IVF / ICSI - everyone welcome for questions, hand holding, and waggle dancing

[Gardenpixie]

Ladies, we ran out of space on the old thread so here is a sparkly new one with dedicated areas for waggle dancing, hormonal outbreaks of bonkersness, sniffing, injecting and progesterone pessary related fartiness.

For anyone thinking about starting IVF / ICSI or going through it at the moment, do come and say hello. These wonderful ladies have kept me sane through the last few months and are a source of all knowledge concerning tests, down-regging, ov stimulating, DIY injections and much more so if you need any info or just some company, do join us.

So here's a welcome for everyone and an enormous waggle dance for many many more BFPs to come

Sorry, I meant Pumpkin!

Welcome Clairebear, sounds like you've been through a lot already so I'm really pleased that you've decided to do this, what a positive thing to do. I think the HFEA website is great too but you can't get better than here for great support, uplifting songs, exquisite decor and plenty of (((hugs)))!

Thanks kool, it seems we're going to be at Guys quite a bit! How did you all explain it at work? Again, not really keen on telling them about it (especially as there are a lot of people already off on mat leave or about to go!).

Fortunately I've already had a load of bloods done at another hospital and have the notes and results so we should be good on that front.

Zeebee, how did you find last night's info session? Do you have your appointment soon?

Hi all, just a quickie to say all went well today, and they got 11 eggs yay! ellan I'll pm you but they were lovely at Leeds. No toast alas, but a cheese sarnie instead NOM.

Hope you're all ok, and I'll be back on tomorrow, once we've had The Call.

xx

Can we also get on here, as I'm giving it up in RL to help the ICSI?!

Hi luck, that's great news! Will keep fingers crossed for the next stage!

Hi ladies

luck 11 eggs sounds great, fingers crossed for as many as possible to fertilise
boddecia - I did the menopur vials (4 of the tablet things) and ended up with a bit less than the original amount of liquid. I had a vial snapper thing which made sure I got most the liquid (and no glass!) in the injection
louise good luck for et, glad you managed to have an evening out
zeebee try not to focus on the success rates, I always try and focus on how my treatment is going rather than everyone else's before me!
clairebear welcome!

Quick update on me, my line has got a bit darker so I guess I have to call it a positive now! Feeling happy although worried about things going wrong further down the line (had a difficult pregnancy with dd). Still given we had to do this icsi it couldnt be going better at this stage!

love to all

owl hurrah hurrah!!! Well done that woman!! Fabulous news, I'm made up for you.

xx

Lovelyluck that's brilliant news, that ovary boot camp obviously did the trick! I'm really pleased for you xxx

Evening laydees

This isn't a proper post as it's late. However, it is an improper post for Luck in the hope that your eggs and Mr Luck's swimmers are very improper tonight .

Hurrah for owl! Great news :o

Good old raisin ovaries, luck they must be knackered after producing 11 luckets.

Hello again zeebee, pumkin and jumping and welcome clairebear make yourselves at home :)

Thanks for all the advice about the vials, and thanks to caramel's mum for waiting while you wrote :) I think we managed to get the hang of it in the end. God love DH though for trying his best with a bit of a lunatic at the moment.

I've got my stims scan today, I'll let you know how it goes.

Quick question please: what did you do in advance to really get ready for it all? Any diet tips (apart from not too much rubbish to eat and drink)? Any super-vitamins I should try? Am currently on a pre-conception multi vitamin with added folic acid, a good probiotic, a super-strength cod liver oil and er cranberry to ward off any nasties (swear by the cranberry!). Anthing else?! I feel I should be doing some sort of uber-healthy thing, but not sure where to start. Needless to say, am not a size 8 (more a juicy pear-shaped 12) but wonder if it would be better to loose a few before I start to really help. Would it help, do you think? Being a bit paranoid and worried that I'm going to cock it up....!

Hope you're all having a good day today. TGIF!

