The Options

The epic failure of IUI#4 has caused us to take a fresh look at things. Life has changed a lot since IUI#3 way back last fall. We have 2.5 jobs between us. We have money (weird). We are beginning to see the big picture of how student loan debt, a future home, and this little thing called infertility will affect us for the coming years. Decisions about any one thing, affect all of the others.

We've been talking a LOT about where we should go from here. We are seeking wise counsel about our next steps in regards to the big picture and the now. We're trying to make the wisest, most financially secure decisions for our family without doing anything that we will really come to regret.

As I see it, we have a few options for growing our family going forward:

1. Do nothing. All of our money would go to paying off debt and saving for a house. We'd revisit the idea of children in four or five years when we are debt free if we had not been successful on our own in the mean time.
2. Save for IVF. This requires sacrificing the dream of home ownership for the foreseeable future. It also means that we would make minimum payments toward our massive amount of student loan debt, so we'd hold on to that beast for a while.
3. Save for cheap(er) IVF. We could complete saving for IVF in half the time if we revisited the idea of the low cost clinic in our area. If it worked, we would be back on track to pay down debt and buy a house significantly faster.
4. Take out a loan for IVF. We haven't investigated this option at all. We have no idea what the interest rate, loan payments, ect. would look like. But we could potentially do IVF in September or October of THIS year.
5. Skip IVF, move on to adoption. There are of course decisions to make within this: domestic or international. We'd have to find an agency, start saving/fundraising, etc. This could potentially bring us a family faster than IVF (particularly option 2), but it might not, it might be three years.

I see pros and cons of each of these options. The fact that we have options is a blessing, but it's also kind of overwhelming. This is an example of those weighty decisions that feel so huge... the consequences of making the wrong choice could stay with us well into our thirties. And with all of this, there is no guarantee. Absolutely NONE of the options means "bring home baby". My head kind of spins when I even think about these different options. It's overwhelming to say the least.

These are my current thoughts on each:

1. Do nothing. I'm not sure if I have this in me... I don't know if I could "forget" about TTC for four or five years. I feel like I'd have to cut ties with it all... no more blogging about it, no more OPK's no more temping. We'd be closing the door on all of this this. We'd be "not trying, but not preventing". It would be a HUGE leap of faith... one that I don't necessarily feel like I've been asked to make. AND if we came back at the age of 32, to discover our chances at IVF were significantly less, we would always second guess this decision.
2. Save for IVF. This had been the plan for the last nine months. It is only now, that we are employed, that we are actually doing it, but it was always the plan. This is obviously the one I'm most comfortable with as it is the one I'm the most familiar with. I estimate that we'd start IVF in January or February with this plan.
3. Save for cheap(er) IVF. $18,000 becomes $10,000 if we go to the low cost clinic. Simple math tells you we could achieve this faster. I estimate that we could start the process in September or October. But if you remember, this doctor was pretty confident that he found a large fibroid during an initial patient consultation. We've checked, double checked, and cut me open to prove that there is no fibroid. I'm not sure how much I trust him after that. And I'm not sure how I'd feel if IVF failed... would I always wonder if another clinic could have done better?
4. Take out a loan for IVF. Nine months ago, I would have been all over this option. A quick ticket to my maybe baby is EXACTLY what I want. I'm not sure how I feel about this option now. I think I would need some numbers to really make a decision about this. My fear is that Sam (the hater of big ticket expenses) would regret IVF a bazillion times more (if it failed) as we write a check each month.
5. Skip IVF, move on to adoption. Adoption still scares me. I feel like I've kind of "mastered" fertility treatments. I mean, I haven't been successful, but I understand them. I speak the lingo. Adoption would be an entirely new subject to learn... dossiers, finger prints, home studies, agencies. It's a LOT of work, it's a lot of money, etc. I also wonder if either of us would regret skipping IVF. Will we later wish we'd done IVF first, when our chances were highest?

What would you do? Which option would you pick? How do you and your family make these kinds of BIG decisions?