Bus 6 of the Donkey club! Ttc for forever helpful supportive ladies for endo/ivf/mfi etc

[Marvellouslymadmum]

Climb abourd donkeys 😂

@paintfairy my nhs one seems to stop treatment on Nov 30, but I don’t know if I’ll receive any comms from them after that date until January.

@Sunbird24 ugh, super annoying. It feels such a big gap because of the closures.

@thislittlebird mine shuts too which is annoying as Im due period 18th dec. Although would hVe been a crappy Xmas with drugs, bloods etc!

@thislittlebird they have to. People respond in different ways and they'll want Christmas off like anyone else. So they won't start a treatment plan with a risk of it running into Christmas. Also they all take the opportunity to give the theatres and rooms a deep clean. Mine is a private clinic but they still close.

@paintfairy oh I’m aware they have to, I’m talking about the communications. My private clinic are happy to do an egg collection in mid December, my nhs clinic stop earlier and I don’t know if they would call me to say I could start ion January in December for example.

@kerrym87 this is exactly my issue. I’m so tired of waiting (and lost 8 months to cockups) and to hit Christmas is just another blow, my cycles will be exactly at Christmas, I’m not waiting for my next one to start now.

I mean I AM waiting now

Hi ladies! Had my appointment this morning. It took 1h 45min in total. To summarise they're putting me on short protocol with the aim of starting in my Jan cycle. Next steps for me is having a trial embryo transfer next month to make sure my path is unobstructed after the LLETZ I had in 2017. Then in Dec we'll both have blood tests taken and I can pick up my meds from Boots in Dec too so I'm ready to go in Jan.

They did my first ever AFC scan as well and came up with 15 but did say I have a follicle about to pop so as it's 22mm it could be obscuring more follicles. She showed me all of this on screen which is a first for me!

It was all super organised and really nice actually. They were friendly, not rushed and I felt like I was in good hands.

Oh and I asked when they're closed over Christmas and they said purely the bank holidays.

Thanks for all the welcomes! I'm having a very tough week so I appreciate it.

@thislittlebird I feel like letrozole will never work for me so I'm down in the dumps about the whole thing but starting the next round of tablets today. I couldn't be arsed even getting them so I made DH go to the pharmacy for me! Letrozole and follicle tracking is the only free fertility treatment available where I am so I'm grateful not to have to pay but after this I'm on my own.

@Juno231 I'm glad it went well. January will fly in!

Re Christmas closures, in my experience no doctor will carry out elective medical procedures near Christmas. Just in case anything was to wrong and there was no one to help you. My endocrinologist won't even adjust my meds in December.

Just wanted to up on and say I’m thinking of you all, you’re all warriors and it’s not an easy journey, happy endings do exist - keep the faith ladies!

Just to jump on the closures thing, if going private I would avoid any clinic that doesn't work 7 days a week because they won't be putting your needs first. My two rounds were with such a clinic but the clinic I was going to do my third round with works 365 days a year because things needs doing when your body is ready, not when they happen to be open. Having said that it's an expensive clinic but best ivf results in the country because they tailor to you and actually adjust meds etc every day. I didn't need the ivf with them in the end but the level of monitoring and tailoring was light years ahead of my original clinic. My first clinic felt like a production line where they just dole out a standard program and hope for the best.

@Juno231that's good news, when is your Jan cycle due? Your first ever scan after all this time! What was the LLETZ for, I'm not familiar? Good that they only close the bank holidays too.

I really wish I'd picked Kings instead of Guys now tbh, Kings seems to be much more on it and organised and clearly give you proper notice. I rang Guys today and asked where the wait list is and they're up to the end of June, I'm end of August. Very concerned my 2-3 months that turned into January will become february and so on. There's just no steer whatsoever about when you might get called.

@Somatronic Yeah, I can imagine. I have a couple of days to decide whether to do a third and final cycle of Letrozole. Ours isn't free because we had a messy route to the ivf waiting list, where a gynaecologist didn't seem to care that I might not be ovulating so sent us away. If I decide to go ahead I have to trudge across the other side of London to get my prescription and scans. Very over it. I assume you're in a CCG that offers little help?

@thislittlebird it's short for large loop excision of transformation zone or something like that. It's when they use a wire to conduct and electric current to excise off cells off of your cervix. I had that and a colposcopy after having pre cancer cells found post smear. It also means they might have to give me a stitch once pregnant to prevent premature labour. Bear in mind I'm only with king's for the embryo part of ivf - up until and including egg collection I'm at Kingston hospital!

