The second trimester is supposed to herald in a renewed sense of energy and feel-good-ness. Instead, I seem to be getting sheer exhaustion. It has become rare for me to manage to stay awake the entire day.
Today I woke at 9am, had breakfast in bed, got up and showered at 10am, went for a 30min walk around the local park and the block, had lunch of fried noodles with tomatoes and spring onions, then promptly tried to fall asleep in said bowl of noodles. The dull headache warned me that I needed to get my head down soon or suffer the consequences of a restless night with no sleep and a bad head.
So I slept from 2pm to 4pm. This all sounds lovely and relaxing, but it is very frustrating and feels like I am wasting my days. In the morning I am mostly too groggy and foggy to get anything done, and I always feel like I have to spend my energy wisely. One outing a day is about my maximum. If I do too much one day I might feel ok, but will then crash out the next day.
I am not worried at the moment, everyone keeps telling me that I will perk up soon enough and that it's just the baby sapping my energy. However I start work teaching again the week after next and I am not sure how that is going to work. I have already got a note from my GP so I can request a disability carpark right up close to my building at work, as I know the walk (5min) up the steep hill at work will leave me knackered - plus the round ligament pain can hurt after too much walking!
My next midwife appointment is next Monday (6 days time) so I will ask her about it. I am taking my pre-natal vitamins but it could be anemia maybe? Hope not as the pre-natal vitamins are upsetting my digestive system somewhat. With the in mind I have decided one thing I can do is ensure I am eating enough. It occurred to me that I now need to eat like I am growing, like I did when I was a growing teenager! So I am working out healthy foods and snacks to eat at regular intervals throughout the day. If I don't, for instance, eat a yoghurt for morning tea then I will feel faint and go low just before lunchtime. I always need to eat before exercise. More fruits are on the menu and we are getting a reasonable harvest of fresh veges and herbs from the garden. Plus eggs from the chooks!
At the moment my one real mild concern is when/how we will get the Tiny Fish's nursery started. I am itching to get in there are start planning the room. It has no storage so I will have to find some second-had pieces and repaint them.
Showing posts with label I don't like.... Show all posts
Showing posts with label I don't like.... Show all posts
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Saturday, December 7, 2013
9w How to thoroughly scare everyone, including yourself
First, be a high-risk Type 1 Diabetic pregnant woman who has just done IVF.
Next, wake up at 2am on a Friday morning with a splitting headache and take a couple of panadol. Wait 20 mins.
Start vomiting dramatically and violently for several hours. Decide you have suddenly been hit by the worst morning sickness the world has ever known.
Drink a tiny amount of water. Fail to keep even that down. Repeat a couple of times, enough to get really scared about dehydration and the baby and whatnot.
Thank the heavens that your husband is here and that he can monitor the Dexcom. Double thank you to the diabetes gods who prevented me from going low throughout all of this.
The the other end joins in. Belly pains. Not morning sickness. Food poisoning. Well, that's sort of okay if it means I won't be doing this every day, but only on the condition that little walnut baby is kept safe and healthy.
At one point I feel so sick, I'm sitting on the couch cos it's closer to the bog that the bed is. My temperature is mega hot and I've just sweated so much I've drenched my big fluffy pink polar fleece dressing gown. Hubby gets very worried when I start moaning and pacing. I know he nearly took me to hospital right then and there.
Early hours of the morning: remember that vomiting plus headache could equal ketones. Do a blood test and get 0.3 on the Optium. Fail to remember that this is still within the normal range and decide I will probably need to go to A&E for IV fluids. Decide to wait a bit until morning and if it's not better, then trundle off down the road to the hospital.
As soon as it's respectable, start texting and calling: my Diabetes Nurse Educator, my GP, my midwife, my boss, my friend, my Mum.
DNE was great, she called or texted throughout the day to monitor my progress. We discussed it and she suggested if I was really worried about dehydration I could go straight to A&E, but that we could try managing this at home.
The time between events started to increase. By about 9am I can drink a little ginger ale, and I try my hand at some marmite toast (too soon!). Tiny, tiny bites. We'll chewed.
The GP doesn't want to see me, even though the DNE and midwife both want me to see him. Well, technically the receptionist doesn't want to see we. She tells me just to go straight to the hospital.
The midwife phones after 1pm and is working off old info by that time. She wants all sorts of nasty tests that involve leaving the house. I tell her I am now able to hold down liquid. Put down the phone, and turn my truth into a lie! Sigh.
DNE checks in again, she is happy with my progress. Hubby looks exhausted, poor darling.
Snack on ginger ale (regular) and ready salted chips. I find that if I let my tummy go empty I feel a lot worse. Use a couple of temp basal increases, and bolus carefully for any food - but always wait to see if I'm going to keep it!
Mum pops round about 4pm, by which time I have finally, almost got a complete set of clothes on.
I manage a small dinner of pasta spirals with chopper mini tomatoes in olive oil and black pepper. The best food in the world it tastes like!
Last night I sleep a full night for the first time in weeks. I didn't even get up to pee. Which probably means I'm still a bit dehydrated. I feel much better today, although I've lost 4kg (from 59kg back down to 55kg). I am eating small snack and trying to drink a steady amount of water.
So, yeah, that is how to scare the pants off everyone around you.
Next, wake up at 2am on a Friday morning with a splitting headache and take a couple of panadol. Wait 20 mins.
Start vomiting dramatically and violently for several hours. Decide you have suddenly been hit by the worst morning sickness the world has ever known.
Drink a tiny amount of water. Fail to keep even that down. Repeat a couple of times, enough to get really scared about dehydration and the baby and whatnot.
Thank the heavens that your husband is here and that he can monitor the Dexcom. Double thank you to the diabetes gods who prevented me from going low throughout all of this.
The the other end joins in. Belly pains. Not morning sickness. Food poisoning. Well, that's sort of okay if it means I won't be doing this every day, but only on the condition that little walnut baby is kept safe and healthy.
At one point I feel so sick, I'm sitting on the couch cos it's closer to the bog that the bed is. My temperature is mega hot and I've just sweated so much I've drenched my big fluffy pink polar fleece dressing gown. Hubby gets very worried when I start moaning and pacing. I know he nearly took me to hospital right then and there.
Early hours of the morning: remember that vomiting plus headache could equal ketones. Do a blood test and get 0.3 on the Optium. Fail to remember that this is still within the normal range and decide I will probably need to go to A&E for IV fluids. Decide to wait a bit until morning and if it's not better, then trundle off down the road to the hospital.
As soon as it's respectable, start texting and calling: my Diabetes Nurse Educator, my GP, my midwife, my boss, my friend, my Mum.
DNE was great, she called or texted throughout the day to monitor my progress. We discussed it and she suggested if I was really worried about dehydration I could go straight to A&E, but that we could try managing this at home.
The time between events started to increase. By about 9am I can drink a little ginger ale, and I try my hand at some marmite toast (too soon!). Tiny, tiny bites. We'll chewed.
The GP doesn't want to see me, even though the DNE and midwife both want me to see him. Well, technically the receptionist doesn't want to see we. She tells me just to go straight to the hospital.
The midwife phones after 1pm and is working off old info by that time. She wants all sorts of nasty tests that involve leaving the house. I tell her I am now able to hold down liquid. Put down the phone, and turn my truth into a lie! Sigh.
DNE checks in again, she is happy with my progress. Hubby looks exhausted, poor darling.
Snack on ginger ale (regular) and ready salted chips. I find that if I let my tummy go empty I feel a lot worse. Use a couple of temp basal increases, and bolus carefully for any food - but always wait to see if I'm going to keep it!
Mum pops round about 4pm, by which time I have finally, almost got a complete set of clothes on.
I manage a small dinner of pasta spirals with chopper mini tomatoes in olive oil and black pepper. The best food in the world it tastes like!
Last night I sleep a full night for the first time in weeks. I didn't even get up to pee. Which probably means I'm still a bit dehydrated. I feel much better today, although I've lost 4kg (from 59kg back down to 55kg). I am eating small snack and trying to drink a steady amount of water.
So, yeah, that is how to scare the pants off everyone around you.
Monday, November 11, 2013
5w3d Panadol vs. Dex
I woke yesterday morning to the mother of all headaches. I knew instantly that it was going to be a long grueling day: my super-human sense of smell sniffed something like paint as I was waking up, and the headache decided to stay with me from 7am to 11pm.
Of course, I can't take neurofen at the moment, bit I didn't want to take panadol either as that messes up the Dexcom readings.
We had the step kids and they wanted to go to a gala day which was a beautiful, noisy, rowdy, fun outing except my head was killing me and I kept going really low. Hubby bought me a lolly kebab on a stick!
I slept fitfully most of Sunday afternoon, waking a couple of times for high alarms. At one point I woke up enough to check the tubing and found a massive bubble going right into the infusion site, so I unplugged things and primed. It dripped a few drops and then seemed to stop. With the bedroom curtains drawn, and bleary eyes, I couldn't see that I was actually shooting a thin spout of insulin across the bead spread! Oops!
By 11pm, and after every natural remedy I could think of, my head was pounding so I gave up and took 4 panadol - why that many? Because paracetamol normally doesn't work for me.
True to form, the Dex duly started to rise higher and higher. That's because it measures glucose molecules, but acetaminophen molecules look very similar to the Dex sensor. This causes false high readings. Very high. My meter said I was about 10mmol, while the Dex thought I was about 19.3! Let's just say I learnt how to disable the high-alarm feature pretty quickly. With the Dex and the Vibe pump both going mad at me every couple of minutes there was no way I would get sleep with them on.
Felt much better this morning, taught Monday class - always a drain that class - and tried to get away early but failed.
I did however get home in time to start calling midwives and OBs. Turns out the OB I want is private only, and costs nearly $4000!!! Although we could just afford that, it would be stupid as there are funded OB options available. I'll just have to make sure I don't get the one we had at the start of this IVF journey as he was strange and gave bad advice.
I did manage to book in my 8w scan with the private OB, as she has ultrasound equipment. I then had to email the fertility clinic so they can send a referral letter through to her offices, and that way it will be covered under maternity funding so free to us - yay! I just hope I don't like her too much :/ I'm checking with my health insurance to see if it covers obstetrics, but don't hold out much hope. I'm just going to have to accept the fact that I won't get the OB of my choice. Which sux big time since I've heard great things about her. Sigh.
The midwife was a more positive call. We left a message and she rang back after dinner. She is the first one I looked at, mainly because she stated in her online profile that she works closely with specialists. She took time with us on the phone and we will meet her early next week.
3rd HCG test is tomorrow. I don't really have any nerves about this one, as I've had so many symptoms. And no bleeding with cramping, or bleeding at all, which I take as a good sign.
Oh, did I mention that the gala day was held at the primary school where me, Hubby, his Dad, my Sister, my 3 step-kids all went? Yeah, it has zoning and we're not in the zone, but Hubby knows the principal and asked him if it's possible to put our name on the list anyway and we can! Talk about forward thinking! So exciting! I really hope this pregnancy sticks and goes smoothly, I am getting a bit fond of our little embryo!
Of course, I can't take neurofen at the moment, bit I didn't want to take panadol either as that messes up the Dexcom readings.
We had the step kids and they wanted to go to a gala day which was a beautiful, noisy, rowdy, fun outing except my head was killing me and I kept going really low. Hubby bought me a lolly kebab on a stick!
I slept fitfully most of Sunday afternoon, waking a couple of times for high alarms. At one point I woke up enough to check the tubing and found a massive bubble going right into the infusion site, so I unplugged things and primed. It dripped a few drops and then seemed to stop. With the bedroom curtains drawn, and bleary eyes, I couldn't see that I was actually shooting a thin spout of insulin across the bead spread! Oops!
By 11pm, and after every natural remedy I could think of, my head was pounding so I gave up and took 4 panadol - why that many? Because paracetamol normally doesn't work for me.
True to form, the Dex duly started to rise higher and higher. That's because it measures glucose molecules, but acetaminophen molecules look very similar to the Dex sensor. This causes false high readings. Very high. My meter said I was about 10mmol, while the Dex thought I was about 19.3! Let's just say I learnt how to disable the high-alarm feature pretty quickly. With the Dex and the Vibe pump both going mad at me every couple of minutes there was no way I would get sleep with them on.
Felt much better this morning, taught Monday class - always a drain that class - and tried to get away early but failed.
I did however get home in time to start calling midwives and OBs. Turns out the OB I want is private only, and costs nearly $4000!!! Although we could just afford that, it would be stupid as there are funded OB options available. I'll just have to make sure I don't get the one we had at the start of this IVF journey as he was strange and gave bad advice.
I did manage to book in my 8w scan with the private OB, as she has ultrasound equipment. I then had to email the fertility clinic so they can send a referral letter through to her offices, and that way it will be covered under maternity funding so free to us - yay! I just hope I don't like her too much :/ I'm checking with my health insurance to see if it covers obstetrics, but don't hold out much hope. I'm just going to have to accept the fact that I won't get the OB of my choice. Which sux big time since I've heard great things about her. Sigh.
