Dr. Luck = Lucky???

Hi guys!

I know the blog has been kinda lacking on posts lately. Sometimes it is hard to try a new topic to write about, especially when you aren't going through treatments.

But...

I hope to start actively trying soon! I have an appointment early August with Dr. Luck (Mansfield, Texas). I picked her for her credentials and also hoping that she will be my lucky charm :o)

Other than that, not much to report.  We will be making some changes with blog design and hopefully adding some more authors!!! Keep an eye out for an application form!

In June a family member announced her pregnancy. Unfortunately she miscarried shortly after. Today I just found out that the mother of my Goddaughter is pregnant again!

Hope are you guys doing???

~Shannon

Disappointing Month

August was not as good as I expected it to be.

I had really high hopes when I shouldn't have.

My OPKs were coming back super close to the control that I was sure I ovulated.

My ovulation bloodwork was the Friday before my birthday and the pregnancy bloodwork was the Friday after.

I hoped that would bring me luck.

Everything seemed to be pointing out that August would be great and the Clomid 100mg would work and I'd have a great birthday month!

But alas, nothing turned out how I hoped.

Ovulation bloodwork: Negative.
Pregnancy bloodwork: Negative.

And I am at the same spot I was in spring of 2009 when we stopped the clomid after 100mg. Just the feeling that it isn't going to happen. Disappointed failure and that treatments worth pointless.

I have to remind myself that it isn't going to be easy and that I have to keep going. That isn't as easy as some might think. I wish I could get pregnant like most normal people and not worry about if I will even get AF to get pregnant (I am currently on CD52... further proof I didn't ovulate).

I'm now 26. I know that most of my friends aren't married or they don't have kids and may not for years. But I also know that most of them don't have these complications.

I don't know what to do anymore.

You can pray for me but please don't tell me to pray. I know that most of our readers and writer's are very Christian but I am struggling with what I believe and have been for a while now.

"I'm still not sure what I stand for, oh
What do I stand for? What do I stand for?
Most nights, I don't know...
Well, that is it guys, that is all - five minutes in and I'm bored again
Ten years of this, I'm not sure if anybody understands"
Some Nights - FUN

Introducing Molly!!!

Hey there! Well I'm a young one too, I'll be 23 in November. My husband is almost 25 and we have been married since May 2011 and trying since June 2011 so going on a year and a few months. We were one of the couples that decided to wait to have sex until marriage. He wasn't a virgin but I was and I don't regret it at all. I was a little naive thinking that we did everything right and that everything would fall into place the way that I had always dreamed. Boy was I wrong! Ha. I've always wanted to be a mother. I wasn't concerned about a career or partying or anything. I was born to be a mother, I just know it! :) I do have a college degree in Photography, because it's my second passion in life. That keeps me super busy on the weekends and I work with elderly in their homes during the weekdays. My husband and I are so in love and want nothing more than to have a child. I was diagnosed with PCOS in January this year. I'm currently on 1000 mg of metformin and had my first unsuccessful month of Clomid last month. My mom was on Clomid twice when she was younger and as a result, I have a twin sister and I also have an older brother and sister that are twins too. Yep, two sets of twins. My mother is an amazing woman and a huge part of why I want to be a mother so bad. I'm so excited to have somewhere to go where I can talk to people who understand me and where I can offer any help and support that may be needed. Such a tough road to have to follow, but I know it will all pay off for us in the end. Thanks for letting me be a part of such an inspirational team and I look forward to getting to know all of you! xoxo

Waiting... and Waiting...

I don't know if any of yal have had this kind of problem with Provera...

I finished the dose on Tuesday evenings and as of today, Saturday evening, I am STILL waiting for my period. Normally AF starts within 1-2 days after I finish the pills.

I want it to hurry up and come (rare for a girl to say that, I know!) so I can start my Clomid 100.

The worse thing is, I stay paranoid about my period hitting since I don't cramp a lot during AF. Thus it can hit me unexpectedly. UGH.

Have any of you had this type of problem before??

AF Only Arrives With an Invitation

Yesterday was officially the end of Cycle 1 of Clomid as I started Provera again.

Doctor had called and confirmed on July 5th that the pregnancy blood draw came back negative so she went ahead and sent the increase dose of Clomid (100) and the provera to my pharmacy.

When I start taking Clomid I will begin to track my LH with the ovulation strips again.

I hope you guys are having some good luck out there!!!

Vitamins, Vitamins, Vitamins

I wanted to show you the new vitamin regimen I started about 2 weeks ago... It is a lot!

