…mostly because they cost over $4,000…that and the shots we got in the mail today are our best chance at having a baby.  That’s right!  Our meds arrived today.  Well, I guess my meds?  It’s a fine line, you know, when talking about fertility, pregnancy, miscarriage, etc.  Mike and I tend to use the royal we, so I guess more often than not, I’ll use we in this blog (don’t hold me to that, odds are I’ll flip back and forth).

Ok.  So.  What does $4,225.23 in medication entail?  Before I get to that, I should mention, we are not printing money in the basement.  Anyone who has ever heard of/about IVF before probably knows it involves a petri dish and a lot of money.  We’re really fortunate.  The fertility clinic that we’re working with is affordable, especially seeing as our insurance covers medications.  We paid $6,500 to our RE (reproductive endocrinologist) which includes all of the monitoring: blood work and ultrasounds, anesthesia, egg retrieval, working with Mike’s sample, embryo babysitting [seriously, this is HUGE! You wouldn’t believe what an embryo babysitter is going for nowadays 😉 haha I’m half-kidding.  Embryologists have to have Master’s Degrees or higher!], embryo transfer (given a successful cycle), and even more ultrasounds and blood work.

So…you’re saying $6,500 doesn’t include meds?  Right.  That’s what I’m telling you.  Luckily our insurance company accepted the claim for our medication…we blew through our deductible and will be paying co-pays for the rest of our insurance year (Oct. 1 – Sep. 30), but this  coverage is a huge deal.  I don’t think I’ll ever understand how insurance is billed, adjusted, and subsequently charged, but I know that out-of-pocket, we could have been looking at an additional $4-6k (some people pay up to $10,000+).  So this was BIG DEAL!  I got the phone call from our IVF coordinator on December 20th that our insurance was accepting the request to cover our meds and I felt like Christmas came early!  And a weight on my shoulders (and Mike’s) had been lifted–one that I’m not even sure I knew was there.

SO.  What was in the box?  twenty syringes, twenty 27 gauge 1/2 inch needles, alcohol wipes, a sharps disposal box, and, of course, the actual medication.  I will be using Menopur, Ganirelix, Follistim, Crinone gel, and then a shot of HcG to trigger ovulation when it’s time to collect my eggs.  You can google those drugs, or not, and when we actually start the protocol (in mid to late January…it’s all cycle based), I’m sure I’ll explain more.  Mike and I had a lot of fun stacking the meds as high as we could get them…both of us acknowledging that it was similar to (but way different than) Jenga.

Opening the box was pretty amazing (and a touch overwhelming).  There was so much hope in that box!  Here’s what could be the makings of our child(ren)…how incredible is that?!  As hard and confusing as this journey can be/has been, I am regularly amazed by and thankful for modern medicine…this is our shot.  And we’re not throwing it away.