The midwife was a more positive call. We left a message and she rang back after dinner. She is the first one I looked at, mainly because she stated in her online profile that she works closely with specialists. She took time with us on the phone and we will meet her early next week.
3rd HCG test is tomorrow. I don't really have any nerves about this one, as I've had so many symptoms. And no bleeding with cramping, or bleeding at all, which I take as a good sign.
Oh, did I mention that the gala day was held at the primary school where me, Hubby, his Dad, my Sister, my 3 step-kids all went? Yeah, it has zoning and we're not in the zone, but Hubby knows the principal and asked him if it's possible to put our name on the list anyway and we can! Talk about forward thinking! So exciting! I really hope this pregnancy sticks and goes smoothly, I am getting a bit fond of our little embryo!
Monday, November 4, 2013
14dp3dt My Husband is wonderful
It's nearly midnight and I am a bit of a mess. I have been battling high blood sugars now (above 15mmol) for several hours and I'm now 2.9mmol. Very low. Amazed I can type coherently even.
This progesterone is totally kicking my butt. Plus I suspect I may be making my own now.
Today was a tough class to teach. I didn't enjoy it and my heart rate got raised. So did my bloodsugar from the stress. That is where today's roller coaster started.
After lunch a high caught me and wouldn't let go for several hours. This one I attribute to accidentally buying a white-bread sandwich that I thought was brown bread. Boo. Sux when something so stupid can wreck and ruin things like it did.
I went low just at the time before dinner when my Diabetes Nurse Educator phoned. We have been playing phone tag for a couple of weeks now, and since she didn't know that I'm now pregnant it was vital I talk to her about these stubborn highs.
Actually I thought I wasnt doing too bad, diabetes-wise, before she said it was urgent to get these under control, and that it would have been more ideal if they had been under control at conception. I said "they were!!" I have been working so hard to keep my numbers safe. And I was doing bloody well before IVF drugs and pregnancy hormones jumped in the ball-pit!
Anyway, it was a friendly Chet and she gave me lots of new (much stronger) insulin to carb ratios which will increase my meal boluses by 30 - 50%. That's huge and I'm not convinced. But I tried it for dinner (another bad choice: takeout, but I'm exhausted, we both are) and at first I thought oh hey this is working! I'm flatlining after a burger! Brill!
And then suddenly about and hour after dinner my blood glucose just took a massive ramp up. Climbing and climbing, until it got over 18mmol!!! I was frantic. Drinking loads of water, giving as much insulin as I dared. Still nothing worked and it kept rising.
I have read of other T1D pregnant women feeling guilty over high blood sugar, but this wasn't just guilt, this was fear, terror. High blood sugars can result in all sorts of bad things for the foetus which I daren't write here. Just google type 1 diabetes and pregnant to scare yourself shirtless. :(
I gave upwards of 4 correction boluses and put a 30% temp basal increase in place as I was about to have more progesterone which will make my blood sugar rise.
And them I decided to check the line for bubble. Bloody bubbles! With only 57 units left (I know, that sounds like too much to throw away to me too) I ripped out the set and put a new infusion site in. When I pulled the cartridge out of my pump it looked all bubbly like sprite. Useless. So, bubbles are another defendant in the case against high blood sugars.
We toddled off to bed, and I was finally dropping, but with double arrows straight down. I felt terrible, the cramping was just cramping up as it tends to do whenever my blood sugar goes low or high or moves too fast (same thing happens on period so not too concerned) and I was exhausted from the day and trying to beat back highs.
I cried and told Hubby I was scared. I'm doing what I feel is my best and it's not good enough. It's one thing to avoid caffeine, but when it comes to the really important stuff like controlling my blood sugar I can't do it. I'm trying so hard. It feels like everything I do with my diabetes management is hurting me, and worst, hurting my baby. My baby. Wow. That made me well up. I feel very helpless not being able to provide a safe, stable blood sugar environment. I'm doing my best. I won't give up I will get this sorted. I knew it wouldn't be easy.
But sometimes you just have to lie there and be held as you pour your heart out to you soul mate and he cuddles you and tells you it's going to be fine and that he's proud of the amazing job you're doing.
I'm crying through this. I know a lot of it is probably the hormones giving my emotions a hiding, and coming out of a low, (5.2 now, thank God) and the sheer overwhelmed-ness I feel having gone through this IVF process. The lead up has been so long and harrowing. Now that the embryo is in me, I feel an enormous responsibility to do my best to keep as healthy as possible.
So, I am being proactive and making a plan:
- DNE's new insulin to carb ratios may be too strong, but I shall try them for a couple of days and then change them if necessary.
- I will txt my DNE to ask advice
- I will try to avoid white breads, rice, etc and other high-GI foods in large quantities.
- don't be lazy. Cook good food. We do get in the habit of eating out once or twice maybe per week.
- be gentle when correcting a low, and always have a stash of glucose with me.
- be gentle and kind to myself, and practice stress-reduction techniques.
- realize that I can only do my best, and what will be will be
Second beta is tomorrow. I have no symptoms to doubt this pregnancy, but I am so, so scared. Please send your love and hope and thoughts to us for a good rising beta.
Thank you for all of your support. This is scary and knowing I'm not alone in these thoughts really helps to calm me.
This progesterone is totally kicking my butt. Plus I suspect I may be making my own now.
Today was a tough class to teach. I didn't enjoy it and my heart rate got raised. So did my bloodsugar from the stress. That is where today's roller coaster started.
After lunch a high caught me and wouldn't let go for several hours. This one I attribute to accidentally buying a white-bread sandwich that I thought was brown bread. Boo. Sux when something so stupid can wreck and ruin things like it did.
I went low just at the time before dinner when my Diabetes Nurse Educator phoned. We have been playing phone tag for a couple of weeks now, and since she didn't know that I'm now pregnant it was vital I talk to her about these stubborn highs.
Actually I thought I wasnt doing too bad, diabetes-wise, before she said it was urgent to get these under control, and that it would have been more ideal if they had been under control at conception. I said "they were!!" I have been working so hard to keep my numbers safe. And I was doing bloody well before IVF drugs and pregnancy hormones jumped in the ball-pit!
Anyway, it was a friendly Chet and she gave me lots of new (much stronger) insulin to carb ratios which will increase my meal boluses by 30 - 50%. That's huge and I'm not convinced. But I tried it for dinner (another bad choice: takeout, but I'm exhausted, we both are) and at first I thought oh hey this is working! I'm flatlining after a burger! Brill!
And then suddenly about and hour after dinner my blood glucose just took a massive ramp up. Climbing and climbing, until it got over 18mmol!!! I was frantic. Drinking loads of water, giving as much insulin as I dared. Still nothing worked and it kept rising.
I have read of other T1D pregnant women feeling guilty over high blood sugar, but this wasn't just guilt, this was fear, terror. High blood sugars can result in all sorts of bad things for the foetus which I daren't write here. Just google type 1 diabetes and pregnant to scare yourself shirtless. :(
I gave upwards of 4 correction boluses and put a 30% temp basal increase in place as I was about to have more progesterone which will make my blood sugar rise.
And them I decided to check the line for bubble. Bloody bubbles! With only 57 units left (I know, that sounds like too much to throw away to me too) I ripped out the set and put a new infusion site in. When I pulled the cartridge out of my pump it looked all bubbly like sprite. Useless. So, bubbles are another defendant in the case against high blood sugars.
We toddled off to bed, and I was finally dropping, but with double arrows straight down. I felt terrible, the cramping was just cramping up as it tends to do whenever my blood sugar goes low or high or moves too fast (same thing happens on period so not too concerned) and I was exhausted from the day and trying to beat back highs.
I cried and told Hubby I was scared. I'm doing what I feel is my best and it's not good enough. It's one thing to avoid caffeine, but when it comes to the really important stuff like controlling my blood sugar I can't do it. I'm trying so hard. It feels like everything I do with my diabetes management is hurting me, and worst, hurting my baby. My baby. Wow. That made me well up. I feel very helpless not being able to provide a safe, stable blood sugar environment. I'm doing my best. I won't give up I will get this sorted. I knew it wouldn't be easy.
But sometimes you just have to lie there and be held as you pour your heart out to you soul mate and he cuddles you and tells you it's going to be fine and that he's proud of the amazing job you're doing.
I'm crying through this. I know a lot of it is probably the hormones giving my emotions a hiding, and coming out of a low, (5.2 now, thank God) and the sheer overwhelmed-ness I feel having gone through this IVF process. The lead up has been so long and harrowing. Now that the embryo is in me, I feel an enormous responsibility to do my best to keep as healthy as possible.
So, I am being proactive and making a plan:
- DNE's new insulin to carb ratios may be too strong, but I shall try them for a couple of days and then change them if necessary.
- I will txt my DNE to ask advice
- I will try to avoid white breads, rice, etc and other high-GI foods in large quantities.
- don't be lazy. Cook good food. We do get in the habit of eating out once or twice maybe per week.
- be gentle when correcting a low, and always have a stash of glucose with me.
- be gentle and kind to myself, and practice stress-reduction techniques.
- realize that I can only do my best, and what will be will be
Second beta is tomorrow. I have no symptoms to doubt this pregnancy, but I am so, so scared. Please send your love and hope and thoughts to us for a good rising beta.
Thank you for all of your support. This is scary and knowing I'm not alone in these thoughts really helps to calm me.
Sunday, October 27, 2013
5dp3dt Twinges
Saturday, and the start of the long Labour Weekend here in New Zealand. We have the step kids staying with us this weekend (they are ages 18 boy, 16 girl, and 12 boy) - they come every second weekend to stay and the first thing Hubby showed them when they arrived on Friday evening was the photo of our embryo. The younger two were quite positive, the older was more reserved. Hard to tell what they are thinking sometimes.
Today I slept in, and then got up, had a lazy shower, and helped Hubby prepare lunch for all of us. I am struggling to get enough healthy choices - I mean, pizza for lunch one weekend with the kids is fun. Pizza for lunch every weekend with the kids is too much. I need healthy choices at this moment in time if never before! Normally, our go-to Saturday lunch with kids meal is make-your-own filled rolls at MILs, with ham, salad, cheese etc. Of course, I can no longer have deli-meats, so I was going to get a little tin of salmon instead (yum!) and take that to MILs house, but she is unwell so Hubby just brought the pizza home with him. But hey, I am not one to complain when someone prepares a meal for me! It's just now I have even more nutritional restrictions (diabetes plus PUPO) and I now feel like I am spending most of my waking moments planning safe, healthy food and drink choices.
Even tea. Black tea has caffeine and I have decided to have zero caffeine intake. I am drinking Dilmah decaffeinated tea, but have also just got some raspberry leaf tea - I quite like it! This is coming from someone who thinks that green tea tastes like lawn clippings lol
So the guts of this post: perhaps the hormones have finally got to me?
Hubby and I had a really bad fight today. We hardly ever fight. And when we do, it's always over nothing. This was no exception, but it felt worse. It started when we were with the youngest at a newly opened playground for kids. It was literally teeming with toddlers and children. Although I may be pregnant, I still carry the years of being infertile with me, so that mixed with my childhood memories of the park and I was already having an internal battle. And then an incident happened that may have involved the youngest. Long story short, it felt like Hubby had instantly "sided" with his son, rather than trusting me. And he couldn't understand me, and I felt he was being irrational. Sometimes I feel really alone in this journey, afterall, he already has kids and cannot possibly have identical feelings to me about this situation, although I know he dearly wants a child with me now. It's just that after 10 years in this family, for him to say one sentence and it immediately devalues my place in the family, and makes me an outsider to the family group, and comes with the assumption that I don't want what is best for his kids. All that is just what I feel, not what I know or what is logical. But that doesn't stop if hurting me deeply and upsetting me. I know Hubby was also greatly upset, it wasn't just a one-sided thing at all!
He took the kids off to get an ice-cream while I sulked in the car - I really didn't want to be anywhere near them. Once back at home, we tried to reconcile but it just got worse. We both got really worked up and I drove off to give us both space to calm down. I went to my favourite garden centre and bought new vege plants, and while I was there Hubby phoned me and we were soon back right as rain. The thing is, while I was so angry and sad and upset, I was also getting really bad twinges in my abdomen, especially over my right hip, and right through to my lower right back. It didn't last very long, but I was concerned enough to decided to go home even before Hubby rang. I am not supposed to elevate my pulse or raise my core body temperature during my 2WW.
Once I got home, the house was empty as Hubby has to do some work, and the 2 of the kids were in town, while the youngest had gone with Dad. So I attacked the garden to work off some of my fury. It was quite overgrown as I had let if go fallow since autumn (I hate gardening in the winter - I am a fair-weather gardener) and it was great to get in there and rip out the old capsicum plants, corn stalks, and giant weeds! Bending and digging was hard, as was pulling out weeds. Every movement which activated my abdominal muscles made me acutely aware of them, and what might be behind them, and so I kept taking breaks. Soon enough, I was all hot and bothered just in time for Hubby to come home and find me covered in dirt. We had a big hug and all was good again. The world was righted on it's axis once again.
