Decisions

This past week has been full of many life changing decisions. If you are my "friend" on Facebook you already know a few of them.

A while back I learned of an opportunity to move back home to Fort Wayne, IN. After a long process of interviews and going back and forth, I accepted a Neonatal Nurse Practitioner position with Parkview Hospital in Fort Wayne. I absolutely love my job here at Akron Children's Hospital. I love the people that I work with and the doctors I work under. The only problem is that it's not at home :(. I have told the girls that I work with that if I could pick up the hospital and the staff and move it to Fort Wayne, I would. So, it was a bittersweet decision to move back to Fort Wayne, IN.

Connected to that first decision was one about housing. We have always wanted to build a house and the time just seems right. We put down a deposit on a lot in July when we were home. We then decided that we wanted a different lot. The first lot backed up to a pond and we wouldn't be able to put up a fence for our "baby" Marley. The new lot backs up to some woods and we will be able to put up a fence. So, on Friday we signed a contract to build our home with Lancia Homes in Fort Wayne, IN. We are extremely excited to be building our dream home. We are not sure when they are going to break ground as we were trying to figure out the next decision.

We were very lucky to have insurance coverage that covers infertility processes up to $20,000 lifetime when we moved to Akron, OH. This is a rarity. We had decided to use that coverage to the best of our ability to get what we want: a baby. Because of this coverage we had to pay some money up front for each cycle and then are reimbursed from the insurance company after the cycle is over. We were recently told that we may have gone through our coverage with the two cycles that we have already done.  We were told that a big portion of the money that may have been used was from the medications as they are very expensive. The last week and a half has been spent trying to talk to the insurance company to get an idea if that was indeed that case.

Our decision was this: if we had enough insurance money to go forward with another cycle, should we given that this would take money from our house fund? If there wasn't insurance money left the decision was made for us, we couldn't do another cycle. After the week and a half, being told that they couldn't tell us the amount over the phone, they had to mail it, then them not mailing it and finally being told over the phone today that we do indeed have roughly $11,000 left of our $20,000. Medications do not count towards our limit. Since we have insurance money left, we have decided to move forward with this next cycle.

In preparation for this next cycle, I started birth control last Wednesday. Since we do not have any frozen embryos left we have to do a fresh cycle and do the stimulation part again. This cycle we are going to try something different than the first fresh cycle. I am going to be on the birth control for 2 weeks then we are going to switch to Lupron shots for two weeks and then do the stimulation for the eggs.

Another big decision that was made this past week is one that was a hard decision to make. Last Thursday I went Gluten free. It is hard to change the food lifestyle that I've been living for so long. After some reading ( a book called "Wheat Belly", thanks Ashley!) and soul searching I decided that this was something that I needed to do. I have not had any wheat or gluten since Thursday at lunch. At first my body rebelled and I had some bad cramps and was very tired and nauseous (more than normal). Starting Sunday and more into today I have felt wonderful! One of the thoughts behind this process is that I would feel better and have more energy. So far that seems to be the case. To top it off I have lost an additional 4 pounds. The weight loss is a welcome side effect for me, since it seems that my weight has been effecting things more than I thought. I am excited about the possibilities with this change in diet. Hopefully things will be different this time!