Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Cycle Day 3

March 15, 2012.  The Ides of March and My March Bean's birthday.  One year ago today, we lost you.  A year later, I still miss you.  Happy Birthday my little Bean.  I'll share March Bean's story in a bit.

On to the events of cycle day 3.

Today is the first day of follistim injections.  My dosage today, and until Monday, is 100.  You get your injection every night for 10-12 days between 6-8pm.

Its a lot like an Epi-pen that is used for allergies, but you can reuse the pen, with changeable needles.  Inside the pen you put your little refrigerated vial of liquid gold:




These puppies cost $250 per vial without insurance.  As you can see, the volume in the cartridges vary, but my vials contain 300 iu.  My dosage is 100 iu.   They do usually overfill the little vials enough where you can get about 400 iu out of them.  Injections usually go for 10-12 days.  Now lets do the math. 

3.5 doses per vial
12 doses needed
4 vials needed per cycle
$250x4=$1000

This is per month and does not include the cost of any other meds you have to take.  Your trigger shot or HCG shot as it is called, it runs about $60-$80 per injection.  You get one injection a cycle. 

Thankfully we now have some fertility coverage.  Whew, because if we didn't have, we'd probably not be able to do it.  Our insurance will now allow 3 vials at a time for $50.  Instead of $750 for those vials, I can pay $50.

Once you have your vial in your pen you can put your new needle on and dial up your dose.  Oh ya, one thing that I sometimes forget and have to deal with.  The medicine must be kept refrigerated.  Set it out about an hour before you need it, otherwise, its going to burn!  The dial is a nice feature because it also doubles as your plunger.

The injection sites are probably my least favorite part.  You have two options.  Under your belly button or on the outside upper part of your thighs.  I go for the thighs.  You get nasty nasty bruises at the injection sites, so pants can hurt if you use your belly. 

Like with any injection, you prep the area with an alcohol wipe.  If you don't let the alcohol dry, it'll burn when you inject.  After its dry, you aim your pen and poke.  You don't have to ram it in to your leg, but it does take some force.  Now that you have the needle in your leg, you press the plunger all the way down and let it burn.  You count to 10 and pull the needle back out.  Sometimes you bleed, sometimes  you don't.  It is literally hit or miss when it comes to veins... 

Now, you repeat this every day until you trigger....

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