Time to see a fertility doctor

In January of 2016, I went in for my annual woman’s visit. That was the first time I visited their office after our check-up from the ectopic. That visit was so much harder than I thought it would be. I sat in the waiting room, looking around at the other women with their pregnant bellies, and became so anxious. They called me back to the room, and before the nurse even started talking I burst into tears. My doctor came in, and I mentioned that we’d really like to start seeing a fertility doctor. I felt like that’s where we’d end up, but he said we needed to wait until we’d been trying a year after the ectopic.

So I mentally marked my calendar for June. I spent the next couple of months trying not to obsess over the fact that I now had a deadline. Either we would get pregnant or we’d start seeing a fertility doctor. I had mixed feelings about that. I felt a little hopeful that we’d have more options with a fertility doctor, but I also felt that we’d then be admitting we needed help. To get pregnant. Isn’t that supposed to be something special between you and your husband? Yeah, not so much. Not anymore for us at least.

In June of 2016, we started seeing a Reproductive Endocrinologist (a fertility doctor). We started by having Reid checked out. Reid has some chronic health issues, unrelated to fertility, but we had convinced ourselves that the problem was related to that. So that’s where we started. We learned that Reid was in fact perfectly fine (in the fertility department at least), and that we needed to start testing to figure out where the issue lied with me. A couple weeks later, we went in to read the results of my tests. The doctor shared that my AMH level is 0.5, which basically means I have the egg count of a 45-year-old (that is my paraphrasing, obviously not the medical definition). Fabulous. He said our best bet was to go straight to IVF (in-vitro fertilization), as that has the highest success rate and he felt that time was of the essence. We left his office sad, but also glad to finally have some answers and a plan. So we started planning for IVF.

The doctor’s office sent me a 20-page document explaining the IVF process. It’s intense. People talk about IVF like “oh, at least you can do IVF,” like it’s no big deal. That process is no joke. We learned that not only would it cost us $16,000-19,000 up front, but your body is pumped full of hormones and you have to go in for testing almost every day at times. But that was our plan. We had decided we wanted a baby, no matter the cost or method. I should also mention that you do all this, and then there’s a 60-65% chance you end up pregnant. Better odds, but there’s still a chance you end up having to go through the whole process again. And again. If you know someone who went through IVF, whether they ended up with a baby or not, know that it was hard work. I reached out to a friend who had recently done IVF, and she said it was the hardest thing she’d ever done. It takes a toll on your body, both emotionally and physically. And the hormones make you a crazy person, which as I’ve demonstrated, I don’t need much help with.

So July 22^nd was the day we’d start the process (this is based on my cycle). We secured a loan, and we already had a trip to Chicago planned for the weekend prior. So we were determined to live it up in Chicago before we started this difficult process. We had such a great weekend together. I came back totally relaxed and ready to start IVF.