Here are alllll the vitamins:

ALL my vitamins plus a prenatal sample

AM vitamins:
Super B-Complex (1) - Walmart
D3 2000 IU (1) (had a deficiency in January) - CVS
Maca 500 mg (1) - Vitamin Shoppe
Black Cohosh Extract (1) - Walmart
Licorice Root 450 mg (1) - Vitamin Shoppe
Vitex Fruit 400 mg (1) - online
Metformin (1) - Script
Cinnamon 500 mg (2) - Walmart

AM Vitamins

PM Vitamins:
D3 2000 IU (1)
Black Cohosh Extract (1)
Licorice Root 450 mg (1)
Vitex Fruit 400 mg (1)
Metformin (1)
Cinnamon 500 mg (2)

PM Vitamins (Big brown one is a sample Prenatal)

Prenatals:
Dr gave me samples and if they DON'T have B12, I take them at night. If prenatal DOES have B12, I take it in the morning. But I only take 1 a day.

The Black Cohosh, Maca, Licorice Root, and Vitex fruit were all recommended for PCOS. When I started taking this cocktail, my basal temp didn't move more than 0.20* until I missed a dose then it fluctuated a little bit.

CD17: LH and Basal Temps

As you have seen from my last post, my LH went down.

And then up a little.

Then down again.

And now going back up.

GEEZ.

I haven't been able to record my basal temp because my basal thermometer ran out of batteries and it wasn't one that you can change the batteries >:(

SO.

I haven't been recording them for the last week because I keep TRYING to remember to buy one when at the store and then completely forget.

But I bought one today :)

I am supposed to go on Thursday to do bloodwork for my Progesterone levels. I am going to keep LH testing until a) I run out of strips or b) AF comes. I know some of you ovulated late in the cycle so still trying to remain positive.

My only question is... If I DON'T ovulate on this cycle of 50mg of Clomid, do I do another month of 50 or just go up to 100??

Any suggestions???

Ovulation Help

In the last 24 hours I have heard of TWO new myths that are supposed to help ovulation. I want to try them.

The first one I heard about was LICORICE (or licorice root). Yes. Supposedly taken for five days in your cycle and it is supposed to help. But they say it doesn't matter WHEN in the cycle.... I haven't found it yet but going to Walmart tomorrow and will look there. I know they sell it online (I don't like the flavor of licorice, so would rather take a vitamin). Supposed to help with depression too... Maybe something some of us could use after years in this cycle.


Second was a swig of Robitussin a total of 6 days (five before ovulation and the day of). Even says you can take it with Clomid but to take it after you take the last pill. It is supposed to help the cervical mucus become more fertility-friendly, especially since Clomid tends to do the opposite. Read about it here!!


Since I take my last Clomid tomorrow, I might buy some Robitussin and give it a shot. I can't STAND liquid medicine but I'm sure I can make a sacrifice for this goal :o)

Silent Blogger

When starting this blog with a few friends, I had initially intended to be an informer of PCOS and infertility but didn't know when I would be doing fertility treatments myself. DH and I had decided we would wait til Aug 2012 and go from there on what we wanted to do. Either wait 2 more years until nursing school was over or just steam ahead.

Sometimes other people's decisions affect our own.

As we all know, Mother's Day was last weekend (sorry for the reminder!). Saturday evening the night before, I FINALLY heard back from the nursing school I applied to. I was rejected for the Fall 2012 semester start. Just what I wanted to hear on that weekend, as though it wasn't bad enough.

I didn't know how to react to that. I had expected it, deep down, but still hopeful. Kinda like how I feel whenever I do fertility treatments. Didn't expect it to work but hoped it would.

DH reassured me that everything was ok and this and that. They next morning he picked his words carefully and explained that he viewed it as a sign. Postponing school with no choice, his mom moving out (which isn't happening now...), and summer coming so his second job wouldn't be as stressful was like the pieces coming together. We need to focus on building our family.

So, Monday morning I called my previous OB doctor that also does minor infertility treatments and set an appointment. I expected the standard 2-3 month wait like the first time I went. Imagine my surprise when they said I could be in on THURSDAY!

The days passed and I got giddy and nervous and finally I was at her office.

She is a nice doctor. The only way I can describe her is that she is very professional and sometimes that makes me feel awkward because she doesn't tend to small talk or converse unless promoted, especially if she is entering notes on the laptop (they have a computer file system there). Me, being the socially awkward person in an awkward 1-on-1 situation provided plenty of small talk hoping to make both of us relax and she talked a little more... Anywho...