But here is the strangest part: in the overgrown garden I found: 1 chicken, 13 eggs, and a perfectly edible pumpkin that had been hiding out all winter! The chicken in question is one of our 4 pet chooks, and she has been going missing in the afternoons from the open-top fenced in area of the orchard that the chooks call home. I was digging out a particularly stubborn weed when this chicken burst out of the undergrowth, clucking like a mad thing! I went to investigate where she had come from and found a hole in the hedge, and if I stuck my whole arm in I could just reach the clutch of eggs. Unfortunately, they will all have to be thrown away cos they will be stin-ky!
Tomorrow, if the weather holds to be fine again, I will look at finishing the clearing of the garden and maybe even get it planted up. I might try and enlist some help with the heavy digging this time.
Hubby and the two youngest are out tonight playing in a band (yes, really) at a local private function, so I cooked a pasta dinner for the eldest and now we are watching another of those crappy James Bond movies. It's one with Roger Moore in it, not my favourite Bond.
So symptoms today, apart from the twinges: generally crampy feelings, they are normally small-sized and will move about every couple of hours - maybe starting quite low, perhaps below my uterus, and then moving to one side, then in the upper abdomen, then around into my lower back. This evening the cramp/heaviness is more similar with what I get prior to my period, and everything I have read suggests that these can be signs of implantation. By breasts are still a bit tender, but nowhere near as bad as 2 or 3 days ago. Blood sugars are getting more erratic unfortunately, and I am experiencing more low blood sugars after not having any during the stims and ER/ET processes. I am finding that I must keep myself well hydrated, otherwise I can start to get a headache pretty quickly.
Now officially past the halfway mark of the 2WW, and I am feeling really positive about this. I still try to maintain a realistic attitude, as the nurse said, I might feel symptoms, I might not, and in either instance anything could happen. Please keep your fingers crossed for us!
Today I slept in, and then got up, had a lazy shower, and helped Hubby prepare lunch for all of us. I am struggling to get enough healthy choices - I mean, pizza for lunch one weekend with the kids is fun. Pizza for lunch every weekend with the kids is too much. I need healthy choices at this moment in time if never before! Normally, our go-to Saturday lunch with kids meal is make-your-own filled rolls at MILs, with ham, salad, cheese etc. Of course, I can no longer have deli-meats, so I was going to get a little tin of salmon instead (yum!) and take that to MILs house, but she is unwell so Hubby just brought the pizza home with him. But hey, I am not one to complain when someone prepares a meal for me! It's just now I have even more nutritional restrictions (diabetes plus PUPO) and I now feel like I am spending most of my waking moments planning safe, healthy food and drink choices.
Even tea. Black tea has caffeine and I have decided to have zero caffeine intake. I am drinking Dilmah decaffeinated tea, but have also just got some raspberry leaf tea - I quite like it! This is coming from someone who thinks that green tea tastes like lawn clippings lol
So the guts of this post: perhaps the hormones have finally got to me?
Hubby and I had a really bad fight today. We hardly ever fight. And when we do, it's always over nothing. This was no exception, but it felt worse. It started when we were with the youngest at a newly opened playground for kids. It was literally teeming with toddlers and children. Although I may be pregnant, I still carry the years of being infertile with me, so that mixed with my childhood memories of the park and I was already having an internal battle. And then an incident happened that may have involved the youngest. Long story short, it felt like Hubby had instantly "sided" with his son, rather than trusting me. And he couldn't understand me, and I felt he was being irrational. Sometimes I feel really alone in this journey, afterall, he already has kids and cannot possibly have identical feelings to me about this situation, although I know he dearly wants a child with me now. It's just that after 10 years in this family, for him to say one sentence and it immediately devalues my place in the family, and makes me an outsider to the family group, and comes with the assumption that I don't want what is best for his kids. All that is just what I feel, not what I know or what is logical. But that doesn't stop if hurting me deeply and upsetting me. I know Hubby was also greatly upset, it wasn't just a one-sided thing at all!
He took the kids off to get an ice-cream while I sulked in the car - I really didn't want to be anywhere near them. Once back at home, we tried to reconcile but it just got worse. We both got really worked up and I drove off to give us both space to calm down. I went to my favourite garden centre and bought new vege plants, and while I was there Hubby phoned me and we were soon back right as rain. The thing is, while I was so angry and sad and upset, I was also getting really bad twinges in my abdomen, especially over my right hip, and right through to my lower right back. It didn't last very long, but I was concerned enough to decided to go home even before Hubby rang. I am not supposed to elevate my pulse or raise my core body temperature during my 2WW.
Once I got home, the house was empty as Hubby has to do some work, and the 2 of the kids were in town, while the youngest had gone with Dad. So I attacked the garden to work off some of my fury. It was quite overgrown as I had let if go fallow since autumn (I hate gardening in the winter - I am a fair-weather gardener) and it was great to get in there and rip out the old capsicum plants, corn stalks, and giant weeds! Bending and digging was hard, as was pulling out weeds. Every movement which activated my abdominal muscles made me acutely aware of them, and what might be behind them, and so I kept taking breaks. Soon enough, I was all hot and bothered just in time for Hubby to come home and find me covered in dirt. We had a big hug and all was good again. The world was righted on it's axis once again.
But here is the strangest part: in the overgrown garden I found: 1 chicken, 13 eggs, and a perfectly edible pumpkin that had been hiding out all winter! The chicken in question is one of our 4 pet chooks, and she has been going missing in the afternoons from the open-top fenced in area of the orchard that the chooks call home. I was digging out a particularly stubborn weed when this chicken burst out of the undergrowth, clucking like a mad thing! I went to investigate where she had come from and found a hole in the hedge, and if I stuck my whole arm in I could just reach the clutch of eggs. Unfortunately, they will all have to be thrown away cos they will be stin-ky!
Tomorrow, if the weather holds to be fine again, I will look at finishing the clearing of the garden and maybe even get it planted up. I might try and enlist some help with the heavy digging this time.
Hubby and the two youngest are out tonight playing in a band (yes, really) at a local private function, so I cooked a pasta dinner for the eldest and now we are watching another of those crappy James Bond movies. It's one with Roger Moore in it, not my favourite Bond.
So symptoms today, apart from the twinges: generally crampy feelings, they are normally small-sized and will move about every couple of hours - maybe starting quite low, perhaps below my uterus, and then moving to one side, then in the upper abdomen, then around into my lower back. This evening the cramp/heaviness is more similar with what I get prior to my period, and everything I have read suggests that these can be signs of implantation. By breasts are still a bit tender, but nowhere near as bad as 2 or 3 days ago. Blood sugars are getting more erratic unfortunately, and I am experiencing more low blood sugars after not having any during the stims and ER/ET processes. I am finding that I must keep myself well hydrated, otherwise I can start to get a headache pretty quickly.
Now officially past the halfway mark of the 2WW, and I am feeling really positive about this. I still try to maintain a realistic attitude, as the nurse said, I might feel symptoms, I might not, and in either instance anything could happen. Please keep your fingers crossed for us!
Sunday, July 24, 2011
I want OFF this damn rollercoaster! Can you help?
Next week the students come back and I will be in teaching mode again. That will be exhausting but challenging work which I'm looking forward to.
The week just gone has been absolutely frenetic, with last minute course prep (still not done, and it's Sunday!), moving the entire Art department into a newly refurbished facility, oh yeah, and 3 days of compulsory academic staff training!! It's been super nuts.
I know my diabetes control has been degrading. It's like, seriously crappy at the moment. Here's the last 7 days for you:
(Apologies for having to twist your neck to see that!)
As you can see, I'm all over the map. There are some trends, which I guess are a blessing as it may just mean the Lantus (basal) dose is screwed up:
Massive peaks and troughs = massive headaches, tiredness, grumpiness, and brain-fogginess :(
So what I'm doing about it is some intensive tracking and analysis to see if I can figure out where the hell I'm going so wrong. I've just purchased Diabetes Diary for iPhone and that's where I got the pretty graphs. Have to say that so far, I'm liking this app the best of all. And I've tried most of them!
I'd been using the Insulin Calcilator app, made by the same folks (http://www.fridayforward.com/) for nearly a year now and I credit it with a 1.5% drop in my HbA1c, so I figured their diary app was worth a shot too. I like how the two apps work together. I can take a bloodsugar test, enter the results into the Insulin Calculator, then just press a button and it transfers all the data across to the Diabetes Diary, where I can add more info and make adjustments. Cool eh? :)
I think it's really good that I'm back in intensive analysis mode, because if 10+ bloodsugar tests a day aren't giving nice smooth control there must be something else going on. And I can't find it without graphs, averages, and data to help me.
Let's be clear: I test constantly. I inject semi-religiously, and I track it all in my paper log book:
But that doesn't give the instant clarity of a graph, or the insight of weekly averages. I hope this system helps. I suspect it will. I've done this intensive analysis thingy before and it has always had positive results, even if only minor.
BTW, if you can spot any major issues for me by looking at the graphs, please let me know in the comments. All help on nutting this one out is appreciated. :)
I take Lantus twice a day (11u breakfast, 9u dinner), and bolus with Humalog. I'm incredibly sensitive to changes in insulin, and am on child-size doses of Humalog. My I:C ratio is 1:14. I eat between 90 - 180g carbs per day including emergency food like juice and stuff. I walk, weather permitting :P And I work hard and get pretty stressed out at times, which never helps. Anything else you would like to know so you can help, let me know in the comments. Cheers everyone.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
The week just gone has been absolutely frenetic, with last minute course prep (still not done, and it's Sunday!), moving the entire Art department into a newly refurbished facility, oh yeah, and 3 days of compulsory academic staff training!! It's been super nuts.
I know my diabetes control has been degrading. It's like, seriously crappy at the moment. Here's the last 7 days for you:
(Apologies for having to twist your neck to see that!)
As you can see, I'm all over the map. There are some trends, which I guess are a blessing as it may just mean the Lantus (basal) dose is screwed up:
Massive peaks and troughs = massive headaches, tiredness, grumpiness, and brain-fogginess :(
So what I'm doing about it is some intensive tracking and analysis to see if I can figure out where the hell I'm going so wrong. I've just purchased Diabetes Diary for iPhone and that's where I got the pretty graphs. Have to say that so far, I'm liking this app the best of all. And I've tried most of them!
I'd been using the Insulin Calcilator app, made by the same folks (http://www.fridayforward.com/) for nearly a year now and I credit it with a 1.5% drop in my HbA1c, so I figured their diary app was worth a shot too. I like how the two apps work together. I can take a bloodsugar test, enter the results into the Insulin Calculator, then just press a button and it transfers all the data across to the Diabetes Diary, where I can add more info and make adjustments. Cool eh? :)
I think it's really good that I'm back in intensive analysis mode, because if 10+ bloodsugar tests a day aren't giving nice smooth control there must be something else going on. And I can't find it without graphs, averages, and data to help me.
Let's be clear: I test constantly. I inject semi-religiously, and I track it all in my paper log book:
But that doesn't give the instant clarity of a graph, or the insight of weekly averages. I hope this system helps. I suspect it will. I've done this intensive analysis thingy before and it has always had positive results, even if only minor.
BTW, if you can spot any major issues for me by looking at the graphs, please let me know in the comments. All help on nutting this one out is appreciated. :)
I take Lantus twice a day (11u breakfast, 9u dinner), and bolus with Humalog. I'm incredibly sensitive to changes in insulin, and am on child-size doses of Humalog. My I:C ratio is 1:14. I eat between 90 - 180g carbs per day including emergency food like juice and stuff. I walk, weather permitting :P And I work hard and get pretty stressed out at times, which never helps. Anything else you would like to know so you can help, let me know in the comments. Cheers everyone.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Some grumpy business
Don't you hate it when you think you are doing something good, and someone slaps you in the face for it?
I have been writing this blog for a wee bit now, and it has been both a cathartic journalling exercise for me, and a way to share information with others in the same boat. I'm really passionate about transparency and honesty in the health system, and the NZ infertility system has really left me disappointed.
Just this week, I thought I was coping pretty well. I had a moment where I thought about all the good things in my life and smiled and got the ol' warm fuzzies. Things like my wonderful husband, my cool job, and the fact that I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Even if it does rain a bit too much some days!
But then I got a short, snarly email from someone who I've been in contact with (who I shall refer to as "The co-Author) during the course of my infertility journey. He was pissed off. My husband agreed with him. I couldn't see the logic in what he was saying. The problem the co-Author had was that I'd published his emails to me, which included his name.
Well, duh!
I was discussing a report he had co-authored, and the information he provided me was basically what my whole life was focussed on for a good few months at the beginning of this year. A report that identifies him very easily - just Google the name of the report. In other words - he was already well and truly "in the open" about working in the infertility industry. And if I write the name of the report, it's as if I had already written his name. So no, I don't fully understand the grumpiness about it. I certainly don't understand the complete lack of manners.
But, because I am a nice person, I have wasted several hours removing the co-Author's name from my posts. I don't actually see that this will harm my blog's integrity, as my readers can still find out that information if they wish. And hopefully it will satisfy the co-Author's need to remain private. Didn't mean to offend you see. I understand what it's like to be a private person and have important decisions about your life accidentally, unwittingly, unknowingly taken from you. Sound familiar?
