Hellobee Boards

@waiting4you: Hi there! Thank you, welcome back, and best of luck with everything!!

@jaguar: I thought about 10 days? Maybe wait one day to be sure?? I hope it works!

@NorthStar: Thanks for thinking of me. I have monitoring appointments Friday, Saturday and Monday. I'm guessing he will have me come back Tuesday if his current guess on egg retrieval is correct.

I hate monitoring appointments more than the shots. My hats off to those of you who have a long drive- mine is ten minutes and all these appointments are such a pain. This is my doc's standard monitoring schedule. Did other people have this frequent?

I ordered more follistim- somehow I got two phone calls into winfertility in the midst of a super crazy work day. Now I'm going to relax and try not to stress. I have tomorrow off. Saturday I'm going to have my intralipid infusion after Monitoring.

@jaguar: I never tested it out, but I had a beta of 4 at 14.5 days after trigger (trigger at night, beta early). I'm guessing you're too early to test- no matter what, it could change. Waiting is terrible!

@AmeliaBedilia: I know, its a TON of appointments! At least you know your schedule of monitoring ahead of time... I have one and then have to wait until I get a call from the RE's office to find out when I have the next one. I'm going tomorrow, too, and after that I don't know .

@Aqualov: Ugh! I hope that's both ways!

On Wednesday I had five follicles 10-11mm on my left and only one on my right, with another 4-5 smaller ones. RE said the smaller ones were questionable. Now I'm feeling a little pressure on left side only, which makes me worry that the right side is only going to have one. First three monitored cycles I had much better response on the right, told my acupuncturist and then I ovulated better on my left. I had a cyst on my right three days before stims started. I'm trying to give me right ovary a pep talk.

@AMELIABEDILIA and @AQUALOV - I'm like aqualov, 1 hour or more each way to the dr. While it SUCKS, I try to remind myself that I'm blessed to have some insurance coverage and if it means I have to drive this far to save $15k, then bring on the playlists and tanks of gas. I start stims on Sunday and they have my first u/s set for day 3 this time (it was day 5 last round). They also kept me on BC for a week longer and and are starting stims a day earlier on day 4 instead of 5 days after last BC pill. Hopefully this is our "time"!

And another situation I had happen with meds. I have to use Aetna Specialty Pharmacy since I have some fertility coverage and they require you use them. Since this is my 2nd round of IVF I had some meds left over from round 1. I sent a detailed list of what I had leftover to my RE. They called in my Rx for round 2 but didn't factor in what I already had. When I called ASP to set up delivery I informed them of the actual quantities to process/send since I had some already. As I know all of you are about your meds, I was extremely detailed and wrote everything down and confirmed before we got off the phone. The package arrived the next day and there were more of certain meds than I had ordered. I immediately called to speak to someone and was told there was nothing they could do about it and once it leaves the building "the integrity of the drug cannot be confirmed and therefore it cannot be returned". I was beyond upset since this will now be charged against my $15k in coverage...for THEIR ERROR! The guy put me on hold and spoke with quality control and unfortunately came back with the same answer. He transferred me to a supervisor who was very very nice, but she pretty much said the same thing and there wasn't anything she could do about it. She said she would try everything she could and get back to me (I was completely sobbing at this point while telling her how incredibly important every $ of coverage is and she ended up tearing up on the phone with me as well).
Moral of the story...check, recheck and check again what they are sending before they send. This was a $600+ mistake on their part that is now costing ME.

@waiting4you: I'm so sorry for this. I happened to see this - I'm not doing IVF at present. Is there any way you could file a formal complaint with the company? Even in the form of a letter or email addressed to their customer service department so it gets on record. Or directly with your insurance company? I would at least use threats of those in order to get your money back. My husband works for a carrier - I find it hard to believe that the pharmacy or insurance company can't do anything.

