Breathing a Sigh of Relief

With Chris's new job also came new insurance.  So, when we got our new insurance cards 3+ weeks ago, I gave that to our financial lady at our doctor's office since all finances have to be settled prior to an IVF cycle.  If you pay out of pocket, you have to pay everything up front so they make certain that your insurance is valid at that time as well so that we aren't charged the out of pocket price by the doctor's office.  A little over 2 weeks ago, I got a call from our financial lady saying that Aetna has an approval process where they need bloodwork and medical history so that they can make the call on whether or not you're "infertile." I didn't realize that there was a possibility that the doctor was wrong in my diagnosis and that an insurance company would be the ones who determine my fertility status.  

Part of the process was a phone interview where they ask about your fertility history and pregnancy history.  Great, just what I wanted to do. Let me explain to a stranger about how my son died over the phone. I made the phone call and we went over how many IVFs we've done, how many IUIs, etc.  Then, they get to the pregnancy history.  They ask you how many pregnancies you have and if they were abortions (haha - seriously? You think an infertile person going through IVF would have an abortion?), miscarriages,  or full term. I picked explaining my miscarriage first since that's the easiest. Then, I told them about Nathan. I caught her off guard and she had to speak with her manager about what to classify that as.  I sure hope they classified him as full term and not just some miscarriage.  I didn't ask because I just wanted to get off the phone at this point.  They told me to wait a couple minutes on the phone while they reviewed my information. After a couple of minutes of waiting, it was confirmed that I am infertile.  Hooray! It was a good feeling knowing that my doctor wasn't wrong.  Definitely some sarcasm included.

So, I passed the first test and the second test was a blood test that then had to be faxed to Aetna.  If your number is over Aetna's threshold, they won't provide coverage for own egg IVF, only donor eggs. I was extremely nervous about this part since the test they measure is actually the test that confirmed I had an issue conceiving. I got the test completed on the 17th and we were supposed to hear by the 23rd.  When we didn't hear by last Thursday, I called our financial lady and she confirmed that they hadn't heard anything yet.  The financial lady called yesterday and again, said they hadn't heard so it might be a good idea for me to check in (considering my IVF cycle officially started with my first ultrasound, which was last Friday). I called Aetna and they explained to me that they didn't have any of my records and proceeded to ask me about my previous history.  I refused to tell them again and they "found" the information, which I'm pretty sure was sitting in front of them the entire time. They told me to call my doctor's office and have them resend the information and they would put a rush on it. I called the financial lady, who called Aetna this morning, who had my medical records and confirmed that I passed both tests, am quite infertile, and qualify for coverage.

So, in summary, I am infertile but we do get coverage for all of our cycles.  Yay for the coverage! I'm glad this headache is over with and we can focus on bigger and better things like getting and staying pregnant.

Blessed

Most days, it's hard for me to admit that Chris and I are blessed.  How can you be blessed when you're battling infertility and grieving a child? It's days like yesterday that remind us that, even though this isn't exactly what we had planned, we're still very blessed. We both have great jobs, have a roof over our heads, and have great family and friends.  Yesterday, most of our friends and family in Cincinnati came out to the March for Babies for March of Dimes and walked in memory of Nate. It was a reminder to us that we wouldn't have survived all of this without them. Yes, a lot of days still are hard for us, but knowing that others care and still remember Nathan is important for us to be reminded of occasionally.  This is one of the loneliest journeys we've ever been on since there are not many who understand the pain and hurt when you lose your own child. Thanks to all who came out yesterday.  You'll never know how much it meant to us.

I had an appointment with Dr. S on Friday to see if the birth control pills are doing their job and keeping my ovaries quiet.  Dr. S was very happy with what he saw.  Both ovaries were quiet and there were several follicles on each ovary so he was optimistic for this upcoming cycle.  My last day of birth control is today (!!!) and I start with my shots on Friday.  We have a tentative retrieval date of May 12. That is 14 days from now, but who's counting?

