be any good at math!

We always kind of snicker amongst ourselves because we think watching all of you have all of your babies- we’ll have it pretty well figured out when ours arrives. Sometimes we forget about the baby restrictions and that a lot of our friends don’t have the freedom to come and go and do as they please like we do. But we’d give up that freedom in a heartbeat.

Like I said, this happens all the time. Our closest and dearest friends avoid telling us for fear we’ll be to hurt or something. I promise- we won’t be. I’m more hurt when I find out months later that someone has been pregnant for months and didn’t tell me. That’s what I don’t like. So please, just tell us. We really do want to know and we really do want to celebrate with you. Let us live vicariously through you for a while… and then we’ll call in some favors for babysitting later on.

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