Clomid Agro

First off, I should state that overall, today has been a great day. I had a good time with the girls today and I had a nice chat with my sister. I also went out to dinner with my wonderful DH to a yummy place. I'm now home relaxing in my p.j.'s. However....

We had our IVF financial consultation today. With M, who we've had 1 other consultation with, and I didn't like her then either. My issue with her in the past was that she claimed they couldn't send ANY of my stuff to insurance and then have me pay for it if the insurance didn't pick it up because I have used all of my lifetime infertility coverage. My issue with that is that my insurance had been picking up odd bills here and there and I wanted to see if they would continue paying for some and then I'd pay for the rest. She was adamant. Moving forward (last consult in Aug I think) they would not submit anything on my insurance. Fast forward---> EVERYTHING has been submitted through our insurance. Of our deposit we were required to place for our IVF we still have over 1/2 of it still on our account thanks to the insurance picking up a lot of it.

Back to today: She reiterates that my insurance coverage is gone, and they will not be submitting anything to them on my account only on DH's. She then starts going over the itemized list. On the list are 2 tests (HSG and SHG) that our Dr did not mention we would need to do. It was my understanding that we only had to do them once a year. She made it sound like in between each IVF they had to be done and that was why it was included in the price she wants us to pay. Ummm, NO. However, I decided not to argue with her I'll just call my nurse on Monday and deal with them that way. She also seemed surprised that we had a balance left on our account from the deposit. She really was pushing the ARC 1 treatment plan which would finance a fresh IVF cycle and a FET at a discounted rate from what they would charge us OOP. That would be fine if we didn't already have the $$$ sitting in our RE account there from last IVF and if we weren't able to bill all of the embryology fees to DH's insurance and if we actually had embryos to freeze which we most likely won't have. The way she wants us to do it would COST us more. She's an idiot. I was getting more and more aggravated as the conversation continued. It was like a switch had been thrown (thank you clomid) and I wanted to make her stop speaking any way that I could. However, I recognized my clomid agro and simply nodded and at the appropriate time signed the paperwork. The other thing that pissed me off was she seemed oblivious to what we'd done in the past treatment wise and what we'd paid for. I mean I know she's not a nurse or Dr but couldn't she see on our account based on all of the billing what we'd done?

Frustrated. But that is one more meeting checked off of my list of things to do to prepare for our upcoming IVF.

Here we go...

I have my clomid challenge test (CCT) this cycle. I had to wait for AF of course, and it was 5 days late. I'm sure my body is still trying to recover from everything which is why it was late. My CD3 bw and u/s are tomorrow EARLY in the morning. I will then be on clomid from cd5-cd9 and go back on cd10 for bw. I'm still upset that I have to re-do this test before they will move forward with anything. But hopefully it will show more accurately where we are at and how/when to move forward.

Work is going ok. My employer is home from the hospital. She had her sister in town this week to help her get back into life, but I'm sure it will be a bit before she is back to herself.

Church was ok on Sunday. I'm planning on going again this Sunday. It was good to be with the kids again. The sermon was difficult as it was all about families and child/parent relationships with emphasis on being the parent vs. the child.

I think I have found a new project to work on during the next IVF for our baby. It will be along the same lines as the faith quilt, I made. This will be a faith knitting project. I'm trying to jump that chasm of doubt and make it over to faith again. I'm not there just yet, but I'm hoping as the time for our IVF approaches, I'll be ready to move forward with faith.

Weight loss. I'm trying to lose 20 lbs. before the next IVF. I'm on week 3 of this. The first week I lost 6 lbs. Last week I lost 3 lbs. This week I've gained 2 lbs. I'm trying not to be discouraged. I wasn't able to work out as much this week and did eat out twice. So, I've lost a total of 7 lbs. of the 20. I still feel like I will be able to lose the rest before IVF.

Valentine's Day

I'm not a super romantic... usually much more practical (I think to my DH's disappointment) but today I am so happy that I have my DH to love. He is wonderful and we've been through so much together. I know that I can always lean on him and he will be there. I am so blessed to have married him. He makes me laugh almost every day. He's supportive of me in all that I do. He's an all-around great guy.
Happy Valentine's Day!

Irritable

The switch to gluten free has made me irritable. This happened last time as well. I crave (read NEED) refined carbs during the first few weeks of the switch each time. If it wasn't so difficult to maintain I would stay gluten free to avoid this. But on the plus side I've lost 6 of the 20 lbs. I'm looking to lose before our next IVF attempt.

Due to the irritability I had to really watch myself at work today. Granted, Mondays are hard ANYWAY as the girls readjust to my parenting style and the routine of the weekday vs the non-routine of the weekend. I kept finding myself stopping and counting to 10. That seems to help when I'm about to say something I don't mean to say.

I came home from a LONG day of work, and the dogs had found my newest knitting catalog and ripped it to shreds. I had to pick all of it up (did I mention my lower back is hurting and bending over intensifies the pain?) and then vacuum the scraps. Grrr...

The dealership got back to me and doesn't have a loaner for me to use while the fix my car until the 23rd. Argh. I hope my car doesn't die before then. It shouldn't, but who knows why the check engine light is on. I wish I didn't need my car for work with the girls 'cause they had earlier appointments if a loaner wasn't needed.
Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day.

A Plan of Sorts...

I saw my amazing acupuncturist yesterday and had a check-up/check-in with her. I told her about our consult and that Dr Opie would like us to move forward next cycle and that we told him we weren't ready. I also let her know that he doesn't want us waiting until summer for fear of lower AFC's. She felt my pulses and agrees with me that I need to let my body heal and replenish before starting the whole IVF craziness again. The plan is for me to eat healthy and exercise heavily to try to lose weight in the next couple of months. Healthy eating = Gluten Free as much as possible, cow dairy free, adding goat dairy and lots of veggies and eating most of my food cooked and not raw. In March I go back to see her, and she'll prescribe a liver detox for me. I'll continue the healthy eating and exercise and then check in again in April. In April I'll hopefully start the suppression cycle with the hope that we'll do stims in May with a May retrieval and transfer. I'll increase acu sessions accordingly as we get closer to suppression/stims. After talking with her I feel a bit hopeful.

On another note... my 1st of 2 remembrance necklaces arrived this week. This is the "dressier" one that I won't necessarily wear every day. I wore it to work, and the little one was constantly trying to touch/play with it. I'm really happy with it and to have a reminder of Rowan.

The picture is a bit blurry, but it's an emerald cut peridot gemstone. Peridot is the August birthstone.