Well Claire, I haven't done much to prepare apart from taking vitamins and not drinking for a few months (except a couple of sneaky glasses of ) I'm a 12 too- well in healthy weight range which is fine as far as I'm concerned. I am taking Evening Primrose Oil with Vit E while going through IVF, but only because Zita says so! I shouldn't think much makes a difference, apart from perhaps acupuncture which a few of the ladies on here have done/are doing. Waiting for lucks news with fingers crossed!!

Hey Clairebear, I took 2 lots of Zita west vitamins (vitafem and vitafem boost), they're pretty pricey though - I'm sure any pre natal vit is good, as long as it's got folic acid in it, I'm just a bit of a mug with these things - my sister accurately described me this week as "an advertiser's dream"!!! . It sounds like you don't need to change a thing. I know it's hard as we all want to do all we possibly can but frustratingly there's only so much we can do, then it's over to the people in the lab coats! I certainly wouldn't start stressing about losing weight, you don't need to. There's certainly no point in putting any added pressure on during an already stressful time. I had acupuncture too.

Bodeccia good luck with your stims scan today. Glad the injections are sounding a bit less stressful now too.

hey ladies,

Well, your waggling worked because we've got 5 embryos!! FIVE!! We're so chuffed, because our consultant was really doomy, and said my eggs would be more brittle so would shatter during the ICSI process - but it appears not so HOORAY! I honestly was preparing myself for none at all, so as you can imagine, Mr Luck and I feel like we've won the lottery.

ET is on Sunday morning. If they offer us two, we're going to go for it.

Claire I am size 16/18 and 5'11", so am, shall we say, robust!! I lost maybe 5 pounds but that's it. Gave up alcohol and, like kool, took the Zita West vitamins and tried not to have too much caffeine or processed food. Plus I'm having acupuncture - no idea if it's working or not, but I'm not going to stop it now! tbh I still eat loads of carbs, rather than my 5-a-day fruit and veg, but I feel happy and fairly healthy so I'm not too worried. Obv if I get a BFP then I will be health personified..

Happy Friday everyone, hope our updiffed ladies are feeling good and are still smiling, and that everyone else has a good weekend. I wonder how Louise is getting on with ET?

pip pip
xx

Hi guys-yes it is lovely to have some lovely ladies who have had success on this thread-so we can pick your brains and see if you did anything magical for this all to work-am planning acupuncture, eating healthily with lots of protein, only pill I take is wellwoman pre-conception and my DH proudly takes his. I have researched alot and have names of numerous vits and pills/herbs to take to improve egg quality-am phoning the clinic to see if they advise this. Size wise-am more like a voluptuous 14-but proud I managed to get my BMI down from 32 to 29 before last go-could do with lowering it more so am being ultra good, apart from the obvious much neede glass of but was told that is absolutely fine! Thinking of a few weeks of 'adios' but don't want anything to affect the meds during cycle. Thoughts please ???? Am off to a Champneys spa this wend, courtesy of a friend who gets a big discount through work-should be most welcome and relaxing! Well done on your EC Luck hoping you've had a phone call by now-Lots of love to everyone xx

WOW luck we cross messaged-Well done on your precious 5 embies little luckies xxxx

Luck out of interest why did your consultant think your eggs would be brittle? Obviously not so tho-You should feel like lottery winners-you are winners! I understand what you mean about preparing for the worst-this is what I will do next time-Why do we do this to ourselves? Probably as a protection mechanism. We are having ICSI next cycle due to no fertilisation with IVF-am just preying that we get more eggs than the 6 last time...

Ooo Luck that's wonderful news! Well done you for beating that gloomy consultant

Claire I sucumbed to the zita west vits too but I think a good multi-vit with folic acid would be fine. Am also dosing myself on good quality omega oil vit, royal jelly, bee propolis (sp?) and coenzyme q10 but all these latter things are because I've got high FSH and low AMH - I think the folic acid is the only key thing. Weight-wise I agree with the others that it's not worth the stress. I'm not drinking and I'm doing my best not to have any caffeine and am generally eating good stuff but couldn't cope with calorie counting right now.

pumpkin I think you asked about asked about acupuncture? Just to say that it's nice, and I feel like I'm doing something but I don't honestly know whether it will make the difference. Though, if we are unsuccessful, I guess that I won't think about the fact that I should have done it. If that makes sense .

