The Baby Journals

Merry Christmas all!  It’s difficult to write over here very often.  Partly because there’s not much going on, and partly because it reminds me that there’s not much going on.  I honestly just sat here for about 5 minutes wondering what I could say, and I don’t have much.

Only this…last night we were having dinner with some friends and somehow the conversation turned to having kids.  Of course anytime that comes up, I always end up rehashing the story because someone hasn’t heard it before.  That’s not so bad - I’ve conditioned myself to talk about it ad nauseum without so much as flinching.  The sucky part is that when I woke up this morning, I’d had the most vivid pregnancy dream ever.  There was a point in the dream that I actually remember looking down at my pregnant belly and seeing the outline of a tiny foot pressing against me.  I even had the baby in the dream (but for some reason I couldn’t tell what sex it was).  It really sucks to wake up from a dream like that, only to realize that it wasn’t real.  I tried to push it out of my mind.  I didn’t even say anything about it to Jay - of course it made it easy not to because we forgot to turn on the alarm and ended up waking up at 9:00, so rushing was in order.

Anyway, I’ll keep chugging away even if it takes way longer than I want it to.  I’ll update as things happen, of course.  I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas & you get everything you ever wanted!

God Bless,

~Brooke~

That was my ticket number for the free IVF drawing this past weekend. It didn’t prove so lucky for us this time, but the odds were high. The conference, on the other hand, was very informative and answered a lot of questions. It was not a waste of time, although I have to admit, I was really hoping for that free cycle!

After the conference (it was over at 12:30) we had lunch at Longhorn in Jax, then just wandered around the city. Jacksonville Beach was packed. They were having an air and sea show, so the people were out in masses to see the planes flying overhead and the boats in the water. We were planning on eating somewhere by the beach but we couldn’t find a single place to park, so we headed back towards Jax and ended up at the Longhorn. After lunch we went downtown and just took in the sights. We paid $.50 to ride the Jacksonville Sky Way train. That didn’t last long. Check this thing out.

I was totally freaked out being so far up & the turns really felt unstable. I kept getting that “roller-coaster-about-to-drop” feeling in my stomach. Of course, that’s sort of the feeling I have some days about my circumstances in general, but those days end (thank God!). When we finally got off, my legs were so shaky I could hardly make it down the stairs to the car! I was glad that was over. Lastly, we ventured over to The.Jacksonville.Landing. There was a band playing, so we got a fresh fruit smoothie and listened to the music for a while. Then we were homeward bound.

It was a good day all around, but we’re back to the planning board. Next step…job with benefits - most likely Jay will find one instead of me. Y’all pray.

~Brooke~

We went to the clinic yesterday. I can’t say that all went as planned, or that it was news we wanted to hear. When we got there we discovered that the tests we were to have done that day did not cost the $800 Dr. W quoted at our first appointment. Turns out, my side of the testing would cost approximately $2000, and Jay’s side would cost about $675. That we were not prepared for. It took everything I had inside not to break down right there in the nurse’s office. So we pretty much just sat there with the IVF Nurse Coordinator, who was wonderful, and talked about our options. Here are a few:

1) Continue saving/raising money (we have almost $3000 in the bank) and just wait until we have enough money to continue. It would be nice to have the entire amount (about $14,000 now) when we start so we would have one less concern while we were going through the process.

2) Nurse E told us some companies that she knew had insurance benefits that covered IVF treatments, one being Ban.k of Americ.a. I could apply for a teller job, work it for the 3-6 month period before I have coverage and then go forward with the process.  I have already sent in my resume to two branches here in town that had part time openings.  If they call me for an interview, I will definitely be interviewing them as much as they are interviewing me.  I guess it’s a good time for change anyway!

3)  This option would be the most appealing to me, but it involves a bit of chance (favor!?).  There is an infertility awareness conference in Jacksonville on November 3rd.  To “give back” to the community, the clinics represented there are giving away 3 free IVF cycles to registered attendees.  I registered the minute I saw that!  I wonder if it’s ok to pray that I win one of them?  I guess it can’t hurt!  If that’s in the plans for me, then let it be!  Obviously, this would be awesome.  I could immediately go forward if this happened, and not only would the first cycle be free (except for the tests above), but if, God forbid, it didn’t work the first time, or I wanted to have another kid later, then the following cycles would be about 1/2 - 1/3 the cost of the first IVF because I would already have frozen embryos ready to transfer.

So, that’s the latest news.  I’d welcome any input or advice you may have to give!  I’ll be sure to keep you updated.

This is a picture of the cost sheet I got from the clinic. Add to that the testing that we’ll be having Wednesday - I’ve been told around $800-$1000. Most of the terms up there are Greek to me at this point, but I’m sure I’ll be quite familiar with them in the very near future. I just wanted to put this up for everyone to see. Sometimes I say how much it costs, and I can hardly believe it myself. I know some may be thinking that there’s no way that this could be so expensive (I know, I think that too sometimes), but here it is in black and white. Very real, very expensive. However, I know that when we have our baby(ies!) it will be worth every single penny.

I’d just ask that if you’re the praying type, please pray specifically that every area above that I need to spend money on will be covered somehow. Some of it already is thanks to our gracious family and friends who’ve invested in our future. I can’t say thanks enough. Also, if you have any creative ideas that we could use to raise funds, please share! Otherwise, we’ll be selling anything that’s not nailed down on eBay :)! Anything it takes.

Here are a few pictures from the Baby Boom Concert. There are more if you care to look over on my Flickr page. Enjoy!