Getting rid of poison ivy

My yard is infested with the stuff. There is an area in our front yard that used to be a flowerbed/garden kind of thing. The previous owner didn't keep very good care of it and it became very overgrown. My wife took to taking care of it two weeks ago and during the process discovered poison ivy growing through it. So, we inspected the side of the house where there is some vegetation and found small bits there. No biggie on these. We can get rid of all of this.

There is a pretty large problem in the back of the house. At the very back of our yard is a chain-link fence blocking access to a drainage ditch. We have three or four trees growing along this fence line, a few bushes, and, we have discovered, a heck of a lot of poison ivy. It is growing up some of the trees and is growing out like a bush in other areas.

The front yard and on the sides of the house are areas we can handle ourselves. But I'm not too sure about all of that stuff in the back. To be perfectly honest, if I didn't have kids, I wouldn't even be worried about getting rid of it.

Do any of y'all have any experience getting rid of the stuff. What I've read about it online has not been encouraging. The biggest debate I'm having is whether or not to call in experts or try and deal with it ourselves.