Elderberry Pavlovas Unite - the over 30s TTC number 1 (thread 3)

[Bunnygirlie]

Hey ladies, we're over here!

bunnygirlie, 32, TTC since June, AF coming around New Year!
Twinklestar 2, TTC1, cycle 16, BFP was due 19/12
BraveLilBear,TTC
Lolcbcb,TTC
Aquarius,TTC
Happylass 34 cycle 4 BFP due Jan 1st
Navis176, 35, TTC #1, cycle 3 (this time around), bfp due around 19 Jan (I think?)
Neshie, 31, TTC #1, on cycle 9, after stopping the pill 18 months ago (took 10 months for AF to return!) BPF due 12th January Fx
MotherOfCleo TTC#1, cycle 3, 5dpo, BFP due New Years Day.
Viviennewestwould, 41, childless hag, TTC one year (mmc in March), on Clomid, ovulating today!
Pipbin 37 cycle 16 BFP due 26/12

Zombies, 32, almost 3 wks pg (by my calculation)- per standard 
measurement from LMP, 6 weeks pg, PCOS. 
MeanMrsMustard 31, 5 weeks pregnant. 
Quod,33, PG
Purplemonster, PG
Janey 38, 12 week scan on Christmas Eve
HazleNutt, due June 21st
Rach, 34, 13+4 pg, due 26th June

Apologies if I've missed you or got something wrong

[ChristmAquarius1]

Hello all back in the land of Internet after spending Xmas in what seemed like middle of nowhere down on the s west.

quod I'm so sorry. Just so unfair.

bunny boo to af and middle of the night pains - been there :(

Hello boodle you'll find an incredibly understanding &supportive group of ladies here.

[Rache1S]

Greetings from NYC! It's 8am and there is a 30 minute news report coming up on the unmentionable royal upduffedness. And they seem to think Zara is in the club as well. Is there nowhere in the world I can go to escape this shit?!!

Welcome boodle!

Sorry about AF Bunny. Here's to a drunken New Year for you though.

[Purplemonster]

Welcome Boodle. Sorry Bunny.
For my part I'm a bad bad pregnant lady. What with Christmas and a stinking cold I completely forgot to book my 20 week scan which apparently MUST be booked within a week of your 12 week scan which was well over a week ago. Oops. Surely they understand my brain no longer works properly though?

[Boodle9]

Phew...thank you all for welcoming me! I haven't even looked at your first 2 threads yet and am already learning plenty. For example, I didn't even know Doppler monitors existed and as for the 'dildocam'...! I'm off for one of those in a couple of weeks and I can't quite decide if that nickname has made me feel better or worse!

[Pipbin]

Welcome Boodle. Seems you can join Twinkle and I on the 'double figures of cycles' gang. Have you been to the GP yet? As you are a nipper you need to have been trying for longer than 12 months.

[captainmoll]

Hi boodle!
Sorry Bunny Good luck for the next round..

Just felt I had to jump on the earlier chat re c sections. A friend of mine had to have one as her baby hadn't turned properly, so I learnt quite a bit about them for her and her medically trained sister and a doctor friend:

Lots of v important stuff happens to the baby on the way out during natural birth - the pressure as it passes through the cervix gets its bowels working properly, squeezes the fluid out of the lungs and fuses the bones in the skull. The passage out essentially wakes the baby up and gets all it's organs working.

Natural birth also releases a massive dose of oxytocin in both mother and baby. This is the "love hormone" that plays a major role in forming the strong bond of love between mother and child. Obviously I'm not saying c-section mums can't love their children - the bond between my friend and her baby is enormously strong, and oxytocin is present in large quantities from around 8 months (it's what makes mums-to-be all floaty and ditzy and happy), But the highest peak of oxytocin in a child-bearing woman's life is at the point of birth.

There's also the issue of scarring which can weaken the womb and make more babies slightly more risky. The main thing my friend found re this is that taking a week to recover from what is pretty major surgery was v frustrating as she wanted to be able to pick her new baby up and be more active and able early into being a mum.

