TTC 6+ months plus, part 2

[skeletonbones]

New thread as the old one was getting to 1000. So, 4 BFP's in the last thread, lets see if we can up the total considerably on this one :)

Boys names are much harder than girls names because it's a fine line between unique and pretentious. I did have names picked out but then as everyone has a baby before me the names I like keep getting used! If I don't get pregnant soon I'm worried that there will be no names left. I don't want a very unusual name but I don't want there to be loads of others in my circle of friends iykwim. I also have the difficulty of trying to find a name that can be pronounced ok here and in the UK. Lots of names I like have had to be ruled out because they don't sound right or people can't pronounce in one of the countries. But I suppose I will have lots of time to choose one. I don't know how people manage when they only have 9 months .

peace if you don't ovulate this cycle don't worry. The gynae said yesterday that everyone has a bad cycle every now and again and it is not true that people ovulate every single month. Also, she said that if you see a rise from temping then it is likely you did ovulate but if you don't see a rise it is still possible you have ovulated but the temp rise is so small that it's not picked up. My pcos was picked up because my hormones were a bit out and then on the ultrasound scan she could see cysts on my ovaries. I don't have any other symptoms or signs though so I would never have known myself.

pout I'm on cd22. Gawd. In 2 years of temping, this has happened twice before. Once I had swine flu (was actively not trying and had a bit of a panic when period was 1 days late - also got a bit excited, hence deciding that I did want a baby after all). Then at Christmas, I really thought I was preggers actually, sore boobs, nausea - I felt different, hadn't felt like that before but period was two week late (wasn't temping very accurately then because I left my thermometer at my mums - thats when she found out). I had three weeks of bleeding then too so I don't know what happened there. So, not unheard of but unusual for me. I like to think sperm and egg mad friends that month but who knows. I also had a cold then too. Sorry, just writing through my own thoughts here. I'm likely to get quite boring with this lost egg saga - maybe my thermometer is broken - it's been pushing out the same temp for days.

I also get a lot of ibs symptoms and am generally a bit fragile in terms of my abdomen. Hadn't really thought about endo too much, I guess I'll have to see what comes out of next months apt. And thanks mrsden I like the sound of your gynae a lot, so do pass on her useful bits of info.

joycep I have no idea if yoga assists in fertility per se, but it is amazing at soothing your brain, which is what I need at the moment. I go to a small class of about 10 people and the teacher is very inspirational. I think you have to find the right class though, gym ones can be a bit procedural and unfriendly. I don't feel ashamed to say that my 2 years of yoga have been quite life altering. I'm such a stress head and it really has helped. I do hatha yoga once or twice a week and a gym one and ones at home. But I fancied getting more of a workout and bikram is a real cardio challenge. I am not convinced that 90 minutes in 40degrees heat is probably all that good for conception but in my current mood I don't really give a s**t because the months I've done everything 'right' have not worked either. It released so many endorphins yesterday that I laughed on and off all afternoon, which is considerably better than crying at least

Morning.

mrsd and joycep im so glad you are both feeling a bit better. The eggs/cyst thing is so frustrating but your gynae sounds like she was v reassuring about it. I'm grateful that you posted about it because i'll be less likely to panic when it happens to me. Mass annovulation, god, that is all we need at the moment isn't it?

nelly belated happy birthday!

euro your DH sounds like mine. He is totally obsessed with ice cream and constantly consumes Ben and jerry's and mars ice cream bars. He is always buying it and makes my pre holiday "being good" efforts very difficult as the freezer is always full of the stuff and I can't resist!

joycep I have been over analysing the story about the pg girl in your office and the giving up smoking thing. I was wondering if she'd been trying for longer than a year and had given up smoking when she'd been trying for a while and it hadn't worked. I think I may need to get a life.

pout really glad you have made some headway and your doctor is on board with it, that's great,

peace I've been trying for just over a year time wise, just about to start cycle 12 when af arrives. How about you? The other thing that is odd about my cycle is I have a weirdly long LP, I usually dont start af until 17 dpo. I know this is better than a short one but I've often wondered if it means my hormones are out of whack as no one else seems to get this. Glad you enjoyed bikram, it's mental isn't it, I didn't realise it was possible to sweat that much. Hope your eggs put in an appearance soon.

