Experiences with IVF?

I had our youngest at he age of 42. She was conceived naturally and was well cared for in the womb. Because I have had two children who were stillborn, my pregnancy was well monitored. I don't believe in aborting at all. I was willing to take any child God gave me. I have had a child with downs, she pasted away. I would give the world to be raising her now. She was and is a gift.

There is no guarantee that a child will be healthier if "made at home", IVF or adopted. I did do IVF about 17 years ago and was "pregnant" the first time - ended up being a tubal. The second time didn't take and the 3rd time we made it to the testing date, but the hormones didn't keep rising. Would I do it again? I don't think so. It is extremely painful both emotionally and physically. We adopted two beautiful children who are growning up way too fast. Robert our first one was 2-1/2 weeks old when we brought him home. Olivia was 10 months when we went to China to get her. Each child is born with his/her strenghts and weakness. Despite that you bond with them so entirely. Wish you and your family all the best with the decision.

J.

I am currently pregnant as a result of IVF with a donor egg. I'm 41 1/2 but already last year my eggs were not good, most likely. We had been trying for almost 2 years by the time I had IVF.

It's true that you can test for defects before transfer.

We chose IVF because we were not successful on our own or with IUIs using clomid and HCG. We have one frozen embryo which will be donated to science, although you can also choose to donate embryos to another family. Our clinic only freezes embryos with very good chances of survival, rather than all that were produced.

I never thought I would choose IVF, but my desire to have a sibling for my daughter was very strong. She will be 4.5 when the baby comes. We also live very far away from all of our extended family and just wanted a larger family for all of us.

It was a big gamble. We don't have a lot of financial resources and only had one shot -and we were adamant about only transfering one embryo. Luckily for us we were successful. -Our IVF was done out of the country in The Czech Republic because we could not afford treatment here.

Good Luck!

MAny of my friends have done exactly what you are talking about and have had good results. We were set to do the same thing in Jan 2010 after 3 miscarriages (all from IUI and injectibles). My period never came that month and by some miracle I naturally conceived a healthy baby. Had that miracle not happened, I would have done the IVF and PGD without question.

Hi Jenn - I'm sorry you didn't really get much in the way of an actual answer to your question. First of all, I have to disagree with Jean that IVF is painful physically, unless she had her egg retrieval without sedation. I have gone through a fresh cycle and a frozen/thaw cycle and neither was painful. Emotionally, that's another story, but I'll tell you about my physical experience first. I had my tubes tied when my youngest was born over 3 years ago, and when she was almost two, my husband and I realized separately and together that we regretted this decision. Not wanting to live with any more regret, and choosing to go the IVF route before pursuing adoption, we went through a fresh cycle last November. It really was NOT that bad... the injections barely hurt and the side effects were minimal. I produced a lot of eggs (19) so I was uncomfortable and felt "full" two days before the retrieval. I was definitely a bit bloated, but no worse than my worst PMS bloating. The worst part for me, honestly, was all the back and forth to the clinic for ultrasound and bloodwork. It's just a lot of rushing and phone calls from the clinic, telling you what to do next, how much to increase or decrease meds, and when your retrieval will be. Your life really revolves around that for about two weeks. The ER (egg retrieval) itself was nothing... the worst part was not being able to eat or drink before going due to the anesthesia. But you're only out for a short time, and you come out of it very quickly. The whole process for the ER for me took about an hour, two hours if you count sitting there waiting, filling out paperwork, etc.

The day after the ER you get a call telling you how many eggs fertilized. Most women have a day 3 transfer, so three days after the ER you go back and get the embryos transferred in. I had 19 eggs retrieved, 13 mature, and out of those 13, only 5 of them made it to day 3. I had one put back because I was afraid of twins; it didn't implant. In February I had two thawed and put back; neither of those took either (frozen cycles have less success rates than fresh). We have two left in the freezer but we are leaning towards doing another fresh cycle in June rather than using them because the success chances with the two frozen are far less than doing it again, according to my doctor. We have no issues other than my TL, and I am 36.5 years now, so we are given high success rates with a little tweaking to my protocol, and two embryos transferred this time after the fresh cycle.

It bothers my husband a lot more than me that the two frozen may not be given a chance, and then there's the question of what to do with them? I hear you there. We don't know what we will do with them. I know if we do have a lot of good quality embryos left after the next cycle, and we are successful (a live birth), then I am going to look into donating them to one of the networks out there where women can adopt embryos if their egg quality/embryo quality is too low. Yes, this is such a controversial issue, but as far as I personally go, I tend to focus more on the science of it... that's just my way. Please don't let anyone make you feel badly for this should you face it. It is personal and between you and your spouse.

The emotional part of it was and continues to be REALLY hard for me and my husband. We were really disappointed and surprised when neither time worked for us, and getting your hopes up and having them crash down is pretty darn awful. Add to that the stress of the experience and the extra hormones you take, and it can be a very tough time. I have had a hard time seeing pregnant women these days or even talking about pregnancy and such plans with my friends... a lot of my issues are tied to having the regret over the TL, so it's complicated. I am so grateful for my two girls, but we certainly are hoping and praying that we can add to our family this summer.

Please feel free to PM me if you have more questions! The process is very arduous but very doable... don't be too scared off. It is all worth it in the end anyway. Good luck to you!

Hi Jenn,

My husband and I tried to conceive for almost 10 years before going with IVF. We were told we had a 1 in 300,000 chance of getting there on our own, so we went that route.

The egg retrieval went relatively smoothly - we retrieved 15 total eggs, of which 12 fertilized, and 8 made it past day three. We implanted 2 and froze the other 6. We waited the two weeks, and were amazed to find I was pregnant. I fully didn't expect it to work the first time around. We hgave birth to our son on March 6, 2008.

In February of the next year we decided that even though J wasn't even one, we wanted to go through the process again, so that if it didn't work, we would have another shot before I turned 40. Another 2 embryos were implanted, and when we went back in two weeks, we were told I was pregnant with twins. I was STUNNED. I, again, didn't expect it to work. One of the embryos never made it past 10 weeks, but Madeline was born on October 30, 2010.

I would ABSOLUTELY do it again. Even though the shots were painful (at times - you sort of get used to them) and the waiting was difficult. We still have 4 embryos frozen in case we ever try again.

Please PM me if you have further questions.

Bianca