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Embarking on IVF...advice or stories to share? (1 Viewer)

Instinctive

Instinctive

Footballguy
Hey FFA fam. Did a search on this and could only find a post or two over in Political Roe discussion threads and randomly a couple in the credit card points thread, so making a new post.

Context: My wife and I are officially moving to the IVF stage after an extended period of trying to conceive, then trying IUI, and still not having success. I'm mostly doing ok, but the various medications, shots, procedures, etc have been hell on her (honestly the hardest part for me is just absorbing her stress and constantly providing support the best way I can). I talk about it super openly and it feels like every single time the topic comes up, the other person (especially dudes) has some variation of "we had a challenge too and I never felt like I could talk about it, so please let me be there for you," and they're super kind.

We've come to the conclusion today that basically nowhere will let you do 2-embryo transfer for our age profile now, which has her super down as it resigns us to going through it at least twice (family goal of two little ones) and she was really hoping to maximize chances of twins and not endure the full process more than once.

I've posted looking for two things:
1. If you've been through it, any advice on the best ways to support her, based on what you went through?
2. Since apparently pregnancy challenges (whether conceiving, miscarrying, something during birth, etc) are wildly common but nobody thinks they can talk about it, I figure I'm going to be the change I wish to see in the world, and maybe those who go through in the future can bump this and read through and share also.


*I would like to make one request, since there's lots of debate/discussion out there: please don't waste your time suggesting we try to adopt. We've been down that road and discussed it at length, and for various reasons, that's not what we want for us. I think it's an amazing thing and would prefer this not become a pros/cons of different options or philosophical kind of thread. That is not the purpose.
 
Here was the thread… https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/trouble-getting-pregnant.255841/

Lots of good stuff in there. I posted in there a bit too. Tried IVF twice… both unsuccessful. Thankful we were still able to have one though.

Tips for supporting wife is just whatever she wants; be there for her. She will be going through a lot. My wife experienced some depression after the IVF failures, which is common, and still sees therapist.
 
I see the OU pic and was wondering if you are in the Oklahoma/Tulsa area? My wife works closely with many IVF Dr's in the Tulsa area. So many twins in her office due to IVF. My wife and I did IVF almost 20 years ago now. We ended up with 2 beautiful kids. We struggled with wife getting pregnant. My wife wanted kids so bad that we decided to do IVF. Back in the day her insurance was wonderful and covered the cost. It was a cattle call. We were in a conference room with so many couples who were in our same situation. It was several days of interviews with Dr's and Psychiatrist and whatever else. Got to know a few of the other couples as well. So we finally get the go ahead to start IVF. We did all of the shots at home to increase my wife's egg production and were able fertilize a lot of eggs. Day comes and Dr implanted 2 of the "Grade 4" eggs. Both eggs developed and boom twins 9 months later. So, the biggest issue for us was what to do with the leftover "eggs." It was very difficult to decide what to do with all those eggs. We donated several eggs to other people who were struggling getting pregnant and the cost was very prohibitive for a lot of families. We finally signed a document that the eggs would be donated to other families from all over the world I guess. If you would like to fast forward and see what it is like to have twins I can send the boys to live with you guys. Have you ever had two 19 year old boys who are either sleeping or eating you out of house and home? If you have any questions I would love to help answer if I can. GL.
 
PM me.

I posted a ton about my experience with this in the linked thread, I believe. But, if you'd like to speak privately to somebody who endured 4 failed attempts (96% success rate for one kid and something like 12% success rate for 4 kids) and it went miserably, I'm happy to discuss it privately with you.

I will honor your request to not make a pitch that you foster and adopt - though it will be a challenge as we have 4 wonderful kids going that route (my son won student of the month today!).
 
Wife and I also went through IVF and I remember going through all of the things you describe. My neighbors are currently going through it and I have repeatedly told the husband that I'm always open to talk to him about things if he needs it, but it seems like something the ladies are much more talkative about.

We did the IUIs for quite a while as they were 100% covered by her insurance, while IVF wasn't covered at all. I was comfortable continuing on as it would have saved us a chunk of cash, but she was losing her mind, probably in part because of the hormone treatments. It was probably healthier for the marriage just going through with the IVF, but I think there is a disconnect between males and females when it comes to pregnancy.

