Fireworks, bonfires and long winters' eves will herald the Rat Smacketeers' BFPs this month and we are Brooking No Argument!

why do my 'mega long posts' always look short next to Geeks lol

Here we go brookers, stealth post... forgive typoes or hasty exit

Such a busy weekend on the fred, I can't believe I missed all the action!

keep glad your visit with friends wasn't unbearably 'baby'. These things can often go one way or the other, it sounds like you had a nice time though :)

solars that warm lamp trick would have had me going big time! I too find lying works best, anything that steers well away from my true feelings. Can't always manage the smiling part though! I was told the lap would only mean a wait of a couple of months, depending on healing time - the six months would be for if it was full open surgery. I'm so jealous of you having yours in two weeks though!!!! That is an amazing turnaround time and just shows what can be done if you are footing the bill yourself What a shame about the timing of that letter though - can you ring the clinic you just attended for advice? I had no idea men could have antisperm antibodies, I thought that was a 'woman' thing. The more I learn about TTC the more amazed I am that we continue as a species let alone that the majority appear to be superfertile specimens If testing is an option, I agree that it would be worth doing before your next IVF, just so that you have every scrap of information to hand.

Keep I read on the news about the riots, glad you are keeping yourself safe and away from them. Boo to the bfn, but it was just too early my lovely. Has the spotting stopped now? I think you still have four days before AF is not going to show so please don't be too disheartened. I am brooking, and refuse to be refused on this! I would wish you good luck with your IUI but you clearly won't need it as your brooking miracle will be confirmed by then. Though probably not on an IC, as I agree they are rubbish. I have had a total of 4 positives on them, and not a hint of a sniff on a 'proper' test (apart from one month when I had evaps on every test I looked at). I still use them, but it's mostly to scratch the itch without breaking the bank iykwim.

biscuits and jen how are you keeping lovelies?

sweetie redecorating? This close to Christmas and your holiday?? Insanio, as a work colleague says! Tenerife sounds fantastic, just the tonic for this rotten weather. You are completely forgiven for deserting us going to another site for a while, there are so many specialist forums (fora?) out there, it's good to get perspectives from people who have already chosen egg donation. It sounds like it will be a very busy day for you on Thursday, will be thinking about you loads - please update when you are ready. I too am amazed there are more donors than recipients, but that is surely a good thing - means you can afford to be choosy. Did they explain how they guarantee egg numbers?

Sorry ladies I need to get on and earn my pennies. Will try to pop back at lunch and post more

Right mega long post!!

But may be one of my last on account of starting a new job soon which is bound to get in the way of MN!!!

Sweetie 60% success rates? thats great!! and of course that doesnt filter in the increased chanced of success due to brooking tendancies!!! are you writing all these questions down?

Keep Ive still got my fingers firmly crossed for you!! I think we should ban brookers using IC hpts they're just so unreliable!!!!

Solars Never ever apologies for being mememe (which you werent being) you're going through the mill a bit at the moment, and its what us brookers are here for!! Have you decided who you are going to speak to? I guess waiting for the lap will give you a bit of time to get the other things sorted as well, or at least the investigation started!!

Im excited/dreading/nervous/happy about seeing Twinkle on saturday, although mrsparks isnt helping by the constant reminders that twins run in my family!! I cant believe that I'm 10+2 today!! This is a true brooking baby and I absolutely wouldnt have got this far without you guys

am a bad person for telling mrsparks that they help with ms when I really only wanted to have a daily chocolate fix!!!

Sparks that is amazing that you are having a scan so soon. These things come around so quickly. Exciting times.

Using a young donor egg increases statistics massively. The clinics quote 60% success rates, so more likely than not to have a successful outcome. But that is one of my questions for Thursday. Not sure if that 60% is BFP or live births.

How is the weather with you today keep and no more riots I hope?

a shagging/reading/sunning holiday sounds perfect sweetie. You deserve it, it's been a hard few months. I don't think you're getting ahead of yourself, you're a brooker, and we will be here brooking for minisweetie and the sibling. I'm so excited for you! Do the chances of success look the same as under 35 when you use donor eggs?

saturday is sparks' scan. YAY!! Are you looking forward to seeing twinke?

