All in...

Well, it's done.  Our first payment for self-cycle has officially been withdrawn from our savings account and wired overseas to the account for SCI.  There's a HUGE mixture of emotions right now for both Harris and I.  It's like the final piece of the puzzle has been put in place and now we just have to step back and look at the bigger picture for a while, I guess.  At the same time, it's like we were one payment away from having the new truck paid for and now we're back to square one in that respect.  Don't get me wrong, we feel like this is the thing to do, and we don't have any mixed emotions about this being an investment rather than an debt.  To the contrary, this is the first time in a while that we don't feel like we're tossing our money down into a bottomless pit with fertility cycles here at home.  Still though, it's not an everyday thing for us to make retroactive progress on debt - that took some deep breathing and prayer. 

I also found out today that, unlike here, I have to be in India for Day 1 of my cycle to do the baseline or all bets are off.  Here, my experience has been that I could do a baseline on Day 1, 2, or 3 with no problem.  That is not the case with the SCI cycle it seems and that has quadrupled the stress for me today in trying to figure out timing issues.  Work already has my notice for the leave time beginning on the 30th of November; the apartment is rented from December 2nd thru 19th; and our flights have been purchased to get us there on the afternoon of December 2nd.  Sounds great, right?  Actually, no it's not.

See, even when I finish my "pills" for the month, it takes 7 days for me to get started on my Day 1 typically.  When my treatment dates were figured, it was as if the Day 1 would happen almost immediately.  Problem?  Yes.  That puts me starting my Day 1 well before December 2nd...or even December 1st.  So, I emailed Dr. Shivani about postponing the start of my next pack for a few days.  She emailed me back and said that would be fine and I should tack on some days at the end also to hold everything off (summarizing here, not quoting).  Sounds good, but now I'm worried that maybe I will have an early start because of trying to adjust my pills for this next cycle.  I mean, seriously, what if I totally begin to have my Day 1 and I'm like 4 days from leaving - apparently, I can't do the cycle then because of that.  Which in turn, means that the money on the apartment will be lost probably, my time off from work will be screwed up, and all this planning for a careful Christmas in and out trip will be for naught. 

STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  STRESS!!!  

Did I mention I was stressed out right now???  I am waiting to hear back from Dr. Shivani at this point to see if the worst does happen and I start before I get there, can I go to my reproductive endocrinologyst here to try and have a baseline done and emailed over to her?  That's assuming that she would be willing to do a baseline on me - which she may or may not since I'm not working with her anymore.  What would that do to the meds then though, you know?  There is (once again) a big murky mess in front of me and the "if's" and "but's" have begun to warp my mind. 

Calgon, take me away...

 

Oh, and one last thing to mention, because it's not adding to my stress or anything...nervous giggling.  Harris and I have begun to talk again about whether or not to tell his parents and my father and his wife.  Honestly, I go back and forth between wanting to spill everything just to have one less secret in our lives and sobbing because of the possible judgment and rejection that may or may not follow.  It is no exaggeration to say that the reaction from his parents could be anything from a simple, "Huh.  That's interesting." all the way to "I just read an article about someone who wanted to have a baby and they started taking ______ and now they're pregnant.  Let me go online and see if I can find out what that was."  The latter of those choices is what I dread because, inevitably, there would be a need for gossip that would come into play between his mom and her female relatives and with gossip of this sort comes either the "tough love" approach or the "pity party" approach.  Neither of which is appealing to me in the least.  Also, this is not an opinion being voiced by just me.  Point of fact is that it's Harris who is telling me these possible endings and confirming what I've thought but not said in so many words.  I honestly doubt that we could get out of their driveway before the computer, cell phone, or some other device started writing down notes on what we'd said and doing research.  While I'm a big supporter of non-violence, if the phone rang and the conversation started with, "After y'all left, I went online and it said that what you really need to do is _____________," I think I might lose it with his mom.  Again, I love her and think she's wonderful, but I cannot deal rationally with that outcome involving her.

From my father, it's anyone's guess.  His wife had some kind of infertility issue herself and ended up choosing to adopt a child domestically almost 30 years ago - so I think she'd take the news with a grain of salt and might be an interested party/advocate for us to my father.  However, the reaction from the man, himself, could be ugly.  I have envisioned everything from him cutting me or Harris off mid-story and telling us that this is something he wants no part of and then asking us to kindly leave and not come back (yes, this has happened before - my wedding - didn't speak for 3 years).  It could also end with some, shall we say "choice" words about the surrogates and how irresponsible it is for us to be doing something like this.  The best possible ending for us would be for us to get it all said, leave and give them time to digest the information, and then come back days later to talk to them again and get the reaction. 

I just don't know what to do with any of this stuff.  Urgh...