Let me get this straight - I did not go out of my way to make anyone unhappy, I just saw that the co-Author's name was already published, so logically, to me, it made sense to continue publishing the name. It didn't even cross my mind that I should censor it. Sigh. Tricky business this, pleasing everyone.
Oh, and the email wasn't exactly complementary either. It insinuated that I have an "agenda" and this only goes to prove my point: discrimination against those made infertile by vasectomy are considered second class citizens in NZ when it comes to accessing funding for treatment.
OK, so I do have an agenda. Yep, it's really well hidden! Guess what? It's TO HAVE A BABY. How hard was that to figure out? :P
Talking to people, such as the co-author, the MP, the many doctors, the HDC advocate etc, none of it is done for fun. It's the only option I can see at this stage in my journey, because I'm restricted from doing anything practical. Like starting treatment. I've conducted myself professionally and have not screamed and shouted at these people, as my heart wanted so badly to do sometimes. So to have one behave so rudely to me is upsetting.
/end rant
In other, nicer news, I took my first group of students on a very successful field trip, and then attended my first graduation ceremony as a tutor rather than a student! How awesome is that?! :)
What about you? Ever had a spat with someone who only knows you via your blog? What did you do?
I have been writing this blog for a wee bit now, and it has been both a cathartic journalling exercise for me, and a way to share information with others in the same boat. I'm really passionate about transparency and honesty in the health system, and the NZ infertility system has really left me disappointed.
Just this week, I thought I was coping pretty well. I had a moment where I thought about all the good things in my life and smiled and got the ol' warm fuzzies. Things like my wonderful husband, my cool job, and the fact that I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Even if it does rain a bit too much some days!
But then I got a short, snarly email from someone who I've been in contact with (who I shall refer to as "The co-Author) during the course of my infertility journey. He was pissed off. My husband agreed with him. I couldn't see the logic in what he was saying. The problem the co-Author had was that I'd published his emails to me, which included his name.
Well, duh!
I was discussing a report he had co-authored, and the information he provided me was basically what my whole life was focussed on for a good few months at the beginning of this year. A report that identifies him very easily - just Google the name of the report. In other words - he was already well and truly "in the open" about working in the infertility industry. And if I write the name of the report, it's as if I had already written his name. So no, I don't fully understand the grumpiness about it. I certainly don't understand the complete lack of manners.
But, because I am a nice person, I have wasted several hours removing the co-Author's name from my posts. I don't actually see that this will harm my blog's integrity, as my readers can still find out that information if they wish. And hopefully it will satisfy the co-Author's need to remain private. Didn't mean to offend you see. I understand what it's like to be a private person and have important decisions about your life accidentally, unwittingly, unknowingly taken from you. Sound familiar?
Let me get this straight - I did not go out of my way to make anyone unhappy, I just saw that the co-Author's name was already published, so logically, to me, it made sense to continue publishing the name. It didn't even cross my mind that I should censor it. Sigh. Tricky business this, pleasing everyone.
Oh, and the email wasn't exactly complementary either. It insinuated that I have an "agenda" and this only goes to prove my point: discrimination against those made infertile by vasectomy are considered second class citizens in NZ when it comes to accessing funding for treatment.
OK, so I do have an agenda. Yep, it's really well hidden! Guess what? It's TO HAVE A BABY. How hard was that to figure out? :P
Talking to people, such as the co-author, the MP, the many doctors, the HDC advocate etc, none of it is done for fun. It's the only option I can see at this stage in my journey, because I'm restricted from doing anything practical. Like starting treatment. I've conducted myself professionally and have not screamed and shouted at these people, as my heart wanted so badly to do sometimes. So to have one behave so rudely to me is upsetting.
/end rant
In other, nicer news, I took my first group of students on a very successful field trip, and then attended my first graduation ceremony as a tutor rather than a student! How awesome is that?! :)
What about you? Ever had a spat with someone who only knows you via your blog? What did you do?
Friday, May 20, 2011
Overload and low blood pressure
Just because I have not been posting recently does not mean I do not love you all :)
I have still been following you all on Reader, but I have not had time to actually write about what's been happening in my life recently. I've come home early today (Friday) and made time to write to you all!
Life has not been terribly exciting, there has just been lots of it.
I am teaching (creating) 4 papers. I am enrolled in 3 papers. Strike that, as of 2.30pm this afternoon, I am enrolled only in 2 papers. Why does it not feel like a relief? Instead I feel guilty, like I have let me tutor down :( Sigh. Move on. Can't do it all.
I have 2 freelance projects on the go, both websites. One is paid, one is done for love.
My husband and I officially started a freelance business venture together yesterday, when we got a domain name. It has now turned from ideas and conversations to "this is real".
I made plans for us to travel next August to a design conference I like to attend each year. This has been hard to plan because, well, see the next point...
The interwebs at work have only worked 2 out of 5 days this week. For-crying-out-loud-I'm-the-Goddamn-Web-Design-tutor!!!! W.T.F. Sob.
The step-kids have been going nuts. Mr 16 turned up unannounced this afternoon and gave me a heart attack when I walked in the front door to see the TV on full noise and him sitting on the couch eating my noodles. OK, that shouldn't startle anyone, but when you are having a low blood sugar, and it's NOT a kids weekend this sort of surprise is NOT OK. Miss 14 is being a whiny pain, and Mr 10 has decided to revert to the behaviour patterns of a very naughty 3 year old. Last weekend when they were here I got so fed up with the way they were treating us that I gave them a stern talk about treating us better next weekend, because we like to be around them, but not when they make our lives so shitty. I am NOT to be treated as hotel staff, and my house is not to be used as a backpackers! Grrr. (Small voice in my head reminds me that my mother always enjoyed the thought of me growing up and having teenagers of my* own to cope with, and now she has the sage advice "this too will pass") *I think this is part of the problem - they are not my teenagers, and I am feeling left out of the experience.
I am currently low, as you may have picked up from the previous paragraph-o-rama. 3.3mmol/L
I also have low blood pressure. Over the last 3 weeks Kind Nurse at my new GPs has measured my BP every Friday. It's never been above 110/60. Today it was a measly 90/60. GP has (jokingly, I'm sure?) told me that if the bottom number drops below 60 then that = death.
(As a side note: seems that the 24hr urine test I did last week has come back with acceptable numbers, just a request to check I don't have high blood pressure [duh], so that, at least, is some good news in the week. Means my kidneys are not failing as bad as the GP thought, but no doubt I will have to have an appointment with him to discuss in detail what those results mean. Hopefully I don't have to have another kidney biopsy. I have already decided that the only acceptable time for me to have anaesthesia will be during IVF! Well, one can try to make plans eh?)
It is now the weekend and I am behind in everything. I have 3 logos to design, 3 websites to create, 1 assignment due on my Diploma of Tertiary Teaching course, 2 presentations to make, dinner to conjure, house to clean, dishwasher to fix, garden to weed, washing to put in washing machine and push buttons beep beep wish-wash wish-wash...
I have still been following you all on Reader, but I have not had time to actually write about what's been happening in my life recently. I've come home early today (Friday) and made time to write to you all!
Life has not been terribly exciting, there has just been lots of it.
I am teaching (creating) 4 papers. I am enrolled in 3 papers. Strike that, as of 2.30pm this afternoon, I am enrolled only in 2 papers. Why does it not feel like a relief? Instead I feel guilty, like I have let me tutor down :( Sigh. Move on. Can't do it all.
I have 2 freelance projects on the go, both websites. One is paid, one is done for love.
My husband and I officially started a freelance business venture together yesterday, when we got a domain name. It has now turned from ideas and conversations to "this is real".
I made plans for us to travel next August to a design conference I like to attend each year. This has been hard to plan because, well, see the next point...
The interwebs at work have only worked 2 out of 5 days this week. For-crying-out-loud-I'm-the-Goddamn-Web-Design-tutor!!!! W.T.F. Sob.
The step-kids have been going nuts. Mr 16 turned up unannounced this afternoon and gave me a heart attack when I walked in the front door to see the TV on full noise and him sitting on the couch eating my noodles. OK, that shouldn't startle anyone, but when you are having a low blood sugar, and it's NOT a kids weekend this sort of surprise is NOT OK. Miss 14 is being a whiny pain, and Mr 10 has decided to revert to the behaviour patterns of a very naughty 3 year old. Last weekend when they were here I got so fed up with the way they were treating us that I gave them a stern talk about treating us better next weekend, because we like to be around them, but not when they make our lives so shitty. I am NOT to be treated as hotel staff, and my house is not to be used as a backpackers! Grrr. (Small voice in my head reminds me that my mother always enjoyed the thought of me growing up and having teenagers of my* own to cope with, and now she has the sage advice "this too will pass") *I think this is part of the problem - they are not my teenagers, and I am feeling left out of the experience.
I am currently low, as you may have picked up from the previous paragraph-o-rama. 3.3mmol/L
I also have low blood pressure. Over the last 3 weeks Kind Nurse at my new GPs has measured my BP every Friday. It's never been above 110/60. Today it was a measly 90/60. GP has (jokingly, I'm sure?) told me that if the bottom number drops below 60 then that = death.
(As a side note: seems that the 24hr urine test I did last week has come back with acceptable numbers, just a request to check I don't have high blood pressure [duh], so that, at least, is some good news in the week. Means my kidneys are not failing as bad as the GP thought, but no doubt I will have to have an appointment with him to discuss in detail what those results mean. Hopefully I don't have to have another kidney biopsy. I have already decided that the only acceptable time for me to have anaesthesia will be during IVF! Well, one can try to make plans eh?)
It is now the weekend and I am behind in everything. I have 3 logos to design, 3 websites to create, 1 assignment due on my Diploma of Tertiary Teaching course, 2 presentations to make, dinner to conjure, house to clean, dishwasher to fix, garden to weed, washing to put in washing machine and push buttons beep beep wish-wash wish-wash...
Friday, March 25, 2011
Letters received, a decision made
This week a letter arrived back from the Member of Parliament (MP):
Monday, 21 March 2011
Dear [Kaitake] and [Hubby]
Thank you for the copy of correspondence between yourself and [One of the authors of the report: Access to Infertility Services: development of priority criteria: a consultation document. Simply referred to as "Author" from now on]. It was interesting to read and after the meeting in my office, it became clear that the single issue stopping funding at this point is when the three year time-frame officially commences for a couple who have one partner sterilised.
[The Author's] comments around the duration of infertility and balance of fairness they seek to manage are important considerations.
Following up from your recent visit and the information you have previously provided, I have written to the Minister of Health and received a reply last week from the Hon Tony Ryall, which I enclose to you.
The Minister's third paragraph mentions that a request for a second opinion on the review of your CPAC score can be made to the [local health board]. [The Author's] opinion is that the CPAC score was correct according to the criteria; however seeking a further review and if possible, a fresh assessment which takes into consideration [Kaitake's] diabetic condition, may be worthy of further consideration.
I know that IVF treatment is expensive. Failing public funding, consideration around personal funding is something you could consider if the waiting period is too harrowing for you. These are deeply personal and highly important issues and I wish you all the very best in approaching the [local health board] for a review.
If we can be of any further assistance please don't hesitate to contact my office.
Kind regards,
[MP]
and here is the letter from the Minister of Health that the was mentioned:
14 Mar 2011
Dear [MP],
Thank you for your email of 25 February 2011 on behalf of your constituent what has asked if her application for publicly funded IVF treatment can be reviewed.
Your constituent will have been assessed by a clinician using the clinical priority access criteria (CPAC) tool. CPAC is a decision-making tool to assess a candidate's suitability for publicly funded fertility treatment and takes into account a variety of factors such as the candidate's age and Follicule Stimulating Hormone level. Decision on who qualifies for publicly funded IVF treatment are made by clinicians.
Ministry of Health officials advise me that a second opinion to review your constituents's CPAC score can be requested from [the local health board]. Your constituent can contact the Chief Executive of [the local health board] by writing to:
[contact details enclosed]
Your sincerely
Hon Tony Ryall
Minister of Health
There are just so many things wrong with these letters it's unbelievable. The MP suggest we pay for fertility treatment ourselves (well, duh! of course we would if we could! we're not all BMW owners). I don't particularly feel like divulging all our financial concerns to him, I mean, I think I've been pretty honest so far. Told him about our fertility problems for godsake.
Then there is the Minister of Health politely passing-the-buck back to the local health board. Who don't offer fertility services. Oh, yeah, and I consider it pretty insulting the way he has just parroted off some crap about FSH... there is nothing wrong with my FSH. Get with the picture and stop telling me useless pieces of information. It's so reassuring to know that when the clinic gets it wrong, you can't actually get results from the government, because "clinicians make the decisions". And who monitors them, eh??
And I especially like the way that no one has taken notice of the fact that there is actually more than one issue for us here:
Monday, 21 March 2011
Dear [Kaitake] and [Hubby]
Thank you for the copy of correspondence between yourself and [One of the authors of the report: Access to Infertility Services: development of priority criteria: a consultation document. Simply referred to as "Author" from now on]. It was interesting to read and after the meeting in my office, it became clear that the single issue stopping funding at this point is when the three year time-frame officially commences for a couple who have one partner sterilised.
