So, here we are. It was December 26th, a Wednesday, and we'd just be told that I was definitely the problem. Once again, I can't express how defeated those simple little words can make you feel. They gave us the option of waiting another month, but also said that if we wanted to try an IUI, that the following day would probably be the best day for it.
But what's an IUI, you say? Well, I'll tell you.
I had heard of IUI before. I have several friends who have had it done. IUI stands for intrauterine insemination, and it's generally the step you try before you go to in-vitro. We were in the perfect spot to try IUI, because I had gotten my first positive ovulation test that morning, prior to our post-coital test. That meant that I would be ovulating sometime in the next 12-48 hours. Now, swimmers can live in the kush, cozy, fallopian tubes for up to 5 or 6 days (crazy!), so if we were going to send them on up, then the next day was perfect for that. We also did an ultrasound and saw that the Clomid had actually developed THREE eggs that were ready to spit. MOMENT OF PANIC. Three? What if all three fertilized? Triplets?? Of course, we went ahead with everything, but imagine that small moment of uncertainty you'd feel knowing you were potentially volunteering to have triplets.
Now, the cost. Seeing how it was the day after Christmas, and the end of the month, needless to say the bank account of two people on cops' salaries was pretty slim. And remember, insurance didn't cover ANY of this. We had already talked to the doctor previously about private pay costs for those whose insurance didn't cover it, and we knew that the IUI would cost around $700... quite a bill for those who aren't expecting it at that moment! And get this, if the IUI didn't work, IVF was going to cost about $13,000! AND only has a 50% chance of working. We had already made the decision that if we had to move to IVF, that adoption would be the route we would take. Amazing that some people just have $13,000 laying around to gamble on getting pregnant. Wish I did!
So, we scheduled the IUI for the next day, December 27th. Our doctor was out of town that day, so his nurse practitioner asked us if we were comfortable with her doing it. Of course, we were. After all the time we'd spent in their office, we were practically comfortable with the records clerk doing it. LOL :)
Back to the IUI. There isn't anything glamorous or romantic about an IUI. We made an appointment for Bobby to go in and give a sample to the lab the next morning, and my appointment was scheduled for 30 minutes later. I'm pretty sure he was mortified at the idea of it. But the cool thing about it was that we got a semen analysis included with it, so at least we found out where we stood from that end. After all the "washing", "sorting", and analyzing, there were 62.1 MILLION swimmers in the sample we used. Remember that thing about only 4 still being alive I talked about earlier?? I knew there should've been millions. The Discovery Channel is good for all kinds of learning.
My part of the IUI isn't any more glamorous than his was. It's basically his sample, injected straight into my uterus, bypassing that "hostile cervical canal" I mentioned before. The uterus and fallopian tubes are much more comfortable for swimmers, so once they're up there, they just wait. And YOU wait. And wait and wait and wait. They told us not to take a pregnancy test until 10 days later, but after about 6 days, you get REALLY anxious. So, January 2nd, I took a test. Negative. I just cried and cried. And got the same result on January 3rd, 4th, 5th, and the morning of the 6th. Bobby told me to just stop and wait until 10 days had passed, but I'd already convince myself that it hadn't worked.
That evening of the 6th, which was a Sunday, we had just come home from dinner at my mom's house, and were watching a little TV in the living room. At about 9:45pm, I decided to go get ready for bed, leaving Bobby in the living room. And yes, you guessed it, I snuck in another pregnancy test. For any of you who have ever taken a pregnancy test before, you know that those three minutes are the LONGEST MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE, regardless of what you want the outcome to be. So, I set the test on the bathroom counter and went to fold laundry that was piled up on our bed. After about 5 minutes, I stood at the bathroom door, staring across the room at the test, terrified to go in because I knew that I was just setting myself up for disappointment again. I worked up the courage and went in.
PREGNANT
Am I being punked again? I actually looked, walked away, and then came back and looked again, which seems really dumb to think about now. And then the tears came. I just leaned against the wall and cried. I probably cried for 2-3 minutes before Bobby heard me and came in. When he came in the bedroom asking what was wrong, I just walked out of the bathroom and hugged him. I was crying so hard I couldn't even get any words out. You know when you cry so hard that snot and drool comes out and you just wipe it on whoever you're hugging at the time? Oh you don't? Well, I did that. He had pretty much gotten used to my emotional ups and downs, and since I'd been crying a lot of all of this, he just sadly said, "you took another test, didn't you...". To which, of course, I nodded yes and pointed into the bathroom. He walked in and looked and smiled the biggest smile I've ever seen and came back and hugged me until I thought my guts would explode out of my body. I can't remember ever feeling so relieved and scared and apprehensive and excited all at the same time before. After nearly 18 months of trying, I saw the test I'd been waiting to see.
All the excitement was welled up inside me like I've never felt before. I couldn't sleep all night, and I got up the next morning with the biggest smile on my face EVER. I thought to myself, "We're done. Finally. And I can't believe it."
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