Meet Archie!

As if preparing for having an infant in the house sooner rather than later isn't enough, we've gone and added a new puppy into the mix too!

We went to dinner at some friends' house a few weeks ago.  These friends have been talking about getting a puppy for many months now and they showed me a picture of one that they'd found on Ebay in the Nashville area.  He was a miniture schnauzer and so precious!  I told her how sweet he was but that I agreed that the timing probably wasn't right in case they needed to buy plane tickets to fly home at a moment's notice due to his aunt's failing battle with cancer, and that waiting until after we got our bonuses in March was really smart and not too far away.

Well, one beer and two glasses of wine later, Elvis looks at the picture and goes into hyper-drive by calling the breeder, asking if she still had the puppies, asking if it was too late to come over that night to look at them, and asking for her address so we could plug it into the GPS.  He instantly fell for this little fur ball to the point that he said that if our friends weren't going to get him, that we would!  (that comment more than pissed me off a little bit because that was their puppy that they wanted)  Now, all of a sudden, our friends were put on the spot to make a snap decision on whether or not they wanted a puppy that night.  Thanks, Spann.

We decided to just go look at the puppies and that if they fell in love with one, that they could put a deposit down on him and wait to pick him up until we got our bonuses.  We had barely stepped foot into the house and both men had latched on to their favorite little buddies, and before we knew it we both were unexpectedly taking home miniature schnauzer puppies!  Our friends already had a name picked out for theirs after a favored Italian motorcycle rider who had recently died in a freak racing accident: Marco Simoncelli.  Since we had not been planning on even getting a puppy in the near future, we had no names in mind for our snuffling little buddy, but on the way home we discussed possibilities.  Since the trademark features of schnauzers is their bushy eyebrows, mustache, and beard, we decided we wanted an old man sounding name.  After running through several other names, Elvis comes up with Archibald, and I agree and say we can call him Archie.  As if Archibald wasn't a big enough name for this little guy, I take it several steps beyond that and bestow his full name upon him: Sir Archibald Oliver Spann.  Yes...Sir. 

And without regaling every sweet thing he does (snuggles, puppy breath, sweet tiny kisses), and every little thing that makes us second guess our decision (accidents in the floor, potty training, sleep deprivation), I'll just say that we are ultimately very happy with that serendipidous moment when he came into our lives unexpectedly and that he has meshed with the family very well.  Maggie is even growing to like him and isn't nearly as jealous as I expected her to be.

Fertility "Surgery" - 2/2/12

I say "surgery" loosely because all procedures are ones that totally could have been performed in the doctor's office.  Let me catch y'all up...

Even though I was toying with the option of having anesthesia for these procedures, it's only February and my $3000 family deductible most certainly has not been met yet.  And I remembered how much I paid out of pocket for the anesthesia, after my deductible had already been met, during my tonsilectomy last summer ($800+), so I elected to go through the surgery sans drugs.  And with that decision, here is how my morning went:

