I had my first round of labs ordered by Seattle Reproductive Medicine today. I was oddly gleeful. It felt like something real in this process; like a notable step towards baby making in July. I couldn’t wait to get to my doctor for the blood draws.
And then I got a phone call that changed my perspective a bit.
My doctor’s office was calling just to make sure that I knew that today’s visit wouldn’t be covered by insurance.
Well, no. I hadn’t thought of that. I mean, of course I knew it once they said it (my insurance doesn’t cover anything related to infertility treatments), but I just hadn’t really put two and two together. I thanked them for reminding me and asked how much I should expect to pay.
“A little over $700” the woman at the other end of the line said hesitantly.
Is it totally pathetic if I admit that the wind was knocked out of me and I was unable to respond at all for a few seconds?
“OK.” I winced “I’ll move some things around and will have it for you.”
I hung up the phone a little deflated.
I think people see me discussing this journey so nonchalantly, and they assume that money is not a factor for me. That is simply not true. Money is a factor. It is perhaps one of the scariest factors of this entire process if we are being completely honest.
Money is a factor.
It’s just that I am not about to allow money to be the factor that keeps me from having a child. I refuse to do that. I have a good job and I make a decent salary. I live a sufficiently middle class lifestyle. I have always been able to provide myself with some luxuries, and those luxuries have simply needed to disappear as of late. There has always been food on my plate and a roof over my head and I am confident in my ability to continue providing that. I have faith that all the rest will fall into place when the need arises.
I am not rich though, and money is a factor.
I made the decision a few months back that I would finance the larger chunk of this process. Seattle Reproductive Medicine has a financing plan available with good rates that I couldn’t pass up. I simply don’t have that kind of money lying around. Let’s not forget that I bought my condo last year too. My rainy day income is more or less depleted. Some people have scoffed at my plan to finance my IVF, but my point to them is that I financed every cent of the price on my car 2 years ago, and no one even batted an eye. That car cost $10,000 more than my IVF is going to cost, and I will maybe have it 5-6 years. Why is it completely acceptable to finance a car, but not make that same investment in your family?
So yes, I will be financing my IVF, and I am not ashamed to admit it. The problem is that in financing, I have come to think of all of these costs as being under one umbrella. I keep thinking of the main number I was quoted, and forgetting about all the “little” costs along the way. I will have at least two more appointments like today’s, with big tabs of their own. My sperm sample will cost a few hundred dollars, and the hormones I will need to buy can run up to $2000.
Money is a factor.
And I get scared. When I think about numbers like that (and the big ticket number at the end) of course I get scared. I worry about whether I will be able to afford this; about how far in debt I will have to go.
When really, the cost of IVF is only a drop in the bucket when it comes to the actual cost of raising a child.
I called my dad today on the way to my appointment, needing reassurance that I could handle this all; needing to hear that I am still making the right decisions no matter how scary some days may be. When I left my appointment I texted him the final amount ($769), along with the fact that I felt like I was going to vomit (a combination of 6 vials of blood being drawn and a late onset panic over the money). He replied:
Keep your eye on the prize! Baby = Priceless!
I kind of love my dad. I told him he was a failure as a father today (both because of yesterdays waste of a trip to the ER and because he flat out refuses to tell me which sperm donor he prefers), but I don’t know what I would do without him.
And I do have to admit that something pretty incredible happened at the doctor’s office today.
I smiled.
This last year, going to the OBGYN has been hard for me. I am not one of those infertile women who will begrudge other women their babies or pregnancies (although, the no vagina pregnancy did leave me just the slightest bit bitter.) I do not believe that someone else being pregnant makes me any less so. But, going to the OBGYN and being surrounded by baby bumps and crying newborns has felt like torture this last year. It has seemed abnormally cruel, and I have often found myself fighting back tears and wondering why they don’t have a separate entrance for infertile's like me.
Today though, I sat in the lobby and I smiled. I swooned over the newborn in his grandfathers arms across from me. I chatted up the woman sitting next to me who was about to pop.
I smiled.
Suddenly I felt like that could be me soon. I didn’t feel discouraged or left out of the club; instead I felt like screaming “Me too! Me too! I’m going to be a mommy too!”
And if nothing else, that simple change in attitude made it pretty clear to me that I am making no mistakes here.
No amount of money is going to keep me out of that mommy club.
ADSPACE