We implanted two embryos and are now the proud parents of 11 year-old twins, but our friends who went to the same facility as us only 6 months afterwards said that they changed their policy and will only implant one embryo at a time, but if it failed they would do a second procedure at no cost.
 
Instinctive said:
1. If you've been through it, any advice on the best ways to support her, based on what you went through?
Click to expand...
It sounds like you're doing a lot already for her already, but one thing that I did for my wife when we went through this was for me to make her favorite meal on the days when retrievals, implantations, etc. were being done. Whatever is her comfort food that you can prepare well for her. For my wife, this was french onion soup with the toasts under a layer of gruyere cheese.
 
Oh, and BTW, I now have 9 year old twins. It was a difficult experience to go through, no doubt. There are a lot of emotional swings, but I know it made my wife and I closer to know that we both went through it together, with each other hand in hand. I will say though that IVF is a modern miracle. I love my kids so much and am thankful for all those doctors and researchers that worked on making our family a reality.
 
We did 4 rounds of iui and 2 ivf. get couples counseling throughout the whole process. regimented sex and crushing disappointment can destroy a relationship. By the time you've hit ivf, you're already traumatized by the process.
 
I think I was one of the last people to post in the old thread. Our now 2.5 year old IVF toddler is as healthy and rambunctious as he can be. Funny as this is as timely a thread as can be as we are trying for #2 literally tomorrow morning and and have the embryo transfer scheduled.

Advice is be as supportive as can be. It's stressful (to some degree the 2nd go is more stressful knowing what we went thru with the 1st). Plan for the the good and the bad. Trust your medical team. Talk to people. Conceiving is a growing challenge and people want to talk about it. They just don't know how.

Oh and science is a hell of a thing....It's wild what they can do these days.

Ask any questions as we're in the throws of it.
 
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We "luckily" were successful our third try of IUI.....

All I can say is good luck and hang in there its an emotional time.
 
the rover said:
We did 4 rounds of iui and 2 ivf. get couples counseling throughout the whole process. regimented sex and crushing disappointment can destroy a relationship. By the time you've hit ivf, you're already traumatized by the process.
Click to expand...
This made me laugh so hard...so true but hilarious phrasing. Good thought on the counseling, will keep that one in mind for sure.
 
Reading through the other thread, slowly, too now. Idk how I missed it but found 3 others haha. Thank you for all the good thoughts and expect some PMs flying to those who offered.
 
Zow said:
PM me.

I posted a ton about my experience with this in the linked thread, I believe. But, if you'd like to speak privately to somebody who endured 4 failed attempts (96% success rate for one kid and something like 12% success rate for 4 kids) and it went miserably, I'm happy to discuss it privately with you.

I will honor your request to not make a pitch that you foster and adopt - though it will be a challenge as we have 4 wonderful kids going that route (my son won student of the month today!).
Click to expand...
I'll take you up on the offer, thank you. And the short version of a longer discussion is that if we find IVF not working and us not wanting to continue, that adoption immediately comes on the table. We just decided let's plan for success on the path we've chosen and cross other bridges if we reach them.

Sounds like a great dad, even though you're a lawyer and a golfer! Who'd have thought :p


(felt like as a lawyer and new golfer i could make that joke but sorry if not)
 
Instinctive said:
Zow said:
PM me.

I posted a ton about my experience with this in the linked thread, I believe. But, if you'd like to speak privately to somebody who endured 4 failed attempts (96% success rate for one kid and something like 12% success rate for 4 kids) and it went miserably, I'm happy to discuss it privately with you.

I will honor your request to not make a pitch that you foster and adopt - though it will be a challenge as we have 4 wonderful kids going that route (my son won student of the month today!).
Click to expand...
I'll take you up on the offer, thank you. And the short version of a longer discussion is that if we find IVF not working and us not wanting to continue, that adoption immediately comes on the table. We just decided let's plan for success on the path we've chosen and cross other bridges if we reach them.

