Well, I was supposed to go back to my fertility specialist on November 20th, but on November 16th, mother nature had other plans and forced the change. On November 17th, Steve and I headed back to the office to do more tests for new rounds of meds.

As we drove up to the North Atlanta office, Steve and I were nervous. (I may have been the nervous one.)  We had decided that, if everything looked good on our test results, we would add Intrauterine Insemination to our treatment plan. That’s right. We want to do an IUI, which is less invasive and less expensive than IVF. You may know this as the other name: Artificial Insemination.

We went to the back waiting room, where we waited to get called for my baseline ultrasound and next round of blood work to check my hormones. Steve and I distracted ourselves with memes and jokes about Atlanta traffic. (We are 30 minutes late because of said traffic.)

When we got called back, I prepared for the ultrasound right before Dr. Namnoum came in. The purpose of a baseline ultrasound is to check the ovaries for cysts, which I have had in the past, and see if any follicles (where eggs come from) are developing. During the ultrasound, Steve stood up by my shoulder, and we both watched the screen as the doctor examined my ovaries. Both looked good. There were 1 or 2 left over follicles from  my last cycle that had not become cysts (yes!) and 8-11 developing follicles per ovary. That was a good sign. She also read me my results from the last appointment’s blood work. Everything looked great. I was normal for everything, including my A1c. (It was 5.8 in June, which is pre-diabetic. Now, it’s 5.1. Woo!) The doctor was very happy with my results and asked how we would want to proceed. With a big smile, I said that we would like to try IUI. Now the wheel was set in motion.

Before we left, Steve and I had more blood work: hormone checks for me and STD/HIV check for him. (Mine came back clear.) I giggled during the blood draw because the stress balls they have there are shaped like sperm. If you know Steve, he had a joke or two.

After the blood draw, Dr. Namnoum put us in the care of her patient care coordinator, Tracey, who would explain the next steps.

Step 1: I would start the 1st of three rounds of medication: Letrozole (Fermera.) I would take 5mg each day from Nov. 18-Nov. 22 while continuing my regular medicine. The office would order my 2nd (Trigger Shot) and 3rd rounds (Progesterone) of medicine. I was to bring the Trigger Shot to my next ultrasound.

Note: If our blood work and Steve’s other tests came back fine, we would move on to Step 2. We will find out Monday or Tuesday

Step 2: On November 25th, I was to return to do a mid-point/mid-cycle ultrasound to check my follicles. There are two ways it could go with this.

• If they looked mature, I would give myself the trigger shot before leaving the office. After that, the IUI would happen within 24-36 hours.
• If the follicles did not look mature, I would have to come back in a few days to recheck before moving on.

Step 3: IUI Day! If everything looks good, Steve and I would move on to this. I will post more about this as we get closer to the day.

Step 4: Two Week Wait with Progesterone. Hopefully at the end of this window, Steve and I would be pregnant. If not, we start over.

So, now we wait and go through the steps with lots of medicine, science, and hope. Please pray for Steve and anyone I come in contact with. I will be on so many different hormones that I may be a different, evil person. I may cry at some point. Just know that I do this out of love for myself and my family. 😀

Fingers crossed that this works, and I won’t go too crazy from it.

For now, I’ll keep drinking the water.