I’m writing this from our little cabin on the North Shore in Grand Marais. Chris and I had this vacation planned for 8 months, and we weren’t expecting me to be 8 weeks (almost 9 weeks) pregnant.
I’m not going to lie. It’s been rough. This morning I had to poop which is always cause for anxiety with my gag reflex and sure enough, I stood up in the small bathroom and did a massive dry heave and thought I was going to throw up. That caused me to cry (a lot).
Yesterday, I overdid it with my knees walking around Duluth. Normally, I would take ibuprofen when I have to do a lot of walking, but I can’t take anything right now, and my calves and shins feel like they’re on fire. I was limping around last night in the cabin, really worried about how I was going to get around the next day, and this morning, they’re still really painful. So I was crying about that too.
I also just woke up from a nap because I was so exhausted from crying this morning and then walking slowly around Grand Marais. But despite all that, I’m still glad we’re here.
The weather is beautiful and the air is fresh and while I feel like shit, it’s still worth it, being here just the two of us.
We ended up telling the girls about the baby right before our trip since they would be with my parents and we didn’t want anything to slip to them. Olivia was really excited and could hardly contain herself. Emelia I think is excited, but after I initially told them, she doesn’t seem to care that much. Though she does like to point to my belly when I ask her where the baby is. So she knows there’s a baby, but of course, it’s not a baby she can actually see. And Olivia immediately asked if she could have bunk beds and now that’s pretty much the only thing they talk about.
I started vaginal progesterone (two pills shoved up there nightly) at 8 weeks. The next morning, I had the confirmation ultrasound, this past Monday. I informed the tech I historically have had a tilted uterus and this early on, it always worked out better to do a vaginal ultrasound. (I haven’t had this many things shoved into my vagina all at once in years.) After two seconds of her doing her due diligence with the ultrasound on my belly, she agreed, yep, let’s do this the other way.
“Okay if I insert it now?” she asked. Yep, yep, get in my vagina, I’m used to this.
And there was a baby. Not only a baby but a baby with a heartbeat. Floating between 178 and 180. The baby was apparently measuring 4 days ahead but they decided to keep my original due date of May 14th because it was less than a week. All this guessing when you have sex to get pregnant. I missed the accuracy of IVF. Of course, not the actual IVF, just the exact due date without question. Baby even gave us some wiggles.
After that, I met with the PA that I had talked to over the phone about the progesterone. I was glad Chris was there. We talked about the logistics of the progesterone injections, with her saying she always uses a certain mail-order pharmacy. (We found out later that that particular mail order doesn’t even take insurance. Suddenly, it made sense why last week she was agreeing with not ordering the medication until we confirmed a live baby since “otherwise you could be out hundreds of dollars.”)
Chris told her our insurance has always covered progesterone injections and requested that instead the prescription be sent to the specialty pharmacy locally. When the appointment was over (BP was elevated, but acceptable), I got once again, not one, but two progesterone injections. (I found out the next day the reason for this.)
The next day, Tuesday, (Happy 37th birthday to me – you’re officially an old pregnant woman) I got to drive to the DMV to renew my license that I waited for the last second for. THAT was a treat, but even better was when I was about to go through a Burger King drive-thru (don’t judge, that burger hit the spot), I got a call from the clinic.
The medical assistant asked me if I wanted my compounded progesterone sent to such and such pharmacy. Um no, I said (rudely, I’m afraid because bitch is so over this progesterone shit) that’s not right at all. I need regular progesterone sent to THIS such and such pharmacy.
Okay, she said, but if you do regular progesterone you need to do two shots at a time to get the correct dose to get to 200 mg. Well, fucking christ do the compounded one then.
I get off the phone and Google. Oh. I remember the most progesterone I was on at a time was 150 mg, which is 3 mL of progesterone in oil, the limit for an intramuscular shot. Hence the reason for two shots.
Oh. Look at this. Compounded medications aren’t covered by insurance.
Sonofabitchwhore can I be done with this please?
I called Chris from the parking lot, still wanting my burger. I told him everything and he said he’d call the specialty pharmacy and ask about it. Calls back. Tells me each vial will cost us over $100. I almost threw my phone. I got in the drive-thru lane, still shouting at Chris that if I never called the clinic this early I wouldn’t be in this mess and stressed out and fucking happy birthday to me!
I got the burger and it was amazing and then I drove to therapy (thankfully I had therapy that day) and unleashed the whole mess to her. I told her many clinics don’t even draw progesterone in a normal person. Progesterone levels can fluctuate – what if that low progesterone wasn’t THAT low? After all, that consent form I signed for progesterone was allllllll due to some Catholic doctor at the Pope John Paul Institute with their own protocols, their own levels of when to intervene. I was low, yes, but all this progesterone… a double dose vaginally and 400 mg injected weekly? Overkill? I don’t know.
But that evening, after opening presents from my sweet girls, we went out to an Italian place for pizza and pasta. I called and left a message for the PA. Thank you, but no, I said. I’ll stick with my progesterone pills and we’ll reassess in two weeks anyway, mmkay?
And I felt….relieved at that decision. At peace. Because my mental health matters.
