To be upset DH said no?

[ThinkingFeeling]

After lots of tests and years and years trying to conceive we've been offered IVF via the NHS.

DH has very low sperm count, I have very damaged tubes and a low egg reserve. Bad quality too. Also suspected endometriosis.

DH has said he's a flat 'no' to IVF because our chances of success are so low (confirmed by specialist) and he doesn't want to go through an unnatural conception. His opinion.

That's it then. I'll never be a mum. Please, no miracle 'it happened as soon as I stopped stressing' stories...I can't take it.

AIBU to be upset he's just a flat out 'no'? Even though it's the sensible rational choice. I love him, I wouldn't want to leave him. We have an amazing marriage. I never thought we'd be infertile. Maybe I just have to come to terms with it.

'He' doesn't want to go through an unnatural conception' - erm, all he has to do is have a wank, it's far more onerous for you. I can understand why you are devastated by this but is there absolutely no further negotiation to be had? The success rate may be low but not as low as not trying.

ThinkFeeling adoption has been fantastic for us but I'm not going to push it on you when you're grieving. However, if the only thing making you doubt it is a traumatic past, please rest assured that it wont rule you out. Have you received help to overcome your trauma? Sought counselling etc? If so, you could be a loody fantastic parent to an adopted child. A parent who has overcome trauma and hardship is much better experienced to parent a traumatised child than a person who has never experienced anything bad in life.

This must feel awful for you both.

My only thought is that there is an ocean between a "low" chance and "no" chance. I don't know if I could get past a flat No when there is still a glimmer of hope, no matter how faint.

ICSI with egg donation. You'd have a great chance.

Ah @ThinkingFeeling, my heart hurts for you it really does. Much as I think your DH is not unreasonable for reaching his limit, I also don’t think you are unreasonable to be gutted about it. Sometimes life is horribly unfair.

YANBU to feel upset.
And youknow your DH isnt ureasonnable either.
Just like if one of you decided to not have children and the other did. There is nothing rigt or worng.

Is there a fertility counsellor attached to your fertility hospital? They are usually vey good! I would go and see them, on your own, to be able to talk about how you feel, the end of the road etc.... Its a harsh situation you are in. You need support and sympathy to work through it.

The wait for IVF on the NHS is usually long. Have you been on the wait list and now you are eligible your DH has changed his mind or are you about to go on the list?
If it's the latter go on the list and continue to discuss it together.
If I was in this position I think I would find it very hard to accept someone else taking away my chance to have children. It's a big decision but you could consider going ahead by yourself opting for IVF with donor sperm.

BTW, I am not sure why so many posters seem to think its ok to push the OP to still go on woith the IVF.
comments about donor egg wth ICSI, its just wank for him etc...

The bottom line is that this guy doesnt want a child. Whether ots because how the child would be conceived or for any other reasons, he doesnt want to.
I am not sure its right to push the OP in trying to convince him to still do so. That would be the best way to damage a good relationship.

Define 'great chance' opticaldelusion

Even with donor eggs and ICSI it's still less likely to work than not.
Fwiw it's a chance I'd be prepared to take but I'd not call it a 'great chance'.

So sorry for all the trauma you have been through OP 💐

IVF gets round low sperm count and damaged tubes, your chances aren't necessarily any lower than other patients going through IVF. My husband has almost non existent sperm and we successfully had our daughter. I think you both need time to come to terms with the treatment options and perhaps some counselling. Good luck x

Your DH is being V, V unreasonable. When I was having fertility treatment my DH didn't want to do it either. He wanted DC, just didn't see why he had to go through all the drama. My doctor actually swore and said to him "FFS, all you have to do is put your stuff in the pot. Your wife has to do all the hard work". This wasn't in the UK.

Give him a few days and then he needs to know how important this is to you.

By the way I have 2 DC from fertility treatment. They don't come out with 2 heads.

wow, it is your body and you want to be a mum, all i am going to say is life is too short!

(and yes, it's an unbelievably difficult choice but if i wanted something so bad, i would try to not let another person stop me)

Neither of you are unreasonable, we each have our own limits.

I've been where you are. We had a consultation for ICSI and decided that the chances of success were far too low to endure the heartache. We explored adoption but weren't suitable. And we've looked at surrogacy but the risk is just too high.

So we've made our peace with being child free. It was fucking hard to come to terms with, but we made it through to the other side. We have a great life and we're very happy.

