What is Prescreening?

Hi Everyone!

I'm back and trying to catch up on my blogs. This will probably be an overload :)

I would like to share more about what exactly what is involved in the Prescreening process. I'm just going to start at the beginning again - then I won't lose track.

When Chris and I started trying to have a baby, we learned that doctors really don't want to research your infertility issues until you have been trying for at least a year. Sure, if we were so concerned (or I should say we were really depressed going month to month and being unsuccessful) we could have lied and said we had tried for a year. But that just didn't feel right at all and we are terrible liars. So we rolled with the punches and did our wait and then scheduled the appointment with my OB. In the meantime, let me tell you how handy it is to have a Flexible Spending Account!! Those ovulation tests and pregnancy tests are soooooo expensive over a 12 month period plus, and at least we got them tax free!

Chris and I were trying to be positive through all this and just think that we were doing something wrong. But, it was always in the back of our mind that something was wrong because I had never been on birth control and we never had a pregnancy scare. So now that we had our appointment we started the process. I'm just going to skip ahead to where the journey going through IVF begins. Please see some of my other posts to read about how we got from discover to IVF.

So we got our awesome news in January at the Infertility Conference. I think that has been our best investment to date. I think it should be our little Mastercard commercial.

• $400 Ovulation and Pregnancy Tests
• $X Doctor Visits to Discover the Truth
• $150 To share stories, learn alternative treatments, and receive support at the RESOLVE Infertility Conference
• Winning a Free IVF Cycle from our clinic at the Conference = PRICELESS!!

I'm probably forgetting some other crucial events, but it's my commercial and I'm constantly editing :)

Okay, moving on...We ended some of the alternative treatments we were in the midst of trying in January and started the IVF process. Prescreening (da ta ta daaaa):

• Physician Orientation
• Doctor Consultation (2 hours class)
• Evaluation (Male and Female Blood Tests to make sure we don't have HIV or STDs (this is kind of weird when you've been with the same person for 13 years, and we had to update our shots)
• Day 3 Labs (This freaked me out at first, but now not so much)
• Begin taking Birth Control Pills
• Nurses Orientation (2 hour class)
• Psychologist Appointment
• Injection Training
• Sonohyterogram
• Consent Signing and Payment

So that is what Prescreening is :) Uffduh!! Now that I write it all down it reminded me of all those visits. But wait until I get into the actual IVF process (now that was a lot of visits).

The two classes were great, but a lot of information to remember and read. There are 2 classes so that we could have both the Doctor and Nurses perspective - which was awesome. The Day 3 labs are bloodwork and a vaginal ultrasound on day 3 of your period. Sounds gross, but there are so many vaginal ultrasounds I had to have during my period going through this that it's no big deal now. Like I said before that I had never taking birth control pills, so I was so nervous to start. I don't know what it is about the pill, but it just freaked me out. So I started the pill, and that might seem weird. Well, actually studies have shown higher IVF success rates having women use the pill to regulate and rest their ovaries during the IVF process. So while I was the pill I would skip the sugar pills and continue taking the pill to stall my period. This put my ovaries in a resting state before I started the drug treatments to start harvesting. Crazy...huh??

Finally, the injection training and sonohysterogram and consent signing. Since I've already discussed the later 2 I'll tell you a little about the injection training. A nurse works with both Chris and I to teach us how to inject me. I would be giving myself 2 shots a day up to day of transfer and Chris would be giving 1 shot a day after the transfer. We were both kind of scared, but got through it. I think watching the videos got us all worked up, but the nurses and doctors helped us through the whole process. So basically, I'm a human pin cushion and my husband is my drug dealer. :)

So I hope this blog helps describe the prescreening process. Please, as always, let me know if you have questions.