Re yoga there is a fertility yoga DVD on amazon which looks pretty good, I was thinking about investing. I will post a link if I can figure out how. I came across it while looking at zita west stuff. Has anyone got her books or CDs? Are they worth investing in or just full of the same crap we've read a thousand times before?

Morning all,

I am feeling a bit better today - thanks to all who asked :) Still bleeding but no AF pains so continuing in limboland where my brain knows that I'm out for the month but my completely unbalanced emotions keep hoping that I'm one of those people who are pg anyway

One week today until my mother goes home. Really struggling not to snap at her constantly. Why is it that I am so critical of everything she does? Probably because I see myself in her and I am hyper critical of myself.......

I've been thinking a lot about endo too pout but the thought of taking time off TTC makes me nervous. Painful periods and bowel issues during AF combined with this spotting makes me wonder about it. No doctor has ever raised the issue though. Will probably try the fertility clinic first and if we don't get anywhere will ask for a lap. I will learn all about it from you :)

I'm off for another day of tea and entertaining......... Have a great Tuesday everyone!

Hi everyone, on phone again so struggle to remember what you have all said. I'm very sorry about the eggs MrsD, that was very rude of them . At least your gyn seems to know what to say; though I'm sure that only helps a tiny bit.

Agh boss just back at his desk as I start this so better scoot, pretending I'm texting! Sounds like a few of you are feeling a little bit happier today at least.

Thanks for the birthday wishes, fingers crossed the extra effort works

pout I am another one who stuffs junk into cupboards but otherwise has a tidy house!

My closest friend had two laps for endo when she was ttc. At the end of it, they said she should be able to conceive naturally but they had ICSI anyway because of male factor issues. She was in incredible pain every month. She had to go home from work. She's dreading it coming back now, post-pregnancies.

My names are now too popular for me to use. They were unusual when I first liked them! My name is very common. There were 5 of us in my class at school! It got very confusing sometimes. Particularly when the teacher with the wonky eyes [technical term] used to ask a question and then say the name of whoever she exected to answer. She could look at two of us at once....

I'm on CD13 and spotted some EWCM just as I was off to bed, uber-tired, last night. But managed to muster the energy for a quickie! Hopefuly I should ovulate in the next day or two.

I've given up on the name searching, it was making me dream to much about having my own baby. I always feel relieved when someone has a baby and gives it a name I don't like. I have a horrible feeling that some of my favourite names might get used by friends over the next year.

I'm feeling fine but I'm bored of waiting. I want to be pregnant NOW. I feel like I've wasted a lot of the last year thinking about ttc. I remember last August we were on holiday and I was so sure that I had pregnancy symptoms but of course it came to nothing. At least now I don't symptom spot so I've made some progress. I might follow your lead pout and try and clear some rubbish out, I think I need a little project to work on because my motivation to do most things has seriously vanished.

That's good news about the ewcm euro. I wish you very happy SWI over the next few days.

I've just nastily sniggered at your teacher with the wonky eyes euro

mrsden bored of waiting is exactly it. Enough already. I haven't totally given up symptom spotting but it's idle speculation these days. All I can say is thank god I didn't decide to give up booze when we started ttc. I'd be even more of an angry mess for wasting a whole year sober . I'm only partly joking.

He'llo,

Cd10 here...

Just got back from lunch with dh, apparently his prodigy and wife are pregnant, whoopy do!

Day 11 here so you, me and Euro are quite close. We can share the madness together!

What on earth is going on with the pregnancy announcements. I haven't had one for a while but that could be because everyone we know has given birth recently . Work is massive though, so I'm sure it's just a matter of time. And every day there is another pram to avoid at lunchtime, with proud parents showing of their bubba to their colleagues. The sound of them crying is like a lovely little stake in the eye to me

Peace - thanks for the info on yoga. That's really interesting it has been life changing. I 'm terribly neurotic and get stressed easily and i don't have a stressful job or life at all. I do think I need to learn meditation or some buddhist practices to really help me loosen up a bit more!