National Infertility Awareness Week, Part 4

Our doctor was on Fox 19 this morning to talk about infertility, when to see a specialist, and what issues can affect fertility. This video just proves how awesome our doctors are and how they really care about infertility and building awareness for the disease. Cincinnati News, FOX19-WXIX TV

World's Best Mom

I found the blog entry below on one of the grief pages that I follow and I can't tell you how good it made me feel about the decisions we made for Nathan when he was born.  I'm glad he was able to be baptized and I'm glad our families, and even some friends, got to meet him.  I do have regrets about our time with Nathan, but this just proves that I need to focus on the positives of our 3 days with him and the choices we made for him.

http://mattwessel.wordpress.com/2014/04/19/worlds-best-mom/

National Infertility Awareness Week, Part 3

"So, what do you think people would say to you if you were paraplegic instead of infertile? (author unknown)

1. As soon as you buy a wheelchair, I bet you'll be able to walk again!
2. You can't use your legs? Boy, I wish I was paralyzed. I get so tired of walking, and if I were paralyzed I wouldn't have to walk anywhere!
3. My cousin was paralyzed, but she started shaving her legs in the other direction and she could walk again. You should try that.
4. I guess God just didn't mean for you to be able to walk.
5. Oh, I know exactly how you feel, because I have an ingrown toenail.
6. Sorry, we don't cover treatment for paraplegia, because it's not a life-threatening illness.
7. So... when are *you* going to start walking?
8. Oh, I have just the opposite problem. I have to walk walk walk - everywhere I go!
9. But don't you *want* to walk?
10. You're just trying too hard. Relax and you'll be able to walk.
11. You're so lucky... think of the money you save on shoes.
12. I don't know why you're being so selfish. You should at least be happy that *I* can walk.
13. I hope you don't try those anti-paralysis drugs. They sometimes make people run too fast and they get hurt.
14. Look at those people hiking... doesn't that make you want to hike?
15. Just relax, you'll be walking in no time.
16. Oh do my legs hurt, I was walking and walking and going up and down the stairs all day.
17. I broke my leg skiing, and was on crutches for weeks, and was worried I'd have a permanent limp, but I'm 100% healed.
18. I'd ask you to be in my wedding party but the wheelchair will look out of place at the altar.
19. You're being selfish, not coming on the hike with us, and looking at all of my track & field trophies.
20. Don't complain, you get all the good parking places.
21. If you just lose weight your legs will work again.
22. If you would just have more sex, you could walk!
23. You don't know how to walk? What's wrong with you? Here let a real man show you how to walk!
24. You are just trying too hard to walk. Give up, and then you'll walk.
25. Here, touch my legs, then you'll walk!
26. Just take a vacation, and the stress-break will be sure to get you walking!
27. When *we* were young we only had to worry about having to walk too much.
28. And I bet a paraplegic going to a bookstore doesn't find books about paralysis stacked next to all the books on running...

So here's a little hint. If someone you know tells you that she's trying to get pregnant and it's taking longer than expected, DON'T tell her to just relax. Don't tell her to adopt and then surely she'll get pregnant with her own child. Don't say, "At least it's fun trying!" Scheduling sex with the person you love isn't fun. Getting vaginal ultrasounds every other day and intramuscular injections in your derriere twice a day isn't fun. Finding out every single month that - yet again - it didn't work this month either is Just. Not. Fun.
DO tell her that you're sorry she's going through such pain/grief/frustration. Do tell her that you're glad she told you. Do tell her that, even if you don't bring it up (because you want to respect her privacy and understand that she might not feel like talking about it sometimes), that you're there for her if she ever wants to talk or vent.
And DON'T feel that because she told you that it's okay for you to tell your other friends, children, co-workers, neighbors, cousins, mailman, whomever - unless she tells you that it's okay to do so. Your need to share news pales in comparison to her need to maintain a shred of privacy and dignity."

Grave Thieves, Part 2

Yes, it happened again.  This time, 2 days after Easter.

