Change of Plans.... again

I decided yesterday morning to have a laparoscopy done. It was one of those things that I knew I should do but had so many excuses not to do it. I don't want to be in pain and out of commission for several days. I don't want to have to wait even longer to start injectables. (It is pretty ridiculous that we decided back in May to try to have a baby and now it is looking like November or December before we can actually start.) Everyone in the Mullerian Anomalies board says people should do it to get the right diagnosis. I am not really sure if I really care if I have a UU or something else because none of the other things I could have could be repaired by surgery anyway meaning that the course of action will still be the same no matter the diagnosis. However, the pain I have been in during my period lately is unbearable and I want to know what is causing that and hopefully get it fixed.

The date is set. October 6 I'll be going under the knife. DH is taking off work for 3 days. I still have to let my mom know about the surgery (and I will still manage not to let her know about the TTC part because I am awesome like that) so she can figure out how to get DS1 to preschool that day and take care of DS2 as well.

I was happy about my decision up until I got off the phone from making the appointment. Now I just want to cancel... but still hoping they find a ton of endometriosis in there that they can suck out and make me all better.

Post-op appointment isn't until October 26 so it looks like we won't be trying to have a baby until after that. Or maybe I will get knocked up the natural way this cycle and we can just cancel all this silly surgery business.

There is always the chance too that after this surgery I could be told there is really no chance I can get pregnant. I am okay with that too. I pretty much decided three years ago that I would never get pregnant and mourned all that. In a way that news would be a relief. We wouldn't start spending money on more infertility stuff and instead just go on to our third adoption as we had planned to do years ago when we decided we were going to become an adoptive family.

Last Boring Cycle

My last boring cycle for a while began yesterday. The plan is for the next cycle to be our first injectable with IUI cycle. I have to start setting up everything for that here in about a week - getting meds ordered and learning how to use them and such. DH finished the last of his antibiotic today which hopefully will cut down on the white blood cells in his semen. He goes back in a week from today to do yet another semen analysis to get that checked out.

The Plot Thickens

I got a letter in the mail from my ob/gyn today. I had almost forgotten that I called and asked them to mail me a copy of my HSG and MRI results so I could hand deliver them to my RE since their office seems to be incapable of receiving the faxes from my ob/gyn. Also, I just wanted to see for myself what was on the HSG and MRI reports. If there was nothing in there that said which side my uterus was on, I knew I was going to have to try to get a hold of my RE and have him redo the HSG or some other test to figure out what side my uterus is on so that when we do finally get around to doing the injectables and IUI, we will know what side I need to ovulate from to get that egg into my uterus. My RE thought my uterus was on the left side based on the sonohysterogram, but that test really isn’t designed to figure out where the uterus is anyway. I was reading through the HSG and MRI reports today and both say that my uterus is on the right side. Glad to know that that is (pretty much) determined. However, there was some information on there that no one ever told me before and when I read it I just started laughing in disbelief that my ob/gyn never even mentioned this to me. The report reads:

“Incidentally, the sagittal midline images demonstrate degenerative disc disease at the lowest two levels of the lumbar spine with probable moderate disc bulges at both L4-5 and L5-S1. Please note that this study was not designed to evaluate the spine and dedicated lumbar MRI should be considered if further information is clinically desired.”

Not sure what I would have done with that information but still! You would think someone might have mentioned that to me. It sure does a lot to explain why I have had horrible back pain on and off for the past 10 years or so.

The Coverage

I got a phone call back from our prescription coverage company today. I was told that all the drugs that I told them about are covered. Okay, good news. Although that was pretty much all they told me. For each drug I will pay a flat rate co-pay, but they couldn't tell me how much that co-pay would be until my dr calls in my prescription. They apparently couldn't even give me a ballpark figure. So I guess that means that I could be paying $2 for month's supply or $2000.

