We're leavin' on a jet plane...

Wow, I cannot believe a week from today we are already heading in to MARCH!  Time, please slow down!  I am happy to be heading in to the warmer months, although here in Illinois we have had some record-breaking, unseasonably warm temps for February and I’m not complaining about it.  Last Friday and Saturday it was about 60°, usually this time of year we’ve got several inches of snow left on the ground and the temps are in the twenties or so.  Yesterday I actually went out for a 2 mile walk around my neighborhood & it was so nice to get some fresh air!

If you guys remember in my last post (almost a month ago, yikes) I mentioned that we had our consultation appointment for March 21^st, well as of today we are about 24 days out from leaving for Georgia.  We decided the flying would probably be the best bang for our buck rather than taking the bike.  March is a tough time of year weather-wise for riding, we don’t want to get stuck in a lot of rain, and we would have to take extra days off of work so we decided flying it is.  I booked our flights with Spirit because the tickets plus a rental car for the 4 days was like $600 and I thought that was a pretty good deal.  Has anyone ever flown with Spirit?  They make you pay for all the extras like bags, seats, sodas, etc. but that is how they save you money on your ticket.  I’d love to hear a review.

Now that we have our itinerary set, Amy (our donor) and I have been making all kinds of plans, of course meeting each other is top of the list, followed by lots of food intake, and probably some cocktails along the way.  We’re hoping for an “adults only” trip to Melting Pot for some yummy fondue and martinis, and we are going to try and squeeze a day in with her kiddos too, depending on her work schedule.  I am so excited to be able to know my donor on this personal level and have a friendship with her.  She and I are both very excited to spend some quality time getting to know each other better. 

So much has changed about the way I feel towards donor eggs.  I remember when Joe and I first started discussing using them there was no way in hell I wanted to know my donor let alone have a relationship with her, I was already so resentful towards anyone who we might choose.  I wasn’t going to tell a soul, especially our resulting child, that we used donor eggs.  The more DEIVF became our reality, and the more that I delved in to the process I became excited to openly share this journey and we definitely will be sharing with our child that they come from a donor, and we will tell them about it at an early age.  It would be unfair to deny them the chance to know where they came from, biologically & what their background and heritage is.  If they want to meet her or wish to know more, then that will be up to them.

Obviously we are in the early early stages of this process and still have some big hurdles to jump.  Our consultation will come first, followed by Amy’s consultation and exam & bloodwork, all of which must be cleared in order for her to qualify.  Once those two things have happened then we can move forward with drawing up our legal contract & making payment for the cycle.  Each of these will be a milestone and will bring us one step closer to starting a cycle!

Making some progress...

Now that the DEIVF cat is out of the bag along with the news about our amazing donated eggs, I can also tell you that we have finally set up our first consultation with the clinic that we’ve chosen in Augusta Georgia.  We’re about 8 weeks out, but that’s perfect for what we were looking for anyway.  We set the appointment for Monday March 21^st so we have plenty of time to make our travel plans and more time to take a break before we start.

Last week our donor had a pretty big scare.  She was having intense pain in her uterus and found out she had an ectopic pregnancy and ended up having to have her left tube removed.  I felt terrible for her as I know how hard pregnancy loss is.  She is recovering well because she’s such a trooper and she has an amazing husband, kids, mother, & friends taking great care of her!  Please send lots of good get-well vibes her way!  She has decided that she wants to continue down the donor path with us, despite her current situation.  I am so thankful for that, but I want her to have the time she needs to recover both physically and emotionally so I’m hoping that over these next couple months she will be able to do that.

Since we have to travel to Georgia for this cycle we are trying to figure out the best way to go about it.  We are highly considering taking the bike for this first trip.  It’s about a 12 hour drive in the car so on a bike we will have to add a couple more hours for gassing up, stretching, eating, etc. but we are really hoping to make this work for us.  Any future trips after our consultation would have to either be by flight or car because after an embryo transfer I don’t think the doctor would recommend me being on the back of a bike for 2 days!  We really enjoy traveling on our bike so this would be a good, last hoorah for me before we hopefully finally become pregnant!  We aren’t 100% sure if it will work out but we are going to try to map out a route & see if we can do it. 

Now comes the hard part, the lull between now and our appointment.  We’re looking at just under 7 weeks.  I know the time will fly and I’m going to try really hard to occupy myself with other things during that time.  My biggest goal over the next 7 weeks is to drastically cut my spending.  Now that this has become a solid reality for us, I am attempting to buckle down on all impulsive/unnecessary spending.  This means clothes, going out to eat excessively, and other miscellaneous spending.  Luckily we don’t have many commitments at all this month or next that would require an excessive spending.  I think Valentine’s Day dinner is about the only thing we may spend much on.  I’m giving up the Winter Wine Walk (about $25), we are foregoing gifts for Valentine’s Day, and instead of getting a full highlight, I’m only getting a partial.  I don’t want to take all the fun out of life, but there’s certainly room for improvement!

