Dammit. No baby. DAMMIT.

Okay, yeah. So.

We were casually trying to have a baby for two years (not-preventing) and have been trying more deliberately and agressively since July. Timing intercourse, clomid, injectable meds, and IUI’s, at various times.

All these are partially covered by my insurance - they pay 50% of the cost. The problem is that every time I go in, it still winds up costing $200 out of pocket, and with the current level of treatment (one visit on day 3 of my cycle for an ultrasound; another ultrasound at day 11; yet another a couple days after that; then two visits for IUIs) we’re shelling out $600-1k/month. Also, the insurance only pays for up to 6 cycles of IUI, and we’ve gone through five. They don’t pay for IVF at all. (And I may not even be eligible for IVF - I’ve only got one ovary, so I might not be able to make enough eggs for a successful harvesting.)

So it all works out to about $4k dropped on infertility treatments so far. And that is a lot of money, for us - Oni no Husband has been out of work for a year and a half. This has come out of the small inheritance my father left me, and at this point it’s depleted enough that we’re barely going to have enough to put as a downpayment on a house, which had been my initial plan with the money.

So. What the hell do we do from here? Every option costs more $ than we’ve got. Or we could just not get the house, and put the money into IVF instead. We’ve got enough that we could maybe do one shot at it…which may or may not succeed.

Fuck.

Anyone got ideas? Adoption costs money, IVF costs money, every goddamn thing costs money. I’m at a loss. And I want to be a goddamn mom.

I don’t have any good advice. I just wanted to offer a virtual hug.

Actually I do have some advice, though it may not be ideal for you. Could you consider becoming a foster parent to an older child? Even ones around the age of 5 or so are hard to place. I understand that this may not seem likely to slake your desire to be a mother, as you would not have been present for the child’s infancy. But it would be cheaper than adopting an infant, I think, and it would present you with the opportunity to do a positively good thing for the world and for someone who needs help.

And now the hug.

{{{{{{{{{{{{ Maggie }}}}}}}}}}}}}

Asked and answered.

Seriously, though, I have nothing to offer but a “there, there”. Have you IDed the problem? Is it your body or his?

I may be misunderstanding what you mean when you say “adoption costs money,” and if so, I apologize. If adoption is a legitimate option for you, are there tremendous expenses associated with it (beyond the obvious costs of child-rearing, which you would have if you gave birth naturally)? I genuinely have no idea.

A little of both. Like I said, I’ve got only one ovary, which definitely affects things, plus I’m 39 and running out of good eggs in the one basket I’ve got left. Oni no Husband has some count/motility issues too - the RE we’ve been seeing says he has enough good ones that we should theoretically be able to conceive through IUI, and definitely through IVF, but almost no chance of it through intercourse alone.

Another hug from me.

We went through the injections (for her), and me visiting the room with the fun magazines for later introduction into her. Never seemed to take. It sucks. My sperm apparently had some issues, and her general receptiveness might have been a problem too. We stopped after around $5k, after looking at the statistics. It was a tough decision.

Yet another hug.

She later got pregnant without any outside influence (other than me and bottle of Bolinger).

Yes. Adoption (of a healthy infant) is about as expensive as IVF. You have to pay for a home study, where social workers look at your home and lifestyle and verify that you have sufficient space/resources for a child, as well as checking criminal records &c. Then there are attorney costs for the adoption contract, etc - and also hoping that the birth parents don’t change their mind at the last moment. The good part to that is that unless they birth parents do change their mind, it’s pretty guaranteed.

If you adopt an older, special-needs child through the foster care system, it can be free - the foster care system takes care of the home study cost - but we don’t have the wherwithal to deal with a child that comes to us with mental, physical, or emotional problems. Gods bless those that can, but that isn’t us.

I see – I was completely unaware. Then I don’t have much to offer than my hugs and love, my friend. I guess my concern on a practical level is wondering if you’re going to be able to provide the life you want for your child if you give up on home ownership to make it happen. How will that affect you down the road?

Another hug from me.

I’m a year or so behind you. We’ve been trying for 5+ years with one pregnancy that ended in an early miscarriage. I have what is basically exploratory surgery on April 5 to take a peek inside. Our next steps are IUI or IVF, depending on what will work best for our situation.

I don’t have any other suggestions other then what’s already been said (foster kids). I wish you could trade me spots for a year so you could get some more stuff done for free (most of this won’t cost a ton for us, and I hear the gov may start covering IVF soon). Are you about 5’8", brown hair, green eyes by any chance?

