Update of sorts - UPDATED!

I can't believe it's been 8 weeks since I last posted. I can't say that there's been any great reason to post. No news. No cakes.

However, I do have an update of sorts now. Since just before Christmas I've been setting aside any funds I've made from cakes, cookies and lottery scratch tickets. I've managed to save what I thought was about 33% of what we needed. With that, and another plan in place we have, we calculated that we should be good to go in June. That's only three months away! I was very pleased.

However, I voiced a fear to V that I had been holding off contacting the clinic because I was afraid that a) the price had gone up, b) they'd given away the embryos we'd decided on because it was almost a year later, or c) that the clinic might have changed their guidelines regarding age and lowered it, aging me out of the program. V said just send the email. So I did on Monday. And it bounced. Which meant that the coordinator of the program last April was no longer with the clinic. Great.

So, I had to call the clinic to find out who had taken over the program. i didn't want to have to explain to multiple people why I was calling, so rather than actually talk to someone there, I listened to their, now very long, outgoing message to hear all the different numbers to call for nurses, cycle monitorig, sperm bank, yada yada yada. I had to listen twice to hear the number for the Ovum Donor Coordinator. I figured that was a good place to start. I called the number and she's on vacation but she left the name and number of the person covering for her. Oh goody. So I called her and got her voice mail. I left a somewhat rambling message about why I was calling, hoped she was the right person and left my cell number.

She called back the next morning. While I was in the shower. So I missed her call. But that's okay. She wasn't the right person, but rather than ask me to call her, she left me the name of the person and her email address. I think that may have been because I'd indicated that I'd sent an email initially. In any case, I'm glad she did because it allowed me to compose a comprehensive email for the Embryo Donation Coordinator.

I sent off an email that provided a brief history of our DE IVF cycles and their outcomes. As well I outlined what had taken place since our final (cancelled) cycle in July 2010 in terms what we experienced regarding booking the counseling session, actually meeting with the counselor, how long it took to get the report, choosing and locking in a profile and the unexpected loss of my father-in-law in July. I felt it was important that she knew why we hadn't moved forward as planned and that we hadn't flaked out on them. I told her that besides introducing ourselves in the email, I wanted to make sure that everything was still on track for us.

I heard back from her today with answers to two of my three questions.

1. Cost - we were working with a figure of $2200 as told to us, in July 2010, for the cycle. Apparently that's now jumped to $3000. Ack!!!
2. Age - I was worried that I'd aged out and wanted to be sure that my RE still worked with women to age 52 when using donor embryos. Apparently I am still eligible up to my 53rd birthday. Score!!!
3. I wanted to make sure that we still had the embryos that we had locked in with the previous coordinator in April 2011. Her response indicates that she can't answer this question. My file is pretty big, so I'm sure she's going through it, especially the last stuff with the previous coordinator. But her response of:

"I am trying to get to the bottom of your file and see if everything is in place - since ashley left we have 'revamped' the program so I just need to get all your paper work up to speed and will be back to you with more details this week."

I'm really hoping this does not mean that somewhere someone dropped the ball and another couple got the embryos we selected. If it means that there are more to choose from, and possibly interracial embryos (a real long shot), then it's not too bad. But when we were presented with profiles, we were given three. And we chose the couple that had used an egg donor in her 20s. The other two profiles had the women in their mid-late 30s. If this is our last shot, I want to optimize our chances if possible.

Anyway, that's where we are now. I've sent back an email asking her to clarify why the fee went up so much in 18 months (if she can). I've told her that it doesn't change our intent, just will delay us a little longer. As I said to V, the silver lining in all this is that even though I really want to do this cycle sooner rather than later, I don't have to get in there before September.


UPDATE:

I heard back from the coordinator. She doesn't know why the price has gone up but she did confirm that there are three 3-day embryos waiting for us whenever we're ready to go. So I'm feeling a bit better about this now. When we're able to do the cycle I'll get in touch and then go in on CD2 or CD3.