It is official! My
HCG is less than 2, which is considered officially 0! We now have 3 months of chilling out before
we can try again. In an interesting
doctor’s order, we have to use contraception for the next 3 months. Seems a little redundant given our inability to
get pregnant without the use of fertility drugs, but whatever. This does mean that we have until September
before we can try again. It is hard to
wait after all we have gone through, but we want a healthy pregnancy and we
know my doctor is being cautious because he also wants us to have a healthy
pregnancy. So, we will wait! I am not sure how much I will be writing
during this time, but I will keep everyone up to date with any news we have
during this time. Doc and I are using
the time to make sure we are ready when September comes. Dental visits, checkups, and some allergy
testing for me. I only need to get my
HCG levels checked once a month, so hopefully my arms will begin to heal
up. While the waiting will be hard, we
were happy to hear that my HCG finally came down! J
Monday, June 25, 2012
Friday, June 8, 2012
June 08, 2012 – A year in review
As the first year of Doc’s residency comes to an end and we
prepare to greet the next generation of interns I have been thinking a lot
about the last year. This time last year
we were just meeting our personal physicians.
They are amazing and we love them.
Doc decided my Internist was better than his, so he has decided to
switch to mine. Mine is pretty awesome,
so I understand. We met our OB and
decided to keep him too. We were just beginning
this leg of our journey. We had no idea
how things would unfold. We certainly
didn’t know they would be as rocky as they were! We are optimists. We thought we would be pregnant in the first
few months of trying. We knew that wasn’t
reality, but somehow we deluded ourselves.
This year has been full of lessons like that.
As many of you know fertility treatments are not covered by health insurance plans, so they get paid for out of pocket. This was news to me too. We switched insurance companies at the start of the New Year and the new company refused to pay for anything, the previous company would pay office visits and sonograms as preventative medicine. The change in companies meant office visits, labs, sonograms, and medications pertaining to the treatment of infertility are not covered by our insurance plan. To give you an idea of how much that costs; each lab is $99 and office visits run $195, sonograms are around $205 at our doctor’s office. It isn’t a cheap endeavor.
The next thing I learned was that any of the services listed above are more expensive when done at the hospital. It is FAR cheaper to see a doctor in a nice, comfortable office than it is to go to the hospital. I want to advertise this fact because many people use the hospital as their primary care doctor and just go to the ER when they need anything. The ER costs $249 (just to walk in) and going to see my fancy doctors in their nice offices only costs $195. Lab fees at the hospital are nearly triple what I paid at the doctor’s office too. That is a pretty big difference in price. Not to mention I got WAY better care from my doctors than I did in the ER. I can’t say it enough; find a primary care doctor and see them at least once a year. It is more than worth it even if you don’t have insurance.
I learned that fertility treatments can impact a person’s life in surprising ways. For example, both psychological and physical health is affected. Not to mention the strain on relationships.
I learned that a failed pregnancy can cost almost as much as a healthy delivery. Of course in our case it was an epic failure resulting in nearly $30,000 of bills (most of which were covered by insurance, thank goodness!).
I learned the value of insurance and am glad we didn't start trying without it.
I learned the value of having doctors that you really trust and the value of allowing them to collaborate on your care.
I learned that my body is not unique or special in its appearance. What does that mean? It means I have repeatedly walked into rooms containing at least 10 people with the full knowledge that everyone in that room was going to see my vagina; including med-students my husband works with. My vagina and the rest of my body hold no special power or allure. They are not worth gossiping about and I am sure no one talks about it. It isn’t worth getting embarrassed and upset about. These same doctors are a part of the organization that employs Doc, which means I do get to have dinner and chat with the spouses of people who have seen my vagina. Embarrassment just makes it more difficult for everyone. Trust me when I say that your doctor doesn’t enjoy looking at your vagina any more than you like them looking at it. My doctor can’t make small talk during exams, which makes me laugh. I like to start talking about non-related subjects because it makes him go faster. I know his coping is to not connect the body part with the person. I mess with him because I am cruel and it entertains me. I once made a joke that he had spent more time with my vagina than my husband had one month and he fled the room. I love the guy because he is human.
That is another thing I learned, even though I already knew it I needed a reminder; Doctors are people too! They are human beings with lives and idiosyncrasies of their own. Treating them as if they are somehow greater than you will only make it harder to get great care, because if you believe they are better than you, you will be less likely to share embarrassing information that could be crucial to healing you. Everything you go through is a human thing, meaning there is no reason that you can’t share it with other humans. I recently had someone comment that I didn’t seem embarrassed to talk about things and my response was, “It is all human stuff, we are all humans. Why not talk about it?” I think that sums up the biggest lesson I learned. I have always struggled with a social filter and I found the perfect profession for that. As a therapist I was trained to ignore taboos and to talk about the real stuff that people deal with (rape, abuse, suicide, messy emotions, etc.). This year I realized that we people suffer needlessly because we are unwilling to talk about the real stuff, not just our thoughts and feelings, but our bodies and symptoms we may be having. That is dangerous. For example; not making it clear to your doctor that you are having severe bleeding or not asking for additional help for fear that you will be seen as whining.