Nope, no more POAS for me. Cannot take it.

Hi keep any more POAS action this morning?

The clinic have both options sharing egg with lady going through ivf or a genuine donor. We are paying so cost differ depending on which we go with. I would also imagine there is a longer wait for the genuine donors but don't know. If we egg share they guarantee 4 eggs & 8 eggs for genuine donor. If we go for more eggs then we may get frozen embies & chance of a sibling in future I know I am getting ahead of myself

We are tenerife bound on Saturday, a week in the sun is just what I need. I have already loaded my kindle with trash chick lit and that is pretty much all I intend doing for the whole week ok it will be shag week so might do other stuff too

sweetie!!! so good to hear from you. I'd forgotten (?didn't know) that you have your consultation on Thursday. Massive, massive good luck for it. It's great that you're feeling excited about using donor eggs, you should be - as it's just a step closer to your brooking baby. Am happy that you got some good info off some other ladies. Please do pop in and let us know how it goes. I'm surprised they have more donors than recipients. Are people mostly donating and doing IVF themselves at the same time, or just donating? What lovely people, if so. Either way, that's great. Are you private or NHS for this round?

Not long until your hols as well! Are you staying at home? we hardly ever do that, but when we do it's great.

Thanks for the IC-bashing, girls! i thought they were meant to be super sensitive. We'll just have to wait and see as i'm not testing again.

Hey there Sweetie good luck for Thursday, sounds like a full on day for you! We had to pay £50 for our notes too. So pleased that things will be happening soon for you x

Brooking for you Keeps still hoping for your pre-iui BFP!

Afternoon all, sorry I have been a bit lacking in posts of late am still very much brooking from afar. Just been really busy in RL DH decided we need to start home improvements (hallway, stairs, landing & kitchen replastered and decorated plus new flooring) 6 weeks before Christmas!!! and then we are on holibobs from Saturday - bring it on.

So I see Jen has gone all Christmassy on the NN front, anyone else joining her this year?

Keep those IC can be the most frustrating what do I know i have never had a dual line on any brand of HPT and often others have said the pink line tests such as Superdrug seem more sensitive. Fingers crossed my dear.

Solars so sorry that these letters dont seem to make things easy do they. Best plan is to ring up and speak to someone about it. Hope you get it sorted soon. You have done well to get your IVF notes so quickly, I have paid £50 for mine and still don't expect them until mid December.

Sparks little Twinkle will be 15 weeks by Chrimmy that is so lovely, you will be positively blooming.

Geek I agree with you that the end of Nov is just a bit early for starting Christmas but as Boo says if John Lewis, Coca Cola & Morrisons says so then it must be.

Beedle I love that your DP is so excited about decorating the place, my DH is the same. I said as we are on hols first week in December maybe we could give trimmings a miss this year - if looks could kill OMG.

boo 17 weeks already, where has that gone? We will look around next year, you will have sneezed and boobie will be here

Maybe Imps hope you are ok my lovelies and up to plenty of RL mischief

I have been on a different site i know I am traitor with ladies a bit more experienced on using donor eggs and everything that goes with it. We are both prepared for our appointment on Thursday. I have a list of questions to ask around the donation process, how much we get to find out on the donors cycle, what drugs will be involved this time plus many more. It is a pretty full day on Thursday, we see the consultant, counsellor, nurse, egg donor co-ordinator, give bloods, DH does another SA. The clinic say they have more donors than recipients so i am not sure how long it will take until we are matched but I would think it will be early in the new year. I am sort of looking forward to it in a strange sort of way.

Keep I used IC and got the tiniest, faintest smudge 1 day after AF was due so you are just too early to confirm

Quick post

keep ICs are rubbish, 3 days before my AF was due and an IC gave me a neg, then the following day a faint line, more evap like than anything else! It wasn't till like a week later the IC properly registered, by that point the asda own and CBD had already confirmed my suspicions!! Bloody faulty sticks!!! Brooking like Billy-o for you!!!!