@thislittlebird no I'm in Ireland so lack of funding for any fertility treatment is universal here unfortunately 😂🙄 The clinic I go to for follicle tracking is as good as it gets here, and probably offers more than anywhere else in the country.

We only legalised abortion here 3 years ago, we have no laws on surrogacy etc so we're miles behind when it comes to women's health in general.

@Juno231 sounds good matey, glad you have a plan in place and your afc is fab!

Echoing @polejunkie you're all warriors! This is a tough bloody road and you're all bossing it 👊🏾💪

@Somatronic are you Northern Ireland?
@Juno231 January will come pretty quick to be honest. Christmas will be here before we know it and then suddenly it'll be January. Happens every year and I wonder how I can be another year older already. 🤣

@Juno231 I'm the same however I won't get meds etc until December cycle when I ring nurses and they give me them and explain. It's toward end December I'm due on I'd rather have more info now but not actually doing anything until period mid Jan then short protocol as they want a gap between letrozole and treatment

@Somatronic hi and welcome, what a nightmare for you! I'm just on my first round of clomid now 🤞🏻😬 it's so hard to know what the next step is when you don't know why it's not happening!

@Sunbird24 it's so tricky trying to navigate our crazy bodies and all the appointments we need 😵‍💫 how are you doing? Was wondering how you were getting on the other day

@Juno231 good to hear about your afc scan and glad the meeting went well

Hi @polejunkie hope you're doing ok?

@Motherofkittens28 hope things are going well for you too

@becarefuloutthere how are you getting on?

Good thanks @Marvellouslymadmum how about you? When's next appointments coming up?

@Juno231 oh, I know what you mean now. Good that they're doing a test run. So Kings are only doing transfer? I didn't realise they have this arrangement with Kingston.

@Somatronic ah yeah, I know Ireland has that private medical insurance system too. I take it they cover very little in the way of fertility on those insurances?

I rang up for my last go medicated cycle with Letrozole. I feel miserable even booking it in, feels like Im throwing £800 down the drain but it is what it is. Sigh.

@Motherofkittens28 great that they stay open that much!

I composed an email to Guys asking about how much notice I'll get to start treatment since it'll be 5 months on the waiting list by January (rather than their quoted 2-3 and then 4) but I haven't sent it. It's cycle day one and I'm feeling the heavy infertility cloud today. Why oh why must my body likely have a december period right before the clinics re-open :/

Or rather cd1 is tomorrow technically, since it started midday.

Hi everyone just jumping on this thread so I am cd 20 and only getting a positive (I think ovulation test) what do Yous think?

Thank you x @l

I don’t know how to attach the picture 🤦🏽‍♀️

@paintfairy no I'm not in the north. I live in Dublin.

@thislittlebird there's something in my insurance around fertility costs but it's only for a few hundred and presumably IVF is around 4k a pop so not great. And we get nothing on the public system.
£800 a cycle for is so expensive for you! I understand the feeling of throwing away money but all you need for it is to work just once so it may be your month! I'm dreading how much this will cost us if we have to go for IVF.

@Somatronic it’s so frustrating how little help there is. Do you have anything like Access packages there like we have here for IVF? Where you get discounts on more than one round? I know I’ve seen Irish women on other threads who have flown to London for ivf too. My clinic will be about £8k probably for the one round but there are cheaper clinics and we have male factor too so ICSI is more expensive. But we’re going to have our funded round first now (probably, hopefully) and if it fails we’ll assess if we think we should buy one or more rounds after that.

I just spoke to the nurse and she was nice, said she’ll try to do just one scan because I’ve reacted similarly both prior months, which is really helpful. Hopefully it’ll save us a few hundred pounds. I’m picking up the letrozole and ovitrelle tomorrow.

@becarefuloutthere ahh glad to hear it! I have a scan next Tuesday to se e how many little follicles are growing away and check the lining, then I'm just on day21 tests each month

@Gemma3439 hi and welcome, if this is your first positive ovulation test this month you may just be ovulating late, it happens a lot.

@thislittlebird that is good with the scan! The nhs aren't even bothering with any scans after my first round I'm just on my own lol

@Marvellouslymadmum the difficult bit is I have to trigger on a mystery day 🤨. But the first month I started on day 3 and triggered day 11, and the next month started day 2 and triggered day 10, so I think if I’m starting on day 2 I’ll trigger on day 10 again this month.