TTC using AI at home - advice

[Whatnext11]

I'm so glad to find this forum! This can feel like quite a lonely road so will be having a good read.
We have been trying for some time, and for various reasons we have decided to go down the route of AI at home. If you've done this, where did you get the kit from? I asked the doctor and she said most people seem to get it online. I don't trust ebay though with something so important! Any recommendations?

There's a website called Pride Angel that sell these kits, think it's £19.50 for the basic kit. You can syringes etc on Amazon prob for cheaper, but best to get the Pride Angel ones if you can as these are specifically for this purpose, so won't accidentally kill the sperm with non-sperm friendly components.

Good luck!! Let us know how you get on! X

Thank you so much NewSew00, really appreciate you taking the time to comment - it's not something you want to ask about in real life!!

Thread bump - does anyone else have any recommendations? TIA

Hi @Whatnext11

I’ve done a ton of reading around this and tried a few different things. I don’t have any definite answers but here’s a summary:

Initially I used essentially a diva cup which is a menstrual cup. The ejaculate was collected directly into this and then I inserted it straight away.
My reason were: less interference with the sperm so more likely to survive, less worrying about syringes and losing some etc. It was super easy and there’s little that can go wrong as there are only really 2 steps!

But ultimately I felt that the cup sits too far down in the vaginal canal and I decided it would be better to deposit the sperm higher up (closer to the cervix) I did not get pregnant (but only tried it once)

I then used a 10mL syringe (Amazon) to draw the ejaculate up from the sterilised menstrual cup. This was trickier than I anticipated (even though I waited 10 mins for it to liquify) and its a bit of a faff getting the air out. I put the syringe in just at the back part of my cervix and injected slowly. After this I put the menstrual cup in just because I’ve read that people do this ....half an hour before I had also put some pre-seed in but only really to lubricate the syringe a bit.

With this second method I had a chemical this month and whether it’s just co incidence or not I think I’m gonna stick with it.

Hope that helps in some way, but I wouldn’t consider myself an expert after 2 goes and no BFP!

I forgot to say I bought an oral syringe because the opening is wider and in my head this would be less damaging to the sperm.