Starting IVF/ICSI this month - anyone want to join the journey?

[Rumplestrumpet]

After over 2.5 years TTC, we're FINALLY about to start our fertility treatment this month (ICSI). My nurse and husband forbade me from chats and forums, but after following MN threads over recent years I think it would be a great help to share the experience with those going through the same thing.

Anyone else want to share the joys/terrors of belly injections, hormonal madness and a series of medical professionals poking around your nether regions?! And, of course, hopefully a BFP at the end of it all

Oh Seb I'm so sorry - you too. I just read your post. I was an absolute mess after my first failed attempt and couldn't stop crying it was awful. I can totally imagine how you are feeling and sending some metaphoric hugs and flowers your way too. I still have to go in tomorrow for the blood test to confirm my already known 10dp5dt hpt negative. I suspect I will burst into tears again when they tell me, even though I already know.

Take some time out and let yourself come to terms with this. Then you can decide whether you want/can continue and whether just to put this one down to bad luck. In the meantime let all the drugs work their way out of your system. They really don't help when it comes to coping with a negative result.

Guys. I'm so sorry i didn't read back over previous posts.

My heart goes out to you smidge and seb. It is devastating, but let yourselves have a few days then the pain will lessen. On my test day, I woke up at 5am desperate for wee. I tried to hold it but I couldn't, so I thought I had to do the test then…I didn't wake dh. I then lay there till he woke slightly sobbing into my pillow. I cried for most of the first day and just lay on my bed wondering 'why me'?

I know no-one can offer any real words of comfort. Thinking of you both .

Thanks guys. I'm sorry your going through this to smidge; bloody awful situation.

Hi Girls

I have been away for a few weeks as we only had our TIA on Tuesday. I start the microgynon pill when I start my period this month (around 28th) then after that I am on long protoacol of 0.5ml of suprecur injections to down reg then after that on gonal F (I think so much to take in!) stim injections.

Confirmed we will definitely have ICSI due to my husbands low motility.

So alot to take in, going to go through all the paperwork and then as we both agreed after Tuesday try and take it one step at a time.

Any of you had the same course of treatment as me? Any side effects?

Due to my PCOS the nurse stressed the importance of the 3 litres of water a day to stop any hyperstimulation.

Feeling excited that this month we finally get going but a little overwhelmed/apprehensive at the same time which I am sure you all felt the same at the start of this journey we are all on.

xxx

Welcome back Anroga. I had short protocol, and different meds, so can't offer much comparison or wisdom in terms of side effects. But I think Nutty (2ww) and Leopard *stimming) both did a similar protocol, so may be able to offer some wise words.

As you can see, we have a mixed bag here, with a mix of BFPs and BFNs. So go into it with your eyes open, but you have to remain hopeful - we wouldn't be putting ourselves through all this if there wasn't a chance of success!

Thanks Rumple x Ok well perhaps they will give me some feedback when they have a chance.

I can see from some of the posts that everyone is at different stages with different outcomes.

I know I have to be prepared for certain outcomes but at the moment I am keeping positive, I have to be as we certainly could not afford to have treatment again unless I do have some that can be frozen.

I meant to mention that we are going to pay extra to have the embryoglue, anyone else had this? xxx

Hi angora, very exciting that you will be starting soon. rumples is right that I also had the long protocol. But my down regging drugs were as a nasel spray and not injections. This gave me headaches ( keep up the water) and a bit of forgetfulness!!! Oh and my down regging period was horrendous!!
Then I moved onto 300 gonal f injections. These aren't painful at all.

I am now in my 2ww after having 2 eggs put back last Friday. And I am going mental!!!!

Thanks so much for your message Nutty. I was warned on Tuesday about the headaches and forgetfulness but she did say it was ok to take paracetamol, have you?

I have read about the sprays but for some reason I have got to inject the suprecur. I think after the scan they will then work out what dose of gonal f injections I will need. Glad to hear they are not painful :)

Oh Nutty I bet you are! But its great news they could put two back that is what they plan to do with me fingers crossed, mind you the nurse did say on Tuesday careful what you wish for as they are having a spat of multiple births at that clinic at the moment and a lady has just found out at 40 she is expecting triplets eek!

Keep us posted on how you get on, got everything crossed for you x

I just did short cycle. It was fine. Gets tiring towards the end but I think that was a lot to do with frequent trips to hospital for scans and bloods. Gonal f did make me feel a bit sick some days. Not all the time. I think I had 3/4 afternoons of what I can explain as morning sickness. I knew I wasn't going to be sick, but just had that yucky feeling.

Injections actually less scary than I thought. I'd rather injections than the pessary up your bum when you have EC! I got myself more worked up about the pessary than the actual procedure.

I'm not sure why I'm even posting on this thread anymore! I'm a has been!!

Can't help myself. Need to get off MN and do something else. It's so addictive and I've got the notifications turned on so they keep popping up in email!!!

Thanks Allchat for your message. Thought you would get some sicky feelings with it and glad to read the injections are not that scary!

So sorry to read back at your posts and to find out the outcome.

I take it you paid like we are? Are you going to give it another go? xxx

Oh yeah allchat pessaries!!!
Up the bum until transfer and then the front. Messy as hell and gives me constipation!! They are horrible.

Angora I'm trying not to think about twins!!! I was told I'd only be allowed one back but then I had a three day transfer so they said I could have two!! Quite surprised really.

thank you for the lovely welcome all.

Smidge this is my first round of IVF and we are doing ICSI due to low sperm count, but definitely feel calmer now we have actually started the process as feels like we are taking some of the control back even though its still pretty much down to luck. Im really sorry to hear your news, and I don't want to give you false hope, but my clinic said even if the test is negative or there is bleeding they always do a blood test to be sure. Having said that I would be devastated as well so understand if you don't want to go through disappointment again.

