Let's Catch Up

This all started in 2010, so let me catch you up real quick.... 

THE BEGINNING

My husband and I were married in the Fall of 2010, we decided to start trying for a baby a few short months later. Cut to a year later and we haven't had any luck at all! Man, I really thought I would get pregnant the instant I thought about it! Both of our families are breeders, it didn't make sense to us why we were having problems, so we decided to go see a fertility doctor and get things checked out. 

The doctor asked us about our medical history. I get intensely bad cramps during my period. Like, really bad. I vomit, I get diarrhea (rarely at the same time! haha!), I get the chills and so on. So my doctor (Dr. Kumar) suggested that I may have endometriosis, but it was just a verbal possibility, he didn't perform any tests. In the end, we decided to try IUI. We were sent home with clomid and a trigger shot of HCG (to make the eggs release at the correct time) and an appointment for about a week later. 

A day or two before we were scheduled for the IUI we went to see Dr. Kumar. He performed an ultrasound and confirmed that I had 2 eggs ready and that we would to the trigger shot that night. My husband and I were so excited at the possibility of finally becoming pregnant! Two days later we arrive at the office first thing in the morning for my husband to give his "sample" so they could wash the sperm and prepare it for the IUI procedure. Scozzi (my husband) does his deed and we go for breakfast while they prepare everything. When we return, our doctor is waiting for us and says he wants us to follow him. We go through the winding hallways into the lab where a technician has prepared a slide for us to look at. Dr. K tells us this slide is that of an average sample, he points out a few swimmers, some dead ones, some crooked ones, etc. Then the tech puts in a second slide and Dr. K says, "and this is yours"....he must be joking. There isn't anything there. Nothing. Not even dead sperm. It's just black. We say as much and he confirms our observations. 

What. The. F. how could this be happening to us? We are so young. Our families all have babies and grandbabies and great grandbabies. We don't drink, we don't do drugs. What. The. F.

Dr. K leads us back to his office to discuss options but neither Scozzi nor I are really hearing what he is saying. I am thinking about how unreal it all is. That I will never be pregnant. That we will never be parents. I don't even know what Scozzi was feeling but I am sure it was something similar. 

We leave the doctor's office and have a long drive back to work. We ride in silence mostly. Each of us crying a little, yelling a little (NOT at each other!). We talk about how it doesn't make sense. 

My husband drops me off at work and I call my mom, I can barely get the words out because the grief is now in full swing. When I finally do tell her she also bursts into tears. I decide to leave work so my hubby comes to pick me up and we go home. By now I have mellowed out and we are talking about how we need to schedule another appointment since we were deaf to what Dr. K had told us earlier that day. 

OPTIONS

It has now been about a month since we received the bad news. Back in the doctor's office, we talk about different options. Donor sperm and IUI, donor sperm and IVF, adoption, a testicular biopsy, etc. 

At this appointment they also drew some blood from my husband to test his FSH levels. The higher the number the less of a chance he has sperm that just isn't coming out. His FSH was pretty high but Dr. K seemed to think there was a pretty good chance he had some in there. 

Another thing we discussed at this appointment was the cost of things. IUI with a donor sperm, assuming we wanted the donor to be the same for all of our kids we would have needed about 24 vials (he recommends 6 vials per kid and we want 4 kids). At nearly $700 a vial  and something like $2,000 for the IUI, that was pretty much out of the question or in the very distant future. IVF wasn't a whole lot better. $9,500 for the procedure and first year's embryo storage and the biopsy for my husband $1,200 plus between $2,000 and $5,000 for the medications. Ho-ly crap. How could making a baby cost so much? We were in the pits. It didn't seem possible that we would ever have an extra $16,000 just laying around for something like this. So, we left the office feeling only slightly better than the last time we were there. 

Over the next few months we looked at a bunch of donors and even picked one out. The next couple months after that we changed our minds and decided to do the biopsy to see if Scozzi had any little guys hiding in there. Then we decided to stick with a donor. Then we stopped talking about it for several months, only bringing it up every so often. All the while, putting money aside.

Last November (2012) we moved in with my mother to help save on expenses. This helped a lot but we realized it's just going to take forever to come up with the kind of money we needed so we decided to go and try for a personal loan for the remainder that we needed. 

In May of this year we decided the time was now. We showered, put on some nice clothes and drove down to the bank. We met with a rep who helped us with the paperwork. She submitted everything and about 30 seconds later, literally, she looked at us and said, "You're approved!". We were in shock! We applied for the full amount we needed and didn't really think we'd get approved! Finally, something went right for us!! We got our cashier's check, took a picture with it, deposited it and then went out to celebrate!! 

A few days later I called the doctor to tell him we were a go and he said to call back on the first day of my period and we would get started. 

I will end this post here as it more or less catches us up. New posts coming up! 

- Sausha