I know what you are thinking.. its been forever! Where have you been?!? Well.. the last time I went MIA it was because Cliff was home and spending time with him is always the top of my priority list (I’m still #sorrynotsorry about that btw 😎 ). This time I can only partially blame my blogging absence on him. He’s been home but I just haven’t slowed down long enough to post an update. Lets play a little catch up..
Quick IVF update.. Due to my body not cooperating in January (shocking, I know 🙄 ), we had to put IVF on hold for about a month. Luckily, everything is going fine this month so we have started over with all of the IVF prep. I am back on meds and those daily shots that I complain about all the time. Today is shot #89. Crazy right?? I guess I should use these to mentally prepare for the week of fertility shots where I get like 3-4 injections daily. For now, I am still working on just breathing through my one per day. Side note –> my shot strategy consists of reminding myself to not hold my breath and repeating “do you want to have a baby?” over and over in efforts to finish the whole shot and not give up. I think its working pretty good so far!
As fascinating as my daily struggle with stabbing myself is, that’s not the focus of today’s post. Today I want to talk (and partially vent) about the ridiculousness that is the cost of IVF. Everyone knows IVF is expensive. Even if you have never been exposed to the world of infertility, you know IVF is expensive. Its a well known fact and at first glace, it makes complete sense. Specialty doctors, medications, egg retrieval, sperm analysis, etc, etc.. Each part is important for a chance at successful IVF and I understand people have to be paid for helping with that. That’s not the part that bugs me..
What really bothers me are the little extras they throw in there for “what if” scenarios that you have absolutely no control over. After you have paid what they expect your IVF to cost (I’ll refer to this as the baseline cost), there is a chance you may still owe more after its all said and done. For example, the baseline cost covers a certain number of sonograms during the week of fertility injections. If for whatever reason THEY decide you need to come in for additional monitoring, you get charged per visit that THEY want you to make. Did I mention THEY determine that?? Anyway… Another example in our case, after they put my girls and Cliffs boys together, if we end up with less than 10 embryos, we are okay. If we get 10 or more, then we automatically owe an additional $500! My question is.. what did the 10th embryo do to y’all to upset you sooooo much that you need an extra $500 to cope with it?!?! Imagine a puzzled but annoyed Danae face right now.. There are at least a handful of other examples but you get the point.. To me, its like they decided there was a one size fits all price but then charge you if your circumstances don’t fit within that one size. ∗end of rant∗
Wait.. no! I still have one more part that needs ranting about!!
The other thing that really grinds my gears is the lack of financial options for IVF. When you are facing a cost that could be anywhere between $10,000 and $20,000, I feel you should have reasonable options of how you want to pay it. Unfortunately, the cost of IVF is expected to be paid in full before you can even start treatment. So if you don’t have lotto winnings collecting dust in an account somewhere or a rich relative that will be dying soon.. what options are you left with?? In my experience, this is what I found..
- Unless you are unemployed or in the military, you really don’t have any options at all.
- Some doctors offer their version of a payment plan if you can stomach the outrageous interest fee that pretty much starts before you even make your first payment.
- There are medical credit cards that wont charge you interest if you pay it off within a set amount of time. Sounds great unless you don’t meet all their criteria or your household income is considered “too high” to qualify for their program.
- There are a lot of offers for discounts or grants but like I mentioned before, most are tailored for a specific group like the military or those who live within a small radius away from the group offering the assistance (I’m still kinda confused with that last one because it really just brings up more puzzling questions..)
What about those who have other large expenses they are responsible for but have an income that’s “a little bit too much” each year to qualify for any options? Or those who will only get one try at IVF because it will completely wipe out their savings? Or those who are forced to wait until they can save up the entire amount because.. you know.. life?!? Life is expensive! Talk about kicking a couple while they are down… After the emotional, physical, and financial turmoil of trying to get pregnant for months (or like us, years), you are given a glimmer of hope that IVF is going to be your best option… buuuuut only if you pay for all of it upfront with no actual guarantee that it will even work. Am I the only one who sees this as absolutely insane??? Even if you have a million dollars sitting in the bank and use $100 bills as toilet paper, I still think you should have the option to make payments without crazy penalties if you want to instead of being forced to pay everything at once! Bottom line.. this is one of those “life isn’t fair” moments and its highly annoying lol
And that ladies and gentlemen, is my loudmouthed opinion.. okay I really am done ranting this time! If you have stuck with me through all of that.. here’s two pictures of Mr. Echo trying to get me to stop typing and pay more attention to him. This is usually what my view looks like every time I try to write a post 😀 ♥
Hooray for comments!