As I have mentioned, my mom suggested trying to do some online funding from IVF. Honestly, I feel pretty uncomfortable asking people for money, but I am trying to swallow my pride and find the least tacky way to go about asking or we will never be able to do this. Although my parents have offered to help, it's a lot of freaking money we are asking for, so I'd like to try some other avenues before I just allow them to take the full brunt of the financial responsibility. We are also looking at financing options and the compassionate care meds program.
So, my plan is this: create a new blog about our journey and within that blog, as for money. I'll "come out" on facebook and post the link to the blog. I feel like this is way less tacky than just posting a link to our funding site. Below is what I have for the blog so far and I would appreciate it if anyone has any insight, if they could leave a comment. I am trying to not give too many specifics, and am also trying to address a lot of the things I know my very religious Aunts will bring up. Also, I have mentioned on here that DH does not want to adopt but I really don't want to have to explain his family situation to everyone, so we just opted with our answer below in anticipation of the question. I also I plan to link a page with our actual treatment history for those who are interested.
Here it is:
S and I have been blessed in many ways. We have 23
amazing animals (dogs, cats, horses, goats and chickens) and live in the
beautiful foothills of the Sierra Nevada’s in Northern California. We have our
health, we are happy and life is good. There is, however, something missing.
There has been for quite some time, and I am sure many of you have noticed: we
have no children. There are no little voices, echoing in our hallways, no
toddlers trying to ride any of the dogs and when we watch Disney movies and I
dance around the kitchen, singing along, it is very much alone (have you seen
S dance?).
So, why don’t we have
kids?
Well, we want children, very much. Unfortunately, due to my
endometriosis and Poly Cystic Ovary Syndrome, we haven’t been able to realize
that dream. We have been working with a
Reproductive Endocrinologist and have been undergoing fertility treatments, but
nothing we have tried so far has worked. We have now come to the point in our
journey of trying to create a tiny human that IVF is our only option. (For
those of you who like details, click here, to read about our journey so far)
What is IVF?
The very short, non-scientific version: IVF or in vitro
fertilization is a process in which eggs are retrieved from the mother and
fertilized by the father’s sperm in one of two ways, using traditional IVF:
putting the sperm and egg together and letting the sperm do their thing, or
ICSI: the doctors choose the best sperm and inject it into the egg. The egg is
then left to incubate and become an embryo. After a few days the embryo grows
and is placed back into the woman’s uterus to grow and be nourished and come
back out, nine months later as an adorable tiny human.
So, why don’t you do
IVF?
Sadly, IVF is very expensive and is not covered by our
insurance. Until recently, we have been fortunate enough to have some insurance
coverage for my infertility treatments, however, due to recent changes in the
health care system, we will no longer even have the coverage that we once
did. While our policy says that it
covers “50% of the diagnosis and treatment of infertility” there is a large
list of exclusions including: medications for the treatment of infertility,
artificial insemination and IVF. So basically, it doesn’t cover anything at
all. While the little coverage it does offer is somewhat helpful for testing,
it does not help people like me with blocked tubes and scar tissue build up
from endometriosis.
What about the risk
of multiples with IVF? What do you want, a litter?
Yes, there is an elevated risk of multiples with the use of
fertility medications and IVF but there are ways to prevent multiples by only
transferring one or two embryos (depending on the embryo quality). There are a lot of dangers associated with
carrying multiples and doctors do everything they can to prevent HOM (high
order multiples). Most often, people who get pregnant with a “litter” do so
because they go against doctor’s orders. For example, there is a very well
known television family who went through fertility treatments (IUI or
Intrauterine Insemination or Artificial Insemination) who responded too well to
the medications. She had far too many mature follicles (eggs) and her doctor
cancelled that treatment cycle. She and her husband were told to abstain or use
protection to avoid HOM. They chose to ignore doctors orders and voila: a
litter of children. In the case of
Octomom, she went to a very irresponsible doctor that choose to implant far too
many embryos. Thankfully, we go to a reputable clinic that works in conjunction with UC
Davis. Our doctors are ethical, well educated and well practiced.
What happens if you
have lots of embryos? Would you just throw the ones you don’t use away, or
leave them in deep freeze forever?
Absolutely not. We believe that life is created the second
sperm meets egg. Just throwing away or freezing our embryos forever would be
like throwing away a tiny human or freezing one forever! There are a few
options for us: Any extra eggs retrieved, that we wouldn’t use during this
cycle to achieve pregnancy, can be frozen for us to use to be able to give our
potential child a sibling, later. The cost of a frozen embryo transfer is much
less that the full cost of another cycle of IVF. Also, if we were to have more
embryos than we wanted to use for ourselves, we could donate the embryos to
another couple struggling with having a child that has egg quality issues.
Isn’t there something
else you can do?
There is a surgery, called a laporoscopy, that helps with
the removal of that scar tissue. I have had this surgery twice and while it has
helped alleviate a lot of discomfort, the doctors cannot remove the tissue
surrounding my ovaries or blocking my tubs without the risk of damaging them
and creating further problems with my fertility. Hence my doctor’s recommendation
that we do IVF.
Why don’t you just
adopt?
That’s a good question and some day we might, but for now,
we would like to try and have our own biological child. Plus, adoption is very
expensive (more so than IVF) and the wait time to adopt a baby in the US is
four to five years.
I think you two will
be excellent parents. What can I do to help?
Well, we are asking people to help fund our IVF procedure by
donating here (HERE will be linked to our funding campaign). Any amount will help. At our clinic, we have been offered a discount and one cycle of retrieval and
embryo transfer costs $9,500 (an additional cost for ICSI is $1,500) plus the
cost of medications, which is an additional $6,000-8,000. We are trying to fundraise the
full amount of $17,500. While we have the means to care for a child, we don’t
have such a large amount of money at our disposal and financing options for
treatment have high interest rates. We are applying for grants and discount medication programs, but there is no guarantee we will receive them.
I would like to help,
but don’t feel comfortable donating through a website.
Please feel free to email us at (I'll insert my email address) and I would be happy
to send you our address and you can mail us a check or money.
I’m sorry you’re
going through this. I don’t know what to say.
Battling infertility is hard and people often don’t know how
to comfort their friends and loved ones who are going through this difficult
journey. Here is a great resource to help you know what to say, and what not to
say, to people struggling with infertility: http://www.resolve.org/support-and-services/for-family--friends/infertility-etiquette.html
