Thursday, November 12, 2009

One shot down, eight to go...

So, I've spent a LOT of time in the past 48 hours on the phone. If not with my infertility clinic, with the insurance company. If not with the insurance company, then with the infertility clinic. You get the picture. Apparently there was some confusion over whether my injectable meds had been ordered, when they needed to be ordered by and whether or not they were going to actually be at my house and accessible to my belly fat and then my ovaries at the exact right moment.

Seriously, if timing sex for conception isn't stressful enough, timing shots of god only knows what hormones and chemicals into your belly for conception is a full-on panic attack of legendary proportions. At least when it's just you and your husband timing the deed, you at least have some control over that. But when your chances of conception are suddenly being controlled by a doctor, a pharmacist and four or five faceless voices on the other end of a telephone line, things get a little more stressful.

I'm not what you'd call a confrontational person. I'm rarely a squeaky wheel; I'll just take my grease when whoever's giving it out gets to me. But with this? I turned into a bit of a harpy.

I tried not to be. All day Tuesday I took deep breaths, and when I called the clinic or the specialty pharmacy, I spoke in soothing, easy tones. I said things like, "I just want to check that..." or "I'm sorry to bother you again, I am just wondering if...". And when the responses I got were, "I will check on that and get back to you," or "No, ma'am, I do not have that order," I took more deep breaths, and double checked with the voice on the other end of the phone that these meds could indeed be shipped overnight, so if I needed them by Thursday, I still had a shot (no pun intended) at getting them on time. And then I'd get off the phone, wait a couple of hours, and start my calls again.

By Wednesday morning, though, I was starting to get a little bit testy. After being assured by the clinic on Tuesday that the prescription would definitely be placed by the end of the day, I discovered, from the pharmacy, that they had in fact NOT been ordered yet. This is when I started to feel the synapses in my brain firing personality-altering messages to my mouth. I called the clinic again, and did a whole lot of interrupting whenever I heard the phrase, "I'll look into it." I do believe at one point I said, "Maria, you're going to do more than look into it. You're going to make sure it gets done. And you're going to call me back to let me know it's done."

I have no doubt that in my medical record file, the words "Gigantic Bitch" are written in red across my full name. I don't care. Maria can suck it. An hour after that phone call, while we were at Ethan's dentist appointment, someone who was NOT Maria called me back from the clinic to let me know that she had personally seen to it that the order went through to the pharmacy. I wish I could remember her name, but I was so busy being madly in love with Ethan in the dentist's chair (see yesterday's post) that I didn't catch it. Whoever she is, I love her.

A couple of hours later, Neisha from my insurance agency called me to set up delivery. That phone call took about thirty minutes. Have you ever tried to change a poopy diaper while talking on an iPhone to a complete stranger? And iPhone, or any cell phone, I think, is really not designed to do the whole cradle between your shoulder and ear thing and I'm not nearly cool enough to have a blue tooth ear piece. So I dropped my iPhone, and Neisha, about six times during our conversation. I'm sure she was thrilled.

But bless Neisha's heart, this morning at 10am, a white styrofoam cooler filled with baby-making serums and syringes and progesterone suppositories showed up, packed on ice, to my doorstep. A--freaking--men.

Moments ago, Husband looked on in, I'd like to think, awe, as I gave myself the first shot of nine. The needle looks pretty scary, but it really didn't hurt. According to the calendar my RE gave me today, the IUI date is either the 22nd or 23rd, so a full day or two before family arrives for turkey day. But, due to overwhelming demand, I will do my very best to fit a turkey baster joke into my Thanksgiving repertoire.

Tomorrow's post will be about something far more fun than this baby-making riggamaroll; I will be writing about my return to TARGET!!!! SQUEEEE!!!!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I will keep an eye on you and the turkey baster. i hope all goes well and I will see you the 24th.
Uncle Al

PS...I can hardly wait to hear about Target.

Becca said...

Ugh, I'm glad you got nasty! It's CYCLICAL! You have to have things ON TIME. No excuse for delaying it. Stupid. Grr.

Glad it worked out, though, and glad the first shot went well. Good luck!

Linsey said...

Can I still wear my red band of support?

Anonymous said...

Do you do anything other than complain?

Amy said...

Hey anonymous, suck it. That's what blogs are for.

I am so glad it all worked out. Way to advocate for yourself!

Anonymous said...

You're also clearly the biggest attention whore - 3 twitters in a 2 hour period? Is it always all about you?

sarah said...

So "Anonymous", let me see if I have this right. You don't like me (fair enough), but you take time out of your busy day to not only read my blog and leave a bitter (and pretty stupid) comment, but to check back to see if your comment has caused a stir, and continue to snark. Seems to me I'm not the only "attention whore" here.

AND you either follow me on Twitter or you are reading my twitter feed on my blog. Either way, that's an awful lot of time and energy to spend on someone you don't like.

I've got no problem with someone disagreeing with me or disliking me. Hey, if you want to spend your valuable time reading the blogs of people you clearly have nothing but disdain for, and writing nasty things to them, by all means, have at it. It's your time and it clearly makes you feel better about yourself. But when you're too spineless to comment under an actual name or leave a link, that's just lame. So from now on, if there's no name or link to accompany your bitterness, you don't get a voice here.

Sarah said...

$20 says we BOTH know where anonymous comes from...

Anywho, good luck w/ the baster and very stoked about Target :)

Lisa said...

Different strokes for different folks, I guess. I personally find your tweets and posts amusing, as I commented to your post on tzedaka. Probably because I identify; complaining, as I do, about bureaucrats spending taxpayers money on wallpapering their loo or a Tudor dog house, the kids fighting, the lack of customer care in the UK, the cost of health insurance in the US or my husband's change of heart about moving "back home."

I have no problem with a little criticism, or even a shock-horror response, as long as it is authentic. But, if you are going to sling --it,at least show the courage of your convictions and sign it, otherwise you aren't being a commenter, you're being a bitch.