Fertility Appointments and Beyond: Electric Boogaloo

[thislittlebird]

Hit capacity on the old thread, will tag you in!

@Kay00 congratulations on 21 eggs!! Amazing - I cannot believe they don't give you sedation. That sounds absolutely excruciating! sorry you're now suffering with bloating, i think it can be a symptom of ohss, can you speak with the nurses at your clinic to check? I think drinking lots of fluids is meant to help, if you feel able to.

Thanks @99pctpractice. I was a bit dismayed at the lack of sedation at my clinic when I found out, but honestly it's not that bad apart from this one ovary which must be an exception to the rule.

I'm drinking plenty of fluids, and it's passing through which is a good sign at least :-)

@Kay00 you would start to get it from the day of the trigger possibly (what trigger was it?) and that does sound a bit like it. Bloated in the stomach and then all over was how my friend described it.

If I had your experience with EC I’d never let a doctor near me again, as I said, you’re braver than me by a long way!

Like @99pctpractice said, drink 2 litres of water per day and lots of protein and electrolytes. Coconut water has lots in if you don’t want to drink loads of lucozade sport.

Hi ladies xx I'm feeling less bloated today, although I'm still sore across my whole abdomen. I'm just taking it easy and keeping an eye out for any worrying symptoms.

I heard from the clinic this morning. Out of my 21 eggs, 20 were mature and 15 have fertilised (using ICSI). So far, so good...

@kay00 thats such good news! Glad you're feeling less bloated too :) x x

@Kay00 wow, those are good numbers! Fingers crossed for you! 🤞🏻🤞🏻

Thanks ladies x I'm feeling less bloated again today too which is good.

The numbers sound amazing, but the real test will be between day 3and 5...

Hi ladies. I had my day 3 update yesterday, sorry I'm late to update you. I have been rushing around Xmas present and food shopping. This year 90% of gifts are chocolate based 😅

Out of my 15 fertilised eggs all 15 are still alive and lots are looking good (8 to 10 cells).

However the embryologist has said than an analysis of the embryoscope time lapse shows not all of them have reached this stage in a conventional way. She said that quite a few of them had an abnormal cleavage (they split in an unusual way, for example from 1 to 3 or 2 to 4 rather than 1,2,3,4, etc..). She said that they can correct themselves by pushing out any corrupted cells but many of these 'blip' embryos might not make it to day 5.

I read an interesting study that showed most eggs that have an abnormal cleavage in this early stage do not make it to day 5, so I will be interested to see which of my eggs make it to day 5 (if any). And I wonder if I had a large number of these abnormal cleavage embryos in my first cycle (where I saw a 92% attrition rate between days 3 and 5). Another study I read said that when abnormal cleavage embryos were PGS tested they were more likely to have chromosomal abnormalities. All very interesting really.

Luckily there were a few good 8,9,10 cell embryos alive at day 3 that got there via a normal cleavage... I hope they survive to day 5 🤞

I'll update you ladies tomorrow (day 5) x

@Kay00 that's good news. Fingers and toes crossed for today 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

I've finally come down with covid. After nearly 3 years. Can't quite believe it to be honest, thought I'd gotten away with it when OH caught it in Oct & I was fine. That's my Christmas break mildly scuppered 🤷🏻🙄

Oh no @JeanieJ 😣 I hope you're not too poorly with it xx get well soon!

@Kay00 those are amazing numbers. Bet you’re so pleased. Did you get any further updates? Are you doing a fresh transfer or a freeze all?

@JeanieJ oh I’m sorry. Get plenty of rest and hope you feel better soon X

Hi @Tinkerbell098 yes, I have my day 5 update.

So the good news is I have 1x very good day 5 Blast graded 4BA which we transferred into me today... So I'm PUPO (although I'm not the biggest fan of that term) 🙌

The bad news is that out of the remaining 14 embryos pretty much none have made it. 12 straight up failed to move beyond day 3, even the best looking ones. 2 others were still alive this morning but one looked like it had stopped.

The other is a bit of a wild card. When checked on day 3 it was only 4 cells, so lagging behind. Early this morning it had developed but was looking poor quality and much smaller than it needed to be on day 5. However by the time we got to the clinic it had started to form a Blast and the embryologist said it wasn't looking terrible. So we are going to wait and see if it makes full blast tomorrow, and if good enough then we might have one to freeze. I'm not getting my hopes up though... It really is a wild card.

Nature is weird.