[The Author's] comments around the duration of infertility and balance of fairness they seek to manage are important considerations.
Following up from your recent visit and the information you have previously provided, I have written to the Minister of Health and received a reply last week from the Hon Tony Ryall, which I enclose to you.
The Minister's third paragraph mentions that a request for a second opinion on the review of your CPAC score can be made to the [local health board]. [The Author's] opinion is that the CPAC score was correct according to the criteria; however seeking a further review and if possible, a fresh assessment which takes into consideration [Kaitake's] diabetic condition, may be worthy of further consideration.
I know that IVF treatment is expensive. Failing public funding, consideration around personal funding is something you could consider if the waiting period is too harrowing for you. These are deeply personal and highly important issues and I wish you all the very best in approaching the [local health board] for a review.
If we can be of any further assistance please don't hesitate to contact my office.
Kind regards,
[MP]
and here is the letter from the Minister of Health that the was mentioned:
14 Mar 2011
Dear [MP],
Thank you for your email of 25 February 2011 on behalf of your constituent what has asked if her application for publicly funded IVF treatment can be reviewed.
Your constituent will have been assessed by a clinician using the clinical priority access criteria (CPAC) tool. CPAC is a decision-making tool to assess a candidate's suitability for publicly funded fertility treatment and takes into account a variety of factors such as the candidate's age and Follicule Stimulating Hormone level. Decision on who qualifies for publicly funded IVF treatment are made by clinicians.
Ministry of Health officials advise me that a second opinion to review your constituents's CPAC score can be requested from [the local health board]. Your constituent can contact the Chief Executive of [the local health board] by writing to:
[contact details enclosed]
Your sincerely
Hon Tony Ryall
Minister of Health
There are just so many things wrong with these letters it's unbelievable. The MP suggest we pay for fertility treatment ourselves (well, duh! of course we would if we could! we're not all BMW owners). I don't particularly feel like divulging all our financial concerns to him, I mean, I think I've been pretty honest so far. Told him about our fertility problems for godsake.
Then there is the Minister of Health politely passing-the-buck back to the local health board. Who don't offer fertility services. Oh, yeah, and I consider it pretty insulting the way he has just parroted off some crap about FSH... there is nothing wrong with my FSH. Get with the picture and stop telling me useless pieces of information. It's so reassuring to know that when the clinic gets it wrong, you can't actually get results from the government, because "clinicians make the decisions". And who monitors them, eh??
And I especially like the way that no one has taken notice of the fact that there is actually more than one issue for us here:
- in our case, a 3 year wait is a penalty. We are being penalised for my husband having done the socially upstanding thing of having a vasectomy in his previous relationship. There is no medical reason for a 3 year wait (with unexplained infertility, waiting 3 years = 80% chance that the couple will have conceived naturally). In fact, for us it increases the chance of my having a child with Down's syndrome, or having complications, or dying in childbirth. (we will be eligible for public funding in September 2012, I will have clicked over 30yrs. We will still have an 18 month waiting list after that. The earliest I could become a Mum is 2014 or 2015, it may even be 2016. I better bloody have my flying car by then, cos that's the future.)
- the incredibly bad and uncaring way in which the Hamilton FA clinic has treated us, like we are second rate citizens
- the way the CPAC form is engineered against us, specifically designed to deny us the right to have a family. It is discriminatory. The points are not deducted for having a sterilisation, or something logical like that, which I could understand. No, the 30 (!) points we lost were because of a catch-22 situation where the have to engineer a "when did your infertility begin?" date, so they base it on the first time you saw a doctor for infertility. This totally discounts 7 years of my life where I've wished for a child.
- the CPAC form does not take the male-partner's age into account, only the female's. This is unfair and discriminatory. In our case it especially important as my husband and I have a significant age difference.
- How the Government did not accept the recommendations of the advisory panel, to set the CPAC threshold at 55 (which would mean we qualify) and instead set it at 65. Money. Always money. And since infertility in basically an invisible disease, there is no massive groundswell of support, say like for breast cancer, or diabetes.
- the way that the GP and then the OB/GYN both took our money and did loads of invasive tests, only to refer us to the fertility clinic at the very last minute, wasting valuable time. NZ patients are actually allowed to self-refer to fertility clinics. No one told us.
- The fertility clinic for insisting that I have an unnecessary operation, and the stupid OB/GYN for taking plenty of public health money to perform the operation.
- that there is no regulating body where I can take a complaint regarding the paperwork side of the fertility industry.
- the sheer injustice of the situation, how bloody unfair and illogical it is, how it's put my life on hold, how it invades my every waking moment :(
So Hubby and I have made a decision. We will make one last attempt with the letter-writing and shit. And then leave it. Because, honestly, no-one cares. I've been crying every night this week and it doesn't make anything better. I can write emails and letters to everyone until I'm blue in the face. But nothing is working. No one will help. Or no one can help. It's useless. But I will try one last time.
Please excuse my foul language. I am in a bad way.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Truly random shopping
The best way to ensure you get an exciting range of groceries when you go to the supermarket is to.....
....yes?
.....of course! Have a hypo! Why didn't I think of that?!
Last night I was super-tired from a really long hard week, but we had the step-kids to stay for the week so we had run out of groceries. I still don't believe how much 3 teens eat!
Anyway, so I drove to the supermarket at about 8.00pm, got a trolley, and wheeled through the fruit'n'vege section picking bananas and mixed nuts. Slightly random, but nothing to be too worried about.
By the time I got to the cereal and juice aisle, I was yawning so much people were looking at me. Like, huge, uncontrollable, too-big-for-my-mouth yawns. I was feeling cold, and my eyesight was getting a little flickery.
Next aisle: pasta, rice, sauces, soups. Something is feeling very wrong. I am gripping the trolley quite tightly, and driving very carefully. The supermarket staff are re-stacking the shelves. There are boxes to drive around. For some reason, this is getting very difficult. It takes all my brain power to appear "normal".
Closing in on the chicken soup, I tell myself "my vision is flickering: something is wrong. DO A TEST YOU IDIOT!!!!" So I stopped and tested right there in the aisle.
2.3 mmol/L
OK, you will have some food in your purse. Dig in and find it. One lonely fruitbar = 15g.
Drive trolley until a shelf-stacker can see you pull the bar out of your purse, and not steal it off the shelf (silly, the things my brain devotes power to in an emergency situation!). Rip plastic wrapper off bar, stuff into face. Chew. Swallow. Repeat. Strange looks from the small asian woman with too much makeup just to be stacking the tinned tomatoes.
Complete another two aisles. Choose things that I think are appropriate. Things I think we need. Realise that a single fruit bar is not enough to combat a 2.3. Start to crave juice. Walk the trolley back to the juice aisle. Make the conscious decision to get juice, then get out.
Get a multi-pack of juice boxes. Gripping the trolley quite tightly now. Must look like a ghost, as the check-out chick asks me if I am ok. Hold on. Wait until it's paid for. Wait until you're outside (stupid brain with low-logic!). Add several chocolate bars from the impulse-purchase shelves at the checkout. By some miracle, I was able to remember my pin number once I had swiped the card, and complete the transaction. Whew.
Concentrate on getting out to the car. I have no memory of putting the groceries into the car, or taking the trolley back. I do remember telling myself: "don't start the car. Don't start the car. Eat the food. Sit there and eat the food and WAIT." Do you know how hard that is? When all you want to do is get home as fast as possible? Away from these people who all seem to be staring at you? It's dark, the carpark is suddenly a very scary place. I cram chocolate bars into my mouth and sit, waiting, for 10 mins to go past.
I get home OK. Uneventful. Drag bags of groceries inside. Hubby immediately sees something is up. Apparently I look really pale. My legs ache. I take a 15 min nap, then a really hot bath to get rid of the leg aches. A Friday night I hope to forget.
*p.s. had to go back this Saturday morning to get the rest of the things I'd forgotten! haha :P
....yes?
.....of course! Have a hypo! Why didn't I think of that?!
Last night I was super-tired from a really long hard week, but we had the step-kids to stay for the week so we had run out of groceries. I still don't believe how much 3 teens eat!
Anyway, so I drove to the supermarket at about 8.00pm, got a trolley, and wheeled through the fruit'n'vege section picking bananas and mixed nuts. Slightly random, but nothing to be too worried about.
By the time I got to the cereal and juice aisle, I was yawning so much people were looking at me. Like, huge, uncontrollable, too-big-for-my-mouth yawns. I was feeling cold, and my eyesight was getting a little flickery.
Next aisle: pasta, rice, sauces, soups. Something is feeling very wrong. I am gripping the trolley quite tightly, and driving very carefully. The supermarket staff are re-stacking the shelves. There are boxes to drive around. For some reason, this is getting very difficult. It takes all my brain power to appear "normal".
Closing in on the chicken soup, I tell myself "my vision is flickering: something is wrong. DO A TEST YOU IDIOT!!!!" So I stopped and tested right there in the aisle.
2.3 mmol/L
OK, you will have some food in your purse. Dig in and find it. One lonely fruitbar = 15g.
Drive trolley until a shelf-stacker can see you pull the bar out of your purse, and not steal it off the shelf (silly, the things my brain devotes power to in an emergency situation!). Rip plastic wrapper off bar, stuff into face. Chew. Swallow. Repeat. Strange looks from the small asian woman with too much makeup just to be stacking the tinned tomatoes.
Complete another two aisles. Choose things that I think are appropriate. Things I think we need. Realise that a single fruit bar is not enough to combat a 2.3. Start to crave juice. Walk the trolley back to the juice aisle. Make the conscious decision to get juice, then get out.
Get a multi-pack of juice boxes. Gripping the trolley quite tightly now. Must look like a ghost, as the check-out chick asks me if I am ok. Hold on. Wait until it's paid for. Wait until you're outside (stupid brain with low-logic!). Add several chocolate bars from the impulse-purchase shelves at the checkout. By some miracle, I was able to remember my pin number once I had swiped the card, and complete the transaction. Whew.
Concentrate on getting out to the car. I have no memory of putting the groceries into the car, or taking the trolley back. I do remember telling myself: "don't start the car. Don't start the car. Eat the food. Sit there and eat the food and WAIT." Do you know how hard that is? When all you want to do is get home as fast as possible? Away from these people who all seem to be staring at you? It's dark, the carpark is suddenly a very scary place. I cram chocolate bars into my mouth and sit, waiting, for 10 mins to go past.
I get home OK. Uneventful. Drag bags of groceries inside. Hubby immediately sees something is up. Apparently I look really pale. My legs ache. I take a 15 min nap, then a really hot bath to get rid of the leg aches. A Friday night I hope to forget.
*p.s. had to go back this Saturday morning to get the rest of the things I'd forgotten! haha :P
Monday, February 21, 2011
I tried so hard, but my BG just wouldn't behave!
Ok so today was always going to be stressful and unpredictable: it was the first day of semester, welcoming students and the start of orientation week.
I woke up an hour early to make sure I had time to get dressed and looking presentable, make a tasty packed lunch (smoked warehou fish, green grapes, one plain slice of dark rye bread) and get to work in time to get a good spot at the welcome ceremony. (more on this later).
I was put in a foul mood by having a hypo in the night, and finding that I was sky high in the morning. I though I only ate a tiny bit of emergency food. Perhaps I should have just waited it out?
The commute to work usually takes me 7 mins. Today it was an unholy 28 minutes. I swore. A lot. I was late for the welcoming ceremony...
Here in NZ it's called a powhiri, and it's usually a very touching and moving event, one that makes you feel special to be a part of it. It's led by the Maori elders and the people attending split into two sides: those being welcomed (students) and those doing the welcoming (tutors and faculty staff). There is speech-making in both Te Reo and English, and karakia (songs) are sung by both sides. It's all about ensuring the proper spiritual protocols are followed, and when it goes according to plan it's beautiful. The students get welcomed onto the sacred learning space :)
Well. Nothing was technically wrong with the ceremony but four people fainted and had to be taken away by the first-aiders due to the heat! At 8.30am!!
Stress put me even higher, hitting 19mmol/L directly after the ceremony. And I had been clutching a fruitbar in my sweaty palm - just in case I went low!! Lol better to be safe...
I bolused twice during the morning, and only came back below 10 in the mid afternoon. Thankfully I had no classes to teach today, so it was just lesson planning and office work.
We had a special welcome for the art department students, and it was good to see all their bright nervous faces!
I then had to wait around for my teacher training class (in which I'm a student) which started late afternoon and ran right over dinnertime. D'oh! Luckily hubby had cooked me a tasty dinner when I finally got home.
Felt like I had the day of disaster blood sugars licked.
We popped round to see hubby's parents after dinner, cue tea and biscuits :) nom!
I had a shower, and I find showers either make me high or low afterwards, nor sure why, the heat maybe? Well, I scored a 24.9mmol/L
W.T.F!?
Oh. Yeah. That's right, you're supposed to take insulin with your dinner! Dumbass! Oh what a waste of all that work!