We discussed my options and she agreed that we would start clomid 50 mg once this cycle of BC was done. Luckily I had decided to start taking it back in January so that ended up cutting off three months of wait time. She also sent a prescription for metformin since it tends to help the clomid out.

I'm excited. AF should start in a week and we will go from there.

How do I feel about all this? Excited. BUT I don't think it will work. I'm hopeful that it will but don't  think it is probable. I guess I'd rather expect the worse so the letdown isn't as hard. We shall see :)

OH! And my insurance doesn't cover ANY infertility, not even clomid so the breakdown:
CVS Pharmacy
Clomid $19.09 for 5 pills (50 mg each) which breaks down to $3.818 per pill
Metformin $1.30 for 1 month (covered by insurance)

Last time we went through this (Spring 2009) Clomid was $18 a pill and generic was $1.80 (Walmart). We decided to just go ahead and splurge on brand name this time :)

Medication cost

I posted a while ago about insurance non-coverage, well here's some numbers I wish we're easier to find, since the mail order pharmacy is shady about giving out this info:

Gonal-F ( I needed 3 900 iui pens)
$1380 each!!! If you can get the discount card for cash paying patients, it's $744 each. If u have insurance coverage you can get for free but u can only use either card once in 28 days so try to get all ur medication at once.

Microdose or low dose HCG (an injectable compound)
$95 at the local pharmacy out of pocket plus the cost of syringes -__- which were $4 each bag of 10.
Mail order from freedom pharmacy was $70. This was one my pharmacy couldn't do because it was an injectable compound.


Certatide (I needed 3 of these but was prescribed and paid for 4 :-/)
From freedom pharmacy $86 each for a total of $344, the maker back orders it for smaller pharmacies.

Novarell
$89.90 from freedom, it was discontinued for my pharmacist to purchase. The alternative is Ovidrel which is $95

Vivelle dot (estrogen patches since I have estrogen issues)
This one has a discount program that is free with insurance, but freedom told me they were 67.81 for a box of 8, or 9.51 each. Which stinks because these are estrogen patches meant to be changed once every 72 hours, however the longest mine have gone is 48 hours...

Doxycycline (antibiotic and typically covered by any insurance)
Freedom said copay was $10.67, idk how much it really was but my pharmacy got it for me for a $5 copay.

Methylpredisolone (idk what this was but took 16mg once a day for 4 days after the retrevial)
Freedom said the copay for this one was $4, again idk how much it was for real because my pharmacy got it taken care of for me, so I think it's one of those on a discount thing. It was 16 mg a day for 4 days.

Progesterone in oil (so far just 2 vials)
Freedom said $55 each vial.

Apparently some of these medications have discount cards that can get the medication heavily discounted or free when used with insurance! Big thanks to Raj and the staff 15RX pharmacy in San Antonio who worked for 2 days straight to help me pay as little as possible! They were like angels from God when I needed stress relieved.

Freedom pharmacy said I would pay $3090 out of pocket (mind you this is with insurance)
Shopping around I paid $1792 out of pocket. Could have been less if I didn't wait for the last minute to order everything (mind you this is the EXACT SAME FREAKIN INSURANCE!) I'm grateful for the insurance coverage I have but still think its ridiculous how little it pays and how my lifetime max is $5k! Thats one cycle!

Anyway, I hope this helps people get an idea of out of pocket costs

Ovulation predictor kits

Maybe because I've never really taken them at the right time or maybe because true only times I've taken them I've been on fertility meds but omg you would think they would be easier to use! Basically it's this stick that is very similar to a pregnancy test, u pee on it an 2 lines appear, only instead of "2 lines mean positive" you have to become a color expert and distinguish between shades of blue! If the test line is darker than the control line then you have an LH surge (something hormone, can't remember what it's called but u get a surge of it right before you ovulate). Ok then theres the whole thing on what time of day to take it, you have to do it at the same time everyday because the hormone only sticks around for 24 hours before u ovulate... I found ovulation kits stressful an no longer use them. There are things that say to take it between 3 & 5 pm which idk bout u but in at work and I'm not gonna do that at work! Lol then some things say any time of day an I think I even saw between 10 am & 12 pm... -__- between timing and the shades of blue... I give up on these! And then basal body temperature... Have u tried keeping up with that? Don't move don't talk don't wait to long don't don't don't don't... Yeah I wake up too many times at night then the first thing in the morning is morning kiss and then good morning... Then I'm half asleep to remember the thermometer and then it falls and so I move and there goes that days measurement... Ima just hope I ovulate one day and see how that goes lol

-Mrs Red