FET

Frozen Embryo Transfer, you await us in the near future.  You cost another $3,000...that's a whopping $25,000 we have sunk into fertility treatments in the last few years. That's not including the co-pays, blood tests, MRI scans, laparoscopy and unpaid time off work. When you look at it that way, I almost would rather save up for adoption instead of spending another $3,000. However, we REALLY want our own child right now and we want to use our embryos we have frozen. It only makes sense. Now that they have found I do have a blood clotting disorder, it makes sense to try again because there is something they are changing/fixing in the way we will do things this time.  And by blood clotting disorder, I mean I have 4 genes that have mutations on them that can account for blood clots in my normal everyday life (yikes, something else to worry about for the rest of my life!), but especially during the implantation process. I have had two positive readings from my IVF attempts, only for them to turn negative or me to miscarry a short while later. That, to my doctors, implied that something was going wrong at or around implantation. Leave it to my blood to do things wrong. Not only are my brain and ovaries not functioning probably in my body, now it's my blood too! AWESOME! One more thing stacked against us for conceiving. Just another challenge to overcome, I suppose.

So our FET will be soon, not saying exactly when. My husband and I have decided to be the bearers of only good news from now on. Not a lot of you will understand because I have been so open this far. But last time really took a toll on both of us. We were there, our dreams almost coming true, only to be stripped away from us so soon. So, this time, I plan to blog, but I will watch the specifics until we know for sure one way or the other. We want to tell people "we're pregnant" or "we're adopting". Not "we're miscarrying again". Make sense?

For this frozen transfer, our doctor plans to thaw 6-8 (we asked for 8) embryos to be thawed...hoping we have at least 4 to work with. 50% of the time, the embryos don't survive the thawing process. With those 4, we hope for excellent quality embryos to grow for a 5 or 6 day transfer again. However, depending on the quality, they could transfer anywhere from 2-4 embryos. I definitely gave the okay for 4. Let's not hold back, please! I am ready for whatever blessings are out there for us.

Drugs involved are about the same. They have added a blood thinner for me, Lovenox, to battle the unruly blood I have in my body! That means 2 shots of that a day, plus the Progesterone the entire first trimester. Then 2 shots of the Lovenox a day for the entire rest of the pregnancy...I BETTER GET A BABY OUT OF THIS. I still start with the Lupron to keep my ovaries and eggs out of this round. This round is focused solely on the uterus. Estrogen patches and suppositories...oh joy! So with the Lupron, estrogen, and progesterone, plus stress = crazy me while trying to conceal the time frame...hmmmm. The good thing is less blood draws, less doctor visits, but still the same 3 day (now strict) bed rest. I will tell you we have planned for a weekend where my husband is off this time and not at work!

With all of this and the possibility of it not working, I have decided to sell Silpada jewelry to supplement our income. All of the money made selling the jewelry will go toward this FET, the next FET (to use the last 8 frozen embryos) and adoption. I have attached a link to my page if any of you wish to look at the jewelry! Seriously, no pressure...but if you were going to buy jewelry anyways, why not support a fellow infertile sister, right?

My box of fun (drugs) does arrive soon and it looks to be just as big as the last one! Luckily, none of it needs to be refrigerated and I don't have to worry about it expiring anytime soon:) Because of the miscarriage, it is advised (to all women) to wait at least 2 cycles before trying again. So we plan on at least that before we attempt an FET. Plus, we have to save up the money first! In the meantime, I have been busy cleaning the house and organizing like a mad woman. In all honesty, for a social worker. In case of adoption, they come to the house and all that jazz. So in my OCD mind, I must clean! I must organize closets, remove all of our items, to make room for potential babies. We are finishing a guest room in our house this weekend as well so our house looks more complete to outsiders...haha. Just things we can control in our lives right now since the one thing we want the most, we can't.  It's nice to have a project to work on together too, since we envisioned ourselves working on the nursery together this fall.

Fingers crossed my blood cooperates and the blood thinner works. There is a chance that it will just prolong a miscarriage my doctor said, but we aren't going to think about that! 80% of the time, this blood thinner creates success...that's what we will think about:)