Our First Appointment with the IVF Coordinator

We had our plan of care appointment May 25th  and met with our IVF coordinator for the first time. We we're super nervous because we didn't know what to expect, but as always as we walked through the door of our clinic we felt so much love and support from our amazing team of  healthcare providers who are all working so hard to help us achieve our main goal of having a baby.

We sat in the waiting room for 15 mins and then our coordinator came out to greet us and took us back to her office. We sat down in the office, on the desk there was a white folder. She sat down and opened the folder we started with the consent forms.

• Consent for In-Vitro Fertilization and Embryo Transfer-

 -We went over what will happen, she went on to explain the procedure and all the medications I would need to be on from Oral meds to Injections (oh my to many to count). We discussed that there will be tons of blood work, ultrasounds that will be preformed almost on a daily bases when the medications are started. How the egg retrieval will happen and when they will be fertilized with the sperm. We talked about ICSI- Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection- The process of inserting a single sperm into a mature egg, to optimize its ability to fertilize an egg.
-We also went over what might not happen which range from the development of eggs, that no eggs will be obtained (less than 1% probability), that once an embryo is transferred back into the uterus that it could fail to implant which no pregnancy will occur.
-That there could be complications like bad reactions to medications, problems during retrieval, if I get pregnant I could miscarry (20% of pregnancies) as with any normal pregnancy, and risk of more than one gestation's.

• Consent for Cryopreservation (Freezing) of Embryo(S) 
• Consent for injection of sperm into human egg (ICSI) its risks and benefits
• Consent to Cyropreservation (Freezing) of the Sperm - for back up sperm 
• Consent to administration of Gonadotropins*, HCG*, or Clominphene 

Just saying we understand that in the course of our infertility therapy, ovulation inducing drugs will be prescribed in order to stimulate the growth and maturation of eggs and follicles. That we understand the side effects of the medications from abdominal discomfort, production of very large numbers of follicles, that with Gonadotropins there is a 20-25% chance of multiple pregnancy, mood swings, and pain at the injection site.

• Consent for Administration of Lupron which stops premature ovulation. They don't want me ovulating early because of the mulitple eggs/follicles it will ruin the whole cycle and they need complete control of the cycle 
• Consent for low dose Aspirin
• Consent for Administration of Birth Control  

After all the consent forms we talked about how our plan of care would go once we started treatment. We went over an example calendar from start to finish. We're looking at about two/three months of meds and doctors appointments.

I found out that my egg reserve is high mine is around a 8 where most women my age are between 1-3 meaning I have a lot of eggs to grow, Its possible we could end up with 20-30 eggs which not all will fertilize, out of the ones that do fertilized they will grow them in the lab for 5 days. The day after retrieval we will get a fertilization report letting us know how many lived past day one and what their status is. Two days after that we will get a day 3 assessment of the embryos by this day (about 60% will have died off) then by day 5 we will get another report (about 40% more will have died off) and the rest will go in for freezing.

We are doing IVF w/ICSI and a Freeze all cycle- Meaning normally we would do the transfer of an embryo on day 5-6 after fertilization but since my high number of egg reserve and high chance of estrogen levels there is a possibility that I may get (OHSS) Ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome which can be really serious. (I'll post a link below about this) So after day five of growing we are freezing all the embryos that survived and will do a transfer 4-6 weeks after CD1 of my next cycle which will include more injections to get my body ready for transfer day. After the transfer its a waiting game to see if the embryos will implant and stick.

https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/007294.htm

So where do we go from here, we are planning to start our treatment late August first of September and are shooting for the transfer late October beginning of November. All of our funds will be due on the day of our baseline ultrasound which will be around the first of September. We are really looking forward to doing this treatment to have our first baby but we are still a long ways away from having enough money for this procedure. We are looking at $7000 for the procedure $4,500 for Meds and $2000 for the freeze all and transfer. We have sold so many tamales and are so thankful to everyone who helped in with the fundraiser. We are also doing a Yard sale to raise money but even with doing all we have done already that barley covers the cost of the medications. So we are asking from the bottom of our hearts that if anyone can please help and donate to our Go Fund Me fundraiser or to our Mountain America Donation account even in just a small amount it will help out tremendously. Our medical insurance doesn't cover any of the treatment. Jeremy and I work full time with Jeremy getting a part-time job on top of his full-time in hopes of getting a little extra money for treatment.

We are eternally grateful to everyone. Our families, friends, and even strangers who have helped and has kept us in your thoughts and prayers. We love all of you so very much can can't wait to one day share our miracle baby with all of you who believed in us and helped us have him/her.

Thank You with Love - Jeremy & Shalamar Graham