To ask for IVF success stories?

[jemimafuddleduck]

Sorry - I know this is not really AIBU but I don't really feel like this fits in Infertility and not sure where else to put it!

I am starting my medications for our first (and hopefully only!) IVF cycle today.

I am fully aware of the possibility that it may not work first time, and have seen lots of stories from people where it has worked second, third, fourth time... or god forbid not at all.

I am trying to have a PMA in relation to my cycle and am thinking THIS IS GOING TO WORK FOR ME!

But it would really help to hear from people who it HAS worked first time for! Can you please share your stories with me to help me remain positive?

I'm particularly interested in people who have used donor eggs as that's our situation.

Thanks in advance!

Actually I’ve just seen that she’s already on your thread 🙈🙈

It's management wankspeak. A three letter acronym for Positive Mental Attitude. Not actually TTC related

Sorry that was for @PetronellaRabbit

I'm 30 weeks pregnant with my 2nd child resulting from my 1st ivf cycle.

I was 41 during treatment using my own eggs and had the scratch done. No acupuncture or anything like that.

12 eggs retrieved, 8 fertilised, 2 best transferred at day 3, none of the others made day 5.

Our problem was male factor so we used ICSI which may have made a difference.

Good luck! I have 2 children from IVF. It didn’t actually work first time but we got there, and it was worth it. I did donate eggs as a part of my treatment package and have since found out that there were children born as a result of that donation.

I got pregnant first time by IVF at 42 and now have a 7 year old son. Good luck to you!

Thanks again to all of your for your stories - these are great!
@PetronellaRabbit yeah PMA = positive mental attitude, basically I'm just trying to be positive about it! That's interesting about no one knowing you used DE, do you mind me asking why you didn't tell anyone? I take it your DC doesn't know? Will you tell them? Feel free to tell me to butt out, but I'm interested in your reasonings for this (no judgement!).
@Coldilox yes I'm pretty much doing the same - continuing to work, eat and exercise as normal (pretty healthy anyway). Not drinking over Christmas is going to be hard, not because I want to drink but because people will guess something is up. No one knows we are ttc let alone going through ivf and I'm just not sure how I'm going to get around it. Being on antibiotics seems to me like a dead giveaway.
@Si1ver "wanky management speak" indeed

jemima it’s a really difficult decision about telling people. I didn’t tell family and friends (actually except for 2 friends and SIL who I love and trust) because I didn’t want people commenting and judging, or accidentally mentioning it to the DC. Once you tell people you can’t untell them!

I haven’t told the DC because I didn’t want them to think that I somehow love DC1 more because they are genetically related to me. I breastfed DC2 for ages because I felt like I was putting something of me into them.

It’s really weird because DC1 is like me when I was a child in personality and DC2 is more like me now! I think that when DC2 is older we will tell them, and get them to have genetic testing probably, because we know no history of our donor.

I don’t mind at all you asking, honestly please ask me anything you want. I don’t care if others on here judge me, we’ve made the decisions that suit us.

IVF, well icsi, worked first time for us. I have a beautiful 6MO DS. I did have quite intensive fertility acupuncture and had been going for a few months before the treatment too. I also had the scratch. We are 'unexplained' and my cycle was text book. I think I had around 22 eggs collected, 21 fertilised, 19 made it to day 3 and 7 or so to day 5 (can't remember exactly). We now have 3 in the freezer.

Good luck. PMA does help I think, although I honestly thought it hadn't worked so was completely shocked when there were two lines

I’m one of those people who took 4 rounds of icsi plus 3 frozen rounds for it to work and then I finally got my beautiful twins. 8 years of heartbreak before that outcome BUT in my long ttc journey I got to know lots and lots of people who had it work first time so it does happen! Ivf cycles are tough and one thing I would say is don’t beat yourself up too much if you can’t maintain the PMA, it won’t make a difference to the outcome.

Thanks for your messages @Liveinfive and @bumblingalongway and congratulations on your DCs.