When I talked with the office the last time that this happened, they told me to have stuff off by the Wednesday after Easter.  I was unable to get up there yesterday so my dad went up to get everything off of Nathan's grave. When he got up there, he discovered that everything was gone in the Baby Garden.  Everything.  So he went up to the office, explained that everything was gone to which the employee was shocked since nothing was supposed to be taken down until April 30, and then took down my dad's information so that she could find out what happened.  When my dad was driving out of the cemetery, he saw the grass cutters and stopped and sure enough in the back of their truck was 2 garbage cans full of all of the decorations that were on graves in the Baby Garden. The workers were clueless, my dad was able to salvage some things, and then he stopped back at the office to explain his concern.  He made certain that those garbage cans would not be put into the dumpster before I had a chance to get up there and go through them to get the remaining items for his site. I went up to the cemetery between meetings and was shocked to find this:

I went through EVERY item in those 2 garbage cans and still was unable to find all of Nathan's stuff, including his nice pinwheels and his ladybugs, so there's a good chance that the workers took them.  To describe me as pissed off was an understatement yesterday.  First, it was 2 days after Easter. Second, the workers weren't following directions.  Third, this is the second time it's happened in the last month. Fourth, we were EIGHT days early in getting up there to get stuff off of Nathan's site. So how do we even decorate in the future? All of his stuff keeps getting thrown away and the office has no clear answer on reasons why it keeps happening or dates that they will really be removed.  How can they not feel terrible just throwing everything away in the Baby Garden?  I understand the other parts of the cemetery since most of those are elderly people who lived a full life, but these are babies' graves.  The only happy thing about the Baby Garden are all the decorations that are always up there.  I need to call up there and express my concern but is it even worth it?

Oh, the best was when the workers were watching me as I sifted through the 2 garbage cans sitting by the dumpster.  No remorse, whatsoever, from them.

National Infertility Awareness Week Day 2

I thought all of this before getting pregnant with Nathan and although it applies to women suffering through infertility without children, the same can be said for people who are grieving lost children, except that we already are mothers.

National Infertility Awareness Week

Did you know that there is a whole week dedicated to infertility awareness?  1 in 8 couples deals with infertility so remember that as you post pregnancy announcements, excessive pictures of your babies, etc on your social media.  Think before you ask people when they are going to have kids, because they may have been trying forever and there's nothing worse than hearing that question and not being able to answer it truthfully. Keep your pregnancy complaints to a minimum because there's some of us who would do ANYTHING to deal with whatever you're complaining about.  Don't judge people that are going through infertility treatments, you would do it as well if that was your only chance at a baby. 

Easter Weekend

Happy Easter, Nathan Christopher.  It is because of Him that you are very much alive right now.  We love you.

Taller

I Know It

Alright, on days when I don't have anything to write about, I'm going to go ahead and post positive thoughts.  I need to work on a positive attitude for this upcoming cycle.  Nothing will stop us from going through with it so I must focus on how it will succeed.

Tax Day...

... and the first day of my period! Hooray! Never did I think I would be this happy.  So I finally got my period 40 days after miscarrying at just shy of 7 weeks pregnant.  Phew.  What a long 40 days.  I'm ready to focus on this new cycle and getting all of the negative thoughts out of my head.  I start birth control on Thursday and I go in for a baseline scan next Friday to see if my ovaries are quiet and if my uterus is empty. I hope I won't be on birth control for the full 21 days but we'll see what next week's appointment brings.

I was cleaning out my work email on Friday and found an email I sent to Chris at work last tax day last year. I told him his one job was to clean out the future nursery so we could start working on the beadboard.  What a depressing email to read a year later.  I immediately deleted the rest of my emails to Chris prior to this past October 10 so I don't have any more reminders of how happy we once were.

