$2,000 down and 4th Injection Done

Since it's become apparent that the insurance company has no intention of honoring their original medication coverage, I bit the bullet today and paid for my meds out of pocket. It was painful.

My first stop was Kaiser. I got the Menopur there for $57.52 per vial which is an excellent price as far as I can tell. I should have also purchased my Endometrin there, but there was a minor miscommunication with the other pharmacy I was purchasing from. They quoted me a cheaper price than Kaiser, but neglected to mention that my RE had ordered two boxes of Endometrin, not one.

When I checked out, the pharmacist said he'd never rung up a bill so high in the 6 years he'd been working there. He'd never seen anyone pay 100% OOP for fertility drugs, the most he'd encountered was 50% and he was astounded that we had literally no coverage for the meds. He actually wasn't sure the system could ring up a bill that high and it did decline my card the first time I swiped it. The second time it worked, with extra authorization, and I left with my $1725.80 worth of Menopur.

The next stop was Northridge Plaza pharmacy, which had my Orvidel for around $77, which was great, but my Endometrin was over $200 for two boxes. I ended up checking out at around $295 and here my card was declined again. I ended up having to call my credit card and assure them it wasn't fraud before they would allow me to make the purchase. They promised it wouldn't happen again and I let them know I'd be making another $800 purchase in the next few days.

While I was waiting on the phone, a woman came up to purchase her trigger shot. She's doing her IUI on Saturday and was thanking the pharmacist for running her Menopur through her insurance. Apparently her Menopur was only $30 and she was so happy she almost cried. I wished her luck, looked down at my $1725.80 worth of Menopur (I was afraid to leave it in the car) and hoped/wished/crossed everything I had that this cycle yields a healthy baby.

On the way home from Northridge, the wood inset on my driver's door handle literally fell off on my foot. It felt like the universe was just rubbing salt in my wounds. I know my car is over 10 years old but I can't pay for insanely expensive fertility medication and a new car at the same time, so she's just going to need to hold herself together. I super-glued the panel back on with some Gorilla glue and I hope nothing else decides to fall off my car in the meantime.

Finally, today was CD4 and injection number 4. It burned like last night but I didn't have any problems with bubbles so the entire process went a lot faster. My routine takes about 15 minutes, I turn on my music, sterilize everything, mix up the injection, put it away, go pee, sterilize everything again and give myself the injection super, super slowly. I could probably shorten the process but it seems to be working for me and there are a lot of vials to sterilize :/

Tomorrow is my next ultrasound, please let there be lots of little follies growing in there!

Gum-Numb Style (TMI)

As part of my quest to get all my medical things in order before I lose my insurance, I had the wonderful experience of gum grafting surgery yesterday morning. In general, the procedure is really common; things like genetics, braces and brushing too hard can cause your gums to recede in places, exposing the root which doesn't feel great. In my case, it seems to be a bad spin on the genetic wheel. Thanks to my sperm donor, I have had low gums in front of one of my bottom front teeth and the only way to correct it was surgery.
 

Swollen frowny face, with my good buddy, a towel wrapped ice pack. Even my nose is swollen from the palate injections :(

They numb you up, take a little piece of tissue from the roof of your mouth and sew it into place where your gum is low. The whole procedure only takes about an hour and is generally minor. In fact, the whole thing really shouldn't have been a big deal except that I happen to have inherited more unfortunately genetics, this time from my mother's side. From her side, I got both an inherited allergy to all opiate drugs and a charming resistance to Novocain!

What should have been a short, painless procedure ended up being nearly twice as long; as soon as the Novocain took effect it began wearing off and I had to get more charming injections. I also apparently have extra nerves in my mouth, which, you guessed it, required even more injections haha. My periodontist ended up giving me enough Novocain to numb a small horse, ugh. Since I've never had a cavity or dental procedure before, neither of us knew what to expect but it certainly wasn't this. For the aftermath, instead of the Vicodin that they normally prescribe, I'm taking Advil and Tylenol which I have to be very happy with since it's all I can really take. Plus, my allergic reaction to Vicodin is so so very much worse than the procedure was, I'd undergo a hundred gum grafts before taking even half a pill.

Now, I have to wait for the graft to take and for the donor site to heal. In the meantime, my mouth looks like a Frankenstein zombie creation. Gum tissue is nice and pink but your palate (the donor tissue) is actually pretty pale. Eventually the graft should blend in better and pink up once a blood supply is established. Though it'll never blend in perfectly, I don't expect many people to be looking way inside my mouth anyway.

RAWR!