Popcorn - I sidled up to the girl in my office today when no one else was here just to ask her a few questions. I didn't out rightly ask how long she had been trying but we got discussing a few things. She has wanted a child for ages but it clearly has taken her a while. I now think over a year by what she was saying. she gave up coffee well over a year ago. I also realise she is nearly 40, partner nearing 50. She has been doing bikram yoga for years and now does pregnancy yoga. I don't think she did ivf but she has a friend who was trying for 5 years and after 4 rounds of ivf she finally got pregnant. Anyway, her friend has just told her she is pregnant naturally 9 months after giving birth at the age of 42. Well personally I love hearing positive stories like this....she got there in the end basically. Anyway my colleague was saying that she thinks that conceiving can be psychological...uuum not sure i buy this but she said it is so stressful she thinks this can be a problem.

Madness - so sorry about the bleeding and about the mother situation. How stressful for you.

Karbea - sorry you heard that over lunch...friends announcing pregnancies is terrible but I don't like even hearing of people I use to know or sort of know being pregnant. In fact I don't like seeing pregnant women in the street....even though some of those women could have struggled. Emma Thompson said in an interview that she use to count how many children people had who passed in the street as she was in such a depression about not conceiving. I find I count now which is a bad sign.

Karbea Despite some strong competition, I think that the prize for worst timed pregnancy announcement goes to you this week. Oh God. How do you feel about it - apart from the obvious? I'm assuming of course that this is not what you wanted to hear - maybe I'm wrong!

Euro I too must be a nasty person because I choked on my tea laughing at your teacher with the "wonky eyes".

About your friend, my GP said that often having a baby sorts out the Endo so hopefully she won't suffer too badly post pregnancy.

Madness Without me wishing to go on and on about this like I'm some sort of expert, which I'm not at all my GP said that it is best not to bring up suspected endo and frame it in terms of affecting conception because at the fertility clinic they are unlikely to be very interested in it. She recommended seeing the GP & framing it in terms of specifically a gynae problem - ie you feel ill and your periods are a pain (literally) in the bum - then you are more likely to get the referral for a lap. Does that make sense????

BTW I'm glad that you are feeling better today

Joycep I'm glad to hear that you too are a bit brighter today. Being tired certainly doesn't help when you are down and it does make things harder to cope with - mind you I challenge anyone to have the kind of day you had yesterday and stay sane.

Hopefully we're moving to Surrey. We have been put forward for a house by the estate agents but there is still so much that can go wrong so it's definitely not in the bag yet. We also have some competition so I'm worried about that. I really like the house though. It's not the palatial place we need, it's smaller than here, but it's kooky which is a big plus.

Mrsd If someone "takes" my baby name of choice that will be the last straw and will really feel like somebody upstairs is taking the Michael.
I sympathise with the pronunciation thing. My Mum wanted to call me something different but she ran it past my Grandad and he kept dropping the aitch off the start of the name (he was very or, cor, blimey guv'nor) so she had to ditch it I'm glad though because I was the only person with my name in the school for many years.

Hi everyone

Sorry I haven't been on for a while, I wanted to try avoid thinking about TTC until we had our consultant appointment which we had this afternoon.

It wasn't good DH is currently not talking so i'm going to go to the gym later and leave him to think things through.

Just wanted to say i'm still here. I'll read through all the posts i've missed and update you on our situation after the gym

I hope you're ok fatima. I always find it's best to have a bit of time on my own after an appointment so I can think it all through and get it straight in my head before speaking to DH.

That's interesting about your colleague joycep. Do you think she gave up smoking after ttc for a while? I don't know how much it affects women but we were told that smoking has a very bad effect on sperm.

