The Nightmare Begins

Warning- our story from here until our pregnancy can be pretty maddening, especially if you already know how we ended up getting pregnant, but if you care about the details of our story, then feel free to read on.  

A couple weeks before we closed papers on our first house, I told Judah that I thought that he should go to a doctor and have a sperm analysis done.  I had recently called our health insurance to ask them if they would cover visits to an infertility doctor.  They told me that we had to wait a year from our activation date before they would cover any visits, and even then, they would not cover medication or ART treatments (more on this later.)  I knew we didn't have the money to pay for a visit out of pocket and I was anxious at the thought of waiting almost a full year before we could find out what our problem was.  A friend who was familiar with infertility issues recommended that we go ahead and ask our family doctor to request a sperm analysis.  She said that the infertility clinic will perform this test before all others anyway since it is the easiest and quickest way to figure out which partner has the infertility problem.  Through some research we discovered that a sperm analysis would only cost us $75 and together we decided it was worth it, even just for our own peace of mind.

The test was scheduled for just a couple days before we moved, and the timing worked out great because we were too busy to anxiously wait the long week they told us it could take before the doctor would get back with our results.  They were supposed to come in by the Friday before our move, but we never heard from the doctor.  We moved on Sunday, and on Monday I finally called the doctor's office to find out what was going on.  I left a message and the nurse called me back within a few minutes.  She told me that the results were in, and that they were trying to call us for the past few days, but that they had the wrong number listed under Judah's name.  

She continued to say that she could not give me the test results over the phone and that Judah had to make an appointment to come in to see the doctor.  I pushed her a little bit, telling her that we would rather not have to pay for another Dr.'s appointment if it wasn't completely necessary, but she ensured me that it was.  When I hung up the phone I was feeling a mix between annoyance at the Dr. and anxiety about the test results.  Why wouldn't they just tell me the results on the phone?  What were they hiding?  Does this mean that the results were bad?  

I didn't know what to make of the news, but I knew I had to tell Judah.  It was his birthday and he was on his way to New Orleans with his Dad to watch the Patriots (Judah's second favorite team) play the Saints (Judah's Dad's favorite team) in the Superdome.  He had been looking forward to it ever since he got the surprise tickets at his birthday celebration the week before.  I told him what the nurse had said and asked him to please make an appointment with the doctor for first thing the next morning if possible. I didn't share with him all my concerns, and I kept telling him and myself that it was just "the way that they did things at that office."  We were both a little worried, but not enough to freak out.  

Judah went to the doctor early on Tuesday morning and he called me with the news.  The next half hour of conversation was so surreal that once I even asked myself if I was dreaming. In short, he told me that the doctor told him that while his count was very high which is good, his abnormality count was also incredibly high which was very bad.  This means that while there were a lot of sperm present in his test, so many of them were abnormal that there would be no way for them to function properly.  Basically, the doctor told Judah that we would most likely not be able to conceive a child naturally and that we should meet with an infertility specialist for more details.

We were devastated.  We still didn't know what it all meant, and I was determined to do as much research as possible, so I spent hours and hours on the internet and on the phone talking to anyone who could help me make sense of what we had just been told.  I got a copy of Judah's test and compared it to charts, and referred to it when talking to professionals, and every time I came up with the same answer- we could not have children naturally.  

I started to do research on ART treatments (ART, Assisted Reproductive Therapy. These treatments include IUI, IVF and Sperm/Egg donation, and Embryo Adoption) and everyone I spoke with told me that the only way that we would be able to have a biological child was through IVF with ICSI.  (I'm not going to go into the details of all these treatments, but you can find everything you could ever want to know online.)  I called and researched every infertility clinic within a driveable distance from my house and any of my relatives houses, and every single one told me the same thing.  There is no guarantee that you will even conceive with IVF and one try will cost you at least 12 thousand dollars.  

It was like getting kicked in the stomach over and over again.