I hope this post doesn't seem preachy - i believe its every woman's choice, and we should be given all the info in an unbiased way to make the right choices for us. I was just so fascinated by how much goes on 'behind-the-scenes' during birth, so just wanted to share.

I have to say,having looked into it, if I ever get my BFP, I'm def going to be hoping for natural birth if at all possible. (Ask me what I think when I'm screaming for the epidurals and gas-and-air!!)

[Griffomais]

Hi can I join please? TTC 27 months (unexplained infertility) AF due tomorrow just in time to spoil NY celebrations :0(

[ZombiesAreClammyDodgers]

Welcome griff!! We are a very welcoming bunch :)

[Boodle9]

Hi back at you captainmoll and Pipbin! That's a really interesting post, captainmoll - I had no idea about all the physical benefits for the baby during a natural birth (the bowel and lungs and stuff)!

At the risk of sounding slightly stalkerish, Pipbin, I had noticed you and twinkle already, due to the double figures thing you've also pointed out!

My situation: Cycle 17 started for me on Christmas Day (thanks for that one, Santa - two years in a row) and I am currently underway with seeing GP. Started back in September with initial blood tests that suggested some possible thyroid problems but it was all a bit borderline. (TSH of 4.6 followed by 3.9 if that means anything to anyone). I have now been booked in for a 'transabdominal' and 'transvaginal' (dildocam!) scan on 17th Jan to see if anything else could be going on.

My gut instinct is that the thyroid thing could be my problem. I have quite a lot of symptoms associated with it and whilst I do usually ovulate, I definitely have a luteal phase issue - 7 days is typical, 9 at absolute best. Have read some stuff online that suggests there may be a link but there doesn't seem to be any real, hard evidence that I can confidently take back to GP.

Meanwhile, hubby has had SA done which suggested slightly low motility and morphology; he now has to get a repeat done, and that's pretty much where I'm at.

Not feeling very optimistic about 2013 at the moment. As many of you can relate to, everyone around me seems to be popping out babies, including close family members, and it seems all set to continue next year...I just want to hide from it all!

Urgh! What a long, self-indulgent post. Not very good form for a new poster - must try harder!

[captainmoll]

Hi to Griffo too - sorry to hear about your long ttc. It sucks. Welcome to our very BFPful thread - all the best for the new year, hope this is the time for you.

Boodle, I'm in a similar situation. Ttc for about 17 months. I had the scan/dildo scan at the beginning of Dec after blood tests all came back normal. They found a 5cm wide dermoid cyst on my left ovary, which may or may not be part of the issue, but will require surgery .

DH hasn't made it to have his tests done yet but is due to go in the next couple of weeks, so we wait to find out where he's at.

I'm not allowed to ttc til the cyst is removed, as surgery with foetus is bad. This makes for a frustrating start to 2013, esp as my naughtily hoped for "sods law" BFP is not happening - AF and a massive chin-spot both appeared this morning!

[Boodle9]

captainmoll, definitely not the way you want to start a new year. How long do you have to wait for the surgery? I hate the chin-spot! I always get one in the whole, lovely PMS package (along with sore boobs and bouts of crying over nothing)!

[HazleNutt]

Boodle, other countries now consider 3 as the max limit for TSH, so you would be considered hypo already. And recommended max for women ttc is 2,5 - being hypo definitely affects fertility.
I would also see if you can get your T3 and T4 tested, just TSH might not give a full picture.

[Boodle9]

Thanks HazleNutt - I've read a bit about that online; I've got to go back to the doctor after my scans so maybe I should brave it and bring what you have said up with her. I'd love to find a real, proper medical journal article with it in so that I could print it out and take it along with me! A lot of what I've found just comes from forums and you're never quite sure where it originated! I think she tested my T3 and T4 and just said they were 'normal' but I've learnt now that I should have asked for the numbers!

