Failure stories

[BipBippadotta]

I'm far past the point where I'm interested in fertility success stories. Tales of lucky couples who triumphed over impossible biological odds to have their miracle baby make me want to self-immolate. Help me feel less alone in my utter irreversible barrenness by telling me about all the fertility treatments, supplements, folk remedies, voodoo, etc you've tried, that work for every other fucker on the Internet, but did bugger all for you.

I'll start!

Things that didn't work for us:
Grapefruit juice
Guaifeneisin
COQ10
Acupuncture
Vitamin E
Royal jelly
Wheatgrass
Pycnogenol
Low carbing
Inositol & melatonin
Cutting caffeine and alcohol
L-Arginine
Baby aspirin
Maca
B6
Starflower oil
Soy isoflavones
Clomid for DH (to increase sperm count)
Clomid for me
Clomid & injectables
High doses of antibiotics
Prednisone
IVF with ICSI

Fab news lh :)

Agree with grading. Said bridge friends 3day C' safe now strapping 11yr twins

My perfect 5aa failed

Testing - was always told 17daya from ec

So 3day transfer is 2ww

5/6day is 12/11 days

I tested at 8days - which was 13days and said negative. Few days later was postitive and now almost 12w preg

LH they look fab! Sending lots of sticky thoughts your way.

Yep today is day three and we have 3 grade 1-2, 6 cell embryos. Honestly I was expecting the worst of them. I feel bad for doubting them!! They'll let them go to blast and we'll do PGS on all three or whatever amount make it to blast. Then they'll be stuck in the freezer until we decide to go back for the FET.

Bip how are you feeling? Congrats on the new digs and the best of luck for your interview! Exciting stuff happening for you.

Lokis that is incredible news!! I am so vey happy for you, and hope you are enjoying some refreshed confidence in the process! Well done!!

Great news, LH and Loki!!

LH and Loki that is great news!

Bip congratulations on your house, I hope you find a floor person soon.

Huge congrats lh - two beautiful blasts!

loki that is bloody marvellous news. How are you feeling post EC?

bip congrats on completion! Hope someone can sort the floors and you'll be safely installed v soon. And fucking A on the job interview - nice one!!

Hope AF has stayed away tiger

How's the baps doing robber?

Nothing much to report here. Made sure I flushed away my FMU when I had a 5am wee this morning so I couldn't test. Will do a FRER tomorrow (7dp5dt). If it's negative will ask for a blood test so we don't have to order more meds just so I can keep pissing on sticks over the weekend

Bricking it

Jesus Banana, I do understand. I am so envious you have already made it this far.

I have woken up today with much reduced aching and less bloating and have convinced myself it is all over already.

Feel physically sick and a bit low. Is this normal when 2WW begins?

Also fot the call that our potential one for freezing has not got beyond Morula stage, so no freeze; so if this fails we are back to square 1.

Off to pick up my Clexane as consultant and I decided just yesterday to use it empirically. I am heterozygous for the MTHFR gene mutation so there is some sense in this.

Walking very energetically through Battersea Park with some idea that I am increasing blood flow to my uterus.

I just ordered four FRER tests on Amazon. Does that mean I have jinxed it?

Well done resisting testing this morning, Banana - wish I had your steely resolve!

Fingers crossed for all the embies, in and ex utero! Loki when do you get the pgs results back?

I am feeling fucking disgusting today. Hormones + hot weather + stinky Londoners = constant panicky gorge-rising feeling & intense misanthropy. I have back-to-back meetings until 8pm and then a long train journey home on which men who have been sweating in their suits all day noisily eat the smelliest hot foods a train station has to offer.

Another job I really, really want has just been advertised. Perfect opportunity, walkable from my new house. The very job I've fantasised about for years. However, the interview date is the 2nd anniversary of my daughter's stillbirth, and just a few days after I'd be likely to have a TFMR if one is on the cards after genetic testing, so it's very likely I will be in the grip of unbearable grief & anger & hormonal chaos and will not be at the top of my game. How the fuck is it that I wait years for these opportunities and they only come up at the worst possible moment? I feel like the universe is just fucking with me now.

Banana and LH yup, the 2ww is awful. My baps and stomach went back to normal yesterday, so I'm pretty certain I'm out. If I follow the same pattern as last time, period will arrive Sunday.

LH physically sick and a bit low sounds like a standard 2ww. I'm so sorry your last one didn't make it. I have everything crossed your symptoms subsiding is just your body getting over ET.

Banana good luck tomorrow! Will you update us?

Tiger hope you're enjoying your holiday?

Bip it is really shit timing but please tell me you are going to apply for it anyway? When you get the interview, ask them if you can possibly do it a day later/earlier because of a medical appointment. And if they say it has to be that day, then fucking channel all of your strength (from what you've been through you must be one of the strongest women I know of) and fucking get that job, it is YOUR job. Having a decent job can make such a difference to your life.

that sounded very rah rah, I don't know what came over me, but Bip you can't let shitty timing beat you!

Last message - Bip if we can do anything, please let us know. I'm generally a decent proofreader (don't judge me by my MN posts!), I'm happy to check your application.

Two FRER at 7dp5dt and BFN. Not even a squinter. 😓 Going to ask for a blood test so that I don't have to order more meds just so I can keep pissing on sticks over the weekend.

There's absolutely nothing there, so I'm pretty sure that we are out.

Maybe the Neupogen wash affected the receptivity? Maybe the prednisolone made me end up over suppressed? Maybe the immunes wasn't enough and I wasn't suppressed enough? Maybe DH and I are a DQ alpha match and I won't be able to carry a baby of ours? Maybe my lining just won't ever support a pregnancy?

