We have had a very small hiccup in our plan. Our local clinic is able to perform blood tests and ultrasounds; however, they are coding them where insurance will not cover the cost. I have spoke to the insurance company and the fertility clinic and those pieces should be covered if coded correctly. Since they state they are unable to fix this, we are now driving 3 hours, 6 hours round trip, to attend all monitoring appointments.

I did two rounds of ovarian suppression so I was ready to grow multiple follicles when the time was right. I had a suppression check on August 10 and there were 19 total follicles seen at that time all very small and my estrogen level was 37. I began a protocol of ovarian stimulation (stims) on August 13 of Gonal-F and Menopur injections in the evening. My follow up ultrasound on Aug 18 showed 25 follicles and an estrogen level of 788. All the follicles were growing at an even pace. At this time I added a cetrotide injection each morning to keep my body from ovulating until we were ready.

The next ultrasound the follicles were too compact to get a good count, but it was noted there was a ‘large group of good looking follicles’ and my estrogen level had increased to 1526. It was about this time that I started feeling a little pressure in my lower abdomen on both sides and little twinges with my steps or bumps in the car.

They asked me to return for additional follow up on Monday August 23 (today) and my ultrasound showed that as long as my estrogen levels came back in a good range it would be time to trigger. My estrogen came back at 3204 and I was advised to take my trigger shot tonight. I will follow up with ovulation test in the morning and as long as it is positive, I will have egg retrieval on Wednesday August 25.

Once we got started with the appointments the process has gone rather quickly. We do anticipate another waiting period after retrieval for the genetic testing to be completed before our frozen transfer. Right now, we are excited and ever-so-grateful for the additional travel being the only bump in the road to date.

Over the past two weeks we have driven 1890 miles to appointments, had 23 injections, 5 ultrasounds, 4 blood draws, a covid test, and a few side effects. Tonight… we trigger!