The IVF Club

A Personal Blog About IVF Treatment & Infertility

Having a Break From IVF

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Its been a while since I wrote in my blog. Since that time a few other long term infertility sufferers have gotten pregnant and I am still infertile. Its funny that no matter how strong you think you are going there are always those moments when you talk about your experiences and get upset. After a couple of months break from IVF, albeit with the constant reminder of my failure to get pregnant (my ankles and fingers are still swollen from steroid withdrawals) I thought I was doing fine. I was also contemplating life without a child and wondering what that could mean.

However on Monday evening I went out to dinner with my biological mother (I am adopted) and found myself crying about it all. As if that wasn’t embarrassing enough. Today (Thursday), we visited a friend who had baby number 2 and I found myself getting clucky and playing with the baby. I marveled at this newborns beautiful soft skin and tiny long and slender fingers. Then I started crying – perhaps it was the realization that I might never have a baby. I don’t know. All I know is that grief can come along at any moment and strike you when you least expect it. I had to fake it and go to toilet so that no-one could see me cry. Its not good when you want a baby. I know I should be happy for the people who have a child (and I am)  except that it reminds me that I can’t have a child and don’t have one.

In any case I have resolved to have a break from IVF and let my body recover. I have rashes all over my body as well as the swollen ankles and this is all related to my reaction to going off steroid treatment for my natural killer cells. I am sick of my body reacting the way it does and want to give it time to recover.  Previously I was rushing against my body clock but now I have a different attitude and just want my body to be ok and I want the horrible symptoms I have left over from IVF to go away. I have also put on weight and I know this isn’t going to help me get pregnant either. So it is rest time for me for a little while at least.  I am going to have a post a picture of the rashes on my legs that started to appear right before Christmas.  I also need to write about another incident that occurred before I left my job. It literally shocked me that someone could be so thoughtless.

IVF Cycle 13 Fertlization Results

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This cycle has so far been the most unsuccessful cycle I have done to date. While my scan showed 22 follicles, the fertility specialist estimated there would be 10 eggs.  I didn’t believe him however he was pretty accurate.

My egg collection yielded only 9 eggs – this is a lot less than I have previously had in any other cycle.  Six of these 9 embryos successfully fertilized. This time we decided to only a Day 2 or 3 transfer.  We decided this before I knew my egg collection results. Because the clinic doesn’t do transfers on Sundays it has meant that I had the transfer done today. So I now have 2 Day 2 embryos floating around in my body which I hope might finally help me realize my dream of becoming pregnant.

The embryologist told me that the other remaining embryos were moderately fragmented.  Two have gone on to become 6 cells embryos (growing a bit too fast), one is four cell embryo and other is only a 2 cell embryo.

I know I have have had a stressful week – moving house, car crashes and dealing with insurance companies probably don’t help but the results surprised me – I thought I would be having a good haul of eggs like before. To top it off, I haven’t been following the Colorado Protocol exactly as prescribed.  There has just been too much going on in my life to even remember what pills to take.  For a start I forgot to start taking the tablets the day after my HCG injection – instead I started it a day later.  My husband and I were also supposed to make love the day before transfer. Instead, I was working on the computer until after midnight (my husband went to bed and fell asleep).  I told my nurse about starting the medication late and she said not to worry – just to take it for the 5 days!  Haven’t spoken to her about forgetting to have intercourse. I wonder what she will say about that!

IVF Over 40

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Whilst IVF can be very a wonderful thing when it works, it can also be a frustrating experience when it doesn’t – particularly if you are over 40 years of age.  The trouble is that your body clock time bomb is clicking away and unfortunately the quality of your eggs declines rapidly at this time.  In fact, while the quality of embryos declines from about the age of 32 (yes 32), the decline is much more rapid at age 40 and above.

How do I know this? I visited a new IVF fertility specialist today. As kindly as what he was in delivering the bad news it was devastating to hear the facts. I had gone to him in hope only to be delivered bad news. At least it was more realistic than what my current Doctor tells me. My current fertility specialist tells me don’t worry you will get pregnant.  Even though I know the odds are stacked against me it keeps me in hope.  Hearing the facts from the new specialist made me upset. My age and the fact that 99% of my husbands sperm is abnormally shaped is a key problem. I had gone to him looking for a solution.  Although I don’t think this is what I got.