Will catch up properly later

Sounds like a plan, solars. And don't apologise, you'll all be bored by treated to my iui tales next week. Of course you want to avoid ivf if poss, but if there's no treatment for these antibodies than ivf anyway, maybe it's worth testing to see if natural is worth it after the lap.

S'pose it could be too early. Could really use some brooking... Twas only a crappy IC... Must be faulty.

Sorry about bfn Keeps but it still could be too early if AF isn't due until Thursday anyway??

The clinic's letter is all quite confusing really. The letter was left quite open in terms of us coming to a decision about whether we pay for ivf with them or go for a lap in which case we would be discharged back to the gp. The antibodies thing was actually written as a ps!!! They said it is quite likely antisperm antibodies but didn't actually test for it at the time so don't actually know what they are dealing with, so I'm not sure why they also wrote that natural conception is still a goer especially considering in over 3years we've had a hint of nothing I am going to speak to the clinic on Monday and ask to speak to a lab person for more info as this wasn't even mentioned in our review appointment, would like to ask how the sperm is prepared for ICSI ie do they remove the antibodies or just look for sperm without antibodies and also ask if they can get our GP to do the test! DH has already made an appointment with his GP to see if they can do the test but they may only do it if asked by the clinic. We'd like the test done just so that we know what we are up against and can take it along with us to argc. I think in the back of my mind I was just hoping to have a go naturally as ivf/ICSI is just bloody hard going as it is and would really like to avoid it!! Thought the lap would enable that but now we may have a sperm issue too! Sorry about me, me, me :(

Gosh how confusing solars. Have you been discharged from the NHS clinic? If not, ask them. If so, perhaps get an argc appt asap and ask there, am sure GP would just Google it...

I don't get what they mean. I mean, they say that it wouldn't affect natural conception, and you are now doing ivf/icsi anyway. Does it affect icsi, as it seems that's the treatment anyway... How did they end the letter, or was it a 'just so's you know...'?

But you are looking at another ivf/icsi anyway, lovely, due to time trying. So maybe don't worry about 'natural chances', as it's all a guess anyway, and you're doing all you can already.?

God, there are just so many bloody things that can be wrong!!

Bfn this morning. AF not due till Thurs, but at 11/12dpo and possible 'bleeding' on Tuesday, I'm inclined to believe it. Sigh. Was so hoping for a pre-iui brooking miracle.

Well at the moment i'm only going on what Dr Google says and he says it depends on %, high % means ICSI is the only way or even donor sperm! Low could mean that natural is still possible but considering nothing has happened over 3 years for us it doesn't bode well to be continuing naturally? Wish we got this letter before our appointment today. We're wondering if it's worth speaking to our GP or sub fertility clinic about and they can do the testing on the NHS perhaps??

And riots Keep - stay safe! Xx

I think I totally would have gone private if I were you also solars just because the whole waiting game just adds to the stress of it all (and it's not like it isn't stressful enough as it is!). How nice to have the appt and then have the lap done in a couple of weeks. (Well, not 'nice' exactly, you know what I mean!) Totally worth it I think. For my money I think I would be tempted to get dh's sperm tested too if that was a possibility and not prohibitively expensive. If you know there was a potential issue there on your other IVF cycle then it might be worth just getting all the bases covered. Can they do anything different depending on the results?

Keep riots? that sounds scary, stay safe! We did talk about ivf with the consultant, he was quite shocked that they only let us have 1 go on the NHS. He highly recommended ARGC. We were talking this evening about whether we should send off the registration form now as their website said it could take 4-6 weeks for an appointment but we may wait until the procedure is carried.

Biscuits lovely, this was private, as just conscious of my age and not wanting to be frustrated by timescales with the NHS. This is one of the areas the consultant specialises in and he doesn't do ivf anymore but as I said he does recommend ARGC. Yes hopefully we can get started in the new year. Hope all is well with you.

This afternoon we've had another complication to our fertility issues. We received a letter from the ivf clinic today reviewing our cycle and some of you may recall that at our egg collection some of DH's sperm didn't survive the 'spinning' and we had to go for 'emergency' ICSI, well it turns out that they they think this quite likely to do with antisperm antibody. The letter did go on to say that this shouldn't effect natural conception?? Dr Google however says it depends on the % of antibodies Now we're not sure about whether we should get DH's sperm tested??! It may give us a a better idea of our chances naturally?? Not sure now May try and speak to the clinic about this on Monday??