So now it's nearly midnite and I'm sitting up, testing every half hour to check I'm in fact coming down, and not going low. I'm exhausted, just want to go to sleep. Thought I would blog and let you know that you're all helping me stay awake and get my BGs back on track. Pat on your back :D
P.S. Please please please let my BGs behave tomorrow for my first class teaching of the year!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
I woke up an hour early to make sure I had time to get dressed and looking presentable, make a tasty packed lunch (smoked warehou fish, green grapes, one plain slice of dark rye bread) and get to work in time to get a good spot at the welcome ceremony. (more on this later).
I was put in a foul mood by having a hypo in the night, and finding that I was sky high in the morning. I though I only ate a tiny bit of emergency food. Perhaps I should have just waited it out?
The commute to work usually takes me 7 mins. Today it was an unholy 28 minutes. I swore. A lot. I was late for the welcoming ceremony...
Here in NZ it's called a powhiri, and it's usually a very touching and moving event, one that makes you feel special to be a part of it. It's led by the Maori elders and the people attending split into two sides: those being welcomed (students) and those doing the welcoming (tutors and faculty staff). There is speech-making in both Te Reo and English, and karakia (songs) are sung by both sides. It's all about ensuring the proper spiritual protocols are followed, and when it goes according to plan it's beautiful. The students get welcomed onto the sacred learning space :)
Well. Nothing was technically wrong with the ceremony but four people fainted and had to be taken away by the first-aiders due to the heat! At 8.30am!!
Stress put me even higher, hitting 19mmol/L directly after the ceremony. And I had been clutching a fruitbar in my sweaty palm - just in case I went low!! Lol better to be safe...
I bolused twice during the morning, and only came back below 10 in the mid afternoon. Thankfully I had no classes to teach today, so it was just lesson planning and office work.
We had a special welcome for the art department students, and it was good to see all their bright nervous faces!
I then had to wait around for my teacher training class (in which I'm a student) which started late afternoon and ran right over dinnertime. D'oh! Luckily hubby had cooked me a tasty dinner when I finally got home.
Felt like I had the day of disaster blood sugars licked.
We popped round to see hubby's parents after dinner, cue tea and biscuits :) nom!
I had a shower, and I find showers either make me high or low afterwards, nor sure why, the heat maybe? Well, I scored a 24.9mmol/L
W.T.F!?
Oh. Yeah. That's right, you're supposed to take insulin with your dinner! Dumbass! Oh what a waste of all that work!
So now it's nearly midnite and I'm sitting up, testing every half hour to check I'm in fact coming down, and not going low. I'm exhausted, just want to go to sleep. Thought I would blog and let you know that you're all helping me stay awake and get my BGs back on track. Pat on your back :D
P.S. Please please please let my BGs behave tomorrow for my first class teaching of the year!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Thursday, February 10, 2011
You know that I wasn't feeling too flash on Monday, but yesterday was far, far worse.
I knew that the clinic manager from the Hamilton branch of Fertility Associates (FA) was going to email me after she had reviewed our case, so I decided not to check my email until lunchtime. This meant that I could go home and have lunch and read the email in peace and privacy.
Trouble was, it hadn't arrived by lunchtime. The suspense was killing me - oh the nerves!
But what had arrived in my inbox instead was a hope-inducing email from my diabetes endocrinologist.
To give you a synopsis, he offered to: edit the letter I sent to the MP and make it more powerful, write a second letter of support for our case, perhaps phone FA directly, and you gotta love this:
"If the are misusing the CPAC for then I have an ethical obligation to challenge them, and they have to explain. Doctor's rules."
He also suggested putting a complaint to the DHB (District Health Board), the Minister of Health, the Human Rights Commission, the Women's Rights Commission, and the Health and Disability Commissioner (The HDC, which I've already contacted).
"...raise as big a stink as you possibly can. The only thing that influences politicians and government bureaucrats is fear of public exposure."
And lastly he mentioned going to the women's magazines and current affairs mags, which I have thought of, in fact, if I did go public with my story to somewhere like women's day, perhaps the money I get could pay for fertility treatment. ha! (not sure if I'm ready to go uber-public like that yet - it doesn't just affect me and hubby then, it's all our family, the kids, coworkers, employers etc).
"It seems to me that FA (with a near total monopoly for the entire country) are not using the CPAC form honestly - probably to make more private profit. THis is what private medicine does - all the time, [it] doesn't even need to be investigated. It does need to be pointed out to the responsible officials however...it disgusts me to see [people using illness to make money], instead of using money to treat illness."
So that was pretty darn awesome to find this email yesterday. It changed my whole mood and stopped the insatiable anxiety from totally consuming me.
Unfortunately, the afternoon got pretty crappy.
At work (at the local college where I lecture) we are busy preparing for the start of the teaching year. We had a big meeting with our newly formed faculty and new Head of Faculty. Very formal. At about an hour into the meeting, my lips started feeling weird. It took a few minutes to click that I was going low :( but I was too low to get myself up, out from between the hundred-odd tightly packed chairs, and out the door with any grace, let alone up the four flights of outdoor stairs and along the 3 corridors to my office, through the security door, and to the juice in my purse. No. I know it's stupid, but when I go low, I never want to cause a scene, especially not in front of my new coworkers, boss, HoF, and Faculty members!
I waited until the end of the meeting, and then just got up and surged out the door and up the stairs in the flow of people. I don't remember most of the meeting - people were talking about it today and it was like remembering a dream - and as I walked zombie-like back to my office another tutor was talking to me but I couldn't hear him. Loss of hearing is an advanced symptom of mine, even worse than tingly numb lips. So I knew this was a bad one.
Luckily, by divine intervention, I got back to my office ok, and unnoticed I hope. Into 2x packs of juice with a meusil bar chaser, and a test reveals that I've come back UP to 2.2mmol/L
I was stunned and useless for the next 30 mins. Luckily everyone was packing up to go home, so I pretended to work/surf the web, and it just looked like I was being virtuous and working late. Not waiting for "normal" vision to return so I could drive home.
I check the email before leaving work. The email from Fertility Associates was there. I didn't read it...
...until I got home.
I knew that the clinic manager from the Hamilton branch of Fertility Associates (FA) was going to email me after she had reviewed our case, so I decided not to check my email until lunchtime. This meant that I could go home and have lunch and read the email in peace and privacy.
Trouble was, it hadn't arrived by lunchtime. The suspense was killing me - oh the nerves!
But what had arrived in my inbox instead was a hope-inducing email from my diabetes endocrinologist.
To give you a synopsis, he offered to: edit the letter I sent to the MP and make it more powerful, write a second letter of support for our case, perhaps phone FA directly, and you gotta love this:
"If the are misusing the CPAC for then I have an ethical obligation to challenge them, and they have to explain. Doctor's rules."
He also suggested putting a complaint to the DHB (District Health Board), the Minister of Health, the Human Rights Commission, the Women's Rights Commission, and the Health and Disability Commissioner (The HDC, which I've already contacted).
"...raise as big a stink as you possibly can. The only thing that influences politicians and government bureaucrats is fear of public exposure."
And lastly he mentioned going to the women's magazines and current affairs mags, which I have thought of, in fact, if I did go public with my story to somewhere like women's day, perhaps the money I get could pay for fertility treatment. ha! (not sure if I'm ready to go uber-public like that yet - it doesn't just affect me and hubby then, it's all our family, the kids, coworkers, employers etc).
"It seems to me that FA (with a near total monopoly for the entire country) are not using the CPAC form honestly - probably to make more private profit. THis is what private medicine does - all the time, [it] doesn't even need to be investigated. It does need to be pointed out to the responsible officials however...it disgusts me to see [people using illness to make money], instead of using money to treat illness."
So that was pretty darn awesome to find this email yesterday. It changed my whole mood and stopped the insatiable anxiety from totally consuming me.
Unfortunately, the afternoon got pretty crappy.
At work (at the local college where I lecture) we are busy preparing for the start of the teaching year. We had a big meeting with our newly formed faculty and new Head of Faculty. Very formal. At about an hour into the meeting, my lips started feeling weird. It took a few minutes to click that I was going low :( but I was too low to get myself up, out from between the hundred-odd tightly packed chairs, and out the door with any grace, let alone up the four flights of outdoor stairs and along the 3 corridors to my office, through the security door, and to the juice in my purse. No. I know it's stupid, but when I go low, I never want to cause a scene, especially not in front of my new coworkers, boss, HoF, and Faculty members!
I waited until the end of the meeting, and then just got up and surged out the door and up the stairs in the flow of people. I don't remember most of the meeting - people were talking about it today and it was like remembering a dream - and as I walked zombie-like back to my office another tutor was talking to me but I couldn't hear him. Loss of hearing is an advanced symptom of mine, even worse than tingly numb lips. So I knew this was a bad one.
Luckily, by divine intervention, I got back to my office ok, and unnoticed I hope. Into 2x packs of juice with a meusil bar chaser, and a test reveals that I've come back UP to 2.2mmol/L
I was stunned and useless for the next 30 mins. Luckily everyone was packing up to go home, so I pretended to work/surf the web, and it just looked like I was being virtuous and working late. Not waiting for "normal" vision to return so I could drive home.
I check the email before leaving work. The email from Fertility Associates was there. I didn't read it...
...until I got home.
Dear [Kaitake]
Thank you for your phone call yesterday, and for conveying your concerns regarding CPAC scoring for publicly funded treatment.
From reviewing your records I understand that [hubby] had a vasectomy 7 years ago. As you know, the duration of infertility is one of the eligibility criteria for publicly funded scoring. After sterilisation (vasectomy), duration is measured from the time that the couple approached a health professional asking for help to become pregnant. You reported to Dr R that you first approached your GP in 2009 to enquire about conception options. Accordingly, Dr R advised that in September 2012 you will count 3 years of duration (from 2009), which will give you the minimum required score on this criteria to be eligible to enrol for publicly funded treatment.
If our records do not accurately reflect the date you first consulted a Doctor on fertility options, please send us the record / evidence of consultation and we will amend your scoring accordingly.
I hope this information is helpful. Please do not hesitate to contact me for further information or assistance.
Kind regards,
Clinic Manager
Bah. This sucks big time :(
And so the fight continues... wish me luck! Any ideas you have too :)
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Don't you just love doctors receptionists?
No. Not really. I don't love them much when they call me at work from a blocked phone number and won't take the hint when I reject the first 3 calls because I'm in a meeting. I don't love it when they keep calling anyway, so I answer just to make it stop!
I don't love it when the doctors receptionist is a newbie who's just read the "office policies and procedures manual" and feels it necessary to tell me, as a type 1 diabetic, that I need to come back and pay for an appointment with my GP because my "circumstances may have changed"
I don't love it when I have to tell this silly ditz 3 times that, no, I've not suddenly been cured, and yes! I still will need the prescription for insulin and test strips and all that other fun stuff we diabetics like to hoard.
I don't love it when I get told that "you've had a good run, it's not our policy to give more than one prescription without seeing the patient" duh. Diabetes ain't goin nowhere! You just want to make $40 off me!
Also, please believe me when I say that this is NOT the way my GP's clinic normally works, well, not for the last 28 years I've been goin to him anyway. I email my doc asking for a script, he or the nurse faxes it thru to pharmacy, I pick it up and pay $3 per item. Easy. But not right, according to miss uppity receptionist lady! Bah!
I told her twice that her request was ridiculous, and that her call was really upsetting me.
I said that unlike many other conditions where the doctor strictly controls the medication, in diabetes the diabetic is making daily choices about their insulin. And besides, my endo is the one who actually advises me on what insulins to use, I just get the paperwork done thru GP as it's much cheaper that way.
But silly receptionist didn't understand. And I gave her an earful. And she relented and said she would talk to my doctor and see if she could just fax my script to the pharmacy like normal. We'll see if that comes to fruition or not over the next couple of days.
Besides, why on earth would I want to see my GP? He obviously doesn't care for me, or else he wouldn't have behaved so appallingly last year when we told him we'd been denied fertility funding.
Speaking of which, I got busy with the whole crusade on Friday, posting our letter to the local MP, and also contacting an advocate at the Health and Disability Commission. The local HDC advocate called back this morning and she sounded really supportive and sympathetic to our case.
Although she said we are not a clear cut case where making a complaint to the HDC was appropriate, she still said she'd be happy to help us in any way she can. She suggested contacting a branch of the fertility clinic in another city, as the original one we got referred to "was known to them" - sounds ominous!
She recommended we ask for a review of our case, and gave me some good words to use.
So that was a little bit of hope to stop a crappy morning from caving in on me. :)
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
I don't love it when the doctors receptionist is a newbie who's just read the "office policies and procedures manual" and feels it necessary to tell me, as a type 1 diabetic, that I need to come back and pay for an appointment with my GP because my "circumstances may have changed"
I don't love it when I have to tell this silly ditz 3 times that, no, I've not suddenly been cured, and yes! I still will need the prescription for insulin and test strips and all that other fun stuff we diabetics like to hoard.
I don't love it when I get told that "you've had a good run, it's not our policy to give more than one prescription without seeing the patient" duh. Diabetes ain't goin nowhere! You just want to make $40 off me!
