Surgery and Testing

Thought we would update everyone on what has been going on the past few weeks with scheduling my surgery and Zack getting in touch with his urologist.

My surgery will be in the morning on March 12th at Kettering and they will be doing a laparoscopy to remove any endometriosis and a hysteroscopy will be done at the same time. And like mentioned in our previous blog by doing this our chance of success will be around 80% with the IVF procedure!

Zack got in touch with his Urologist, Dr. Shane Russell, and he had him do some blood work to test his FSH hormone level. This test is to pretty much to check to make sure his brain is sending the signal to produce sperm. The results came back and they were perfect which means there is over a 90% chance when they go in to do the TESE procedure they will be able to get sperm. The next step which he has already called on is to get his CF doctors to ok him being put to sleep to have the procedure and as soon as they give that they will work on getting a date set for it after my surgery. They won't schedule it before my surgery till the doctor knows for sure that there are no major issues that he finds while performing my surgery.

Also the first week in March when I am on day 3 of my cycle I will be having blood work to test all my hormone levels to make sure there are no issues there. I will also be starting birth control following the blood draw which they said I will be taking for 6-8 weeks.  But I could really use prayers that week because I have had issues with some of my hormone levels a few years ago but they haven't been tested since.

We hope to have more details for you next time! As we start the actual IVF process our blogs will get more in depth and more frequent! But the next time we will probably post will be after my surgery and we will have the results of what they found during surgery and my hormone levels. And we should also have the date scheduled for Zacks surgery and have better idea of when we begin the IVF medications. Again thanks everyone for your continued prayers we could not be more at peace during all of this!

Our 1st IVF consult!

*Warning - this post talks about fertility treatments in some detail in case you have a weak stomach, lol*

We had our first IVF consult today at Kettering Reproductive Medicine! So first I will give a summary of what we found out and then we will go into detail later in the post. The process is going to begin with:
- Me having laparoscopy surgery to remove any endometriosis
- I will begin taking birth control for 6-8 weeks
- Zack will have his sperm extraction called TESA
- I will have blood work to check hormone levels
- Then we begin the actual IVF with ICSI process which they say should take 5-6 weeks from start to positive pregnancy test!

Before we go into the details we wanted to explain why we are doing this blog during our IVF process. God has blessed us so much! We have been praying for an answer from God about how our family would grow and since spring 2012 we have just left it alone and let it work out in God's timing, all the while praying for an answer and a sign from God. So after a year of waiting and praying, God gave us our answer through a family member's church who lives far away randomly sending us money for us to start to try to have a baby. We hadn't told anyone about money for a procedure like IVF or really anything about what we was praying about. So along with saving ourselves and without us asking, we had people donating money and praying for us and some of the people we didn't even know who they were, we now feel like we are at a place where we can start the IVF process! So we wanted to thank them and keep everyone informed of what we are doing so they can continue to be involved in our journey!

Now to go into more detail  I will have to start with explaining how we got to the stage of having the laparoscopy surgery to be followed by Invitro Fertilization. We always knew we would have to undergo fertility treatments due to Zacks CF and almost all males with CF are not able to have children naturally. But what we never figured was that I would have fertility issues my self. In 2009 we began doing a procedure called IUI (intrauterine insemination) at a different fertility clinic in Columbus. Between 2009-2012 we had done either 7 or 8 IUIs, I actually lost count we had done so many. In that time we had gotten pregnant actually on the first try but that ended in a miscarriage about a week later and we had no success with any of the other IUIs. And this brings you up to where we are now.

Today we met with Dr. Jeremy Groll at Kettering Reproductive Medicine. We loved the doctor, nurse, and the rest of the staff we met with today. They are very focused on the details and are being very thorough so far with all of our past history and what we need to do now. After talking with Dr. Groll today he seen my past history of the failed IUIs and is thinking my family history of endometriosis and my own personal issues I have had with what seems to be endometriosis could be part of the issue. He informed us that if I do have endometriosis it lowers our chances of having success with IVF. So to increase our chances we have decided to have laparoscopy surgery done to remove any of the endometriosis and they will also at the same time check to make sure my fallopian tubes are not blocked. It will actually make our chance of success around 80% with the first cycle as long as all the other tests come back OK. Some of the other tests they have to do is on cycle day 3 I will have bloodwork done to check all my hormone levels along with some other blood tests. I will also be put on birth control following the surgery and will have to be on it for 6-8 weeks before starting the IVF process.

While waiting to have the surgery Zack will meet with a urologist, Dr. Shane Russell, to discuss and schedule having the procedure called TESA performed. They said its best to do this step before starting into the IVF process before we get to far in and find that the sperm is going to not work. They will take a biopsy of the testis with a needle and freeze it till its time for it to be used.

After all of this is finished and I am coming to an end of taking the birth control we will begin the IVF process. They did not go to far in depth with this at todays appointment just because there are so many factors that could determine the timeline, medications I will take, etc. So now we are just waiting till tomorrow to find out a date to have my surgery and the date for Zacks consult with the Urologist. We will update again when we find out the dates on these! So if you guys can keep us in your prayers we would appreciate them! If anyone has any questions feel free to ask!

Also below is an example of the general time line that is similar to the one they told us except for the birth control because I will be on it a little longer:

  Birth Control Pills

(Approx. 14-21 days) 

Synarel/Lupron
(Approx. 12-15 days)

Baseline Ultrasound

Stimulation
(Approx. 10-12 days)

Trigger Shot

Egg Retrieval
(36-37 hours after trigger shot) So

Embryo Transfer
(3-5 days after retrieval)

Pregnancy Test
(14 days after retrieval) 

Ultrasounds
1st - Approx. 6 ½-7 weeks pregnant
2nd - Approx. 7 ½ - 8 ½ weeks pregnant
Release to OB at 8-10 weeks pregnant