I called a different number at my RE today to ask if they had gotten my HSG and MRI results that my ob/gyn was supposed to fax in. They called back to say that none of that was in my file. So I was pissed/frustrated. I called my ob/gyn to see what was up and the woman said she was almost certain it was already faxed but would fax it again while I was on the phone. She faxed and I hung up. I really don't have much confidence that it will end up in my file at the RE though. So far the RE hasn't had anything that my ob/gyn was supposed to fax in. When the RE gets it, I will need my dr to review the information to let me if there is enough information in there to figure out if I have a right UU or a left UU. I have decided to be my own dr. Tomorrow I am going to call my ob/gyn and see if I can get them to mail me a copy of the HSG and MRI report. Next time I am at the RE I will have my own copy to take. Plus, I will know firsthand if the reports say anything about what side my uterus is on.

I should probably just get a laproscopy. That would determine once and for all how my organs are all situated in there. But, I'm scared. I really don't want to be in pain and out of commission for several days. I figure that is going to happen for the nine months I am pregnant... one of these days.

Junkie

I just called to see if any of the injectable medications will be covered by my insurance. I had to give them a list of all the possible drugs so they could go through them and call me back to let me know what, if anything, is covered. I felt like quite the junkie rattling off the extensive list. They should call back in the next few days. I am very nervous about what they are going to say and just how much this is going to cost. And that is just for the drugs. I don't think any of the u/s and other monitoring will be covered, or the IUI. I can hardly wait to see what level of junkie-ness I will feel when I get my medications and needles and all that fun stuff.

DH has been taking an antibiotic to hopefully help clear up the issue of white blood cells in his semen. I called yesterday to make the appointment and he goes in on August 31st to get that checked out again. The urologist wrote something on his prescription about "chronic prostatitis". DH googled it although I am kinda confused about what he said he saw. Basically it could cause infertility issues but can also result in depression and tiredness - both of which DH has issues with. (Technically he has anxiety issues but his anxiety always responds better to anti-depressants than to anti-anxiety medications.) I told him that I was actually glad that he might have a medical condition that makes him tired because all this time I just thought he was lazy. I'm actually far more concerned about the depression/tiredness issues than I am about the fertility thing. Although the fertility thing sucks for right now, the depression/tiredness is going to affect him forever.

We decided to "try" to have a baby the old fashioned way this month. We pretty much sucked at it. I guess we are out of practice with having sex when we are supposed to instead of just doing it when we want to. The only chance would be with the sex we had last night, which turned out to be the day after I think I ovulated, so probably not much luck there.

Still planning on holding off until my late-September/early-October cycle to do the injectables and IUI.

I've been a member of a yahoo group for people with unicornuate uteruses (uusisterhood) for a little while now. Someone contacted me who came across my blog from another yahoo group for people with Mullerian Anomalies (MullerianAnomalies). Mullerian Anomalies cover pretty much all abnormalities in the formation of the female reproductive tract. The group is so active and there is so much information on there that I can't even keep up! When I was diagnosed I thought I pretty much learned all there was to learn in the matter of a week or so of checking out the internet. That was only because I couldn't find much information on UU's or Mullierian Anomalies.

And that is where we are now.

Makin' a Baby

It looks like we are sticking with the plan to hold off on injectables until my October-ish cycle. I got DS1's preschool schedule in the mail the other day and the way this cycle is shaping up, it looks like the first week or two of preschool will also end up being the period of time when I need to be monitored daily by the RE.

I was thinking that maybe we could try to old fashioned "natural" way of having a baby. Not that I think it will work since we did it that way for a year and spent the last 20 months not avoiding doing it that way. But it could be worth it to have some more sex when I have fertile CM (which started today) just in case we got lucky and could avoid infertility treatments and the costs associated with them. (Talk about outrageous! We spent nearly $350 last month on infertility "stuff" and that wasn't even for any proceedures that might get me knocked up.) Plus, I was looking at the literature that the RE gave me today and got to some photos of how to give yourself the injections and that kind of freaked me out. I don't think DH would be too crazy about giving me injections to begin with but I also am the type of person who will have to give them to myself just to prove to myself how awesome I am and that I can do it. I brought some of this up to DH this evening and we had the following conversation:

Me: So I think we should try to have a baby.
DH: Ok.
Me: We should start tonight.
DH: Ok.

Yeah, if only it was that easy. No over thinking and analyzing and wondering if this is the right time and if we would make good parents and no unicornate uterus and infertility doctors. Just sex and a baby. How ludicrous is that?