Strapping on our lady balls and going menkul because we HATE THIS SHIT!! The Berries: a lovely bunch of 30 something Ladybros TTC #1

Sesame what a ton of brilliant information. Thanks for sharing, it's really helpful. I like a few of the suggestions made so far and I agree that there isn't any harm in doing a few iui's given the lowish ivf success rate on offer. I would just say that I found iui frustrating though as I wasn't able to know if anything had fertilised and indeed if there had been an egg released, despite having 3 follicles the first time and 2 the second. I had 75 of gonal f and if I did it again I would still do low stims and a trigger I think, plus progesterone. I bled very heavily a week after insemniation the first time as I had no luteal support too. Would you not be able to have any treatment through the NHS? Could you ask for a lap & dye via the NHS based on v painful periods/suspicion of endo (just to get one done)? Which clinic did you decide to go to for a consultation? How are you feeling about it all? I'll probably be doing short protocol with Gennet as they thought my last cycle was very encouraging given my stats. They emailed me today with a couple of further q's the Dr has raised and also a list of tests they suggest, but overall I think I will stick with them if my final nhs cycle doesn't work. Need to get saving though as this house has taken everything.

Happy thinking of you. I'm sure you would get a pretty accurate result on an frer this Sunday if you did test. Fx. Does yours and Lucies FC start you on a natural cycle? Mine starts from bcp so they can pencil you in for ec etc. they are open 7 days anyway though. Lucie great news you will be seen so soon too.

I'm going to post now as my phone is going to die but I'll be back to check in with everyone else soon!

Sesame, yes it is a little yuk but well worth it! Doesn't coasting affect egg quality if you don't trigger at exactly the right time? I'm a little worried about it already. I realise I'm very lucky to have these free attempts though so I'm just going to chill and go with it and let them do their thing.

Thanks for posting all the info up it has been really interesting! It sounds like you are getting things clear in your head and setting out a good path to go down. Are there any other fertility clinics in your area that might be able to do the hsg without a referral? My local clinic will allow people to ring and book whatever they like so I'm sure they aren't all the same.

spare how are you getting on? Are you booked in for an early scan?

clem nice to hear that things are moving along for you. Well done on managing to get all those tests done at the gp, I’m impressed!

happy how are you feeling at the mo? Any symptoms?

lucie thanks for that info, ok have now peaked on ff website and see they’re calling it the yuk test! My 1st fc were small and also didn’t do EC at weekends and preferred to schedule collections only on Mon/Wed/Fri. They would coast you an extra day without stims, or cut down the dose for the last few days, to slow you down. Other places use bcp before the start, for similar reasons.

tiger glad you found them helpful, that’s all my notes posted now – it’s helped me to remember what people told me and to get my head round things. The level 1 mc tests are also listed on one of those earlier posts, in case you want to add any to clem’s list. I’m so for you that your fc are now saying April, I can’t believe it! So glad you’ve got nice things to focus on otherwise, have you chosen a particular colour scheme or theme for your wedding?

barking congratulations on the house purchase, I’m so impressed how much you manage to fit in! I hope this is giving you some good distraction.

beaky hiya, how are you feeling today? Any further thoughts following the consult yesterday?

Well that’s me uploaded the last of my updates from the show. I hope you don’t mind me filling up the thread! I do still have a lot to think about. And I also have my wtf appointment at my fc on Monday to think about and prepare for. So far I’ve decided I do want to keep going if I can, and despite trying to convince myself otherwise, I do want to stick with own egg.

I think my next steps are to book in for an hsg, as without this I won’t know if iui is worth doing, or if I have to stick with ivf. An hsg might also give a little information about my uterus and whether there is anything that might warrant further investigation for failed implantation etc. I called the place that can do an hsg, but they will only do it with a referral, which means asking either my own private fc (who have told me I don’t need one, that the hycosy they offer is just as good, and essentially they would have to refer me to a rival hospital, and they would probably charge me for the privilege) or I would have to ask my gp (as I self referred, I’ve avoided telling them anything about my fertility treatment so far). I don’t like either of these options. I also want to look at the lists of all the other tests and figure out which ones I want to do and how I would go about getting them.

I think I would stick with my current fc if I’m going to try iui. I’m thinking it’s pretty low tech, so I will probably be better doing it based on convenience. If I choose to continue with ivf, I could try my current fc one more time, but only if they are prepared to try something using less drugs. Abroad still feels a bit scary and difficult to fit around my job. This means that the better option for ivf is London. I have already been in touch with one of the clinics I saw to try to book in for an initial consult, and I’m still waiting for them to get back to me.

