The Battle, Chapter 3

In vitro fertilization, or IVF for short, was something that I never thought would be in my vocabulary. It had never even crossed my mind that getting pregnant would be an issue. My sister had become pregnant when she was a senior in high school. Knowing that I wanted to complete college before ever even thinking about kids, I did everything I could to prevent getting pregnant. While completing my internship, I met my now husband, Mike. Early on, I knew he was the "one". I couldn't help but think about having children with him. Now we were in a position where we had to face the fact that conceiving children naturally was not a realistic option. I was never told that getting pregnant on my own was impossible, but the chances were very slim. As a woman, being told you probably couldn't do something that came so naturally to so many, was devestating. All I could think was, "Why me?" You would hear about many unplanned pregnancies and the people that didn't even want their babies. Why could they get pregnant? And why was someone who wanted children so badly not able to conceive? I knew God had a plan, but I wasn't able to figure out what it was. Now I hold his plan in my arms. And of course, he knew what he was doing. It's just not easy to wait to find out what the plan is.

The journey of IVF began by finding out how to pay for it. After doing some research, there was a specific credit card that is used to help pay for medical costs. It is more like a loan. It has a low interest rate and you could pick how long (up to 48 months) you would like to have to pay it off. After looking into it, that seemed like the best option for us. We wanted children very much. Waiting until we saved up enough to pay for it in cash would be a long wait. We applied for the card and received the line of credit we needed to pay for the procedure. The only thing that we couldn't use the card for was the medications.

We decided to go ahead with things. We weren't going to tell our families when we were going to start. We didn't want them to get their hopes up. It was hard enough to deal with my emotions let alone try and deal with the thought of them getting excited when the procedure isn't a gaurantee. We had to go to a class with other couples to get our plan and an explination of how things were going to go. We also were given a demostration of how to give the intramuscular (IM) shots and the subcutaneuos (subQ) shots. Yes, this procedure involves daily shots, that you give yourself. It's a good thing I'm not afraid of needles.

I was given the list of drugs that I would need to order and all the other supplies that I would need to get started. The first round of drugs and supplies came to a total of just over $1600. The cost is so high because our insurance doesn't cover the cost of infertility treatments. Little did I know that that was just the start of medication costs. I received the shipment about 2 days after I placed the order. The medications aren't stocked at your local pharmacy, so the office gave us a list of reputable pharmacies that you could call and order the medications from. They were pharmacies that have been used by the fertility office and were familiar with the meds and supplies that are commonly used for IVF. Along with the list of medications that we were given, we were given dates to begin what meds and the quantities that would need to be given. They were contained in folder that also had instructions for giving the shots, descriptions of the meds, directions to the office where the retrieval and transfer would take place, and phone numbers to call with any questions you have during the process. We were ready to start the process that could possibly make our dream of becoming parents come true. Our process began on 3/24/2007. The next chapter will contain the first round of the IVF process. Stay tuned for the next installment.