The clock is ticking ...

Our specialist appointment was good.  Good in that things are now moving again in terms of getting my insides checked and sorted so we can move ahead with this baby making process.  But the results of my AMH test were somewhat depressing.  Dr P said it came back a bit low.  Exactly how low ... 3.5 ... which is way lower than I had ever contemplated it being.  I was hoping for something like 12 or even 10.  To be honest, even 7 or 6  would probably have been ok ... but 3.5! It was a rude awakening to the fact that I am actually getting old and that my baby making days are numbered.  So now I'm half wishing I'd gotten my act together and started this whole journey earlier but we just weren't in any position to even consider it till now.  I know I’m 37 and they say it’s more difficult after 35 but I guess since I still look pretty young and feel pretty young on the outside I thought my insides would be the same.  Apparently not.  I know I should be happy that it’s not 1 or 0.  But it’s still got me feeling pretty depressed. She basically said that with those kinds of numbers it starts to get close to the point where we may have to consider IVF.  We really can't afford IVF if we don't have a diagnosis of infertility because it's like $8000!  Fortunately after a bit of discussion she said she is still happy to support us with giving insemination a go first.   She said that the ultrasound showed a number of folicles and that that's a good sign regardless of whether the AMH is low.  I think/hope she's thinking the AMH may not be correct as she has asked for me to have the test done again which I am more than happy to do even if it does cost me another $60.  However I guess I had the first test 2 months ago, so maybe she wants to see how rapidly it's going down.  If it's gotten much lower then maybe we will have to bite the bullet and go IVF before I run out of eggs altogether.

We also discussed my rather unpleasant experience with the levovist test.  Dr P said that even though it didn’t work, it still gave us some valuable information – primarily that my cervix is blocked and this needs to be fixed before we can look at insemination.  So she wants to do a laparoscopy and hysteroscopy to look at both the inside and outside of my bits to see if she can find any problems and also try to open up my cervix a bit.  Since we already figured the laparoscopy was the next step, she didn’t need to say much more to convince us.  Scout asked how soon we could inseminate after the surgery and she said it should be ok to go the very next cycle but the surgery might throw my cycle off a bit so we may just have to wait and see.  She went though all the risks etc and gave me some info and then sent me out to her receptionist to book the surgery.  So it will be on 23rd Feb, and apparently I need to take at least 1 week off work to recover.  As soon as I got back to work I cleared my schedule and told my boss who was fine about it.  I also rang my insurance company and the other doctors involved for their costings. It looks like I’ll be up for around $1600 out of pocket which I think is pretty reasonable considering the actual cost is closer to $6000.  Thank goodness I got off my butt and organised private health insurance at the start of last year, cos the waiting period for all this stuff is 12 months.   Without it I would have to go on the public waitlist ... and with an AMH of 3.5 I don’t think I have time for that!  So now I am just waiting for the 23rd to come around.  I’m hoping it will all go ok and there won’t be any major issues ... but I can’t help but feel a little stressed about what will happen if things aren’t as great in there as I’d hoped.