If I could change my decision on the IVF honestly I wouldn't. It wasn't right for me, but that doesn't mean it isn't right for others.

It is clearly a very difficult and individual decision. The problem is that there are two of you who have different perspectives and neither of you is being unreasonable.

The decision to have children or not is highly emotional and almost impossible to rationalize but that doesn't mean his no or your yes is wrong.

There are so many things in life that don't work out how you want. Clearly, this is a big one, but he isn't being unreasonable. You do have a right to be upset - it's an upsetting situation. Can you get to a place where you can accept his no, and he can accept your reaction? If you can both support each other's feelings & decisions then you should get through this. But it will take time. It's a legitimate form of grief.

fwiw - I also had a health condition in my 20s that affected my fertility & was ignored by doctors. I think young women get dismissed about health concerns far too easily. If doctors has done one simple blood test on me, then my fertility could have been much better and my life completely different. That's so hard to learn to live with, but I can't change a thing about it.

We did do IVF (and have 1 daughter) but the emotional train wreck of it was FAR worse than all of the testing leading up to it. Your DH is making a sensible decision. The treatment was so hard to go through that we decided we couldn't face doing it again for a second child (and we didn't have as many obstacles to overcome - in theory we were fertile but just didn't get pregnant). Deciding not to have a second child was absolutely the hardest thing to do, but IVF can be emotionally destructive; many couples end up divorcing or never having sex again. I'd agree with your husband that putting yourselves through that for a million-to-one shot is just too much.

I'm really sorry your husband feels this way. Would your husband consider artificial insemination? The clinic can spin his sperm and seperate the good ones and put these in your womb? Its not as natural as the actual act, but it is still his sperm entering your womb and hopefully fertilising your regular egg being released. Its just increasing your chances as the good sperm won't have to fight through the deformed sperm!
Clinics recommend IVF because that is the best chance of you getting pregnant...but if you ask them they are unlikely to refuse to pay for artificial insemination if you would prefer that - it would be cheaper for them too.
My husband's sperm was 0 - the specialist didn't even trust his sperm to be able to penetrate an egg so we had ICSI and fell pregnant when I was 35 on our first attempt.
One thing I would say is, I did lots of research into fertility including on poor sperm to improve our chances. Things like its better to give a man with a low sperm count 500g vit C in the morning and another 500g at night rather than 1000g in one go. Or that binge drinking is very very bad for sperm - a little each day is better than a binge session. And make sure he keeps his phone out of his pocket! Heat is very bad for sperm - boxes are the best option.
There used to be a fertility charity that had great success with improving natural fertility especially for woman in their 40s where they tested the couple's hair samples and recommended vitamins or heavy metal detox programmes as appropriate.
The charity recommended getting your pelvis checked by a cranial oesto to make sure you are aligned ie your womb is not being tugged because its not in the right position as that's not an ideal situation for embroy implantation, that you go to a GUM clinic for a sexual health check, that you avoid aluminum kettles and pans etc.
But its now closed unfortunately - if you haven't already - I highly recommend you go to someone who will test both your bloods to see if you are missing any key nutrients. I recommend Dr Alan Stewart who works near Harley Street. www.stewartnutrition.co.uk
Dr Stewart keeps prices to a minimum and was a GP before he trained as a nutritionalist. Dr Stewart picked up my zinc levels where so low that at that level IVF was not going to work regardless of what I did.
www.stewartnutrition.co.uk
If you can afford it - I also highly recommend acupuncture. They have done official research into it and it has been proven to increase fertility especially on the day of implantation.

Knowing how much you want a baby and everything you’ve been through and that your husband was initially onboard with having a baby, I think he’s being very selfish and cruel to turn around any deny you the chance now.

Yes, IVF might not be successful, but you could have a free try through the NHS and all he would have to do is provide sperm. He wouldn’t have to undergo any procedures or anything? You’d be doing all the hard work.

I think to move the goal posts right at the last minute is a horrible thing to do.

@ThinkingFeeling

Huge hugs from me. One childless wannabe mum to another. DH infertile. My fertility is ok. We're 38 & 39. Our chances at IVF are so poor we opted not to even try as we'd only get one shot on the NHS. But it was a joint decision. Joint.

DH felt guilty, like he's deprived me of the experience of being a mother. I felt sick that I'll never experience a successful pregnancy after a history of miscarriage and a termination donkey's years ago.

