I decided that it’s time to update my “About Me” section. Amy Hemple can only take things so far..
My name is Jessica. I am 27 years old. I met my husband when we were 16. We got married when we were 21. We have two cats and two retired racing greyhounds. My husband is an engineer and loves his job more than any person I know. I have a Bachelors in English and after spending a year working on my master’s degree and teaching in the Chicago suburbs, we moved to Raleigh, North Carolina where I don’t do any of that anymore. 😉
We started throwing around the idea of having kids 4 years ago and started trying 6 months later. Our college graduations came and went. Our 23rd, 24th, 25th, 26th and 27th birthdays came and went. We went through three rounds of clomid that all ended in mega cysts. Then we started working with our reproductive endocrinologist, Dr. B. We finished a failed injectables cycle (Gonal-F, ovidrel, and prometrium orally) and our first IUI (same medication/doses) ended in a miscarriage just before 5 weeks in October 2012. Our second IUI failed with double the Gonal-F dosage. After a couple month break, we went ahead with a 3rd IUI, no injectables this time. In April 2013, I had a laparoscopy and stage 2 endometriosis was found and cleaned completely out. Unfortunately, Dr. B thought the endometriosis is too aggressive and rather than allowing it to grow back within a couple months, I was put on Lupron for 3 months to shut my reproductive system down. After a rather unusual end to my lupron experience, we did our 4th, 5th, and 6th IUIs with injectables. I produced more follicles that I ever had, but still no baby.
After Dr. B told us IVF was our only option, my husband took a job in Raleigh, North Carolina. A job that would further his career and give us the IVF coverage we’d never had before.
We started our IVF journey in January off 2014. In February, 22 eggs were retrieved and 6 embryos grew to 5 days and were frozen. In March 2014, 2 beautiful blastocysts were thawed and transferred. At least 1 of them grew and implanted and gave us a great first beta of 80. Unfortunately, we lost them around 5.5 weeks in April 2014.
Unhappy with our care at that clinic, we moved to UNC Fertility in Raleigh and underwent our 2nd FET in August 2014. Despite their excellent care, FET #2 failed.
The plan is to take some time off. We’ll use our last 2 embryos eventually. But for now we want to enjoy our life. We want to chose to be joyful and content and thankful. There’s so much more to life than needles.
Jessica
From My Bathtub 
Hi! I just nominated your blog for the Shine On award. Check it out on my blog for details. 🙂
I see that you went to NCCRM for IVF? Let me know about your experience! I am going for a consult on June 24th.
I did my retrieval and my first transfer with the NCCRM and am refusing to do another cycle with them. =/ It takes forever to get a nurse to call you back and they don’t do much to keep your stress levels down. I lost our baby around 5 weeks but didn’t actually miscarry until 7 weeks and they refused to call me back when I was concerned and they insisted that I miscarry naturally. There was a lot of testing before IVF and after the miscarriage that they didn’t run that the subsequent clinics we consulted with insisted on running.
I was really disappointed with their lack of compassion and the fact that it seems like they’re way understaffed all the time. They stressed me out more than they helped me. I wouldn’t recommend them.
We did consults with Duke and UNC and LOVED both of them. We ultimately decided on UNC.
Unfortunately, I have to go there because they have a special on IVF’s right now and I have no infertility coverage 😦 Do they do 3 or 5 day transfers? I think you are right about being understaffed because I sent a message to the financial person on Thurs. evening and no response yet! I guess I will have to deal with this if I want to become pregnant. You can email me: angelamtonkin@gmail.com
I just wanted to say I found your blog while doing some research on Dr. Binor whom I’ve been seeing since June of 2013. We did four IUIs–one took but ended in a chemical at 5 weeks exactly. I literally just did a 5-day fresh transfer today with two blastocysts, but this is my second IVF cycle. I’m keeping my fingers crossed, and I’m wishing you lots of luck in your journey.
Oh you’ve been through so much! My heart goes out to you, and I really wish you the best of luck. I look forward to following your journey. Sending hugs your way ❤