Happy New Year! I got my period! (And Olivia starts school)

There’s something really satisfying about my cycle starting January 1st. We’re wasting no time ringing in 2019 with fertility treatments around here. I went in on Thursday for my CD3 ultrasound and blood work. I’m at a new satellite clinic now and so far it’s been going well. My labs all looked good, lining was thin, and follicles were quiet. January is ERA (endometrial receptivity array) month for me, so I’m doing a mock cycle. Pretending to go through a FET, and so I started my estrogen pills and patches that Thursday night. Luckily, I have plenty left over from the last transfer and I’m hoping to not have to even buy many more of these medications for this month.

Part of this mock cycle involves doing progesterone injections for about five days and I get that the whole point of this biopsy and testing is to check if the timing of when I’m starting progesterone is right for my body, but really all I’m hearing is YOU NEED MORE SHOTS BIOTCH.

The other thing about this ERA is my satellite clinic here has been really nice about it, really accommodating, but are just falling short for my confidence in them performing it. I started making calls and coordinating everything for this almost a month ago when I was planning out where I was going to do my monitoring. I had spoken to a nurse, as well as the fertility nurse practitioner at this clinic and they all said, “Oh yes, we do those all the time!” when I asked about the ERA. Even after confirming it was an ERA, not just a biopsy, they kept referring to it as an endometrial biopsy, which is a part of it, but is also a different procedure entirely, so I was always left a little confused.

Then I had my consult with one of the doctors there, and I thought it was strange being that he wasn’t going to be monitoring my care. But he was very helpful with questions and if I’m pregnant I can continue to see him as long as I’d like. He said he’d be happy to do the ERA for me but he’s never done it and his clinic hadn’t either. In fact, he knew of one woman that was a satellite patient from CCRM in Colorado and she actually flew to Colorado to get the test done.

He even went and spoke to his nurses and when he came back to the room, he said no, they haven’t heard of it either. Which was obviously the opposite of what I was told, but that’s why I’m thinking they heard endometrial biopsy and ran with it.

The weird thing is—because there are always weirder and weirder things happening to me—is that right before my appointment, I was meeting with the lab tech and she had a kit for me, but it was sent to the wrong location. I must have looked confused, and she said, “You were the one who needed to get a test done, right? We have the kit, but it was sent to the other location and I’m there tomorrow and can grab it.”

I should have brought this up to the doctor when I was with him because that would have made things so much easier, but it had slipped my mind.

Anyway, so a few days later, I called the clinic and spoke with the lab tech. Yes, she had the kit with her now and was going to put it on the doctor’s desk for when he got back after Christmas. “Here,” she said, “I have it right here.” So we went through it and she emailed me the form that needed to be filled out by the doctor.

I sent that off to the nurse at the Houston clinic, asking if my doctor needed to fill any part of it out. I was feeling good. I was feeling like I was getting ahead of this planning and coordinating so that when my cycle started, I’d be able to just go ahead with everything.

It wasn’t the right form, ergo, it wasn’t the right kit. I think I literally did a facepalm when I got that message. So the last three weeks of planning and coordinating and repeating to several medical professionals over and over that this is an ERA, and all they heard was endometrial biopsy and now we’re right back to where we started.

So it really sucks and it’s an added expense, but after ranting to talking with Chris we decided that the best way to guarantee this gets done the right way the first time is to fly out there myself and get it done in Houston. So that will be towards the end of January. I don’t know. I feel like this is so much easier than the stress of the coordinating. I mean, I don’t even understand this procedure 100% and I am the middle man trying to communicate this to the two clinics. The testing itself will cost upwards of $600 out of pocket and I just want it to be done right the first time. So away I go to Houston to do it. More on this later.

In other news, Olivia had her first day of kinda sorta preschool on Friday. Friday Friends is for three and four-year-olds and it’s a preschool curriculum, but one day a week. In September she’ll officially start preschool and we have the option of sending her on Fridays as well, to make it three days of school. She was so excited to get her backpack, which she promptly stuffed with her kitty ears headband, a comb, a necklace, and a bouncy ball. “I ride the bus!” she exclaimed as we were heading out the door. No, not yet, kid.

But she got to hang up her coat and backpack on the hook outside the classroom and the preschool director came in and helped her find her name card to check in. “Bye Mom,” she said to me, leaning in for me to kiss her. When did she get so big? Do I say that in every post? I do, don’t I?