Instituto Bernabeu - experiences?

[Botanica]

Just starting out on exploring this avenue after four failed attempts at IVF. It still feels like a large leap to make as I still had hope that I might be successful with my own eggs but starting to come to terms with this and now looking into alternate options.

My clinic works closely with IB in Spain, and I'd love to hear experiences from anyone who has been through a donor cycle with them. How did you find the whole process? What worked well and not so well? Any advice that you can share?

@Caroosje I’m so happy for you! What wonderful news. Congratulations and please do keep us updated x

@Caroosje
That’s fab news and a great HCG. Mine was also high (250 6dp5dt with one and 480 10dp5dt with the other), neither were twins. Although yours is higher than that.

The HCG level being so good is a really positive sign anyway (regardless of whether one or 2 have implanted).

Congratulations @Caroosje that's a lovely result x

Little update: we had our ultrasound at 5w6d and saw TWO sacs! Both of them had a beating heart!!! So we are having twins!!!

Caroosje
So happy for you !

@Caroosje Congratulations!!! ♥️ x

Hi ladies. How are you all getting on??

We got some good news today... Donor is doing well and is scheduled for collection on Wednesday. Eeek! Fingers crossed 🤞🏼

Hope it went well with the donor @CJ72507 and that you can get a transfer sometime soon (I presume FET?)

Not sure yet when I will start up again.

Hope you're feeling well @Caroosje

How did the egg collection go? How many eggs did You get? And when is your transfer planned?

11 collected, 8 mature, 5 fertilised. I was a little disappointed but it’s probably just me being greedy! Hopefully we’ll be transferring mid-late August 🤞🏼

I think it is really average...great to have 5 fertilized. But I understand...it is nice to have extra embryos...Will you get an update how they are progressing? This is such an exciting phase!

Thank you 😊 I don’t think we really knew what to expect in terms of numbers. Our embryologist in the UK is amazing and we’ve always had a 100% fertilisation rate so I think we were just surprised to lose 3 at the ICSI stage. But you’re absolutely right, 5 is still something to be very grateful for. We won’t get an update until Monday now...

How are you feeling? I hope everything is going well for you 😊

I hope they will progress wonderfully untill monday! I am doing okay accept tot feeling really nauseous. Baby's are doing well!

@CJ72507

11 collected, 8 mature, 5 fertilised. I was a little disappointed but it’s probably just me being greedy! Hopefully we’ll be transferring mid-late August 🤞🏼

I felt the same with almost identical numbers and was really disappointed. We ended up with 3 blastocysts to freeze (our clinic usually do FETs), I thought there was no chance with only 3, as we got one baby from 5 top quality blasts the first time round. However of the 3, one is now a person and the other 2 are still in the freezer.

@Caroosje What a beautiful photo! So pleased for you, you must be over the moon ♥️

@EarlGreyT Thank you so much for telling me this. I’ve been feeling really guilty for feeling disappointed, after all I couldn’t be more grateful to our amazing donor. I hope we’ll be one of the lucky ones x

@Caroosje congratulations. That’s great news.

@CJ72507. It’ll teach me not to read the thread title properly as we didn’t have our treatment in IB although that probably isn’t relevant for what I wrote in my previous post.

Fingers crossed you’ll be lucky. I found it hard not veer between the extremes of thinking donor eggs were a guaranteed solution first time to panicking I was going to be one of the rare people who for an inexplicable reason they don’t work. The reality is of course somewhere between the 2, but definitely in favour of being successful. The quality of the eggs is probably at least as important than the number of them and being from a youngster they’re likely to be really good from that perspective.

We got 9 eggs 8 mature and six fertilized. Of those 6 all six turned into AA blasts.
I think it really is about quality over quantity.
Praying for good blasts for you on monday!
What institute are you with?

@EarlGreyT I’m literally feeling exactly how you’ve described! I keep thinking I’m going to be the unlucky one - Hence the disappointment. It’s definitely a tough situation to process in your head, probably more so than I realised before we started. Do you have plans to use your frozen ones in the future? Thanks for the reassurance, I really do appreciate your kindness.

@Caroosje Oh I so hope I’m telling you a similar story on Monday!! I’m in Alicante. Haven’t been there yet myself but my husband said it’s nice. You’re in Alicante too aren’t you? How far gone are you now?

@CJ72507
Sorry, I hope the above isn’t a really insensitive answer to your question about our remaining embryos. Thank you for asking especially at what I know is a really stressful time.

How was the update of the embryos?

Oh @Caroosje it was horrific... 1 embryo 😢 I’m absolutely devastated. They said it was just bad luck, sadly at our expense x

@CJ72507
I’m so sorry to hear this. How very disappointing. I know it probably feels like you have no chance, but you have one embryo which is good enough to freeze (you said up thread you are aiming for August transfer so I have deduced that the embryo is being frozen) so there is still hope. I do completely understand why you’re feeling devastated and why it probably feels like there is no hope.

Oh...I am so sorry! Do they not guarantee at least two blasts? This must be very disappointing...
But I do hope you will be Lucky with this one embryo...( did you plan siblings?)

We’re currently in dispute with them so hopefully we’ll find out by the end of the week if we’ll be going ahead with the cycle or not. It’s just so disappointing at this late stage 😔