I Love Plans

To close out the counselor saga: I did eventually get an appointment, although not with any of the people I called that day.  Reinvigorated by writing that post, I expanded my search a few miles farther out the next day and found someone who seems great.  I called, left a message, she called back, and we scheduled.  Done and done.  It was sort of funny because I think she assumed I am in worse emotional shape than I am* – I have a terrible cold at the moment and when I answered my phone the first thing she asked was, “Have you been crying?”  After I laughed and said no, she offered me an appointment for that very day (she had a cancellation).  I told her that I’m really fine right now, just making the appointment to get ready for my next cycle, and since that isn’t starting for a while I would wait for an evening appointment so Henry could come.  We made a date for a few weeks from now! 

*How pathetic do you have to be to consider yourself in not-that-bad emotional shape when you only cry once on the phone while making an appointment with a counselor?

Speaking of appointments, I had my post-IVF-failure-follow up appointment, (I’ve seen it referred to as the “WTF appointment,” and I love that) with my doctor this week.  I didn’t learn a whole lot of information that I didn’t learn when I talked to him the day of my negative pregnancy test, and the plan we made is just a fleshed out version of what we decided on then, but since I never wrote about any of that here I can fill you in.

One of the first things my doctor told me when I got that negative was “It’s not like you had a perfect cycle and didn’t get pregnant.”  This statement is actually the epitome of how my doctor is: on first glance it seems harsh and insensitive, but ultimately it’s actually pretty reassuring.  I mean I started with a hydro, developed a cyst, only made eggs in one ovary (and therefore got about half as many eggs as we wanted), only had one egg fertilize naturally, and yet STILL ended up with a chemical pregnancy?  All things considered, I think that counts as a success.

Some of those things we have no control over – if I’m meant to get a cyst I will, no amount of pleading is going to make my left ovary make eggs if it doesn’t want to, and ultimately we can put back the most perfect embryos in history but their developing into a baby is up to chance/fate/the universe/God – but we made a plan that will hopefully account for the others.

The most complicated issue is that hydro.  My doctor said that his instinct is that the hydro isn’t causing a problem – it’s in an open tube, he never saw the hydro on the ultrasound during stims, and there was never any fluid in my uterus.  Still, he agrees that it’s probably a good idea to close off that tube, just to take that variable out of the equation.  EXCEPT!  That the hydro is on the same side as the ovary that makes eggs, and the surgery that would fix the hydro also comes with a certain risk to that ovary.  So he’s very nervous about going ahead with the surgery; his discomfort with the surgery outweighs his discomfort with the hydro.

So how do we solve that dilemma?  The plan is to put me on a significantly higher dose of drugs (hopefully fixing the half as many eggs issue).  Then we will go ahead with the egg retrieval, ICSI all of the eggs (hopefully fixing that low fertilization issue), and let them grow.  From there we have three options:  (1) If I have lots of embryos and the hydro has stayed hidden throughout the process, we’ll go ahead and do a transfer and freeze the remaining embryos.  Then, if I don’t get pregnant, I’ll do the surgery and have plenty of frosties as insurance against the risk.  (2)  If I only have a few embryos and the hydro is dormant, I’ll forget the surgery and just do the transfer.  (3)  If I have a medium amount of embryos and/or the hydro seems to be causing a problem, I’ll freeze everything, have the surgery, and do a frozen transfer at a later date.

Whew!  Does all that make sense?  It does in my head.  I’m rarin’ to go - I joked with my doctor that he had my full permission to overstimulate me to the point where they wouldn’t do a fresh transfer even if the hydro wasn’t there.  He laughed, then decided on the higher of the two doses he was debating between.

I feel good.  I love plans.