The Cost of Infertility

As I sit here tonight thinking about the HSG test this week, I began to think more about cost. Not just financial, but physical and emotional also. Unfortunately my insurance doesn't cover infertility, and the reproductive endocrinologist needs $300 up front just to book my appointment. The cost of the IUI could be close to $10,000 and to be honest, that's $10,000 up front. We don't have that kind of money and because we're not married, his insurance will not cover the costs either. He's going to be scheduling a sperm analysis this week to make sure that his end wont be another obstacle on this road. We attended my god daughter's birthday party today and I catch a lot of flack from her and her family. She's 26 and has two girls (8 and 5) and I'm 26 and have no children. We often dreamed about our children growing up together and now I half joke that by the time I'm able to have children, hers will be old enough to babysit.
For her this journey was easy... they had no difficulty conceiving and have two beautiful healthy children. So to hear her say how it's my turn to have children, hurts. We left there and I haven't said much since. It's disheartening to me to think that teens worldwide get pregnant "accidentally" and here I am struggling.
The truth of the matter is that this is taking an incredible toll on me emotionally and physically. The heavy bleeding every two weeks is extremely painful and draining. I have iron deficiency anemia so the bleeding is making it much worse. I'm always cold, and fatigued.
Emotionally it also hurts. I wanted to do things in the right order.... meet someone, get engaged, buy a house, get married, plan a family. It hurts me more and more that this isn't an option for me anymore. It also hurts that people just assume I'm CHOOSING this route. I get a lot of the "shouldn't you be married first?" sure, we should. Truth is, I really wish this was the case. I think it is just all very overwhelming to me. Sometimes I'm not sure Chris even gets it. I guess that I'm just extremely hormonal and emotional and I'm venting. Afterall, that is why I created this blog. I just wish that for once in my life, something would be easy.