We’re in the same boat, now looking at IVF and adoption. The costs are staggering to me, for both. Good wishes for a happy outcome for you.

I’m sorry. We have one son that came to us through adoption, and are pursuing infant adoption again. It is hard, and expensive, and on the way to being parents the first time we went through the infertility medical stuff and a (very expensive) failed adoption.

So I know a little bit how you feel. I don’t have anything to offer you but sympathy, but you sure have that.

I sort of understand how you feel. The fiance and I would like to be parents some day but we don’t want our own biological kids. We’ve got some genetic stuff we really don’t want to pass down to any kids we might have biologically and I am terrified of giving birth so we are really looking at adoption but it is the most expensive thing I’ve ever seen. To adopt in the US you either adopt an older, special needs kid (we’ve looked at several adoption agencies and only seen kids with severe emotional and physical handicaps) or you pay for a woman’s medical needs through 9 months of pregnancy and all of the adoption agency fees and still never know if she will turn around and take her child back some day. If you adopt internationally you pay thousands of dollars in bribes with no guarantee of leaving the country with the child you were told you were adopting. It really sucks to look at your budget and know that you can own a home or you can invest in the possibility of being a parent but you can’t do both. :frowning: I hope you are able to find a way to bring a child into your family. It’s nice to see kids end up places where they are truly loved.

I’m going to chime in with the the “hey, you could still get pregnant naturally” crowd. I’m also going to say something that hopefully doesn’t come off as too heartless. IME, stressing out in general and more specifically about trying to get pregnant seems to hinder your ability to become pregnant.

My cousin and his wife tried for years to have a child. Fertility treatments, a miscarriage or two. Gave up. Wife got pregnant a year later at the age of 40.

My mom and dad had their first child oh, a year after they got married at the age of 19. Tried for 13 years for a sibling. Gave up. Sold the baby furniture. I showed up about 10 months later.

One of my coworkers and her husband (who are admittedly near peak childbearing age) had been trying for about a year (not very long, I know) to get pregnant. Coworker quit about a month ago due to stress and I just found out yesterday that she just got pregnant.

I know, anecdotes =! data and probably the only thing you can do is not stress out about getting pregnant, but if you’re not already doing it, maybe some relaxation techniques could help?

I say this to you as half of a couple in their early 40s: You can buy a house at any age.

I’m so sorry for your difficulty. We’ve been not-not trying for almost 2 years too, although we have a daughter already, and I’m 39 too. We made the decision not to go for IVF or anything, but gawd it’s hard to know if we make the right choice. I’m going through the hope-raised hope-dashed hope cycle every month and it’s hard hard hard. I’m so sorry you’re going through this and I wish for a happy ending for you, however that happens.

My neighbor is a foster parent specializing in newborns. When a mother who is on drugs gives birth in the hospital, the baby is removed from her care and placed with my neighbor (or other foster families). Then one of 3 things happens

  1. The mother goes into treatment, kicks the drugs and gets the baby back

  2. A member of the family agrees to take the baby (aunt, grandmother, cousin etc)

  3. The baby is made available for adoption

My neighbors has adopted 2 of these babies who are now rambunctious healthy kids.

Would this be of interest to you?

Okay, deep breath. Thank you for listening to me rant.

We’re going to give it another shot with the IUI. It can’t hurt, right? And in the meantime I’ll find out what I can do, what options and cost savings I can find…

Maybe a really big yard sale.

Its tough. Its a battle. We chose to get off the infertility roller coaster and enter an adoption program with a short wait and a lot of certainty around it. My sister chose IVF. All the options are expensive - although honestly NONE of the options are as expensive as actually HAVING children - start a diaper/college fund now…you’ll pay for IVF or adoption in no time.

We opted not to spend our savings on IVF as I’m not a gambler. We found private local adoption to be less expensive than expected. Our wait was about 2 weeks to be contacted by a pregnant mother via newspaper ad, 3 months to birth. The highest costs were the lawyer’s fees, so we dealt with his staff as much as possible. The home study was not that expensive, less than one month of your IVF. True, adoption is also a gamble, but at least the odds were more in our favor.

Good luck.

Is IVF that much more expensive that it’s not worth the ‘definite’ result? Wouldn’t it be worth it anyway?

And there has to be a mass effect of anectodes > generic data. The weight of all the people I’ve known, not to mention those I’ve heard of second-hand, who pop up pregnant after being told it’s impossible, well…yeah. You know the drill. It’s not worth giving up other options over, but it’s a tad bit of hope, maddening though it may be.

Faced with the same situation, I believe I would skip the IUI and go straight for the IVF, whatever way possible.