4 Year Anniversary and the Most Expensive Gift Ever

(nice of us to change it up in that last one and have me on the left for a change ha)

Man, time flies! It seems like yesterday that Dillon and I first met, but it was almost 6 years ago. It blows my mind to think that we've been together for 5.5 years and married for 4. It feels like forever and at the same time the blink of an eye.

And so for our 4th anniversary we pulled out the big guns and decided to get in vitro for each other. So sweet, right? Ha. I mean, I was trying to convince Dillon to get me (us) a smoker, but turns out they'll probably be making smokers long after my ovaries give out, sooooo IVF first and then the smoker is probably the smart choice ;)

I don't know if I've shared this before, but when we first got married Dillon and I had decided to wait for a little over a year before starting to try to have kids. But about 6 months in we both felt compelled to start trying sooner. I thought that meant we would be having kids sooner. So naive.

Then after we realized that it was taking longer than it should and went into the doctor, they told us we could start fertility treatment (medicated IUI's) asap. We wanted to wait and try on our own for a little while longer, but then there came a point at 18 months of trying when I felt like we were putting it off and got that same compelled feeling that we needed to start the treatment. Naively, I thought that feeling meant it would work.

It was really hard when it didn't work, but helped me to realize that maybe there was actually something wrong. I had still been thinking it was all just somehow a fluke. When we found out about the genetic mutation (MTHFR) and then miraculously got pregnant with just the medicated part of our treatment, it felt like we finally had answers. Turns out that pregnancy was a fluke, but I was able to finally be getting vitamins and nutrients that I need.

After losing the baby and getting the okay to start trying again, we did all the same things from when we were successful, but still didn't get pregnant in a reasonable time frame. I think that's about when it finally sank in that there is a legitimate problem and we need more help. So we scheduled an appointment with the doctor to discuss the next step, which we knew would be IVF. I mean, there really aren't any other options (besides waiting around), but that same compelled feeling has come back in regards to not putting off doing IVF. This time, I won't assume it will work first try, but I do hope that it will work!

We decided to switch to a different clinic that we had heard good things about. Our first appointment was great and we feel good about the move. It was strangely relieving to hear that 3.5 years of trying is not normal.

I have felt that way for a while, but didn't want to be overly dramatic or jump the gun on things if it just required a bit more patience on my part. I felt like I would be doing needless treatment and minimizing others' actual trial of infertility by just not being patient and letting nature take its course. Maybe that sounds silly, but I was in denial that we had a legit problem for a long time because, due to testing, there's "nothing wrong" with us.

Our new doctor asked questions about my cycle and family history of auto immune disorders and told us that most likely I have endometriosis. She said in 50% of unexplained infertility it's endometriosis. 20 years ago the standard of care was to do surgery to check for it on every unexplained case, but now they give the option to do surgery and let you know that it doesn't help your chances of conceiving on your own, just gives you a cause, but the treatment plan is the same regardless (IVF if medicated IUI's fail).

So that's where we are. It's crazy because I never thought we'd get to the point of needing IVF, let alone have any problems with fertility at allllllll, so this is a weird thing to wrap our minds around.

Mostly it's hard to wrap our minds around the price tag--IVF is expensive! We feel lucky that we've been able to save over the last few years, but are still a bit disappointed we will be using our house down payment money to buy kids instead of getting them for free like most of the world. And yes, I know kids are expensive. We would just like to start paying when everyone else does, not years ahead and thousands more ;)

Anyway, we've had testing and appointments over the last couple weeks and today we got our calendar. It's a crazy schedule and most of the next two months are scheduled out, so please wish us luck during our attempt at IVF!