On the positive, he told me his clinic did things differently.  For a start, he would be the doctor who treated me – not like the clinic I currently attendwhere I get treated by whoever is scheduled to treat me on the day (a major plus).  He told me that this particular clinic only did Day 2 embryo transfers not blastocysts. He thought the fact that I had lost so many embryos at Day 5 was wasteful. Interesting – a debatable point amongst the world’s experts.

It seems there are two schools of though in IVF – Day 2/3 transfers versus Day 5.  My current clinic does either day 3 or Day 5 but this clinic doesn’t. In any case, I was directed to the patient co-ordinator and we set up some appointments to begin my next cycle.  The first thing that happened was that I was informed that as I was deemed medically infertile, I would not be eligible for the medicare rebate and as such my total costs would be $12,800 with no hope of rebate.  I was shocked.  I went back to the Doctor to check this and discovered he had made a mistake. Phew – was I relieved.  One hurdle down. However my next hurdle made me question why I was changing clinics in the first place.

When I analyzed the treatment protocol what I discovered shocked me.  What shocked me the most was that he was recommending an Antagonist cycle with the same medication as what I had previously been on.  He was also not convinced on the Colorado Treatment protocol. As far as I could see, there really wasn’t any major difference between the treatment protocols which clearly was not working for me.  The only difference was the day the embryo got transferred.

With this in mind, I had to question why go through the heartache of change. The steps I would need to take to change clinics would mean I would need to get all the paperwork on police record checks and child protection checks from my current clinic. My husband and I would also have to go through counselling all over again. The clinic locations were not as easy and accessible for us to get to. All these steps would mean another delay to my treatment.

On reflection, I don’t think this clinic is offering me anything different. I can choose to transfer an embryo on day 3 instead of day 5 at my current clinic. Personally, I am not convinced that there is a hell of a lot of difference between Day 2 and Day 3 embryo transfers.  Ours all seem to survive to Day 3.  So I think I should just save myself the heartache and continue with my current clinic but still explore another doctor in that clinic who I know will offer a different protocol to what I am currently doing.  Heck I might as well even try a day 3 transfer. At 40, I might as well try and preserve what embryos I have.

Age and IVF

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Without doubt the strongest indicator of a women’s ability to fall pregnant is her age. From age 35, a women’s fertility starts to decline alarmingly rapidly. It is rare to find any research that contradicts this basic fact – it is harder to become pregnant as you age and harder to maintain a diagnosed pregnancy.

Between the ages of 25-29, your likelihood of getting pregnant visa IVF is between 45-50%. However, by age 40 your chances of conception are almost halved.

As depressing as this might be for those of use old enough to worry about our biological clock, many of us still live in hope that our dreams of becoming a mother are realised.  Without doubt I have pushed my body to its limits in doing repeated IVF cycles.  The toll it has taken on me both physically, emotionally and professionally has been significant.

Now, as I sit here contemplating my impending 40th birthday I wonder if all the pushing has been good for me.   However, if I asked myself if I would do it again then the answer would be a resounding yes. If I was younger, perhaps I would not do each cycle as close together as what I have done (4 stimulated cycles per year is quite intense) but do it I would.

Judging by the results of my my ovulation test kit this evening, I have a feeling that I will be ovulating sometime on my 40th birthday.  Which means I will be having the last of my frozen embryos transferred into my uterus.  If all else fails, then it is back to the clinic to start yet another IVF cycle.

IVF Conception Still Possible

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A visit to my IVF specialist revealed that he still thinks my husband and I will conceive. So despite being nearly 40 and despite my husbands sperm problems, he still thinks this is a realistic goal.

It’s funny how a Doctor can be so confident when after 7 failures, you are not. So after asking all the probing questions, he still feels we will get pregnant. Apparently, he has done every test possible to me so from his perspective there is no reason why I should not fall pregnant. IVF apparently helps overcome male infertility issues so theoretically, there is no reason why we shouldn’t be able to become parents.

This makes things a little frustrating as it seems everything that should be working isn’t. I guess it puts us in no mans land. The other annoying thing is that IVF is not cheap – not by a long shot so every failure means spending more money on another round. Whilst, you can’t put a cost on what I perceive to be a joy in having a baby, it does place a financial strain on your budget.

So with this in mind we have decided to continue down this path and try again. Fortunately, we have one frozen embryo left from the cycle I did in January. So apart from giving my body a rest from the drugs it means we will use our last remaining embryo. So if this fails, another stimulated cycle is on the cards. In the meantime, I will continue to focus on having a good nutritional diet, no alcohol or coffee – basically following the suggestions in the Pregnancy Miracle ebook I purchased a few weeks ago.

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