First off, thanks for your patience on the next chapter in our story. Of the month of March, I was on the road for either work or vacation and have been home a total of only 6 days. I am exhausted, drained and just needed some time off. With all the "stress prep" this IVF cycle has prepared me for, you would have thought traveling would be nothing. But it got the best of me and now we are back.
It was Dec. 18, Day 529, the day I needed to call in to the doctors to let them know my December cycle started. This means we have roughly 27 days until our Egg Retrieval cycle begins. YAY! The plan was for me to call in and schedule an appointment to get my baseline levels taken, this helps see where you start and compare it to your progress on the meds. Of course, the day that I called in, my nurse that I had been working with was out. But, the nurse on-call said she would take a message and relay the information to her and also suggested I email my nurse to let her know what we discussed. I was not looking forward to driving up just for bloodwork and an ultrasound so thankfully, with me being 2 hours away, they agreed to let me to do my baselines on my cycle start date which is cycle day 2 of my retrieval. The email to my nurse was a summary of what we talked about and also a reminder for her to order my meds on Jan. 2 (Day 544). My coverage on my DH insurance starts Jan. 1 so all should be well with the ordering at that point... or so I thought.
On Day 544 I emailed our nurse expressing how excited we were to start our cycle in a week. We had checked on the insurance website and my coverage was active and good to go! We had been waiting for so long for this to happen, nothing could break our spirits! A quick response back from the nurse said "I believe Dr. Will will want to use your next cycle for final lab testing to finalize your IVF protocol. As soon as I have your protocol from the doctor, I can call in your medications and the requisition for the PGS testing. I suspect you will start IVF medications as early as February!"
UH WHAT?! When I read that email, I was still laying in bed. Needless to say, that calm, excited emotion running through me went sprinting out the door and I shot up in bed. I don't think my fingers have ever typed so fast as I replied to her email. But, my impatient self couldn't wait for a response and I got on the phone with our nurse right away. Apparently, there was some miscommunication between the on-call nurse, and her not seeing my email I sent about us starting in January. Don't you worry, I cleared all that up and said nope - we are starting next week just as we planned. At this point, she hadn't ordered my meds yet so now were were on a tight time crunch to get them ordered.
She spoke with our doctor and got my protocol and called it in to my insurance. Unfortunately, it was called into the pharmacy that my personal insurance uses for its main pharmacy. So, when I spoke to the pharmacist, she said, well the insurance that the doctor gave us was yours not your husbands... we don't take your husbands insurance at this pharmacy. BACK ON THE PHONE I WENT. After some more clarification, we finally got the request sent to the proper insurance for review and approval. Of course things can't be easy right?
Here we are on Day 546, 5 days before my start cycle/baseline appointment and we don't have our meds on hand. The pharmacy calls me back and says that the insurance is not approving one of our medicines because the amount ordered needs an authorization form approved by the doctor then re-sent to the insurance company and then once approved, they can process the order. I was on the phone all day making sure all these loose ends were tied and we could get this thing to work. By the end of the day, dozens of phone calls later, we had the approval form sent to the appropriate people at the insurance company. If I didn't hear back from them on Monday by 3 p.m., start calling people!
Well, Monday at 3 p.m. rolls around, 1 day before my cycle is supposed to start, 2 days before my start cycle appointment, and no update. I jump on the call with the pharmacy to find out what the hold up is. There was apparently more miscommunication between the doctor and the insurance company on the approval form.... UGH I am stressing out and my anxiety is skyrocketing!! Thankfully I don't technically start the meds until Thursday so I still have one day left to get them ordered and here.
On Tuesday, the pharmacy called and I suggested, why not just order me as much as we can UNDER the limit so that I can have my meds on hand for when I need to start taking them on Thursday (Day 552). Genius! It worked! We were able to get all the meds that I could get approved without an approval letter ordered. They were being overnighted and would be at my house Wednesday morning. Just in time. I was to call back a few days later and simply ask for a refill on the prescription that was needing approval.
I want to say that with all the miscommunication and frustration on all parties ends during this first week of 2019, I am so thankful that my nurse, doctor, and pharmacists were all able to pull strings left and right to get this done for me. It was a very quick turn around but they were able to make it happen. THANK YOU to all involved.
Day 551. IT WAS FINALLY HERE!! 551 days of negative tests, sad days, no light at the end of the tunnel... it was here. Our Day 1 Cycle Appointment. We are beginning our path to become parents. On this day I got a baseline ultrasound and some bloodwork done. I also received training on how to administer all the different shots. It was a littler overwhelming but knew we could handle it! Thankfully, I don't have a big issue with needles because boyyyyyy that would be tough to handle with this process. The doc called us after the appointment and reviewing the ultrasound and bloodwork and said everything looked great. The baseline reading from the ultrasound showed 15 follicles. That means 15 could potentially grow into eggs to be retrieved. More could still grow, but we knew we had at least 15 to start.
With the hope that all the stress and road blocks were behind us, we were thrilled to be finally starting this process on becoming parents. Tune in next time to hear about Day 1 of shots up until the Retrieval Day. :)
Until Next Time...JR
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