Hope

Yesterday we went to the open house for a different fertility clinic. What a different feeling and atmosphere! How I wish we had known about this place 10 months ago. For the first time in a while I am hopeful again. We only spoke with the doctor for a few minutes individually but we spent about 2 hours watching the presentation, touring the facility and getting a feel for the place. I really think this place is the one that will help us achieve our family. This feeling of hope is so wonderful and I've greatly missed it!

A Fresh Start

So, yesterday was a little nuts. We waited in line for 6 hours to get the new iPhone 4! Crazy? Yes. Worth it? Absolutely!!!
For one, between my husband's gift card and the money we sold our old phones for, we only had to pay about $70 for both new phones....definitely a deal. It's also got cool new features and an absolutely beautiful display I'm amazed by.
Most importantly though...it's starting to represent something wonderful to me...a fresh start. Literally, the fresh start is because I messed up. I wiped my old phone before I restored the backup to the new phone. Then I hooked up the old phone to iTunes to make sure it worked. Sounds innocent enough. Unfortunately, that created a new backup...of a completely wiped phone. No contacts, no text messages, no internet bookmarks, no saved app data. I felt sick to my stomach as I frantically tried to fix it.
Then, it was really odd but all of a sudden it didn't bother me so much. I can get people's numbers again...and if I can't, maybe that person isn't someone I need to contact anyway. No text history? If it's really important I'll find out again. If I can't remember the address of a website...it was probably a site I just wasted time on and I don't need to do that. My apps that reset...it's a little freeing knowing I don't have to check my mafia or farm settings every four hours so I don't miss anything.
Interestingly enough...10 months of tracked fertility data is gone. Notes about CM, OPK, IUI...all reset. It almost seems fitting somehow...a fresh start. Tomorrow we go to the new clinic's open house and I will go in with no written history...maybe that's a good thing. If I can have an electronic fresh start...maybe I can have an emotional one too. :-)

Couples Retreat

So, we rented the movie Couples Retreat and watched it last night. It was upsetting to me...mainly because the main couple organized the whole retreat because they were going to get divorced after a struggle with infertility. Just...ouch. Wish I had known that's what it was about before I bothered renting it. We did finish the movie and it was ok...I just had a hard time enjoying any of it.

Worries

The last few days I have been working on finding a new job. I decided not to return to my teaching position next fall with the hope that I would go to work for a former boss of mine. Now that is up in the air and I don't know what is going to happen. What I do know is that it is a terrible time to be unemployed. There are so many people looking for work and I'm afraid of just how many applications there are for every open position. I've never had a problem getting a job before but I don't think I'm going to be that lucky this time.
Of course not having a job also means not having a paycheck. My husband's work has been keeping him pretty busy, which is good because he is an independent contractor. He bills hourly based on how much there is to do so the busier he is, the bigger his checks. I'm hoping he will stay busy enough that we don't have to dip into our savings too much while I'm not getting paid. If I don't get a job within a few months however...well, things will be really rocky.
Keeping that, and our recent frustrations with our fertility clinic, in mind, we've decided to hold off on any more fertility treatments. We are going to an open house for a different fertility center next weekend though...they are even giving away one IVF session to those in attendance so fingers crossed!!! I guess we'll just have to see where life takes us over the next few months.

Decisions

I called the doctor yesterday to set up another fun round of Clomid to culminate in an IUI cycle this month. We had to skip last month because we were out of town and also because we were told that if we skipped a month in between Clomid cycles we could avoid having an expensive ultrasound. Turns out, that wasn't exactly true. Because I've had a cyst before they are now telling me I need to have the ultrasound anyway. For some reason, that was the last straw. I assume it is because my hormones are a mess and this has been going on way too long...but I just lost it. I feel so hopeless and depressed about this. We have been on this infertility journey for far too long already...5 years. The last 9 months I had some hope, some feeling that at the end of this everything would work out. I don't feel that way anymore. All I feel is older, poorer, and defeated.
They are only giving us a 5 - 10% chance that the IUI will even work. At almost $600 a pop now with the ultrasound, that seems like a waste of money, a waste of raging hormones from the meds, a waste of hope. If we want a 50% shot at having a baby we will need to fork over $13,000 or so EACH time we try. No guarantees, no refunds. And for all those "just adopt" people...it costs over $20,000 for a private adoption of a healthy, US baby....about half that if we go out of the country but then you add travel expenses for at least two trips there. Plus, all the adoption horror stories. Yeah we could try adoption from state foster care, which is minimal cost but it's a gamble I don't think I'm strong enough to take.
So where are we? It's time to make some decisions I guess. Am I willing to bankrupt us for the chance to be a mother? Can I be happy without a child in my life? I wish there were easy answers out there. I'm tired of crying, tired of hoping, tired of pretending my heart doesn't break every month.