Also, please believe me when I say that this is NOT the way my GP's clinic normally works, well, not for the last 28 years I've been goin to him anyway. I email my doc asking for a script, he or the nurse faxes it thru to pharmacy, I pick it up and pay $3 per item. Easy. But not right, according to miss uppity receptionist lady! Bah!
I told her twice that her request was ridiculous, and that her call was really upsetting me.
I said that unlike many other conditions where the doctor strictly controls the medication, in diabetes the diabetic is making daily choices about their insulin. And besides, my endo is the one who actually advises me on what insulins to use, I just get the paperwork done thru GP as it's much cheaper that way.
But silly receptionist didn't understand. And I gave her an earful. And she relented and said she would talk to my doctor and see if she could just fax my script to the pharmacy like normal. We'll see if that comes to fruition or not over the next couple of days.
Besides, why on earth would I want to see my GP? He obviously doesn't care for me, or else he wouldn't have behaved so appallingly last year when we told him we'd been denied fertility funding.
Speaking of which, I got busy with the whole crusade on Friday, posting our letter to the local MP, and also contacting an advocate at the Health and Disability Commission. The local HDC advocate called back this morning and she sounded really supportive and sympathetic to our case.
Although she said we are not a clear cut case where making a complaint to the HDC was appropriate, she still said she'd be happy to help us in any way she can. She suggested contacting a branch of the fertility clinic in another city, as the original one we got referred to "was known to them" - sounds ominous!
She recommended we ask for a review of our case, and gave me some good words to use.
So that was a little bit of hope to stop a crappy morning from caving in on me. :)
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Sesame snack attack
Last night I had racehorse syndrome. And I couldn't figure out why.
I wasn't too high, I wasn't too low.
And then today it clicked. It was these:
Oh my how they are tasty! And according to the nutritional info each pack of three slices was only 7g carbs! Yay! A tasty treat I can eat as a true snack!
NO.
That is not the case at all. Because you have read the pack wrong. For a whole week. Dummy. It's not 7g of carbs per pack, it's 7g PER SLICE!!! That means 21g carbs per pack! Oh woe!
On closer inspection, I also found that each slice has a whopping 10g of sodium, so that explains the racehorse: extra sugar, extra salt, extra tasty, extra-needing-to-pee!
*Marketed as a very tasty and nutritious, healthy snack. Unfortunately their website doesn't actually reveal the high levels of sugar and salt in their products. :(
Have you ever been tricked by food like this?
I wasn't too high, I wasn't too low.
And then today it clicked. It was these:
 |
| Dark Chocolate Sesame Snaps from Golden Days |
NO.
That is not the case at all. Because you have read the pack wrong. For a whole week. Dummy. It's not 7g of carbs per pack, it's 7g PER SLICE!!! That means 21g carbs per pack! Oh woe!
On closer inspection, I also found that each slice has a whopping 10g of sodium, so that explains the racehorse: extra sugar, extra salt, extra tasty, extra-needing-to-pee!
*Marketed as a very tasty and nutritious, healthy snack. Unfortunately their website doesn't actually reveal the high levels of sugar and salt in their products. :(
Have you ever been tricked by food like this?
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
So sleepy
I'm now in my second week back at work after the Christmas break, and there are 3 things on my mind:
::sigh::
First things first: the tiredness.
Last week, I took 2 full afternoons off work, and each time as soon as I got home I fell into a coma-sleep until dinner time. Then there was the drama with the fish hook over the weekend, and then I got so exhausted with a migraine yesterday lunchtime I once again came home and fell asleep. I've taken iron tablets, and now I am taking B vitamins as well. Today seems to be ok so far, but I am dreading lunchtime because I'm afraid I will be too whacked to make it through the afternoon.
Lucky that I'm on a 3 week contract with another department here at the tertiary institute, because I don't have a real boss at the moment, which is great cos it means I can just slip home, sleep, then work in the evenings if I need to.
Second: the Christmas holiday beach post
Sometime this week I hope! I have a gazillion photos to download from my camera (last count I think it had close to 2000 photos waiting for download.) I'm hopeless at downloading...just love taking photos! haha
Third: the letter to the MP
This one is hard, because I know it's the next (read: only) step in our journey for IVF. I started re-writing what I had done already, but got part way through and turned into a mess of tears. It's so hard reading about the last year+ and all the crap we've been through, and knowing that this MP probably can't do much to help our particular case, and how am I supposed to approach this letter anyway? Everytime I start, it's too much. It's overwhelming. I have set myself a deadline to do it each week for the past 3 weeks and failed each time. I don't know whether to explain what's happened in great detail, or give bullet points, or just plain ol' beg for help?? I want to get a draft written and send it to my Endo, so he can give it the once over before I send it to the MP. I also want to be able to post it here first, to see what you all think.
Yeah, so today I am also starting the non-holiday food. That means, eat more fresh healthy stuff, and less "it's holiday time, fast food is ok!" food. Delicious cous cous with spring onions and chopped baby toms for lunch, with an apricot. Raisins and sesame crackers for snacks. No more bakery food for lunch! Makes me feel too ugh. Makes the diabetes too hard to predict. Fresh food always makes me happy.
How are you handling the back-to-work transition from the holidays?
- why do I keep falling into an exhausted sleep at midday?
- when will I finally write the Christmas beach holiday post I promised you all?
- how on earth do I write a letter to my Member of Parliament asking for help with getting funding for IVF?
::sigh::
First things first: the tiredness.
Last week, I took 2 full afternoons off work, and each time as soon as I got home I fell into a coma-sleep until dinner time. Then there was the drama with the fish hook over the weekend, and then I got so exhausted with a migraine yesterday lunchtime I once again came home and fell asleep. I've taken iron tablets, and now I am taking B vitamins as well. Today seems to be ok so far, but I am dreading lunchtime because I'm afraid I will be too whacked to make it through the afternoon.
Lucky that I'm on a 3 week contract with another department here at the tertiary institute, because I don't have a real boss at the moment, which is great cos it means I can just slip home, sleep, then work in the evenings if I need to.
Second: the Christmas holiday beach post
Sometime this week I hope! I have a gazillion photos to download from my camera (last count I think it had close to 2000 photos waiting for download.) I'm hopeless at downloading...just love taking photos! haha
Third: the letter to the MP
This one is hard, because I know it's the next (read: only) step in our journey for IVF. I started re-writing what I had done already, but got part way through and turned into a mess of tears. It's so hard reading about the last year+ and all the crap we've been through, and knowing that this MP probably can't do much to help our particular case, and how am I supposed to approach this letter anyway? Everytime I start, it's too much. It's overwhelming. I have set myself a deadline to do it each week for the past 3 weeks and failed each time. I don't know whether to explain what's happened in great detail, or give bullet points, or just plain ol' beg for help?? I want to get a draft written and send it to my Endo, so he can give it the once over before I send it to the MP. I also want to be able to post it here first, to see what you all think.
Yeah, so today I am also starting the non-holiday food. That means, eat more fresh healthy stuff, and less "it's holiday time, fast food is ok!" food. Delicious cous cous with spring onions and chopped baby toms for lunch, with an apricot. Raisins and sesame crackers for snacks. No more bakery food for lunch! Makes me feel too ugh. Makes the diabetes too hard to predict. Fresh food always makes me happy.
How are you handling the back-to-work transition from the holidays?
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Bike ride, hot sun, faint!
We are back from our holiday up the coast (more on that in the next post), and the kids are here for the weekend.
We are very lucky in that both of our sets of parents live within bike-ride distance, so we packed up the kids and pedaled off to hubby's parents. About 3km away I guess, with a couple of gnarly hills thrown in.
We took off and it was all going well. After the first hill however I didn't feel too flash. Not very good at all! We stopped and I did a test. At 9.8mmol/L it was not a low, surely! But with a spinning head and nausea, it was reasonably similar to some of the low symptoms I get. I sat in the shade while hubby gave me water to drink. I would have fallen down if I hadn't already sat down! So faint. So hot. So want to feel not sick and just finish the ride!!
Eventually I was ok to hop back on the bike and keep going. At the grandparents house I did a test and got 6.5mmol/l. Also not a low, but when you consider that was a fall of 3 points in only ten minutes, the funny feelings start to make sense. It was a blood sugar crash! I had just caught it higher up than normal.
12g carbs in he juice box and a cup of tea 4g sugar did the trick. I looked back in my meters memory to see what the lunch time test was: 15.9mmol/L - no wonder I felt so horrid! That's a drop of ten points in about 2 hours. Coupled with strenuous exercise ( for me! ) it was all just too much.
The ride home was great :)
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
We are very lucky in that both of our sets of parents live within bike-ride distance, so we packed up the kids and pedaled off to hubby's parents. About 3km away I guess, with a couple of gnarly hills thrown in.
We took off and it was all going well. After the first hill however I didn't feel too flash. Not very good at all! We stopped and I did a test. At 9.8mmol/L it was not a low, surely! But with a spinning head and nausea, it was reasonably similar to some of the low symptoms I get. I sat in the shade while hubby gave me water to drink. I would have fallen down if I hadn't already sat down! So faint. So hot. So want to feel not sick and just finish the ride!!
Eventually I was ok to hop back on the bike and keep going. At the grandparents house I did a test and got 6.5mmol/l. Also not a low, but when you consider that was a fall of 3 points in only ten minutes, the funny feelings start to make sense. It was a blood sugar crash! I had just caught it higher up than normal.
12g carbs in he juice box and a cup of tea 4g sugar did the trick. I looked back in my meters memory to see what the lunch time test was: 15.9mmol/L - no wonder I felt so horrid! That's a drop of ten points in about 2 hours. Coupled with strenuous exercise ( for me! ) it was all just too much.
The ride home was great :)
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Monday, December 13, 2010
What's the worst thing a low has forced you to do?
I am curious, because I had a low today and I was so desperate (2.3mmol/L, 41.1mg/dL) that I stole someone else's orange juice.
OK, so had the person been present, I would have asked. But they weren't, and I took without asking (probably without being able to ask, if I am honest! I could sort of think clearly, but I couldn't talk properly).
It's the last week before the office shuts down for Christmas break, and one of my colleagues brought in this neat toy:
We have a video lab at the training institute where I work (art dept), so it was hooked up to a large projector in a darkened studio. Very cool. Before I knew it I had spent half an hour punching and kicking and victory-dancing my blood sugar from 16 down to 2.3. That is a very quick drop.
I looked in my bag: no juice boxes, no muesli or fruit bars. Nothing in the secret draw of emergency food either. Dumb. So I toddle down to the communal kitchenette that the whole top floor uses. I knew there was at least white sugar there. So I start making a cup of tea with about 10 teaspoons of sugar in it. Waiting for the jug to boil. Waiting, waiting, can't wait - need sugar NOW!
I look in the fridge - oh, there is juice! Two big 4L bottles, although one of them looks like it has been there since the beginning of time. Orange juice isn't supposed to be green, is it? :P
So I drank the non-green juice. And I am glad I did, and I would do it again if I needed to. It tasted awful. I hate orange juice! After a few minutes the jug had boiled and my brew was so sweet the spoon *almost* stood up by itself in the cup :P haha. Another 10 minutes and my blood sugar had slowly climbed to 3.3mmol/L. Talk about a close call.
Maybe I should write a note and stick it on the bottle, thanking the person and offering them a new bottle of juice.
What's the worst thing you've had to do to get sugar when you've been low/hypo?
OK, so had the person been present, I would have asked. But they weren't, and I took without asking (probably without being able to ask, if I am honest! I could sort of think clearly, but I couldn't talk properly).
It's the last week before the office shuts down for Christmas break, and one of my colleagues brought in this neat toy:
 |
| Xbox Kinect. I played soccer, and boxing. TKO! |
I looked in my bag: no juice boxes, no muesli or fruit bars. Nothing in the secret draw of emergency food either. Dumb. So I toddle down to the communal kitchenette that the whole top floor uses. I knew there was at least white sugar there. So I start making a cup of tea with about 10 teaspoons of sugar in it. Waiting for the jug to boil. Waiting, waiting, can't wait - need sugar NOW!
I look in the fridge - oh, there is juice! Two big 4L bottles, although one of them looks like it has been there since the beginning of time. Orange juice isn't supposed to be green, is it? :P
So I drank the non-green juice. And I am glad I did, and I would do it again if I needed to. It tasted awful. I hate orange juice! After a few minutes the jug had boiled and my brew was so sweet the spoon *almost* stood up by itself in the cup :P haha. Another 10 minutes and my blood sugar had slowly climbed to 3.3mmol/L. Talk about a close call.
Maybe I should write a note and stick it on the bottle, thanking the person and offering them a new bottle of juice.
What's the worst thing you've had to do to get sugar when you've been low/hypo?
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Jaffas attaaack!
With only one week of work left before Christmas, the weekend proved to be both exhausting and worrying.