It took us a few years to come to terms with it, all and now we're going through the adoption process.

None of it is quick. None of the feelings are wrong. None of the feelings are invalid. You're both grieving for the loss of what you had expected to be experiencing in one way or another by now.

Take the time you both need to do that, and consider that you might need to have a few minutes to do it separately or at least do it differently while you grieve in your own ways.

OP I get you. You are grieving for something that is gone and anyone in your situation would be the same. You sound like a very strong couple who will get through it, but it is a horrible situation and I really feel for you.

Your DH isn’t wrong to have his opinion, especially as the consultant has confirmed that your chances of success are low. I can see that he feels he is probably saving both of you a lot of heartache. But I would be devastated in your shoes.

Have you heard of Gateway Women? A good place to start finding your peace with childlessness.

ThinkingFeeling,

We got the low sperm count diagnosis and were immediately referred for IVF so I went along with everything before my husband was like 'hold on, is this what we actually want?'. The truth was that it wasnt, it just felt like the next step. Actually at this time I decided enough was enough and if I wasnt going to get the family that I wanted so bad then I wasnt going to stick in a job for thr good maternity package and retrained. I had to find my identity somewhere else. I was fed up of being bitter and jealous of every single woman who I knew or followed on social media. The career change was absolutely the mental boost I needed.

My DH said no to IVF, when we were suffering from secondary infertility. We had already had IUI.

It was an incredibly painful time but I just had to make a decision to not hold it against him. It was too big a thing and, given that the problem for us seemed to be with implantation, who's to say that it would have worked anyway?

But, I would honestly advise keeping that appointment. You don't want him to come around at a later date and find that you have lost your place on the list.

NoCauseRebel - I’m calling bullshit on this^ Statement. Having already had a child changes everything. well that’s where you’re wrong. IVF was something which we talked about before I got pregnant with DS and even then I was stil of the view that it wasn’t something I wanted to go through.

And given the OP’s dh is the one who has the low sperm count he is not wrong to want to be in charge of this part of his own ability to reproduce, or not. I really wish that people would stop shouting about how they would LTB under similar circumstances. If the OP hadn’t wanted to be the one to go through IVF and her husband wanted to leave the relationship because of it he would be branded a selfish bastard on here, yet the husband doesn’t want to go through IVF (and no, IVF isn’t just having a wank in a cup for a man, it is a long, arduous and emotional process with an extremely low success rate even in the most successful conditions) she should ltb and take the same limited chances with an as yet non existent partner and likely still end up with no child at the end of it all, and no happy marriage either.

Let’s be honest here, the reason why three rounds of IVF are recommended is because the success rate is extremely low and hasn’t really increased much over the years. For every successful pregnancy which occurs through IVF there are two failed attempts. The OP and her dh both have fertility issues and have been told that the likelihood of successful IVF is minimal. Knowing that the likelihood of success is low anyway (between 30 and 40% nationally) and being told that the chances are lower than that even is perfectly legitimate reason for not wanting to go through that process.

And adoption, while fantastic for some is not the be all and end all either. Adoption no longer means having a baby, it means likely adopting a child with severe emotional and behavioural issues, and the older the child, the higher the chances of failure. But people don’t talk about that, they bandy about the “you could always adopt” line in the same way some people might pop down to the local rescue and adopt a puppy. It’s not for everyone, and nobody is in the wrong for having their personal cut-off points.

I think you need to talk to your DH about how much this means to you. Yes chances are low but not non-existent. It may not work but how will you feel if you don't try?

Yes his views are valid but I think it is easier for men to adapt to the idea of childlessness / a life without children. I've had my own challenges and I couldn't give up TTC until we really had tried everything - I would have struggled if my DH had said that's it, not prepared to do it any more.

I suspect your DH may be feeling very low at the moment and needs time to process and regroup. It is wearing going through fertility testing and sometimes we both reached the end of our emotional reserves and said 'we can't do it any more' but we did after a bit of space ...

Perhaps you could put on hold now and revisit in a couple of months - assuming that the offer of NHS IVF isn't going to disappear

But people don’t talk about that, they bandy about the “you could always adopt” line in the same way some people might pop down to the local rescue and adopt a puppy. It’s not for everyone, and nobody is in the wrong for having their personal cut-off points

totally this! People love to throw this out there