@kay00 how exciting! Hope youre feeling ok! Its ok to feel deflated/worried too :)

@JeanieJ hope youre feeling ok! X

@Kay00 congrats on being PUPO.
I can imagine it's hard not to feel a bit deflated about the other embryos.
I Hope that other blast is ok to freeze & fingers crossed you don't need it this time 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻I know someone who recently transferred a not so great embryo and she's 🤰 so there is hope Xx

@Kay00 fingers crossed for you

I’ve completely lost it today. We had our follow up with clinic, doc told us to find out which andrologist guys had referred us to in Feb. Turns out it’s none. They referred us to another fucking ivf doctor. I’ve flipped my lid over this, we were so pleased we had a plan, and didn’t have to pay for all the male tests again. I can’t really believe they’ve done it to us again. Since 2019 we’ve fought and fought and fought with them to get things done, to have something paid for because we do actually pay our taxes. And now here we are again with a referral to a fucking gynaecology ivf specialist and not an andrologist. I cried my eyes out and went crazy, dh and not coping well with my rage.

@thislittlebird 😣 oh my! That's incredibly frustrating. I'm so sorry! Did they say they will refer you to the correct person now?

Thanks all. No, my 2nd embryo didn't make it, so I have nothing to freeze.

And worse than that, I've started bleeding already. Just two days after transfer. So I think it's likely all over already.

It was such a traumatic egg collection. To get one embryo and my body didn't even give it a chance, I'm so disappointed 😭

@Kay00 how many days are you? Are you sure it’s not implantation?

We can’t even get through to anyone. I’ve emailed andrology, the acu and his practice secretary to try to get it resolved. They don’t answer the phone. I’m so angry we have to pay for all this again when we should have had a referral to one of the experts who is now working with Guys.

@thislittlebird you are right to be angry and frustrated, you have had a rubbish set of interactions with these clinics.

I'm 2dp5dt, so 7dpo. It's early for me to be bleeding/starting my period, but in my last IVF cycle I bled for a good week before my test day

Aargh @thislittlebird what a total balls up by the hospital. I'm so sorry that they are so shit and incompetent...you are totally justified in your rage, the amount of time effort and money you have put into this and every time you think you're getting somewhere you have to go back to ground zero 😢

@Kay00 all fingers crossed for your little embryo on board. Have they checked your progesterone levels? If you're bleeding already, that could be because your progesterone is a bit low? I'm sorry your other embryo didn't make it, ivf is just so hard.

@99pctpractice my clinic said I just needed to wait until 30th December to test. They said sorry there wasn't much else they can do.

However... I feel like there must be better luteal support out there for an 'easy bleeder' like me?

@kay00 I had some spotting the day after my transfer (bright red, I freaked out), nothing immediately after which was weird, but I do tend to spot in the week before my period. But I got a positive, so you never know! Can you ask for a progesterone blood test? Interesting my clinic does these for private cycles (and you keep pessaries plus take injections if you're low, which I suspect I am) x x

@thislittlebird aw man, that fucking sucks. I really hope you get answers from them, and that they do honour what they said and refer you x x x if it helps, I cried at a bloody Ed Sheeran song today, not any of the ones that are obviously sad, but theres a sneaky line in 'Perfect' and I was gone 🙈

Ok so after three hours, more tears and rage, various emails and a call with a nurse it seems that there was a communication issue and it’s a joint clinic with andrology and the ACU. So it’s in the name of the ACU staff. All of this could have been avoided if we had been told this but no, they’ll just tell us nothing and I’ll get stressed out.

I still don’t like it, I don’t want to see the ACU at all. Guys have royally fucked me off the last few months, why can’t we see andrology without the ivf people? We don’t want ivf at guys, we want help with my husband’s male factor issues and I don’t want to have the chat in context of ivf there. I’m just so annoyed after the nurse called me to explain, she said ACU are there because that’s who will get you pregnant and I said no they won’t be since the whole experience has been a nightmare.

@Kay00 what progesterone are you on? when you start bleeding last time? Push for progesterone testing. My private clinic bumped mine up to injections every other day and pessaries twice daily.

@Kay00 oh, I'm sorry about your spotting and that the last embryo didn't freeze. You poor thing.
Fingers crossed it stays put though 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

@thislittlebird sounds like a total nightmare that they won't join the dots for you 🙄
It seems to be quite common. My hospital is Croydon & OH had to get referred to the urologist by our gp, not our clinic - it's so disjointed. They don't speak up eachother!

@beckyCarlos oh god, I keep crying at all sort of weird stuff. Need to avoid that song. I can’t say I’m coping well with Christmas, and not being able to do another ivf cycle for months.

I forgot to say, we had our follow up with the lister and they basically said DH’s sample was atrocious. They’re right, it was, we compared it to past tests and it was the worst ever. The sperm were “occasionally twitching”. Discussed a different protocol for me etc but can’t do anything until DH’s sperm has improved and we’re going to freeze some in case he gets covid again. Got to get through a second wisdom tooth removal and infection first in the new year 🙄

For him, not me