Not a Goodbye, but See You Later

I will be the first to admit that I haven't been around much. The past few weeks have been a bit crazy, both with TTC and just our lives in general. We've had two weddings, a shower and bachelorette party (that I planned and hosted), a bad car accident and having to buy a new car, crazy work schedules and trying to sell our house. Oh yeah, and IUI #2. Needless to say, I feel like we've been spinning in circles. And the trying to conceive part hasn't gone too well.

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In my last post, I talked about my injection class. I learned how to use the follistim pen, and was gearing up for my first injectable cycle. I will say now that the follistim injections were a piece of cake, and after the first couple of days I couldn't even feel the needle when I gave myself the shot. I ended up doing six days of shots, and at my final ultrasound I was told that I had five mature follicles. Yes, you read that correctly...FIVE mature follicles. The nurse said that my RE would cancel my IUI cycle if we had six follicles, but with five the choice was mine to continue or cancel. Mr. Chef Bud and I had many conversations about our options, and I talked to a close friend that has dealt with IF, and we decided to continue with the cycle. I didn't want to look back and have any regrets. I triggered, had a lining that was thicker than ever before (7.4), had 37 million sperm post wash with five follicles. Everything was lining up for a perfect cycle and a BFP...



Until AF arrived. I started my period 9 dpIUI, and honestly, I was devastated. If 37 million sperm and five follicles couldn't produce one baby, there had to be something else going on. I stayed home from work on Monday to get myself together and made an appointment with my RE for Tuesday to talk about what happened and what to do next.


She had no explanation for why it didn't work, which is what I expected with an unexplained diagnosis. What she did suggest is for us to move on to IVF. The way she explained it was that she would have more control with IVF, and would be able to look at other factors including egg quality and fertilization to see if those might be something that is affecting our ability to get pregnant. I understand the rationale behind moving to IVF, but I will be honest when I say that I was really scared. I just never thought I would be at this point, and it was really hard to deal with. Mr. CB had a really hard time with it, especially the financial aspect. He is the money man at our house, and thinking about the cost associated with IVF just blew his mind. We knew we definitely had some long converstions ahead of us.

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We ultimately decided that we needed to move forward in our journey to start a family, but we needed to be financially smart as well. Lucky for us, our clinic offers what is called a split donor cycle. Basically, we will be matched up with another couple who needs an egg donor. I will do an IVF cycle and donate half of my eggs to this couple, and in return I will have a reduced rate for my cycle. In my eyes, this is a win-win situation. Mr. CB and I are able to pay about half of what a standard IVF cycle costs (really important since we are 100% OOP) and we are also able to help another couple whose only shot at having their own child is with an egg donor. I feel very strongly about this since I have seen firsthand on my message board the heartache that women face when they are told that their own eggs are not good enough to create their baby.

Right now we have filled out the donor paperwork, I have talked to the coordinator and we are waiting for them to go over my chart and decide if we are accepted. Once we get the approval, we have to make sure we have all the preliminary testing done, and then we wait for a match. To be matched, a couple has to choose our profile as their donor. It is all anonymous, and I've been told it takes 2-3 months. Once a match has been made, we will do genetic and psychological testing and if all looks good, the recipient and I will go on BCP's to make sure our cycles coincide and then we are on our way. I am hopeful that we will be on our IVF journey sometime this summer. That thought is both exciting and scary.


I have decided that for the next couple of months I will take a break from the blog. We won't be doing much other than waiting to be accepted and then to be matched, and I think it's important for me to focus on other aspects of my life. I have pushed so many things to the back burner since I've been TTC, and now that I have a plan in place and know I have a break ahead of me, I think I should focus on some of those things that have fallen by the wayside. I hope that you will still be interested in my story when I return, and I promise that as soon as I have a match and my IVF cycle is underway (hopefully soon!) that I will be back to let you all know what the process is like. Thank you so much for all of your support and love as Mr. CB and I embark on this next part of our journey!