Relaxing Weekend

Before every IVF cycle, Chris and I like to take some sort of trip to relax and sort out our thoughts.  This past weekend was the perfect time for us to get away since Nathan's 6 month had just happened and I've been extremely cranky due to the fact that I have no period and can't start my birth control until that comes about. Since we just paid off this past IVF and will be paying for another one so quickly, we decided to do a smaller trip this time around.  We settled on camping at Hocking Hills, OH with Sidney.  I'm not much of a camper and I would rather pay to not have to sleep outside, but Chris loves it so I agreed.  We went up Friday night, got there at dark, set up the tent, sat by the fire for a bit, and then went to bed.  On Saturday, we were up by 7 and probably hiked around 10 miles with Sid. We did what we wanted to do and got back home by 5. Yesterday, we hung out with my family.

Now that the trip is over, I'm ready to get the show on the road.  How is it that whenever you don't want your period, it comes but whenever you do want it to come, it stays away?  And no, I'm not pregnant. So now we wait. I'm still extremely irritated and although the trip was fun, I'm still less than pleasant to be around right now. I'm 5.5 weeks out of my miscarriage (a miscarriage where my numbers weren't even that high) and I STILL don't have my period. 

Maybe this is God's way of telling us to slow down.  Maybe, but then I'm not quite sure what he was telling us when Nathan died.

Pray that I don't go crazy this week and pray that Chris survives me until my period comes. :)

Love you, Nate.

Jesus Smiling

Shout out to Lisa for sending this my way yesterday. The last two pictures are perfect. (Turns out this picture is ridiculously small and I can't make it any bigger.  Here is a link to a blog with the picture of Jesus holding the baby. http://discoveringlifenow.com/2011/07/05/discovering-peace-in-tragedy/ )

Not a Day Goes By...

6 Months

My little boy,

It’s hard for me to write this letter this month. I can hardly see through all the tears as I type this up. I know I say this every month, but seriously, half a year?  Half a year without you?  What in the world? For some reason, the 6 month mark is a lot tougher than the other months. Thoughts of what you would be doing now have been flooding my head due to the nice weather, all the strollers I see, and all of the neighbors’ kids out.  Those are the kids that you would be running around with in a couple of years. On our private drive alone, there were 2 other boys born in 2013 and then another little boy was born in 2013 whose house is cattycorner from ours. It will always be tough to see them all running around together when you should be out there with them.

Is Heaven everything that they tell us it is? Do you get to see all of our relatives and friends who have passed away as well? Do you get to interact with Jesus? I’m sure with Easter coming up that everybody is celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. We, too, will celebrate extra this year because it is with his selfless act that there is a forever after and that’s where we’ll see you again.

I had a dream this past month that I was able to save you.  Maybe that’s what bothers me right now is that I wasn’t able to save you. I’m sure there are people who think, “how could she let her baby die,” while in my belly but the truth is, if there was anything I could have done to save you, I would have done it a million times. If that meant switching places, I would have done that as well just so that you could have grown up with your dad. There’s the saying, “if love could have saved you, you would have lived forever,” and that’s the honest truth. I hope you know how much your dad and I love you and that you are single handedly the most important thing in our life still.  That will never change. Our love for you grows exponentially and that’s why it hurts so much not having you here with us.

Soar high, Nathan, and know that our love for you is endless.

Understanding Infant Loss

http://www.scarymommy.com/understanding-infant-loss/

Nothing

I honestly have nothing going on right now.  I am to start birth control when my period comes, but apparently having a miscarriage can delay that type of thing.  So, for right now, my life is pretty boring and depressing.  Going through an IVF cycle gives me something to focus on and right now, I don't have that. My emotions are all over the place and there's been more than a few times that I have cried myself to sleep in the past week or two. It sucks thinking that I would be 11 weeks pregnant right now and it sucks thinking that Nathan would be 6 months on Thursday. It's actually hard for me to describe how I feel right now and how I have felt the past couple of weeks but it isn't good. That's the main reason I haven't posted in the past week.  I'm just at a loss for words.


I miss you, Nathan.  Come back to me.

I've Got a Secret

http://stillstandingmag.com/2014/04/ive-got-secret/


Love you, sweet boy.