Colorado Bound

You may have noticed that I still haven't provided the "Consult 3 of 3" post ... well, that's because I'm still waiting for it! I will let you know more when I know more!

Berilac and I have decided to pursue the diagnostic testing in Colorado with CCRM. We are also pretty certain we will do an IVF cycle in Colorado. Another cycle where they extract the eggs and test them for chromosomal normalcy. We are not testing embryos, we are testing eggs. When I asked Dr. Schoolcraft if they provide this service he said they could but that NOBODY has ever asked for it before. I thought that was kind of strange. And a little disconcerting ... to be the first at their clinic to do this.

Usually he does a cycle where he'll extract eggs - for women who are single and wanting to preserve their eggs for the future (and not test them) OR they will do a more standard IVF cycle and test the embryos, but he's not retrieved eggs for "future" (read: as quick as humanly possible) use that he has tested prior to fertilizing and freezing.

I'm so special.

I am waiting for my cycle to start and then I will plan my trip. Most of the time the initial testing can take up to three months to complete.

1. First month: First CCRM wants you to fly out on CD5-13 of your cycle to complete a 1 day workup
2. Second month: from home, they have you take Day 3 blood work and you ship it to them for results.
3. Third month: then if it's needed they have other diagnostics - like a lap or a Clomid Challenge Test and you might or might not need to fly back to Colorado for these treatments.

then when the testing is complete the doctor has enough information to identify the best protocol for your body and your test results - in many cases you can start IVF the next cycle. Well, I don't have that kind of time, so I'm putting myself on the fast track.

Here's the plan:

Somehow force my body to ovulate this cycle, and SOON so I can get this show on the road.

CD1: My period arrives, book flights, book CCRM appointments.
CD2: Fly to the mile high city!
CD3: 10 minute appt w/Dr. Schoolcraft, provide Day 3 bloodwork
CD4: Co-chill in Denver
CD5: Hopefully* have my 1 day workup
CD6: Fly home with CD10 blood work kit
CD10: (if needed) Have blood work taken locally and ship my creepy blood to CCRM.
CD11: Dr will determine if donor egg/embryo is our best or only option or if not, what our protocol will be.
*The 1 day workup could fall any day between CD5 and CD13 ... the longer it's postponed in my cycle, the longer I have to stay in Colorado! I'd prefer to get home (and back to work) as soon as possible.

The nurse suggested this tactic yet she did warn me that there's a likelihood that we won't be able to squeeze in a cycle by the end of the year if my protocol is longer than a 1 month protocol.

So our current plan, at this moment ;-) is to complete the testing with CCRM to get a better idea of what protocol would work best for me. If they provide a thorough outline for what protocol they would use - I could take that information and have my local clinic (the one where I still have one more "free" extraction round) use the protocol devised by the top clinic (CCRM) in hopes that we get a better outcome than a handful of eggs where most are immature. But we have heard that in order to see the complete picture of what a CCRM protocol looks like, you'd need to actually complete an entire cycle with them (from what I understand they give you the first X weeks of the protocol and tweak it as needed as the cycle progresses) ... so we may do that, just so we can see what protocol develops and find out if it actually works. If it doesn't work, we will know that we sought out the best and it still did not work - and if this is the case, we move on from continuing to try to retrieve my eggs and we pursue "alternative" options.

Watch out Denver - here comes Polly!