WOW. It has been a whole year since I last updated this blog. We started our first IVF cycle as planned last year but this didn't go well. My wife under responded and our cycle got cancelled. We managed to convert it over to IUI as she did have 2 follicles that had grown. The result of this was a BFN. It was really difficult as IVF is suppose to be some miracle intervention and everybody seems to have such success with it. After this failure, we ended up taking a break for several reasons.
She had been suffering from stomach pain for a few months and the drs had put this down to indigestion and had put her on an antacid. During the beginning half of last year, the attacks started to get more frequent and she was referred for scans etc. and it turns out she had gall stones and subsequently her liver function was all over the place. She was put on a waiting list to have her gall bladder out. We couldn't have carried on TTC with all this happening so we had to wait. In the end this was done in July. She then had to recover from this. Her liver function went back to normal and the pain attacks stopped. Apparently her gall bladder was chronically messed up and was definitely something that had to be removed. She also ended up with a post surgery infection too due to the infected gall bladder. We spent a glamorous evening down at the walk in center. This cleared up though with antibiotics.
We also bought our very first home last year and moved in, in August. It is a 3 bed with lots of room to grow our family. While renting would not have been the end of the world, it is so lovely owning our own home. As we had prioritized IVF, it was something we thought was years off. Thankfully our parents clubbed together and gave us the remaining money we needed towards a deposit, so we used the rest of our savings on our house deposit. We are glad we did though. As this house feels special and I have an overwhelming sense of being 'home' whenever i walk through the front door.
We decided that following the failure of IVF #1 and the fact we were unable to continue with egg sharing, which made their prices more reasonable, we decided to move clinics as we had not been happy with the care we received and also the extra costs that they added on to cycles, that were not only unnecessary but something that our other local clinic did not even do. Our first clinic insisted on me having an infection screen done to check for HIV, HEP B etc under the guise of 'welfare of the child' and tried charging £150 for the privilege. Luckily I donate blood and they were willing to accept a letter from then saying that I carried no blood borne viruses. They also got really arsey when I would not give consent for my physical description to go on their sperm donor match form. I pointed out that as a female, I did not want an exact match to my features and would just like my hair and eye colour noted. I also pointed out that I was a heath care professional who was paying thousands to have a child so the whole welfare of the child thing is complete bollocks, as I could have had sex with any old bloke and got pregnant. They also charged £750 for their sperm and if we were to import it from another clinic they wanted to charge us £500 just for importing it (not including cost of the sperm and shipping that we would have had to have paid!) They also used to shout confidential information out at the reception desk which was directly next to the waiting room, so the entire of the city new that they had cancelled our cycle and pretty much the whole tale. The final nail in the coffin was when our second scan showed she was still under responding and the nurse said "Are you actually injecting the medication?" as if we were just squirting it out of the window (also bearing in mind I administer injections as part of my job!). It was the most patronizing stupid comment ever.
When we moved to our new clinic, I asked when I needed my bloods taken, and they were like erm what are you talking about? Turns out they don't do them and the sperm matching was literally just her handing us a list and being like "Pick one?" and when we said that we were thinking of shipping sperm from America and inquired about the additional costs, she was like erm what additional costs? You just pay for the sperm and shipping. I even asked her again confused and said "Yes, but how much do you charge us for not using your sperm bank?" She looked at me really weird and just repeated "Nothing" haha. We seemed so perplexed by the difference in both their attitude and practice. It was a pleasant surprise though.
Another issue that cropped up was that when we referred ourselves to our local NHS attached clinic, we also transferred my wife's endocrine care from London due to her raised prolactin. She met with the new consultant in November who got a copy of her notes from London and immediately thought she saw a tumour on her pituitary MRI that had been missed. She ordered a repeat MRI and sure enough, she does have a benign tumour! She restarted her medication for this in January and her Prolactin levels are now much lower again. We were suppose to start IVF#2 a month ago, but her CD2 bloods noted her elevated Prolactin and the fertility consultant would not let us continue with the cycle until her levels were reduced. We found our last week that her levels have gone from 1100 down to 500. So he's given us the thumbs up to start.
Today is CD 1... Scan and LH/FSH bloods in the morning and we start stabbing on Friday morning. We have had all the bloods in our fridge for a month now, after the false start of last month. We are just keen to get going now
Sorry this post has been very word heavy. Having a year off TTC has been difficult but we are in a much better postion now than we were a year ago. My wife is in much better health (we didn't know she wasnt last year though) and we have our lovely home and a clinic that I have faith in.
Hopefully in November, we will be introducing our little pumpkin :)
No comments:
Post a Comment