Follicle-stimulating hormone

Great news today. The terrible traffic today helped make any news feel like good news. But this were actually good news.

We woke up at 4:00 am, it was still dark and cold outside. It was too early in the morning for us. We picked up Chuy Ayala, a friend, since he needed transportation, and it was on our way to Austin, TX. We had to be at the laboratory, near downtown Austin, by 7:00 am. We left Waco, TX, around 5:15 am and arrived to the laboratory by 7:08 am. We thought we would be the only ones there, but there were already 8 other people. The idea of coming early was because Dr. Natalie Burger wanted to see us at 11:30 am, and leave early for thanksgiving break. We were a little nervous about that.

The nurse at the laboratory was an expert; she found the vein quickly and extracted three blood samples (tubes) really fast. They ordered the tests to be done as soon as possible.

Between the laboratory and the appointment, we were killing time in Austin, trying to find a McDonalds so that we could get free WiFi and find a route to a "GoodWill" store (they sell second hand items) and look around. It came the time of our appointment, and we went to the fertility clinic.

The nurse introduced herself to us (for the third time) and then she checked Nancy's vitals and weight. And even when Pablo is convinced that Nancy looks very sexy, the weight scale somehow makes Nancy think that she looks big and fat. But she is not. We waited a few minutes; and Dr. Burger came into the room announcing that Nancy's vitals were perfect, and that she would do two things: 1) measure the size of the follicles, which contain the oocytes (eggs); and 2) measure the size of Nancy's uterus.

Dr. Burger performed a sonogram to measure the follicles; she found at least 12 follicles of good sized. Good job Nancy! The Lupron that Nancy has been injecting in her belly has been working, otherwise, those follicles would have been released and that would be very bad.

Then Dr. Burger took a catheter and measured Nancy's uterus, in the old fashioned way. Nancy held on and suffered through it, and the results were good. The size was normal and they will use those measurements during the oocyte extraction process.

Overall, great news. Dr. Burger, shown in picture, approved the next step, which is injecting (another) medication in Nancy's belly. The injection is a follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) that essentially will help the follicles to mature and produce great oocytes, in other words, it will induce ovulation; however, combined with Lupron, those oocytes are not released. They first will grow healthy, and have to remain there for a while, and later, they will be extracted for fertilization purposes.

Nancy will be injecting herself twice a day. One with Lupron (morning) and the other with the FSH (evening). This new hormone may cause:

• Hives.
• Bloating.
• Pain, swelling or irritation at the injection site.
• Rash at the injection site or on your body.
• Stomach or pelvic pain.
• Coughing.
• Headache.
• Mild nausea.
• Sneezing.
• Sore throat.
• Stuffy or runny nose.

Please pray for Nancy so that she does not experience any of this side effects. It is enough having to inject yourself twice a day in your belly. Seriously, it is not pleasant. But at least they gave her a very nice little thermal bag for the medicine, which needs to be refrigerated; and they also gave her a journal, see picture.

In this visit:

• Sonogram + 15 min consultation with Dr. Burger (not covered by insurance): $279.00 dollars.
• Deposit to Texas Fertility Center (TFC) for oocyte retrieval (not covered by insurance): $1,339.00 dollars.
• Deposit to TFC for embryo transfer (not covered by insurance): $536.00
• Deposit to Austin IVF for insemination (after a discount of $1,075.00): $175.00

Total: $2,329.00

Thank you all for your support in prayer and financially. We really need your help! If you would like to support us click here to donate. Thank you, you are amazing.

Peace,

Pablo and Nancy.

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