@waiting4you: Yes, and I would document document document, to the extent you can - make sure it's not all verbal telephone calls. That way you can show them and your insurance carrier (if necessary). Perhaps your doctor could help provide supporting documentation of the amounts you needed, etc. Just a thought. (I'm a lawyer, I want everything to be in writing even if ultimately it's just a "he said, she said" kind of situation)

@waiting4you: That's terrible! I hope it gets worked out. You make a good
Point- my doc is convenient but I'm paying out of pocket for everything. We're looking about 12,000 if we don't have anything to freeze, 13,000 if we do. I did a lot to save money, but requiring high doses of meds to stim sucks. While I don't have any IF coverage except diagnostic, I've had three bills that were incorrect- either I shouldn't have gotten them in the first place, or my HSG was charged at $1000 more than I had been told. This process is already hard enough without all this.

Ultrasound went well. Six good ones on the left, four good ones on the right plus a few "maybes." He amended his estimate from 8-12 eggs and said "plenty to work with." Uterine lining already at 8, which surprised me since Dr. Google says my estrogen is on the low end. Day 3 (after two doses) was 47, day 5 (after four doses) was 90.6. Today's level (day 7) is pending. My doc is happy with the rise, so I'm trusting him. I'm waiting for the call with official results but I expect it will be same dose (gonal f 375 plus menopur 75) and adding ganirelix.

@waiting4you: that's awful! hope they can fix the situation for you!

Hope all the january cycle ladies are doing well! i have a good feeling for lots of positives this month

@waiting4you: That is awful. That said, none of our clinics or med pharmacies here will take returned drugs either - but if THEY were at fault, they should leave them with you free of charge.

@AmeliaBedilia: Those follies are taking off! So much for lower numbers, haha!

@waiting4you: I can't believe this! As if you need the headache of dealing with extra meds and extra costs. I really hope that they resolve this for you in a reasonable way - either the pharmacy or the insurance.

@endymion4: Thanks so much! Definitely feeling hopeful!

@GreenThumb: That's the way to do it safely!

@GreenThumb: Agreed. I start ganirelix tonight and another ultrasound tomorrow. When do you expect egg retrieval to be? Mine is estimated at Thursday.

We're doing an intralipid treatment tomorrow due to my NK cells at 34%. DH is able to infuse them (much cheaper- yea!), and RE is ok with that. My RE is somewhat progressive on immunologic treatment, but not as aggressive as I'd like. He is starting me on prednisone after retrieval. He didn't recommend intralipids, but when I brought it up, he was fine with it. I called Sher institute about the infusion rate, and she was awesome. She said that they rarely see NK cells over 20%, and 34% was higher than she'd ever seen. She said I could have been sick (I felt badly at the time but thought it was due to starting cabergoline), or lab error. I've had high prolactin levels, which can activate NK cells as well. She said the level needs to be under 10% for a healthy pregnancy. Of course, this makes me nervous. She said for the patients around 20%, they do two treatments plus steroids. Does anyone have any insights?

I was silly and was hoping this Femara cycle before IVF round 8/9/ican't remember/too many to remember would be awesome and give us a miracle baby.

Nope. BFN. I am so over this hope.

@jaguar: Hug! You're not silly. I've done that too. There's just enough miracle stories to make you think you'll be one too.

Appointment was fine. 7 good ones on left, 4 on right, plus some maybes. Largest is 15mm. I asked how many mature eggs he expected, which was 7-10. He used the word "great" and might drop my meds based on the estrogen, which is pending. I'm doing the intralipid treatment right now.

@GreenThumb: how was your appointment?

@GreenThumb: Awesome!

Yikes, E2 plateaued so I have to increase Gonal-F tonight. Headed in for U/S tomorrow. Ugh, please don't let this cycle stall out!

ETA: I found this from an RE on the SIRM website. It makes me feel a whole lot better because I just started cetrotide last night. "If you started cetrotide just before the estradiol drop it may simply be due to this; cetrotide and ganirelix will artificially lower your estradiol level and doesnt actually have any clinical relevance. (In other words the estradiol level becomes unreliable as a gauge of follicle size or growth when one uses cetrotide or ganirlelix). In such antagonist cycles you must go by the follicle sizes and their development in order to know when the stim is adequate, and most importantly, when to trigger with hCG."

Thanks guys. Just disappointed.