That sounds more positive about your housing situation pout. Do you mind me asking why you are moving from West Sussex? I heard that it was a lovely place to live but this is from an ex-colleague of mine who lives in Haywards Heath and she is prone to boast a bit but to hear her talk you'd think it was heaven on earth so I wondered what your take on it was. One day I'll visit and see for myself.

I hope you're all safe from the riots, I've been asked about it loads today, such a shame that people see the pictures and think that is what the UK is like

Fatima I hope that you are okay too. I hope that your DH opens up a bit to you when you get back from the gym.

mrsd I really like West Sussex though I wouldn't describe it as "heaven on earth"! We are in a little village just outside one of the towns so it is a bit quiet for me if I'm honest. We're moving because of DP's job. The train fares from here into central London are massive so we figured that we may as well pay more rent but have cheaper train fares and DP will get a shorter commute to boot. He also does a lot of site work around Surrey so he will find that easier too. I am a bit worried now though that we will lose the IVF safety net. But what's to say that the funding wouldn't be withdrawn anyway next financial year.

I am gobsmacked & livid by the rioting. DP says that there was some trouble in Kilburn last night close to where we lived a few years ago. That sent a bit of a chill through me. I really want the government to send the army in and put a curfew in place because this can't go on. I hope that everyone on here is safe too.

I'm with you on the shorter commute and lower train fares pout. We could have lived in a more rural area but I didn't want a long commute and I'm really pleased we live where we do because I can be home within 15 minutes. I really hope you get this place.

It's awful that we all have to think about paying for ivf. I wish I could wave a wand and we would all be pregnant. We so deserve it now, we've waited long enough surely?

Fatima - oh it sounds like you ahve had a horrible day. We really aren't doing well on this thread at the moment...I hope you are ok.

Pout - cross fingers your kooky place comes through. It's about time something went your own way.

MRsd - my colleague is French and I was reading an article the other day where apparently a lot of french women still smoke through pregnancy so I'm not sure if she gave up after she was trying for a while. My grandmother use to smoke during pregnancy. It never seemed to effect people's fertility. I have heard it is terrible for a man's sperm but my father use to smoke 80 a day and they never had any problem conceiving. Like all of these things, it seems to effect some but not others.

urrh pout - all these rioters are complete scumbags. These poor people who have lost their homes and livilihoods.

Evening all,

To join in the baby name debate, I had a name that I liked that my best friend used for her daughter . I'm over it now but was quite tearful when I deleted it from the list that I have actually typed up on the computer . DH has banned any name associated with royalty so that rules out pretty much all of my family names!

Fingers crossed for the new house pout. When we got this place a key factor in the decision was that DH can walk to work. I need the car for my job but he can just stroll over 15 minutes before he starts.

Haven't bitten my mother's head off as yet, so it's been a good day. 6 days to go :)

Karbea I know what you mean, I hate pregnancy announcement. My colleague and good friend is pregnant after two months off the pill but I am actually really happy for her.
But MIL and other people keep telling us about so and so from 3 streets down who's pregnant

Anyway.... our appointment...

We didn't see the consultant but one of his fertility nurses. She looked at our results and went through our history. DH has had another SA since the first which came back worse

So the jist of it is, we can't have children.
She's put us on the NHS waiting list for ICSI which is approx. a year.
Her big concern is that DHs count is VERY low, and it's lower in the second test than the first. So she's advised us to get some of his sperm frozen as she's worried that in a years time when we get to the top of the waiting list that he wont have any sperm

So, we've got the 1 NHS free go and we need to look at whether we'd want to go private while we wait, or after. I'm also looking in to egg sharing, to see if that's an option to bring costs down.

I don't really know how I feel at the moment. I CAN'T NOT have children, I can't. I've always wanted at least two if not three, but looks like we'll be lucky to have one

Oh fatima no wonder you are so down :( What a rubbish rubbish day for you.

I'm sure you are still very much at the processing stage, so apologies if you aren't ready for questions (feel free to ignore!) but did they actually say you can't have children? And was the nurse interpreting the results, or relaying a message from the consultant?

