extra extra, read all about it...

 Here I am to provide you with a much-needed break in Election 2012 coverage. Your relief is almost palpable, so I will say you're welcome in advance.

And for the record-- hopefully by the time you read this I will have voted. Go Erika, you amazing citizen, you! I'm heading over as soon as I get off work, so...who knew, right? Anyways. Moving on to things that actually matter.

Breaking News Story #1:

On Friday night, I bought lipstick.

...annnnnd for some reason this picture gets all pixelated when I make it bigger, so...sorry 'bout that. So this is possibly the first real lipstick I've ever purchased in my life (other than freebies in the Clinique Bonus packages, or stuff people handed down to me), and I went with bright red because I'm all go big or go home when it comes to these things. But I only spent 99cents (Wet & Wild, baby...haha) because I'm not go-big-or-go-home when it comes to my money. I figure if I actually like the whole idea of lipstick, maybe I'll invest in something a little pricier, but this works just fine for the experimentation phase.

Breaking News Story #2:

We had an appointment yesterday at the IF clinic to go over the results of all the tests/ultrasounds/etc Matt's been having for the last couple months. As you may recall, we've had a male-factor infertility diagnosis for about 3 years via my regular OB and a local urologist. Unfortunately, although he did have quite a few appointments with that urologist a few years ago, they couldn't figure out anything or provide any help other than referring us for IVF/specialty clinic. So anyways, now that we're neck-deep at the RE practice with MY janky insides, we figured we may as well start working on Matt's, too. We're equal opportunity and all that, right?

Luckily yesterday's appointment didn't involve any actual exams/poking and prodding/discomfort, just a review of the results of all that that he's already done. Even still, Matt was not terribly enthused about the whole situation, so I did what I could to cheer him up:

Matt had never heard of a mustache finger before, can you believe that??! He cracked up laughing every time I did this. It was precious. I am the best wife ever, right?

So. Not surprisingly if you've ever met me, I took notes during the appointment. And rather than waste my precious time (hahahahaha) re-typing them up (and since probably .0002% of you will actually care about the details here), I just snapped a picture and you can read my notes in their handwritten glory. Please know that the doctor was talking fast, so that's my excuse for poor handwriting and incomplete thoughts.

For clarification, the numbers in parenthesis after most of the parenthesis indicate what would be normal/what they'd like the percentages to be. So like for the first line: Matt's motility was 11-18% (based on different analyses of different samples). Ideally, motility would be at least 40%.

The part that I found most fascinating was that less than 10% of the sperm could survive uterine conditions (that number should be over 50%). Then, OF THOSE that COULD survive, only 47% were capable of penetrating the egg (should be over 80%). I was totally fascinated by what the doctor was describing he saw during these tests. And NO WONDER we can't friggin get pregnant!! The doctor said that the extremely high mortality rate of Matt's sperm explains why our post-wash counts during our IUI cycles were so bad. The 'violence' of the wash process totally wiped them out. Poor little guys. Anyway, I just thought all that was really interesting.

The bottom line, though, in case you can't decipher my notes, is that a few dilated veins are (through a long, complicated procedure he explained at length that I could definitely not re-explain to you) causing the abnormalities in the sperm. So our options are:

1) IVF. Surprise, surprise-- who saw that one coming??!?! He said our odds of achieving pregnancy via IVF (only taking into account Matt's sperm issues-- NOT INCLUDING my endometriosis/janky tube/etc) would be around 50% over a 6 month period-- because of the abnormalities INSIDE the sperm, however, even if they were able to successfully fertilize eggs/implant embryos, there would be an increased risk of miscarriage for me because the sperm really may not be very viable to do things right. (Sorry for all those technical terms. Ha.)

2) Correct those veins surgically, which would allow for the future production of normal sperm. Odds of achieving pregnancy after this surgery (again, not taking ME into account) would be about 60% over a 1 year period. 

Obviously, he recommended IVF if we were anxious to have children as soon as possible. However, he pointed out that without correcting the problem (and it's degenerative-- the sperm will continue to get worse and worse as a result of increased swelling and temperature in the sperm-making-factory), we will continue to have issues for any subsequent children, requiring future IVFs or whatever. He recommended surgery if we had time, and also because it'd be a one-and-done deal, meaning that the sperm issues should be fixed permanently in case we want more than one kid. Additionally, the surgery should be covered by insurance, whereas (duh) IVF is not.

SO. While we obviously are anxious to have children as soon as possible...clearly, since it's already been 4 years and we're not 30 (quite) yet, we have time, too. One more year (with much better odds) doesn't seem like that much. Of course the biggest element is MONEY, as in, we have little/none...SO a mostly-covered surgery that will give us long-term results is a LOT more attractive than an extremely pricey one-time-chance.

So looks like we're signing up for another surgery! Woohoo! We're trying to get it in before 2012 ends, since we've already paid Matt's deductible. 

Breaking News Story #3:

To celebrate our successful appointment yesterday, Matt suggested we stop by the Mall of Georgia on our way home and see if we could find anything at Forever 21 and H&M. This is him playing best husband to me playing best wife earlier (mustache finger, remember?). Not shockingly, I found a number of outfits and earrings that I absolutely needed. And Best Husband strongly suggested I purchase them. So I did.

In summary, I have red lipstick, a fantastic new sweater dress, and a hottie-and-generous husband who is happily and enthusiastically submitting to man surgery in our pursuit of kids. I win.