Sounds like a great dad, even though you're a lawyer and a golfer! Who'd have thought :p


(felt like as a lawyer and new golfer i could make that joke but sorry if not)
Click to expand...
Haha it's totally fine and I wish we could have this conversation on the course with a couple of drinks.

Regarding the kid(s), most of that credit should go to my wife...
 
Both kids (11&15) were IUI on account of my monster headed sperm, not because my wife's womb being a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase.

I'll try to come back when Ive got time.

GL!
 
We had issues getting thru pregnancy for several years, then went thru IVF and it didn’t work. Then went to a local doc who prescribed Clomid…instantly got pregnant and had a healthy pregnancy…now 5 years later we have 2 boys. Always wonder why someone didn’t recommend Clomid before IVF…but thankful regardless.
 
Good luck, dude. We went through this about 10 years ago. After four years of trying naturally and about 6 Clomid/turkey baster attempts we now have an 8.5 & 6 year old from IVF.

Lots of good advice already given. I think the best thing I did was to stay positive (sometimes faking it) when things seem down after failed attempts.

It might just be me, but I also tried not to touch anything besides the look on the door in the "specimen collection" room.
 
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My wife and I had several failed IVF cycles with multiple early miscarriages (enough to exhaust our lifetime insurance maximum for IVF) before we decided to switch providers and be more involved in the protocol going forward on our own dime.

For us, that meant doing extensive genetic testing of each embryo before implantation and having my wife (who has a genetic clotting disorder) on blood thinners for the entire pregnancy. One thing I learned through the process is that different centers can have pretty drastically different success rates, particularly if the mother is "advanced age" (late 30s and up). One clinic in Colorado has almost a 70% live birth rate on cycles with that age cohort, while your run-of-the-mill fertility center might be closer to 40 percent. It depends on the strictness of the protocol.

Of course, much also depends on what the fertility issues are in the first place. It seems that most places can handle most male-factor infertility now. My best advice is to do your homework and make sure you feel your doctor is actually listening to you and not just brushing you off. It seemed our first clinic had its process and they weren't really interested in exploring any alterations for potentially difficult cases.
 
Been through all of it, although some time ago.

We got pregnant on our honeymoon, but had a miscarriage in the first trimester. Thought it would be easy but two years later, no luck. Tried all of the treatments available up to and including several rounds of IVF all of which were unsuccessful. After the last one, I pulled my wife aside and said let's take a break and forget about doctors and fertility for a couple of months. After that, we will regroup. Unbeknownst to me, she went to an acupuncturist for a fertility treatment and we got pregnant naturally a month later.

Exact same for my son a few years later--pregnant naturally from acupuncture after all of the fertility treatments failed. I really think much of our issue was psychological and my wife was putting immense pressure on herself which perhaps affected the quality of her eggs but I can't say for sure.

My daughter turned 21 in December and my son will be 18 in June. From what I understand, fertility treatments have come a long way since we tried them. Good luck.
 
Our son was six when we decided to do IVF after trying "naturally" for several years and then getting a diagnosis that my round-headed seed was not able to penetrate the wall guarding her promised land (they said our son was a "miracle baby.") My wife was 43 and I was 45 when our daughter was born a year later. She's now 11 and I can't imagine life without her. I don't really have much advice other than to just provide hope that it worked for us at an advanced age and obviously we're thrilled. One odd thing is I've never told anyone about this other than me posting on this board, and hardly ever discussed it since. I doubt my wife has either, but never asked. I asked my wife a couple years ago if she thinks we should tell our daughter how she was conceived and we decided no need, haven't discussed it since. I wish I had more advice but would say we were just extremely lucky that it was pretty much a no stress thing we embarked on and it worked out for us. Maybe having our son already made it a bit easier since we were Ok just having one kid if that's how it was going to turn out. Or maybe I'm just an insensitive prick who didn't notice the stress my wife was under. Good luck friend - hope it works out for you.
 