We had the step-kids come to stay as usual, and the youngest (9yrs) developed a fever. It started with some uncharacteristic bad behaviour at lunchtime on Saturday, when he refused to eat his lunch at the Grandparents. It turned into a bit of a drama, and by the time we got back to our house, the family was pretty tense. I left to do some Christmas shopping (nightmare! soooo busy), and Hubby sent me a text saying that Mr 9 had finally eaten his lunch.
At bedtime, the kids were exhausted and went to bed no worries, but Mr 9 woke with a headache and very high temperature at about 11.30pm. We got him water and some kids liquid panadol for the fever, and put him back to bed. Hubby checked him several more times during the night, and we made plans to go to the emergency doctor's in the morning.
Come the morning, the fever was mostly gone, and the headache had abated. But his chest hurt to breathe, and he had developed a bit of a cough. With the fever going down, it seemed the worst was over...
...Hubby took us out to lunch at a local favourite cafe, and Mr 9 was looking a bit green around the gills. We ordered a fluffy for each of the 2 kids with us (eldest stayed with his grandparents), and then our coffees arrived. I gave my marshmallows to the kids, while Hubby played with the jaffa on his saucer, picking it up on his teaspoon and passing it back and forth, via teasoon, to each of us at the table. I should have just eaten the damn thing, cos next thing I know, Hubby put the teaspoon to his lips and inhaled the jaffa. Yes. Inhaled. Choking. Wheezing. Purple. Very. Scary. He stood and left the cafe, and I followed after about a minute. I told the kids to stay put, and just to start eating their food should it arrive.
Hubby was not looking so good, he was leaning against a railing, and he had turned a funny colour. He told me that he'd given himself the Heimlich Maneuver, and got the jaffa out. His throat hurt and he had tears in his eyes. We went back to our table and had a slow lunch. Oh but it was scary. It's not everyday a sweet chocolate-orange candy treat tries to kill your husband!
And he's been talking differently this weekend too. About how he wants to be a father...again. :) It makes me feel very warm and fuzzy to know that he's now wanting this as much as me. :) With some hope that it may indeed happen, we've been talking about whether we'd like a boy or girl (human, please!), what each of our preferences are about finding out the sex of the baby before birth (Hubby: no, me: probably not). It's still a dream, but now I definitely know it's one we are both thinking about. :D
On the diabetes front, dropping the nighttime Lantus by one unit (to 8u) has so far worked much better than it did previously. I've had two acceptable breakfast tests.
Well, I have had enough unpredictability for one weekend! Back to work for one last, hopefully cruisy week, and then I plan to get stuck into preparations for the Christmas lunch we're hosting.
How was your weekend?
p.s. Mr 9 has made a full recovery :)
We had the step-kids come to stay as usual, and the youngest (9yrs) developed a fever. It started with some uncharacteristic bad behaviour at lunchtime on Saturday, when he refused to eat his lunch at the Grandparents. It turned into a bit of a drama, and by the time we got back to our house, the family was pretty tense. I left to do some Christmas shopping (nightmare! soooo busy), and Hubby sent me a text saying that Mr 9 had finally eaten his lunch.
At bedtime, the kids were exhausted and went to bed no worries, but Mr 9 woke with a headache and very high temperature at about 11.30pm. We got him water and some kids liquid panadol for the fever, and put him back to bed. Hubby checked him several more times during the night, and we made plans to go to the emergency doctor's in the morning.
Come the morning, the fever was mostly gone, and the headache had abated. But his chest hurt to breathe, and he had developed a bit of a cough. With the fever going down, it seemed the worst was over...
...Hubby took us out to lunch at a local favourite cafe, and Mr 9 was looking a bit green around the gills. We ordered a fluffy for each of the 2 kids with us (eldest stayed with his grandparents), and then our coffees arrived. I gave my marshmallows to the kids, while Hubby played with the jaffa on his saucer, picking it up on his teaspoon and passing it back and forth, via teasoon, to each of us at the table. I should have just eaten the damn thing, cos next thing I know, Hubby put the teaspoon to his lips and inhaled the jaffa. Yes. Inhaled. Choking. Wheezing. Purple. Very. Scary. He stood and left the cafe, and I followed after about a minute. I told the kids to stay put, and just to start eating their food should it arrive.
Hubby was not looking so good, he was leaning against a railing, and he had turned a funny colour. He told me that he'd given himself the Heimlich Maneuver, and got the jaffa out. His throat hurt and he had tears in his eyes. We went back to our table and had a slow lunch. Oh but it was scary. It's not everyday a sweet chocolate-orange candy treat tries to kill your husband!
And he's been talking differently this weekend too. About how he wants to be a father...again. :) It makes me feel very warm and fuzzy to know that he's now wanting this as much as me. :) With some hope that it may indeed happen, we've been talking about whether we'd like a boy or girl (human, please!), what each of our preferences are about finding out the sex of the baby before birth (Hubby: no, me: probably not). It's still a dream, but now I definitely know it's one we are both thinking about. :D
On the diabetes front, dropping the nighttime Lantus by one unit (to 8u) has so far worked much better than it did previously. I've had two acceptable breakfast tests.
Well, I have had enough unpredictability for one weekend! Back to work for one last, hopefully cruisy week, and then I plan to get stuck into preparations for the Christmas lunch we're hosting.
How was your weekend?
p.s. Mr 9 has made a full recovery :)
Friday, October 22, 2010
In denial
I saw read about Eilish yesterday. But it did not hit home.
Today, the blog posts are flooding in. This sad story is all over the DOC:
TuDiabetes
Six Until Me
The Diabetic's Corner Booth
Talking Blood Glucose
Diabetesaliciousness
Sugabetic
I was once a thirteen year old girl with diabetes. It makes me feel numb and a bit terrified to think that any of us can be taken in the night like this. :(
Today, the blog posts are flooding in. This sad story is all over the DOC:
TuDiabetes
Six Until Me
The Diabetic's Corner Booth
Talking Blood Glucose
Diabetesaliciousness
Sugabetic
I was once a thirteen year old girl with diabetes. It makes me feel numb and a bit terrified to think that any of us can be taken in the night like this. :(
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Another blow
So we went to see my GP this morning, to see if he could help us with our stupid paper work issue: the fertility clinic won't give us access to publicly funded IVF treatment without a note saying that we have been trying to conceive for at least 3 years. IVF costs $11k
Long story short, my GP has morals, and is also unwilling to bear the burden of writing a forged document. And is also a wanker. And who already has kids so has not one scrap of compassion it seems for us in our plight. I could not believe he was willing to ruin our lives over a piece of paper.
Literally, I feel we are being killed by paperwork and bureaucracy. Hell, the GP even suggested writing to our local member of parliament. As if that will help at all. No, it seems we are just too difficult a case for anyone to want to take care of us properly.
But then, I realise that I have been thinking like a patient. Saying things honestly, getting all my blood work done on time, Hubby got lots of tests, there have been plenty of stressful doctor's visits, heck, I even had an elective operation and an invasive ultrasound in the run up to this. We had been told all along the way that we would be able to access public funding for treatment, because we had been together and trying for over 6 years. We were told we were infertile. We were given the options. All along this process I have asked if we are eligible for funding, and the response has always been positive.
Not so now, it seems. I should have been thinking like a business. All these doctors have gotten a lot of money out of us. And we have not even started treatment! If any one of them had taken the care to actually CHECK if we were eligible for funding, we would have had an answer a year ago. And that would have given us much more time to make decisions. But no, instead they found a delicious cash cow, which they could share around. All these tests, procedures, consults, and operations have cost the taxpayer a lot of money already, and a lot of money out of our pockets.
It makes me sick. In fact, I felt like throwing up in the GP's surgery this morning, as soon as he started saying things like "well if those are the rules..." and "I can't do that, as the liability would come onto me..." and "you have to start thinking of this as a moral and ethical issue..." I HAVE BEEN! I HAVE BEEN TOTALLY HONEST ALL THE TIME!
It's only this stupid process which discriminates against us, and where the rules keep changing, and no body cares and no one will tell us the rules. And no support is offered. HUGE things like "infertility", "IVF", "no funding", and just plain old "No" are spoken to us, but there is never any emotional help offered.
I am so upset. I had to stay home from work because I can't think of anything else. I can't think what to do. We have meagre savings, and not enough to pursue IVF by ourselves. I am totally at a loss. I can't believe it. We know the solution, but we are not even allowed to try it becauese we are not rich enough. We are not allowed to try because some doctors consider a vasectomy to be infertility, but others just call it contraception. We are not allowed to try because the "rules" say you have to be trying to conceive for 3+ years - well, we have been having unprotected s.e.x for 7 years now. But with a vasectomy, does the amount of years you are trying really matter? No, it won't make any difference. And when you do decide you want a child, is the first person you tell your health professional, to make a nice tidy, auditable paper trial exactly 3 years long? No. You tell your partner. You only go to your doctor when you want to kick things off. You don't realise that if you had only lied to the fertility specialist none of this crap would have happened. She would have accepted any year you said. And now I can't think of a single way to fix it.
Of course, I could complain. We have been treated pretty badly I think. Here in New Zealand we have a body called the Health and Disability Commissioner. They deal with complaints across our entire health industry. But that would mean writing a complaint against my GP, by ob/gyn, and the fertility clinic. A) that is a lot of people to fight, and B) it would probably still not get us funding, and C) it would leave me with no doctors.
I don't know what to do. This is so unfair. I keep having to wipe the keyboard because I'm crying so much. I feel sick. I don't know how I will get to work and teach the class this afternoon. I don't know how I will face moving out of this chair. It's not fair. We don't deserve this. But there is no one who will listen, who will help, who will make it better. At least, I can't think of anyone.A storm has come in. Good. I feel stormy inside.
(Apologies for bringing you down. I hope I didn't spoil your day)
Long story short, my GP has morals, and is also unwilling to bear the burden of writing a forged document. And is also a wanker. And who already has kids so has not one scrap of compassion it seems for us in our plight. I could not believe he was willing to ruin our lives over a piece of paper.
Literally, I feel we are being killed by paperwork and bureaucracy. Hell, the GP even suggested writing to our local member of parliament. As if that will help at all. No, it seems we are just too difficult a case for anyone to want to take care of us properly.
But then, I realise that I have been thinking like a patient. Saying things honestly, getting all my blood work done on time, Hubby got lots of tests, there have been plenty of stressful doctor's visits, heck, I even had an elective operation and an invasive ultrasound in the run up to this. We had been told all along the way that we would be able to access public funding for treatment, because we had been together and trying for over 6 years. We were told we were infertile. We were given the options. All along this process I have asked if we are eligible for funding, and the response has always been positive.
Not so now, it seems. I should have been thinking like a business. All these doctors have gotten a lot of money out of us. And we have not even started treatment! If any one of them had taken the care to actually CHECK if we were eligible for funding, we would have had an answer a year ago. And that would have given us much more time to make decisions. But no, instead they found a delicious cash cow, which they could share around. All these tests, procedures, consults, and operations have cost the taxpayer a lot of money already, and a lot of money out of our pockets.
It makes me sick. In fact, I felt like throwing up in the GP's surgery this morning, as soon as he started saying things like "well if those are the rules..." and "I can't do that, as the liability would come onto me..." and "you have to start thinking of this as a moral and ethical issue..." I HAVE BEEN! I HAVE BEEN TOTALLY HONEST ALL THE TIME!
It's only this stupid process which discriminates against us, and where the rules keep changing, and no body cares and no one will tell us the rules. And no support is offered. HUGE things like "infertility", "IVF", "no funding", and just plain old "No" are spoken to us, but there is never any emotional help offered.
I am so upset. I had to stay home from work because I can't think of anything else. I can't think what to do. We have meagre savings, and not enough to pursue IVF by ourselves. I am totally at a loss. I can't believe it. We know the solution, but we are not even allowed to try it becauese we are not rich enough. We are not allowed to try because some doctors consider a vasectomy to be infertility, but others just call it contraception. We are not allowed to try because the "rules" say you have to be trying to conceive for 3+ years - well, we have been having unprotected s.e.x for 7 years now. But with a vasectomy, does the amount of years you are trying really matter? No, it won't make any difference. And when you do decide you want a child, is the first person you tell your health professional, to make a nice tidy, auditable paper trial exactly 3 years long? No. You tell your partner. You only go to your doctor when you want to kick things off. You don't realise that if you had only lied to the fertility specialist none of this crap would have happened. She would have accepted any year you said. And now I can't think of a single way to fix it.
Of course, I could complain. We have been treated pretty badly I think. Here in New Zealand we have a body called the Health and Disability Commissioner. They deal with complaints across our entire health industry. But that would mean writing a complaint against my GP, by ob/gyn, and the fertility clinic. A) that is a lot of people to fight, and B) it would probably still not get us funding, and C) it would leave me with no doctors.
I don't know what to do. This is so unfair. I keep having to wipe the keyboard because I'm crying so much. I feel sick. I don't know how I will get to work and teach the class this afternoon. I don't know how I will face moving out of this chair. It's not fair. We don't deserve this. But there is no one who will listen, who will help, who will make it better. At least, I can't think of anyone.A storm has come in. Good. I feel stormy inside.
(Apologies for bringing you down. I hope I didn't spoil your day)
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