I'm doing one session a week and it's worked out that I did the first session a week after starting down regs, another session during down regs and then have done one session on the day I started stims. I have another session booked for next week which will be during stims again and then I'll probably do the a session before ET and after ET and then it's recommended to do it a few days later to encourage implantation. That will be seven sessions in total but if money is tight then as kool says you could just do the ones before and after ET or you could do these plus one or two sessions before during the stims phase.

Bodeccia hope scan goes well today and Louise hope the ET is great too xxx.

Thanks teds think I will go for the acupuncture-will make me feel good am doing something proactive-also like lying down relaxing!-not sure about the needle part of it tho but sure they're a breeze post injecting DR and stims! Do you know when your EC is due? I also have low AMH-dropped from 11-9 in a year, and am sure linked to my only having 6 eggs fr 12 follies-so being dim-in a regular natural cycle does that mean we ovulate but sometimes an egg wouldn't come out?? Is it indicative of egg quality too? Am also planning co-enzyme Q10 (sounds like whats in shampoo!) royal jelly and omega oil-do you think its too late as start DR in roughly 3 weeks?

Good luck for Bodeccia today and heres for good looking scan-also Louise hope ET is going to plan.
xx

pumpkin not really sure about EC. I have a scan next Weds and so the earliest EC will be is Friday but we'll have to see how it goes. My AMH is very low - 2 - but all the doctors are confident that I'm ovulating (with egg!) every month and because I'm young(ish) they think there is a good chance my eggs might be reasonable quality - it seems they look at a combination of things.

You would be taking vits for maybe 5 weeks before EC so I reckon it's worth shot but agan, it might be me making myself feel better about the whole thing!

Hi pumpkin the consultant thought my eggs would be brittle because I'm 39 and she said my ovaries are ageing quite fast. This is shown by my long cycles (35 - 42 days). Apparently there is a v thin 'shell' around each egg, and this gets more fragile as you age so when they inject it for ICSI the shell can shatter.

kool, caramel, owl, if you're out there, please tell me what you did during the 2ww to make your wombs lovely and snuggly for your mini-mes to implant!! And is there anything you specifically avoided?

xx

PS bodeccia good luck for your scan!

Hello,
So I'm back from my stims scan (day 8) and it's so-so news. There is a response, with lining 9.1 thick and lots of smaller follicles, but only about 5 between 10 and 11, so not as good as they would have hoped for at this stage. I have had menopur upped from 150iu to 225iu and have to be scanned again on monday. Worried it's not going to work now! Any words of advice from anyone with any experience of this??

Lovelyluck you clever lady! Yours and your DH's constituent parts really must have had a most improper night!!! That's such good news hon, I'm made up for you. I wish I could say there was something magical I did during my 2ww but it really was a matter of waiting and trying to stay as relaxed as possible I guess. I obvs didn't drink and I also cut out caffeine. I listened to my Zita West post transfer cd quite a bit. I carried on with the acupuncture. I ate (and still do eat) a handful of brazil nuts and almonds every day. I think relaxing as much as you can during the actual ET is quite important too. Apart from that, I took it pretty easy for a couple of days after ET but then carried on as normal albeit in quite a sloth like, chilled way! It's so hard, I know, because all we want to do is the very best to give ourselves the best possible chance and I think that's the hardest part at when it comes down to it there's actually very little we can do. I swung wildly from wanting to try everything I could to being fairly pragmatic about if it works it works, and if it doesn't, I'll keep trying until it does. I'm not saying I would have found it anywhere near that easy if I hadn't got my bfp but I think it did help my mindset a bit. Hope this all makes sense, I fear I've waffled

Sorry Ellan x posts. Try not to worry too much, at least they've spotted that they need to up your dose and you'll have had 3 more injections on the higher dose by your next scan. Even though they're small, it's encouraging that there are a lot of follicles there as I guess they've all got potential to respond to the higher dose. Even if you're stimming for a bit longer I'm sure they'll get you there. Hang in there and try to relax as much as poss as the weekend xx