Wow! Are you going to test this weekend happy?

Kings - I had another mini consult with a very likeable dr, he said not much I can do about my ovarian reserve but I could try dhea for 2-3m if I wanted to - which may or may not help. The reason I liked him was because he accepted straight away that I knew my own mind, that of course I was aware of the increased success rates of donor, but if I wanted to carry on pursuing own egg at age 40, that was a perfectly valid thing to do. He thought that the issue with amh was no.s not quality, which made the success rates for ivf lower, but there was still every possibility I could become pg as a result of treatment.

So I brought up the iui vs ivf thing. He thought about it and agreed straight away with the other consultant. He actually thought it was a very sensible thing to do. He said if I was going to try for another 6 months that I should do 6 months of iui, back to back, which would give me the equivalent chances of success, for less cost. He also didn't see much of a reason for stims, given it's not likely to change the egg count. Now I also think I have to bear in mind that amh, or iui or even treating single women is not his specialism but it was nice at least to chat to a sympathetic dr who told me something I wanted to hear.

Ohhh OK in Czech they collect any day of the week so that's a bit different. I would worry a little that they would be over mature but if that's the way it's done I will have to just go with it and see what happens. They prob won't let me go to blast either if I don't have many embryos.

Ok thanks happy. What if the eggs are the right size to be collected on a weekend though? Do they just let them get too big and potentially not get as many? The joys of the NHS!

barking to be honest, I was surprised too, that the GP agreed, but I figured I could ask, and what is the worst that could happen...he could say no and tell me to bugger off. fortunately he didn't tho.

Happy, sorry for all the questions but what's happens if you need a scan or egg collection on the weekend or on a bank hol with the nhs?

Lister - they had a busy stand at the show with lots of consultants/nurses etc on hand to speak to potential patients. They also gave me a 50 off voucher for an initial consult.

I had a much more positive chat with one of their drs with an interest in low ovarian reserve. I can share her name if anyone is interested. When she heard my history she agreed I could continue to try with own egg if I want, although recognising my chances are low.

I got the impression that she saw low amh as a numbers rather than quality issue. It's a different stance to my current fc, where the founder has a strong specialism in amh but has strongly held views that it impacts on egg quality too. Essentially it is possible the dr knew to tell me what I wanted to hear. She also thought that given I only got one egg on the last round that if my tubes were open that my chances of success with iui were probably now exactly the same as ivf - with less cycles. She thought that despite low amh and 2 years of trying, my problem at it's core was essentially lack of sperm and both routes could give the same result. Ivf could still have the edge in terms of success per try, but iui is more cost efficient, less demanding, and I could have more tries back to back. This advice is the opposite to what my fc told me.

There is a big if to all of that. My tubes must be open. She recommended I should get an hsg rather than hycosy to find out. She thought that there's a small chance that past ec's could have damaged the tubes and a good hsg would show a better resolution at the distall end, which I wouldn't get with a hycosy. My fc doesn't do hsg, so if that's what I want I need to think about how I get it organised.

Thanks happy, both of my last two cycles were a bit of a disaster with numbers. I only got 3 collected and 2 mature but the % to blast was good. I think I will tell them about one of those cycles rather than the one where I got 7 collected. I can't decide if I want to do antagonist or flare again though. I suppose it doesn't really matter. I can tell them about either one and they can decide if I should do the same again or something different. Sounds a bit of a nightmare with the appts. I only work 10 mins away from crgw and I always used to get the earliest appt around 8am so that was pretty straightforward.

Happy I got my iui bfp at 12dpo on a frer. At 8dp5dt you are 13dpo, definitely worth a pimp!!!! I'd get frer though. As sesame says, 99% accurate!

clem, wow, can't believe you managed to get level 1 tests from your gp?! After over 2.5 years ttc and two mc's I still had to fight my case to be referred to the recurrent miscarriage clinic to get them done! They usually refuse unless you've had 3 mc's.

tiger Wedding planning rocks for distraction! So does suddenly buying a house and needing to sell one in 2 weeks!!

tiger it was a friend of a friend (who had a long hard fertility journey) who suggested I get these checked (she said it would help highlight if there were any other factors affecting things). List she gave me (which I passed to the GP and he just wrote up the blood test form thingy) had the following on it:

1. Full blood count, liver function tests, Urea and Electrolytes
2. Thyroid function tests (both free T4 and TSH)
3. Immunoglobulin panel (IgG, IgA and IgM)
4. Autoimmune antibodies (must include anti-nuclear antibodies,

1. Anticardiolipin antibodies (both IgC and IgM)
2. Thrombophilia (must include lupus anticoagualant, Factor V Leiden

Doc said he'd never heard of no. 6, but put it on the form anyway, and nurses at haematology unit at the hospital didn't bat an eyelid.