It just feels like its one thing after another now but I guess it's good in a sense that it hopefully means it's giving us some sort of answers to our issues of natural conception not being easy for us. However I'm a brooker and I'm not going to let this stop us and looking at it as a step closer to getting our baby.

That sounds like a really positive appointment Solars - I am so pleased you seem to have found someone who knows what they're talking about! May I ask if you've gone private for this or is it NHS? Is the chap an endo specialist or can he do IVF too? It sounds like a really positive plan in any event (not that you'll be able to have that lap anyway because you'll be staring open mouthed at a positive pregnancy test!)

So in theory you could be looking at IVF in the new year, not that you'll need it?

Talk any ivf, rather...

What great news, solars!! Am brooking of course for bfp in the interim, but if not what a brilliant plan!! When will you go to ivf clinics to look round, after the op?

Am so happy for you! Did you talk any if with this lovely doc.

Riots here today but I'm safe and sound, staying well away.

As promised I'll update you all on our consultation this morning. We had a long discussion about my ivf cycle, the endometrioma and the 2 options we were given by the clinic, either go straight away for another ivf cycle with the endo still there or a lap and waiting 6 months to start ivf again.

Firstly, he said that I wouldn't have to wait for 6 months for ivf if I go for the lap, I would be good to go within a few weeks, the ovaries can heal quite well with the plasma technique he would perform on it. He did a scan and said it was a classic chocolate cyst what a difference it makes to getting seen by a consultant with 35 years of experience and a nurse who first said it was a simple cyst!! We also saw my corpus luteum. There may also be other bits of endo present which he wouldn't be able to see unless he does a lap.

He recommended doing the lap so that we can start with a clean sheet and give ourselves the best chance possible, which is exactly as I thought. So the up shot is we're going to go for the lap, hopefully in a couple of weeks. I'm halfway through my 2ww so we thought we would wait for my next cycle just in case of a brooking miracle that I get my BFP in the next week or so!

Keep sorry we didn't go for the obligatory brunch/lunch post mortem as we had other chores to get back to at home! Is it about a week left 'til your DH gets home now?

Hope everyone else is well and having a good weekend so far x

solars sorry you're not feeling too good about things at the moment. I am brooking like mad for your appointment today. Hope you're having the essential brunch/lunch to dissect it all afterwards with dh

maybe good luck for the hsg. You're having the vf though, so I thought they didn't bother. X

Cupcakes lovely to see you back but sorry work is getting in the way of your MNing must put a stop to that I think the bloods for DH are perhaps the HIV, hep B & C? It's good that things are moving on for you and I am sure they won't refuse your ivf! Unless of course you become pg, which would be the only reason they would. In all honesty I'm not feeling too good about it all, I really want the consultant to say to me tomorrow "oh yes I performed a lap a couple of months ago to get rid of someone's endo cyst and she's just informed me that she's pregnant" I really hope they can give us a realistic chance either way.

Oh no my folder is not posh, I think it was a cheapo one from Rymans Geek. Just to add on the full bladder debate when I had my ET I too was terrified of losing control and at one point the nurse rested a lamp against my inner thigh and the warmth made me believe, for a good minute at least, that I had in fact relieved myself how embarrassing if I had The vitamins sound like a good idea by the way.

Hope you got lots of bargains today Beedle

That's a lovely thing to say to your child that they were much wanted and loved Sparkes hope you're doing we'll.

Keep I find the smiling and lying works best a lot of the time too, although I have to admit it is getting more difficult these days! We had those statements when we were in our year out in Darwin and a couple of people actually said "apparently everyone who comes to Darwin gets pregnant, there's something in the water you know" well we obviously didn't drink enough of it!!

Right my list is all ready now just hoping to hear some good things from the consultant now!

Oh yes if you're lurking Maybe, Sweetie & Scarlett hugs

Thanks all, I'm OK and it wasn't all baby talk. Most was lovely.

8 days sparkly and twinkle!!