Moving Forward

I won't lie, yesterday we were totally overwhelmed with all the information Dr. Kim gave us. I have always thought I had an underlying immune issue and after all the tests ran, it is now confirmed. I went through most of the day in a fog just trying to digest off of this and honestly I am still working on processing it this morning. Al and I sat down last night and had a very long talk. We have decided if insurance doesn't cover IVIG and we can't get it done here in Oklahoma then we are moving past that specific treatment. We don't have the finances to fly to Chicago and also pay thousands of dollars out of pocket for this treatment. I told Dr. Kim yesterday that without insurance coverage we would not be able to do the IVIG and asked if we should move forward with the other treatments or just move past trying to have a child. She said that with the blood thinners, steroids and other medications that we will had a pretty good chance of keeping a pregnancy. Of course the IVIG does help chances even more, but I was happy to know that we can keep going even without it. I am still waiting on the offical report to come through and will know all of the immune issues I have. I also asked her about doing TI verses IUI and she said that the IUI would only give us a small chance over the TI and the "delivery" of the sperm and egg was not the issue. The issue is my body attacking the embryos and the blood clotting issues I have keeping them from implanting. So at this point, Al and I have decided to hold off on IUI for at least a few months, start our new medication protocol and do Follistim/Femara TI for at least 3 months. At that point if we haven't succeeded on getting pregnant, we will re-examine and maybe move to IUI again.

I know that all of this is a total crap shoot on what is going to work and what isn't. She really wants us to make another trip to Chicago for an u/s after I start blood thinners to see if it is helping with the blood flow and then another after we get pregnant to see. I explained to her that we are tapped out after all the ivfs, medications, surgeries and trips for our infertility. Al and I do live comfortable, but we don't have anymore money to spare for this. We are still paying off a 401K loan for our two ivfs last year. And we made a promise to each other that we would not go in to debt anymore, as hard as that is, we have to be responsible for our finances and family as it is already. We might be able to squeeze one more trip to Chicago to see how the blood thinners are working, but that would be it. She said she totally understood and wish people had better coverage for infertility. She is such a caring woman and I highly recommend anyone going through multiple losses to see her. Especially if your doctor keeps telling you it is egg quality. I was so tired of hearing the generic ass "egg quality" excuse with nothing to prove it. 

Also for anyone considering seeing her, I wanted to let you know that we don't have infertility coverage on our insurance and was very scared on how much the labs were going to cost. I got a bill yesterday and my insurance covered all but $35.01 out of $2,000.00 in labs. Since this is immune testing and not "infertility" it was covered. Dr. Kim also allows you to make payments to her and does not expect all the money up front. I will continue to keep her as a doctor along with my current RE. Dr. Kim will oversee all of my medications and care for the most part. Let me stress again that if you are having these issues, please call her and see if she can help you. Although I did get a lot of  "not so great" news yesterday, at least I now know what exactly I do need to get pregnant and stay pregnant. If we wouldn't have seen Dr. Kim I would be having recurrent loss after loss and not know how to fix the problem.

To end this very long and draw out post, Al and I have decided that this is the end, the last of treatment. We will give this protocol a fair shot for a while (1 year) and if there is no pregnancy out of this, we are moving on to the next phase in our lives. We are almost at the 4 year mark of treatment and it tends to wear a person out emotionally, physically and financially. I wouldn't trade our struggle for anything though. I have learned so much about myself throughout all of this and I know that I can handle anything thrown in my path. Many people can't say that.................. Struggles in our lives are put there for a reason. Even though it is not apparent to us at the time.