I did mention to the FC about whether level 1 immunes was something they could do, and it wasn't.

My next steps are to go with zita west, to get my level 1 immune test results translated.

hope that helps...

happy if you wanted to test on Sunday that would be the equivalent of 13dpo, which should give you 99% accuracy on a frer, according to the back of the box. Nope, not at all obsessed with early testing over here...

Thanks for the info happy, that's brilliant! So do they not need to do fsh, LH and all that malarkey again? My results are over a year old now. I'm not sure what to do if they say book in for treatment there and then and get your drugs. In that case I guess I would be starting off my jan af which would be around 4th Jan but then I'm thinking if I go back to Czech in Jan and have another round there I would maybe have 4 or 5 blasts frozen to try for a sibling if I was lucky enough for the NHS to work. That would delay the NHS until probably March though and I think am I mad to do that if they offer me to start straight away?? Are they quite flexible if you say you want to start in a particular month or do they like you to do it when they tell you? I told her on the phone today that I have had one treatment privately. It so hard to decide which one to tell them about though. I can't decide whether to go with the antagonist one or the short flare? How often do they scan you when you have treatment? Might be awkward with work as I can't imagine they are early mornings or at convenient times. This appt is at 11.30am so will have to make up a reason to leave work for a bit without getting too many questions from my nosey colleagues!

Omg I don't think 8dp5dt is too early with a frer I think it would definitely show something by then. I told myself next time I'm going to wait until 7dp5dt as I started early so think you will definitely be ok at 8 days only with frer though. Good luck really hope this is it for you.

Also meant to ask - does anyone else get v bloated around ov? I really do get a round tum!

X post happy. 8dp5dt is 12dpo right? So possible with a FRER I would say. Everything crossed for you xx

sesame thanks for sharing all of this information, it's really helpful. The approaches are all so different, and your notes are fantastic at giving an overall impression of each. Did you come away with any strong feeling toward a particular clinic? I get what they are saying at create - it ties into my own feelings that ivf is so drastic or it's the wrong answer to solve the problem (if they even knew what the problem was in my case).

clem I'm I interested to hear your GP did level one immunes testing rather than the FC. Can anyone tell me what the level one immunes tests are made up of please?

I'm considering the hidden c test lucie, especially as my cycle looks like it will be delayed. I was rather wild in my teens and 20s. Whilst I was mostly careful, it wouldn't surprise me to have something lurking in the background.

ungoog how are you feeling today? Hope the worst of af is out of the way now.

spare hope you're going ok.

happy hope you're hanging in there. Am Pom-Pomming like mad for you. When are you testing?

beaky hope you're ok. How are you feeling at the moment? Are you still in the wigwam? If so, I'm coming in , as I need somewhere to hang out sulk about the crappy delays at my FC! Can't believe that staff shortages mean I have to delay my cycle until April. That is pants timing for so many reasons. Grrrr

Waves at barking if you're lurking.

Hi pip good to see you lady, and good work on the Berry recruitment!

Other than being told my cycle will now start in April rather than Jan, I'm ok. Just plodding along till the appointment next thurs and concentrating on the wedding. It's such a relief to give over some of the headspace that has been thinking about TTC to flowers, dresses and rings!

Create - their stand was chaos, there were lots of staff but not many that seemed to be able to deal with questions. I persisted and it was worthwhile. Eventually I found out they had a show discount of an initial test package plus consult for about 200, possibly instead of 300+ (although I'm still waiting for details about which package this actually covers...).

By milling about for long enough, I eventually managed to have a chat with Dr N herself. She said she was shocked that my first treatment was a LP with an amh

Sesame, it's a little bit gross but you have to send off a bit of blood from af If it comes back positive the penny will give you a prescription for the antibiotics. I ordered mine from a chemist in London that I know accepts foreign prescriptions by email. They are very good and the medication arrives the next day. Think it was around £50 for medication and £200 for the test. I'm going to have a hysteroscopy next year as well. I know a couple of ladies who have had them at my clinic recently and although nothing has shown up on previous scans they have had several polyps and necrotic cells removed so think it's well worth it to double check before putting anything back in there.