Tonsilitis

Second Z-pack of the season. Seriously? Twice in 3 weeks? Not fair. I went in to work today anyway since I'm going to be using a bunch of sick days soon for monitoring (or half-days at least). No working out. Went to sleep at 8:30 last night.

I start estrogen patches tomorrow, changing every other day until I get my period (probably in less than a week). Then the fun begins.

$15k of drugs on the way...

For the bargain price of $26 in copays. That part worked out. Cornell taking my insurance worked out. Now we just hope the baby part works out. I start the estrogen priming part of the protocol soon...within the next week or two. Then when my period starts the fun begins.

Lifted today. I've been lifting once a week or so, not long, just 30-40 minutes. But I've been lifting heavier, and focusing more on legs than I have in a while. I like it.

Tutoring picked up, expectedly, this past week (midquarter grades went out last week). I have 5 hours a week steady right now, which ends up being an extra paycheck a month. Less time to workout, I do feel more stressed timewise, but we need this. Even if we didn't need it, I would think we did...and we would, as savings and retirement savings are nowhere near where they used to be. But at least this keeps up afloat. And at least I don't have to shell out any money for IVF. Which, I know, is incredibly lucky.

I've also, the last 2 weeks, cut down on my daily prednisone dose. I'm down from 5mg to 2.5 a day. It was the sleeping on my stomach a few nights in a row that made me realize the RA has, at least for now, moved out of my neck. So I figured it was worth a try. The stuff is great when I need it, but of course I'd rather not be on it. So far so good with the lower dose...

Ok, thing may work out

After many many phone calls, the drugs are supposed to be covered through another branch of the medical insurance. The pharmacy associated with the insurance company won't cover them, but another one will. Really? Could the make this more confusing? How do old or poor or uneducated people ever get anything covered? Oh, right, they don't. So unfair. What a fucked up health care system we have.

But at any rate, the drugs have been called into this other branch and now I wait to see for sure if or what we pay. We may have a copay, they may be 100% covered, that much I do not know yet. But if the drugs work then we are pretty much ready to begin. I would start the estrogen patches in about 2 weeks and shots about 2 weeks later.

Fuck...

IVF drugs likely not going to be covered. Still trying to figure it out. Will we spend $5k + on this? I know people spend a lot more. But we don't have a lot more. And I don't know that it's worth it given the uncertain outcome. If we were guaranteed a kid I'm sure we'd do it. But...honestly. I question whether another kid would just be that much more stress. I might be too selfish to want another. Maybe this is just me protecting myself. I won't let myself cry about this yet. It's not over. It's just frustrating because my benefits say the drugs are 100% covered but the fine print that no one told me about apparently says only covered if given by the doctor. Um, I can't go to the doctor every day for 6 weeks to get stim shots and progesterone. My IVF nurse hadn't heard of this. Maybe there's a way around at least some of it...

Still sick

I have strep throat. Again. I have had this more in the last 3 years than ever before. I went 2 week with a cold and a week with laryngitis (great thing for a teacher...luckily my students are mostly really nice and polite) before today, and felt like I had a fever. Driving home from the city after my IVF class I called my doctor, made an appointment and went. Another Z-pack. I dropped one pill in my car and can't find it anywhere. So instead of 5 days, I only get to take 4. Hopefully it'll be enough. But I do feel better that I am really sick. A usual, I just assume I'm being a wimp and need to get over it. And feel guilty for not working out when all I want to do is sleep. Sometimes sleep is more important. But always only in hindsight.

The IVF class was good I guess. Learned more about the process. Met with my nurse. Think I know what I need to do. In about 2 weeks I will start the estrogen priming protocol, which is just wearing estrogen patches until I get my next period. Then the fun begins. The stim shots don't bother me, I am used to giving myself shots. The progesterone shots scare me, but whatever, I'll get over it. I will have to tell a couple people at school in 2 weeks or so, as I will probably be missing A LOT of my morning classes due to monitoring. The clinic doesn't open til 7:30, which is when school starts. I need to just not care about that, and I'm working toward it.

Had one good run last week, when I struggled to get out the door because I wanted to sleep. I did 20 minutes hard (that is around a 9:30 pace I think, I am still so annoyed by that but not able to do enough to change it yet) and then walked another 10 min. One day of lifting, one boot camp, and pretty much nothing else.

Definitely in a slump. Just feel like I can't keep up.