[HazleNutt]

the guidelines from American Association of Endocrinologists:
thyroid.about.com/cs/testsforthyroid/a/labs2003.htm

[Boodle9]

HazleNutt, that's exactly what I wanted - thank you! I think I've even read that before (the bit about the skewed reference range rings bells) but even if I did,I definitely didn't have the sense to bookmark it.

Do you, (or anyone else for that matter) have thyroid problems, or is that just knowledge you've picked up?

[HazleNutt]

yes, I had Graves disease and my thyroid taken out earlier this year, so I did a lot of reading. We half-heartedly ttc before I was diagnosed, nothing happened. After surgery it took a few months to get my thyroxine replacement dose right, but then got pregnant straight away. My TSH is now 0,3 and this is what works for me.

[Boodle9]

I'm sorry that you had to go through all that, but it's great that once you were sorted, pregnancy happened straight away!

I think once New Years is out of the way, I will get myself back to the doctor armed with that information!

[Quodlibet]

Hello all, just popping in to say thanks for kind words and that I am bearing up. Heading back to London tmw for a rescan and most probably EPRC on Monday. Happy fucking new year! To top everything off our car has broken down and we are having to leave it here and get the train back. Feeling quite royally shat on tbh, and staying away from MN so as not to spread doom and gloom. But I am doing ok and being looked after, and hopefully this limbo will be over soon, at which point it's back to depressing square one of TTC.

[HazleNutt]

Quod nice to see you back but indeed, happy fucking new year, so sorry about this.

When I had my mc, it was a small consolation that at least I knew I could get pregnant. And happened right away - they say you're more fertile after it as well. Hope all goes as well as it can, considering the circumstances, on Monday.

[MotherOfCleo]

so, tested again this morning and still BFN

[Griffomais]

Sorry to hear that [Cleo] when is AF due?

[MotherOfCleo]

NY day, so still a glimmer of hope.....

[viviennewestwould]

Quod, my thoughts are with you and I hope Monday helps you to move forward x

Welcome Boodle and Griff Boodle, over on the Clomid thread there is a lady who has been battling to get her TSH down to 2.5 and as soon as she did she fell pregnant. What were your husband's motility and morphology scores? If you didn't get them, try to get into the practice of demanding evidence of tests scores etc.

Zombie, I promise to try to stay away from that thread

Rache, I am more than a little at your holidaying in NY. I am going to Accrington on the bus to watch Skyfall

Well, it's 7DPO for me and I have given my thermometer to DP to hide so I can't scrutinise my chart pointlessly for the next week looking for signs that aren't there. I no longer feel hope during the 2ww - only a sense of resignation that yet another BFN is on the horizon. Thank goodness a defeatist attitude doesn't stop sperm from fertilising eggs!

[Rache1S]

Captain I am absolutely terrified at the prospect of labour and birth, but after what you wrote I am going to do more reading up on natural birth and its benefits to try and get my head around it (and then knowing my luck a c section will be medically necessary!)

Viv I have been to NY before but DH hadn't and wanted to visit before we are restricted to child-friendly holidays at Centre Parcs and Butlins. TBH it is really taking it out of me - it's absolutely freezing and all the walking around and sight seeing is making me so tired. And TMI ALERT the time difference has screwed up my body clock meaning I haven't 'been' for 3 days which is quite uncomfortable. In hindsight I think maybe a beach holiday would have been better in pregnancy. Oh well.

[janey1234]

Rache and captain - yes I know all those stats. In my close family I have two GP's and two paediatric consultants and have been discussing option over Christmas lunch!

To me I'm just quite a logical / mathematical person, and all the benefits of a natural birth have to be balanced our with the risks to my mind. Risks increase significantly once you're past 35 (eg you're 3 or 4 times more likely to need an emcs, and assisted births (forceps etc) are much more frequent). Some of the risks are quite scary, and my midwife agreed and said to weight them up and choose. Argh don't know what to do. If I could be guaranteed a straightforward natural birth I would of course choose that... But who knows. Have a while to think about it though!