It was a chromosomally normal embryo so the problem is definitely me.

I honestly can't see that we are ever going to have a baby. 😓

Oh god banana- just delurking to say are you absolutely sure it's not too early to test? 7 days past sounds pretty early to me.

If definitely not then I'm im so so sorry. I've been following your journey (in a lurking but not stalking kind of way!) and no one deserves this more than you after all you've been through. Hopefully there are positives to be had- such as lessons to be learned or other methods for next time. I seem to remember you had a good batch of embryos stored. Obviously I appreciate that may not be any consolation right now if it hasn't worked. If this is the case I hope you can have a day in bed/looking after yourself or eating chocolate.

Oh Banana. I'm so sorry. Will they be able to do the blood test and results today? Will that be definite at this stage or only indicative? Lots of unmumsnetty hugs. Are you at home with DH?

So very sad for you Banana. I hope you can get certainty either way quickly. I cannot find words to express how awful this process is. If intellect, ambition, focus and drive were the measure here, a BFN would not be your outcome. But that is meaningless to you today. I am very sorry.

Banana I'm so sorry. And I don't want to hold out false hope, but FRERs never work for me - I never see anything on them at all until a Superdrug early result test has been positive for about 2 days. Might it be worth trying one of those?

I can't imagine how shitty this must feel for you after everything you did to prepare for this cycle. Huge hugs.

Thanks ladies

I'd love it if it was too early but I'm not expecting it. DH said the consultant said, when I asked him if anyone ever waited till OTD to test (when still off my tits on sedation so only have hazy memories of the conversation), that it did happen that women could have BFN at 7-8 post 5 day transfer but BFP at 10-12 post. I would love to be proven wrong but I just feel in my gut that this isn't it.

BFN preferable to another miscarriage I suppose. Although if it implanted last time into crappy lining and no immunes, and hasn't even tried this time, it does feel like we've gone backwards.

We said if the cycle failed we would go back to the hysteroscopy and IUD plan. Being on contraception when my due date rolls around doesn't fill me with joy, but hey.

Well at least an enforced break will give me time to get my career back on track. I've barely worked this year as I've been either pregnant / miscarrying or continually tapering off my pain meds in anticipation of a transfer that didn't come. And as I can't sit or be much good to anyone when I'm off my meds, as a freelancer / consultant, I've had to turn down load of juicy projects because I didn't know if I was going to have to pull out if we actually got to transfer

At least I can throw myself into work, as clearly project baby isn't exactly working out.

2016 has been an unadulterated clusterfuck and I would quite like to find the receipt and send it back for a do over.

Oh banana :( tho agree it's too early to test

Think j said before was always told 17days after ec. Tho that doesn't help a fet

I tested negative around your time yet 2/3data later when I was meant to test I got my first ever bfp

All the other cycles I never tested early as if a negative you still have to test few days later

I only tested as was my birthday and wanted a drink yet even tho said bfn I still didn't drink any alcoholic drinks

Understand you don't want to buy more medication tho also surprised clinic didn't make sure you had enough to last 2ww

Bip. Typical about the job. Agree try and get an interview another day

Lh. Hope both are sticking.

Oh banana :( tho agree it's too early to test

Think j said before was always told 17days after ec. Tho that doesn't help a fet

I tested negative around your time yet 2/3data later when I was meant to test I got my first ever bfp

All the other cycles I never tested early as if a negative you still have to test few days later

I only tested as was my birthday and wanted a drink yet even tho said bfn I still didn't drink any alcoholic drinks

Understand you don't want to buy more medication tho also surprised clinic didn't make sure you had enough to last 2ww

Bip. Typical about the job. Agree try and get an interview another day

Lh. Hope both are sticking.

Whoop. Sorry

Banana I'm so sorry, it's just shit isn't it? It's so damn unfair. I really am hoping that you will get a late BFP.

We got to day five with 1 grade 1 blast. The other two fell behind and went down to grade 2-3. Our blast has been biopsied for PGS and stuck in the freezer. We have to wait 30 days for the results.

I'm taking a break of 2 cycles not including this one so we're looking at FET in December. If that doesn't work we're done. We're drawing a line under it and moving on. Reading the "I hate being a parent" thread has been oddly comforting to me.

LH how are the symptoms?

Lokis thank you - I am ok.

Well done on your grade 1 blast!! That is lovely news - and all fingers crossed that was the perfect healthy lovely normal one waiting for you.

I slept better last night and cramps are significantly less today - so I could hope that means implantation happened yesterday (my consultant said it can easily happen within one day of a 5 day blast transfer). Or could it could mean the embryos have decided they cannot be shagged, and thrown in the towel.

Either way I remain a hugely fat and saggy and puffy and pale faced and unfit COW. I just bumped into someone I know and her mother on the Kings Road and I they didn't recognise me at first. Because I look so shit.

I am sad for Banana and feeling down on the whole thing today. Not sure when to test now...

Btw, if you liked that 'hate being a parent' thread, when I had PND after I had my son, I obsessively read the below thread which made me feel much worse. I am in no way belittling infertility, because we are all on this board because we want a/more children. But it may perk you up while you wait for your FET. Plenty of women on the below thread speak a lot of truth.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/feeling_depressed/781410-Does-anyone-else-regret-having-children

Fab news on your blast loki!

Dr wanted me to come in for a blood test, so just had that drawn, and will now watch the phone like a bomb detonator. Presume if it's a complete non starter that at 7dp5dt he considers that a fairly reliable indicator for a quantitative test, or he wouldn't have got me in. Gah. Such a head fuck.

Readying a Valiumtini with a vat of wine and a bowl of oxycodone for dinner....