Dollars to Donuts

I went to the RE's office this morning and forked over enough dough to purchase a new car (with some left over, depending on the model). Or make eight months of mortgage payments. Or spend three weeks at our favorite resort, plus airfare. You get the picture. A pile of money changed hands today. Well, not literally, instead of going to the bank to get stacks of money with non-consecutive serial numbers, I handed over my credit card and got a tiny little piece of paper in return.

At least we get a percentage back for every charge, so we'll get a little bit of the cost returned to us, but it won't be enough to pay for the required blood work.

DH and I ended up deciding to go with the Shared Risk Plan versus an Individual Fresh Cycle. Since I've never knowingly been pregnant (there was one cycle in which my breasts felt like they were about to explode but I didn't test before big red showed up*), we have no idea if my body will even embrace the idea of having a collection of my and DH's cells snuggled up close for any length of time. Comparing the costs and our comfort level, making the decision to spend more up front was the right answer for us.

Drugs get started Saturday night. 300 Units of Follistim and 2 vials (150 Units) of Menopur. On a good day that means 2 shots. On a day when there's only a partial amount left in a Follistim vial, that means 3 shots. I'm used to the Follistim process - the needle is pretty tiny, and it's in a pen style mechanical dispenser - you just turn the knob to the level of units you need, shove the needle in and push the clicker down until it stops. It's a pretty cool and fairly idiot proof system. The Menopur process isn't quite so simple. There are more steps. Steps I can easily mess up if I'm not paying full attention. And I have to use a real syringe. Not so cool.

Back to the RE on Thursday. With my previously slow response, the RE isn't expecting me to be exploding with eggs by then even on a "regular" dosage level. (Leave it to me to prove him wrong. No, don't. I don't want to do that.) The timing of all following events will be based on my response, but I'm expecting to retrieve the weekend of the 30th (or early the following week) and do the transfer mid to late week.

I think I need a donut. Or six.




*I keep thinking I need to go back and look through my notes to find out when that actually occurred - if it was pre-Clomid or in the early days of Clomid.