I had a doctor's appointment on Friday for my pre-cycle scan. Everything looks okay. There were 7 good follicles on my ovary. My cyst looks to be about the same size. I asked if the seven we were looking at were what we had to work with for this cycle. The doctors said that some of them will go away, but some smaller ones will emerge and it's a good start. I think it's similar to the past two cycles, so that's okay.
So tomorrow I'm on 300 Gonal-F and on day 4 I add the Cetrotide. I'm also going to schedule my next scan for day 4 so that's Thursday. As we are changing the drug dose this cycle, it may need to be more closely monitored. The doctor said he might reduce it ond ay 4 or might keep it the same, so we'll see what happens.
I also paid for this cycle which really hurt the bank balance but it is what it is. When I was paying, I again flagged the issue of the 'follow-up appointment' charge, as I've now been charged twice for it. This time, she went to speak to the clinic director who said that it is definitely not included. So I told her that I thought this was really unreasonable. She said the only time they do a 'free' appointment is in the case of a failed IVF cycle. But I argued that in that case, firstly, the couple comes in one more time after the retrieval so gets to speak to the doctor, and isn't all drugged up and also secondly, as I knew I was going to do at least two cycles, it was fairly obvious that there was a mandatory 'in between appointment' and it was shit to be charged for it. She said she would raise it at the next internal meeting, in the meantime however, I'm out the extra money. I mean fine, in the grand scheme of things it's a small proportion of the money, but I'd rather they bump the overall fee by 100 pounds and then include it then dump it on you like that. It's annoying. And what you don't want to be, in an emotional and hormonally charged process, is annoyed by things that seem really stupid.
I also learned that my clinic has been bought by/has joined a larger network of IVF clinics in the UK. I'm not sure it makes any sort of difference as it seems more of a higher level management issue and each clinic seems to be independently run. But I suppose it can't be a bad thing in the long run, particularly if in a couple years time I'm not in London but somewhere else in the UK, it might be easier to use a local related clinic then go back down to London but that's a long way away to be thinking about. I suppose although it's interesting, it really doesn't seem to impact me at all.
The other thing I'm looking forward to now that this cycle is starting is getting my fridge space back! This is more for my non-UK/European visitors but having had my drug delivery a couple of weeks ago, it's put a serious limit on my fridge space! I have a flatmate, and she gets the bottom half of the fridge, so as you can see from the picture, space has been a little tight!
Anyway, that's all the news from here. I'll keep things updated as this cycle goes.
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