Thanks for replying @PetronellaRabbit. I absolutely agree that you have to make the right choice for you and understand your reasoning for it. What age are you planning on telling your DC at, or is it more waiting for the right situation rather than the age?
If it helps, one of my best friends is donor conceived (sperm) and found out as an adult, when she became pregnant herself her parents decided to tell her. Although it was a huge shock she cooed with it very well and it didn't negatively affect her relationship with her parents at all.
Having said that, we are planning on telling our DC from the beginning (if we are lucky enough to conceive!). I firmly believe each to their own though x

my love;y friend, after agonizing for ages as to whether they were going to do it, decided to investigate further and at the beginning of dec, had an appointment with the consultant.
They came away definitely wanting to do it, and by second week in January she was pregnant! None of us could believe it was so fast.

baby is now a bouncing 2 year old, and she is about to give birth to baby no. 2 conceived naturally totally by surprise.

6 cycles for me, 3 pregnancies but only 1 baby who is now 11. My boy was a result of frozen embryo transfer and I had acupuncture on the cycle he came from. Good luck to you

IVF worked fist time for us last year! Me and DH both aged 39, unexplained infertility.
I put it off for ages and refused to talk to anyone about babies.. Looking back think I thought that if this doesn't work well that's it, I'll never be a mum. So I buried my head in the sand.

Eventually we took the plunge- didn't tell anyone at all (private as too old for NHS in our area).
12 mature eggs collected, 11 fertilised, and 6 made it to day 5. Had 2 put back in and the rest frozen. 1 implanted- gave birth to DS this spring.
I was pretty negative about it & never expected I'd ever get pregnant. But it worked. Best thing we have ever done.

Ahh I'm loving reading your fantastic stories, this is really making me feel good! Thank you so much and congratulations to you all xx

Mine wasn't donor egg but my one and only attempt at ivf resulted in twins. I didn't do anything special, in fact I just tried to forget about it and went back to work and got on with normal stuff during the two week wait! Good luck!

I’m nearly 11 weeks pregnant from first round of ICSI with my own eggs and I’m 32. I was feeling quite negative throughout and especially when we got 13 embryos but only one made it to day 5. I was convinced it hadn’t worked so cried my eyes out when I got a bfp. Best of luck for your cycle.

ICSI worked first time for us, DS is now 6.
Good luck!

My brother & SIL had 2 rounds of I think icse, they had boy/girl twins from the second round who are now 11 years old, it was my brother who had problems. They were treated at the Jessop Wing in Sheffield.

I had my twins from first-time IVF. Rather than PMA I aimed for super zen-like calm, ate very well, rested, looked after myself and did everything any doctor or medic advised. Also acupuncture. Good luck OP!

Ours worked first time, my eggs were harvested the day before my 43rd birthday. 11 eggs, 8 embryos, the 1st became my daughter after implantation at 5 days and 3 good quality blastocysts were frozen. Of those 3 only 1 was a successful subsequent transplantation, but for complicated reasons not a successful pregnancy unfortunately.

Your mental attitude, whether positive or negative, makes no difference to the outcome of IVF.

Your willingness to accept a donor egg massively loads the dice in your favour though, because the donor is probably younger than you are.

What makes the biggest difference is your bank balance. The more rounds of treatment you can afford, the better your cumulative odds of success.

jemima not sure yet, we’ll get the stroppy teenage years out of the way first! Probably would have told DC2 from birth had we not already had DC1 from my egg. My friend has a family member who had a baby with donated sperm, they told her when she was about 18. Her reaction was - well you always told me I was special, I’m glad that that’s all that meant. They’d been dreading telling her but it was a non-event. I know that every case is different though.

Good luck with your treatment. I really hope you won’t be going on that skiing trip! x

Ivf 9 years ago (icsi). Worked first time but was told the pregnancy would not last as the hg numbers were too low. Prepared myself for miscarriage. Never happened! My daughter turns 9 soon

meant HCG levels