• Arrive at Centennial Women's Center at 8:30 AM, get registered, pay $1000 toward the cost of my stay, go upstairs to the admitting desk
• Sign in, receive restaurant waiting list-like pager, pee in a cup, work the City Paper crossword puzzle until approximately 9:00 AM
• Get escorted back to my room by my nurse Emma (although at the time of introduction I could have sworn she said "Belle"), change from my comfortable clothes into a lavender plastic lined, paper gown with large holes in it for vacuum tube delivered heated air if necessary (I declined; I was already sweating), and begin going through my paperwork
• As Emma discusses the anesthesia procedure, I politely tell her that I am not having anesthesia and she stops speaking.  She looks at me quizzically and says, "Well, you're gonna hafta have something.  They're still gonna hafta give you an IV."  Which I said was fine, but that I wasn't being put under.  She mentioned something about "Twilight" and told me I could figure all that out with the anesthesiologist.
• Elvis leaves to walk over to Dr. Vasquez's office to do his part of the testing (side note, how is it that I have to go through draining 6 pints of blood, an ultrasound, 2 pap smears, and a trip to the O.R. and all he has to do is look through a Penthouse magazine to determine our fertility hang ups???), gets back in time to see me before I get wheeled downstairs by a super friendly, super large orderly
• Arrive in the holding area and am met with a CRNA who begins to tell me about the anethesia.  I tell him that I am electing to not have anethesia and he says nothing.  He looks at me funny and asks if I'm sure.  I tell him yes.  He agrees and begins setting up my IV for my antibiotic
• Five minutes pass and the anesthesiologist arrives to tell me about the putting to sleep and waking back up process of sedation.  I tell him that I am not going to be sedated.  He looks at me dumbfoundedly.  He asks me if I've ever had these procedures done before.  I tell him that of the four, one is a pap smear that I have annually, one is an HSG that I've had before, one is simply a telescope with a camera, and the last is one that my mother has annually at her exams and says is no big deal.  I'm good.  He says he needs to check with my doctor to see if we can move forward with the surgery.
• When he returns, he says that Dr. Vasquez can perform the "operation" with only a blah-blah-blah, something-something.  I say great!  Dr. Sedation then tells me that if I feel the slightest bit uncomfortable, that he will be there at a moment's notice to relax me with a light stream of oxygen, followed by a syringe of anethesia into my IV and that I would be well taken care of.  I thanked him and continued waiting.
• I talked to 3 more nurses after the anesthesiologist, and everyone was down right flabbergasted that I was not being put under for this procedure.  But before I knew it, I was being wheeled down the hall and into an O.R. with a sign that read "Patient Awake.  Please Be Quiet."  As I entered the room my stomach started to flutter and my teeth started to chatter.  Typical nervous reaction for me, but I knew I was going to be ok.
• I scooted myself off of the gurney and onto the operating table.  I put my own legs into the stirrups with the nurses laughing about how strange it was not to be lifting dead weight.  I lifted my butt off the table when the nurse was draping me with cloths, to which she actually thanked me and told me how difficult it is to wedge those sheets under sedated patients' bums.  I chatted with everyone, and Dr. Vasquez and all of the nurses were wonderful at keeping me informed about what was going on, but I could tell that they felt very out of sorts by me being awake.  It was really quite humorous!
• After about 15 minutes of speculum, cathader, pincers, and telescope, Dr. Vasquez told me everything looked good and that he was finished and was going upstairs to tell Elvis how everything had gone.  It took longer for the nurses to prep and break down everything than it did for the entire "operation", which frankly, was no operation at all.  Doesn't surgery require the use of a scalple?
• As I'm being rolled back up to my room, the head nurse tells me that I was a fantastic patient and that in her 20 years of assisting on these surgeries, I was only the second person to ever have it done fully awake.  So crazy to me!  After checking all of my vitals again, I was allowed to have some Sprite and some saltine crackers, and as long as I didn't throw up (from what??), I was free to be released.
• I changed back into my clothes, peed (which was OUCH! the first time after having a cathader removed), sent Elvis to get the car, and then waited for my chariot, i.e. wheelchair, to arrive so I could spring the joint.  I finally got to leave around 1:30 PM.  Five hours and $3,300 later (ultimately the amount I'll owe for everything) I was free to get some Burger King and go home.

So the day went great and now we're just waiting until the 23rd to have our follow up appointment to put all of the pieces of the puzzle together and see how we move forward.

I actually got my first statement in the mail yesterday for my hospital stint.  It's a small fortune, broken down like this:

• Med-Sur Supplies (i.e. "operating tools") - $143
• Lab Urology (pee in a cup) - $240 (!!!!)
• Drugs/Detail Code (antibiotic in my fluid bag?) - $102
• Pharmacy (antibiotic in my fluid bag?) - $93
• Sterile Supply (IV o cathader?) - $128
• OR Services (15 minutes of non-operation) - $4,693
• Total Charges - $5,399
• Holy Crap

But now that my deductible is met by February 2nd, I want to make the most of that by getting pregnant ASAP so that I can take advantage of having the 80% paid for labor and delivery.  This means that I would need to be pregnant by April.  No pressure.