Really....

You can call this the update of the This process is a M@th$r F*%&#r  post.

Last time we spoke about the process, S was taking the Gonal-F pen to help her follicles (eggs) mature and get to a certain size in order to inseminate. Well S has now been to the office practically everyday since that last post for the nurses to monitor the growth of her eggs and simply keep us on pins and needles. May I also remind you that each time S goes to the doctor's office we are charged and as many of you may very well know, this is not covered by insurance so....yeah. Money, money, money.

Last weekend we noticed that only one follicle was growing an estimated 2 millimeters every two days. We decided to talk to a nurse to have a better understanding of what is going on and what the overall plan is since we haven't been given any information. Essentially every time S goes to get tests or be inseminated she's run through the baby making conveyer belt and no one seems to sit down and explain what is going on until she has to ask for clarification.

When we met with the nurse we wanted to know why S's follicles were not growing faster and why the dosage for the Gonal-F pen was so low considering we saw other couples who were getting higher dosages. The nurse informed us that the dosage was low as a precaution because S had so many follicles and if the dosage was higher than a large number of follicles would mature at the same time which is not good. Hmmm.....interesting because what she was telling us sounded like something called Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. S was told before that she has PCOS but this was not confirmed by the any of the nurses or the doctor after the battery of tests that she was given when we first started the process. I could go into what Polycystic Ovary Syndrome is but I'm sure I would be missing some vital information. If you Google it there are a ton of sites that have detailed information about it.

So S tells the nurse, "Maybe I have so many follicles because I have Polycystic Ovary Syndrome." Guess what the nurse said. "That's a possibility." REALLY! Maybe that would be some vital information for us to know since this is essentially an infertility issue. Luckily we already knew about this but had we not known anything we would have remained in the dark the entire time. And may I remind you, spending more money. We came to the conclusion that the doctor must have noticed that S had PCOS but failed to communicate this information to us. Otherwise why would she be given such a small dose of medication and why would she have to have her follicles monitored nearly everyday. Obviously this made us very upset so we decided to talk with the doctor. That was a disappointing conversation.

First off the doctor didn't have his facts straight and kept referring to me as S's husband. Wrong! Secondly he was distant and aloof on the phone. Once S expressed that she had some concerns about going ahead with the IUI process since she had PCOS the doctor said, "that's why I recommend doing IVF rather than IUI." REALLY! Cause guess what folks, he didn't recommend that to us. In fact at our very first visit S told the doctor that we wanted to go ahead and do IVF but the doctor suggested (actually insisted) that we do IUI. In his very words, "Why do the big guns when we can go this route first." So we went ahead and did what he suggested. I mean he's the doctor and has been doing this for years with such success that we figured we could take his advice. Needless to say S and I had a talk and have made the decision to do IVF if this second round of IUI doesn't work.

While we have the second round of IUI to look forward to we felt so frustrated and overlooked by the lack of communication and poor bedside manner of the doctor. Have you ever heard the saying, Want to know how to make God laugh? Make a plan. We we are learning that first hand. This is certainly teaching us about patience and holding on to faith. If we can get through this we can certainly get through anything.

But do you see what I'm talking about? This process is a M@*%er  F#$+&r for real!