CD 1: Procedures and Policies

This is the last time I will announce CD 1.

Why? This is an infertility blog. The odds that I am not pregnant on any given month are far higher than the odds of a pregnancy. In my continuing quest to manage expectations, I'm going to expect my period fourteen days after ovulation.

To help me cope with CD 1, each month, I am going to do one small adoption-related task. This is jumping the gun a little bit. We want to see whether I'm still really infertile post-surgery, plus DH needs a job before we can actually apply to an agency. But adoption-related tasks and decisions will help me feel less desperate when my period arrives again. So for those of you playing along at home: until June, adoption-related updates will signify that another cycle has come and gone.

DH was turned down for a job last week, which was a bitter disappointment, right when my PMS was at its worst. But I started feeling better on Monday, when my period started in full force. Tuesday, I called Adoption Agency #1 with a list of prepared questions, mostly cribbed from Stirrup Queens. Actually, before I called, I had a full-on panic attack. I was convinced that the Agency would be quick to tell me that there was no way in hell any birthmother would choose us to be parents. I expected a long list of questions about our ages (too old, especially DH), our home (rented apartment), finances (lots of medical debt) and mental health (touch and go, most days).

But instead, there was lots of good news. Agency #1 adopts mostly Latino and African-American infants. They place about 25 children a year and have 15-20 families on the waiting list at any given time. The average wait is 6-12 months for 95% of their couples. The five percent of couples who wait longer usually have strict criteria for the birthmothers and potential children. (The agency led me to believe that these are the couples who only want white children who've been protected from any potential harmful substance their entire stay in utero. That's definitely not us.) So....6-12 month wait! That's crazy fast.

The money aspect looks like it will work out for us as well. For our recent wedding, we put the word out that we are saving money to grow our family through adoption and our friends and family were most generous. Plus, I get a generous adoption benefit through work. And the Adoption Tax Credit means that as long as we have the money saved up in advance, we probably will not bankrupt ourselves adopting.

[I would like to take a moment now to reflect on the fact that my (former) RE said that it was a "shame" that I wasn't willing to try IVF because my chances of success were a good 20% per cycle. At a cost of $11-15K per cycle. In what society is it reasonable to pay more than $30K for a chance to parent your genetic offspring?]

So for now, I'm not focused on CD 1, but the fact one day in the not-too-distant-future, DH and I will be parents.