We officially do fertilization tomorrow now. Many things happened, some of which surprised me:

My wife actually listened when I said if she dislikes the clinic we've been using so much she should just tell them we're pausing to talk to other clinics because our experience has been so terrible. Same day, the clinic director called to ask what was going on and express kind sentiments or whatever...and my wife was READY. Listed out every single instance by date and time of when questions went ignored, incorrect information was given, the wrong billing procedure was done in spite of pre-confirmation, etc. I was actually very impressed with the director. She was:
  • PISSED at a couple things that she was like "I took this job and specifically instructed staff to handle this piece in a different way."
  • Super apologetic about the finance, apparently they have a new person and the same week she had decided she's taking a more active role in that part of things
  • Very understanding of our core challenge, which is "We tell you at every single appointment that we both typically travel M-Th for work, and we just need a rough calendar so we can set expectations with out teams on times we'll need to be at home. We understand that it's not set in stone, but knowing that around month x or week y we'll probably have something for a couple days isn't asking too much." She totally agreed. Previously we'd been told "building those calendars is a lot of work so the nurses don't do them until each appointment for the next appointment," which my wife almost went apoplectic at, but instead said "Can you just copy paste someone else's cadence and take the name off it?" Director was like...well, yeah that seems like it would be easy and would work. DUH.
  • Gave us her personal number (I'm sure this is something they do with everyone but still the right gesture) and was adamant that we call her directly without hesitation if the office is every squirrely.
So that immediately eased my wife's mood and trepidation and we moved into phase 2 immediately (if phase 1 is egg extraction, which we did like 18 months ago just in case...we are clearly planners).

Guess we'll see! I spent all week doing like every medical thing I could find to eat/exercise/abstinence/etc. to ensure best possible quality tomorrow. LOL.
 
Instinctive said:
18/21 eggs survived. We find out quality and such tomorrow morning on remaining 18.
Click to expand...
Been awhile for me, but this is a great number IIRC. Congrats!

Next step is you doing your thing and seeing how many embryos? We got four embryos. I believe average is 1.8 unless the technology has improved the last decade or so.
 
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Zow said:
Instinctive said:
18/21 eggs survived. We find out quality and such tomorrow morning on remaining 18.
Click to expand...
Been awhile for me, but this is a great number IIRC. Congrats!

Next step is you doing your things and seeing how many embryos? We got for embryos. I believe average is 1.8 unless the technology has improved the last decade or so.
Click to expand...
Yep...at each step it typically cuts in half. So if they harvest 24, 12 are usually quality enough to use. Of those 12, 6 become strong enough embryos to insert etc.....

There's one thing that my wife swore by that isn't talked about a ton in these conversations and that is acupuncture...specifically for pregnancy. To this day, she swears that is what pushed us over the edge for our kids. At MINIMUM, it calmed her and cleared her head and provided positive thoughts during the process even if there was no physiological link (I don't know one way or the other honestly).
 
Instinctive said:
18/21 eggs survived. We find out quality and such tomorrow morning on remaining 18.
Click to expand...
That's a great number! Even with the evaluation period that should land you with a good pool of quality embryos to work with. Next step is to then decide when you want the transfer process to be. We took a few months between extraction and transfer just to enjoy the small win and mentally reset for the next step. But I know some folks who jumped straight into it. I can't remember is there were pros/cons per the doctor clinic's recommendation.

Also personally its been two weeks since transfer and I'm happy to say the embryo took and we got a positive test back yesterday afternoon :-). Now we're in the two week period of testing hCG levels.
 
EZD222 said:
Instinctive said:
18/21 eggs survived. We find out quality and such tomorrow morning on remaining 18.
Click to expand...
That's a great number! Even with the evaluation period that should land you with a good pool of quality embryos to work with. Next step is to then decide when you want the transfer process to be. We took a few months between extraction and transfer just to enjoy the small win and mentally reset for the next step. But I know some folks who jumped straight into it. I can't remember is there were pros/cons per the doctor clinic's recommendation.

Also personally its been two weeks since transfer and I'm happy to say the embryo took and we got a positive test back yesterday afternoon :-). Now we're in the two week period of testing hCG levels.
Click to expand...
Congrats!!! We have transfer scheduled for March 3rd lol. Wife is not interested in breaks :lmao:
 
JUst saw this thread. No personal experience but a college teammate of mine went thru multiple rounds until they finally had triplets.
 
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