Shellster thats great hopefully we can get each other through it as we are close enough time wise.

Seb so sorry to hear your sad news

I had my scan today and the nurse said everything looks good to start my stimms tomorrow. So will be double injecting now definitely not looking forward to two, but think I'm finally getting the hang of it. Can I ask did anyone fine their AF hung around for longer than normal once they had started down regging? The Nurse said its perfectly normal but just want to know when it will disappear again lol.

anroga. Yes we paid and now we paying for frozen to be stored.

We are still naturally trying as I just cannot believe it can't happen. It's weird when you have one child together and I didn't even 'try' for her. It was odd this month waiting for ovulation and trying to time sex. Almost preferred ivf. less pressure. I'm in another 2ww now!

Got 2 blasts to go. I wanted to do it next month naturally, but clinic says wait until I at least have another spontaneous cycle. But everything seems back to normal already. Maybe it's the 2nd cycle after ivf that goes a bit funny as this one seems pretty normal. Bled for same amount of days and ovulated about same time, maybe 2 days late….

Just a question, when did the clinic tell you about the pessaries? Mine haven't mentioned them yet!!

Awww smidge and seb how awful, I'm so sorry . I hope you are looking after yourselves?

Thanks also for the kind words, I guess we will just have to wait ad see how my cycle pans out. It is stories like yours chat that keep me realistic. What a textbook cycle you had and still a BFN, I bet you were gutted.

ANyway, my EC has been put back to Monday (ish) so I had to order some more Gonal-f. Despite me saying about 4 times that I wanted them to order the pen, not the vial, yup, they ordered the vial by accident - grrr. Oh well, this should be interesting tonight.

Nice to 'meet' you anroga and whittlefish

Hows the 2ww treating you nutty?

Update the Gonal-f vial needle is the most painful thing ever. Use the pen - for the love of god use the pen!

hen this has been the longest week so far in my life!! I have no symptoms so far. I am trying to stay positive but it is so hard. I will be totally devastated if this doesn't work, probably like everyone else.
lildottie I was sent two packs of cyclogest (pessaries) with the rest of my drugs. Plus the clinic gave me an extra pack after my transfer as I didn't have enough. They have said if this cycle works then I will have to take them until week 8!! I will need more though if this works

lildottie. Pessary to put up my bum before egg collection was given to me by hospital on last scan before EC. It's when they talk through hcg injection and time you have to take it.

They told me about progesterone pessary up my vag right after EC. I had to start them evening of EC and keep going until bfn in my case. So even the morning of my ET I already had pessary up there. Bit gross. Felt like I should apologise to doctor! Ha.

thanks ladies. I hate how they wait until the last minute to tell you this stuff. I like to know everything so I can be prepared so this whole infertility journey has been a massive nightmare for me. they seem to treat you with kid gloves, like if you know what their going to do to you you'll freak out and they don't want to have to deal with that! thank god I found you kit to prepare me! oh the glamour! remind me why I'm putting myself through this again?!

My blood test has confirmed my negative result. The nurse said my HCG level was so low it is probable that it never implanted at all. Not even for a day .

anroga what is embryoglue? My second round was long protocol with injections, but I used lucrin rather than whatever you said your drug was. I found that as long as you drink 3L of water a day (I'm including milk on cereal and the odd cup of decaf tea in my 3L) I barely had any side effects at all. Except for the longest ever period. I thought I'd still be spotting by egg collection!

lildottie and allchat i am interested to hear about your experiences as I have only ever been told to start the pessaries 2 days after egg collection.

Is that standard for others in the uk?

Leopard – looking forward to hearing your scan results. I am in Aus so it's already Fri here but I think you guys are a bit behind.

Lildottie – yes what a nice little chrissy pressie for yourself – an injection. Wondering if I am even more insane as I start my injections next week just in time to get an outcome right before Christmas. Trying to do the whole Zita West thing with the power of positive thinking so I shouldn't think negative and just expect a BFP for Chrissy. Interesting that the Zita West books all seem to be based around positive thinking. I am doing a meditation CD for my next attempt and it seems to have the same focus. Perhaps there really is something to positive thinking and increasing the success? Then it's so hard as we only have further to crash down if it doesn't work!

Allchat – that is an absolutely amazing result – 11 eggs and 11 blasts - yet just as devastating to end in a negative! So one put back and 2 frozen means the other 6 were not good enough quality to freeze???? Can't offer any experience in the FET dept as I have never made it that far but will watch to see how you get on.

Nutty, how many cells were the embryos at day 3 transfer?

Whittle – you are a bit ahead then as I will be on day 20 when you do your first jab. When is your next scan booked to see what's brewing?

Sorry to hear that Smidge - I know you were expecting it, but it's no doubt still very upsetting.

On progesterone pessaries, I was told to start taking mine just after egg collection, maybe that day or the following day. But on the day of ET I was told not to put the pessarie in until after the procedure (perhaps to spare the doctors the mess!).

Hen - sorry you're having trouble with the new needles, at least it won't be for long. I find a healthy serving of chocolate cake seemed to ease the pain for me

Whittle mine was ICSI too, and I definitely started feeling better once I started injections - that total sense of impotence lifted and I felt better knowing we were doing SOMETHING, ANYTHING!

Good luck Leopard with your scan, keep us posted.

shellster I've never been much on the whole positive thinking mind over matter stuff but I'm willing to try anything! have been devising a neak plan from recommendations in Zita's book this week. also read online than avocados may triple success! guess what's in my meal plan a lot!!

shellster one egg was at 4 cells and the other was at 8