It was a year full of lessons. As we go into the next year of trying to start our family I can only hope that we will carry them with us. And I will probably still think it is funny to make my OB nervous. Seriously, it makes me laugh. Just don't tell him, please. J
P.S. My HCG is 3. I will have another draw in 2 weeks. Just think about this; each lab costs $99 and I have had over 15. Thank goodness for insurance!
As many of you know fertility treatments are not covered by health insurance plans, so they get paid for out of pocket. This was news to me too. We switched insurance companies at the start of the New Year and the new company refused to pay for anything, the previous company would pay office visits and sonograms as preventative medicine. The change in companies meant office visits, labs, sonograms, and medications pertaining to the treatment of infertility are not covered by our insurance plan. To give you an idea of how much that costs; each lab is $99 and office visits run $195, sonograms are around $205 at our doctor’s office. It isn’t a cheap endeavor.
The next thing I learned was that any of the services listed above are more expensive when done at the hospital. It is FAR cheaper to see a doctor in a nice, comfortable office than it is to go to the hospital. I want to advertise this fact because many people use the hospital as their primary care doctor and just go to the ER when they need anything. The ER costs $249 (just to walk in) and going to see my fancy doctors in their nice offices only costs $195. Lab fees at the hospital are nearly triple what I paid at the doctor’s office too. That is a pretty big difference in price. Not to mention I got WAY better care from my doctors than I did in the ER. I can’t say it enough; find a primary care doctor and see them at least once a year. It is more than worth it even if you don’t have insurance.
I learned that fertility treatments can impact a person’s life in surprising ways. For example, both psychological and physical health is affected. Not to mention the strain on relationships.
I learned that a failed pregnancy can cost almost as much as a healthy delivery. Of course in our case it was an epic failure resulting in nearly $30,000 of bills (most of which were covered by insurance, thank goodness!).
I learned the value of insurance and am glad we didn't start trying without it.
I learned the value of having doctors that you really trust and the value of allowing them to collaborate on your care.
I learned that my body is not unique or special in its appearance. What does that mean? It means I have repeatedly walked into rooms containing at least 10 people with the full knowledge that everyone in that room was going to see my vagina; including med-students my husband works with. My vagina and the rest of my body hold no special power or allure. They are not worth gossiping about and I am sure no one talks about it. It isn’t worth getting embarrassed and upset about. These same doctors are a part of the organization that employs Doc, which means I do get to have dinner and chat with the spouses of people who have seen my vagina. Embarrassment just makes it more difficult for everyone. Trust me when I say that your doctor doesn’t enjoy looking at your vagina any more than you like them looking at it. My doctor can’t make small talk during exams, which makes me laugh. I like to start talking about non-related subjects because it makes him go faster. I know his coping is to not connect the body part with the person. I mess with him because I am cruel and it entertains me. I once made a joke that he had spent more time with my vagina than my husband had one month and he fled the room. I love the guy because he is human.
That is another thing I learned, even though I already knew it I needed a reminder; Doctors are people too! They are human beings with lives and idiosyncrasies of their own. Treating them as if they are somehow greater than you will only make it harder to get great care, because if you believe they are better than you, you will be less likely to share embarrassing information that could be crucial to healing you. Everything you go through is a human thing, meaning there is no reason that you can’t share it with other humans. I recently had someone comment that I didn’t seem embarrassed to talk about things and my response was, “It is all human stuff, we are all humans. Why not talk about it?” I think that sums up the biggest lesson I learned. I have always struggled with a social filter and I found the perfect profession for that. As a therapist I was trained to ignore taboos and to talk about the real stuff that people deal with (rape, abuse, suicide, messy emotions, etc.). This year I realized that we people suffer needlessly because we are unwilling to talk about the real stuff, not just our thoughts and feelings, but our bodies and symptoms we may be having. That is dangerous. For example; not making it clear to your doctor that you are having severe bleeding or not asking for additional help for fear that you will be seen as whining.
It was a year full of lessons. As we go into the next year of trying to start our family I can only hope that we will carry them with us. And I will probably still think it is funny to make my OB nervous. Seriously, it makes me laugh. Just don't tell him, please. J
P.S. My HCG is 3. I will have another draw in 2 weeks. Just think about this; each lab costs $99 and I have had over 15. Thank goodness for insurance!
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