Sometimes I sit back and cannot believe that this is our reality.  It is extremely painful to think that I may never know what MY child would look and be like, that another woman’s eggs will work with my husbands, but mine won’t, that my line of DNA is coming to an end (I have am the only child of my mother & father and only have a half-brother).   It is a very hard thing to work through, but I have felt for a while that this would be the path we would travel.  I will stay optimistic that maybe one day I will have a biological child of my own, but that is of little importance to me now.  Infertility comes with so many emotions, but DEIVF comes with even more and I can see why some may never choose this path if it were the only option.  For now I am welcoming everything about this DEIVF process with open arms and a positive outlook because this may be the only way that we can grow our family and I am so thankful that this is even an option. 

I am so appreciative of all of the love and support that we have gotten as we announced our news that this is our new path.  We are so grateful and blessed to have such an amazing team behind us and again, we are so unbelievably thankful for our sweet donor & her family for giving us this beautiful gift of life.

Our Next BIG Adventure...

On Tuesday we FINALLY had our WTF appointment.  It was a looonnngg 27 days from the day I made the appointment to the day that it finally took place, but I thought I did a pretty good job of occupying myself with other things and focusing on other important aspects of my life like my marriage.  Joe and I have been enjoying ourselves as much as we can for it being winter.  We’ve been going out a lot on dates and with friends and probably indulging in too much alcohol, but it’s been fun.

Anyway, when we spoke to Dr. Sherbahn we told him that our concern was egg quality and he agreed.  He said that egg quality can be very hard to diagnose (especially in our case because we had such a good cycle with so many blasts the first time around) because sometimes a poor quality embryo can result in a baby.  He said that we may want to consider other options and we discussed donor eggs. 

If you guys remember back in July we had this same discussion with our doctor in Springfield so this was nothing that we hadn’t heard before, but for me at least, this was our true confirmation that egg quality IS a real concern for us.  Everything about how this cycle turned so quickly indicated to me that my eggs just aren’t able to make great embryos anymore and now that 2 out of 3 cycles have had such a poor outcome, I am convinced.

Joe and I both agreed that DEIVF is the next path for us.  We aren’t in a big hurry, but we know that the process can take time so we are going to get the ball rolling as much as we can without rushing too quickly into this.  This will, by far, be the hardest part of our infertility journey we will encounter, but I know that we are doing the right thing.  I have been slowly coming to terms with the fact that we are closing the door on my eggs forever.  That is not to say that I couldn’t get pregnant naturally one day, but as far as assisted reproduction is concerned, we are done gambling with my eggs.

It is hard to not have a real solid answer as to WHY.  Sometimes I wish I had a real diagnosis like PCOS or DOR or blocked tubes, not that I wish any of that on myself, but not knowing for certain what the problem is is unbelievably frustrating.  We don’t know what to treat because nothing needs to be treated.  There is probably still a chance that my eggs could work someday either assisted or naturally, but I am not willing to put myself or Joe through the emotions and the devastation that we have experienced over these last couple years anymore.  I am done.  I think I said in my last post, I am done looking for the answer as to why.  Now I just want to focus on the outcome that we are truly in this for and that is getting pregnant & having a child.    

So now, with the help and support of some of the most amazing women I know, I have been able to accept and find excitement in the DEIVF process.  Seriously, if it wasn’t for some of these women who are so strong and brave, I probably would be back where I was this summer, in denial about the truth.  With their help I have been able to talk about the processes of known and unknown donors & most importantly, learn so much about how biology is of little importance and that LOVE is all that matters. 

On top of my amazing support group, we have been given the ultimate gift, donated eggs!  I don’t know how I got so lucky or how we even crossed paths, but a beautiful soul reached out to me and offered her eggs to us (or surrogacy if we needed that!) and we decided to take her up on her offer.  We are so thankful and blessed to have such a generous offer made to us.  There are lots of tests and things that she has to go through, but I am confident that she will be just fine through all of that.  Her donation will require us to travel to Georgia so we hopefully we will get to take a couple fun trips and we will get to meet (and hug x 1000) our amazing donor and her husband and children.  Her gift will also save us substantial amount of money as all DEIVF costs are out of pocket.  Cycles can range anywhere between $15,000 and $40,000 depending on a whole host of things. 

Although this is all very new, I am more excited than I ever thought I could be.  I have felt in my heart that this is the road we might have to travel and I am ready for this newest adventure.  We have quite the journey ahead of us, but I think we are ready to do whatever it takes to make it happen & finally have our miracle. 

Thank you to everyone who has been such a support to us over all of these years.  We are so blessed to have so many friends, family, and strangers supporting us from near and afar.  It’s been a truly amazing part of the experience to connect with so many beautiful beings!