I don't know anything about the medical interventions (yet, I'm sure I will in time) but did they give any reason for your Oh's count being so low? Do they not think there are things you can try to improve it? Apologies if you have already been down this route.

Sorry for the questions and I hope they aren't insensitive. It just seems, as we've debated on this thread before, that it's such a massive unknown. For instance, I think it was on here that I read that it was important to capture the first (pre?) ejaculation for the SA. So even something that you'd think of as quite low tech can actually add more complexity than you'd imagine.

I think what I'm not very eloquently saying is don't give up hope yet! We've all got to keep on believing - and hard as it is, at least this is moving forward, albeit not the way you'd have wanted :(.

I just wrote a really long message and then clicked post and it all disappeared.

Anyway this is the gist of what I said. Massive hugs to you fatima. You can have children. With ICSI it doesn't matter if your DH has 10 sperm or 10 million they only need one per egg. Freezing sperm is a good idea if your DH's count is prone to fluctuate and at least then you won't be worrying about it being low at the time of your ivf cycle but remember sperm are not like eggs. They do not run out over time because they are made continuously. Did the nurse give you any lifestyle advice? I know you've heard it all before but I can happily post what we've been advised if this would help? Also, has your DH been referred to see a urologist to determine the cause of his low count? Because you might want to rule out genetic factors or hormone problems.

You have only seen the nurse and while I'm sure she if very knowledgable she is not the consultant and you need to wait to speak to them before you have all the facts. I know facing ICSI is a bit scary. It has taken me weeks to get used to the idea. But the results of it are very good when used for male infertility so there is every reason to be hopeful. And remember it does only take one so although the odds are low if everything happens to be right one month one of the sperm might just make it. This is what I cling to.

I have started brown spotting, so I'm hoping that this means this stupid no ovulation cycle is coming to an end. I'm only on CD27 so it's strange because I always thought anovulatory cycles were usually long . Anyway it's typical that AF is likely to turn up in the next couple of days because we're having a weekend away and going on Friday.

Morning,

Fatima so sorry for you and your poor dh :( I think that men take problems relating to them so much more to heart than we do. Is he able to talk about it yet? Do you have an appointment to go back and see the consultant? I'm sure that this news is the last thing that you wanted to hear, but one round of ICSI might be all that you need and no matter what the nurse says, people do fall pregnant with really low sperm counts. My friend (whose dh had cancer treatment and now has an extremely low count) has managed to conceive, and another colleague was told that they wouldn't be able to have a second but they now have a 6 month old daughter. You might find that you get there on your own while you're waiting to get to the top of the list.

Apologies for rambling........

Oh bloomin' hell Fatima that's horrible. Has your DH opened up to you yet and have you been able to talk about it?

I don't wish to bombard you with questions either so ignore me if you don't want to discuss it, but I wonder did the hospital give you any indication why your DH's SA was worse than the first. I ask because sperm regenerates every three months and applying some layman's, unqualified logic I wonder whether this sample was taken before the regeneration and that's why the count was worse than the last time.

I'm so sorry that you are going through this. I second Mrsd when she said that she wished she had a magic wand and we would all be pregnant.

Fatima - what a cruddy day you had yesterday. I'm so sorry to hear what you are going trhough. I don't want to add to all the questions and Mrsd gives some excellent pointers including the point that you can have children through Icsi. I hope you get to see your consultant to talk through things.

Ok is there some great GP conspiracy going on? Both DP and I have had initial tests, but I only talked to reception for my results. So I thought I'd talk to the GP about next steps. Phoned the surgery and had to go through several layers of interrogation. Finally got the secretary who said "uh huh, tests confirm ovulation". Yes, I said, but there were more tests than that and I'd like to discuss it with an actual medical doctor please . She said he might want me to come in to the surgery. That's fine, but I'm not psychic and need to know that - hence my phonecall. So I think I'm waiting for GP to call back and/or to get a message to go and see him. My GP is actually very nice and I'm sure will be fine, but the system is hard work. And this is just after the very first tests .

Sorry for the rant. How are things today with everyone? Is your DH talking a bit now Fatima?