New to infertility- chances of improving egg quality with these figures?

[Doodles27]

Hello this is my first post here, I’m turning 38 next month and my partner is 45. We have been together 3.5 years and TTC for 2. We have never got pregnant, we were due to have our first appointment at the fertility clinic In March this year but when into the first lockdown 3 days before, we have been waiting since for the clinic to open for new patient referrals.
In October we paid to go see the same consultant at a private clinic. My partners SA came back good but we had another appointment last night and the results are not good for me. My AMH is 3.9 and FSH is 19.6. He said that with an AMH of 3.9 and a much better FSH my chances of successful IVF would be only around 5% so with such a low AMH and a really high FSH my chances are much less.
I honestly never thought I’d be in this position and a suppose I took my fertility for granted especially when you spend most of your life trying not to get pregnant.
The consultant made it very clear my chances of getting pregnant with IVF with my eggs is very very low and to consider egg donation which is something I have to start to process and not sure how I feel about this but I can’t help thinking can I do anything to improve my chances? I’m going to order the it starts with an egg book. I currently only take a Vit D, Folic acid and Vit C supplements. Does anyone have any experiences with similar figures?

To be honest I'd be wary of a consultant that writes you off so quickly and pushes you down the egg donation route. You know he's doing that because he doesn't want you to bring down the success rates he publishes dont you? But maybe I'm sceptical because personally I don't particularly agree in the ethics of egg donation

There are clinics that specialise in treating women with a AMH lower than yours with your own eggs - I'd look at a clinic like Create first before you give up on your own eggs and having a biological/genetic link to any baby x

Which clinic is this? HFEA suggests that in 2016 at 38 you have about 15% chance of a baby per IVF cycle. That is the average- irrespective of hormones. Your FSH is a bit high but you need a second test at the right date before you draw conclusions. In terms of your AMH- this can also fluctuate during your cycle and there are many women with much lower AMH who have success. Ultimately you need to do a closely monitored cycle before you can dismiss your chances. I personally haven't seen evidence that you really can improve egg quality but many women love the book 'It starts with an egg'. I have no problem at all with donor eggs at all but it is true that some clinics now push this on women as they earn more money. I don't think your consultant was quite honest with you. Take care and good luck xxx

My AMH is 3.5 so lower than yours. To be honest I don’t know my TSH and I really don’t even want to know it. My consultant has told us that it just means we may not get as many eggs - so we probably won’t have any frozen embryos. This obviously reduces our chances but she was still optimistic. Both the counsellor and the nurse at the clinic have said egg donation is a possibility but that is so far down the line that I don’t need to think about it yet. You need to try with your own eggs first. Try and take each step at a time. If I was you I’d want to give it a try. We definitely are. I know how heart breaking it is to get your AMH back with a result like that. But I feel hopeful again. The nurse also told me she hates AMH because it is literally only a tool they use to decide medicine. Nothing else and it isn’t an indicator for success. I wish I didn’t know mine.

@Doodles27 sorry to hear about your AMH. I would say it's worth a second opinion before moving onto donor eggs, just so you know it's definitely the best option. I'm in a slightly similar situation, found out a few months ago when I was 33 mine is 2.1 with an FSH of 16. My consultant says it's a quantity but not necessarily a quality issue. They did say ago is the biggest factor with egg quality. We tried Clomid and now IUI, if the next 2 IUIs don't work then we'll move to IVF. But if that's doesn't work I'm starting to get my head around Donor eggs, I follow some rather inspirational women on Instagram who went down that route and it gives me some hope. Also Definitely read 'it starts with the egg' & take Ubiquinol it can't hurt x

I had an AMH of 2.2 and and an FSH of 9, I was on the NHS and they only let me try once as the 2nd time my FSH was 19 so they said I could only use my funding for donor egg treatment which I did, I know that isn't an option for everyone but for me having a baby was more important to me than having a bio child.

I think you just need to consider how much you want to invest in own egg treatment emotionally and financially, low AMH often responds well to an aggressive stim if your FSH is within range, a high FSH means your body is kicking out loads of FSH as it's struggling to ovulate so it's hard to get a response to meds as the meds are FSH too.

I don't agree with people saying clinics are protecting success rates when they advise donor eggs, years ago some clinics reported success 'per cycle started' but now most clinics as advised by the HFEA report 'per embryo transferred' the biggest risk with patients with DOR is not getting an embryo to transfer, so a lot of patients with a low chance of success would not even be included in the data if they failed to get to transfer, people are so quick to think consultants are on commission or do everything to protect success rates but in my experience of working with them on a daily basis, they want to get patients a baby in the shortest possible time.

I agree with @Lauren83 that I don't think this is the clinic being crafty. I think you probably saw a very pragmatic consultant who (from what I've read) is right that with your stats your success rate naturally or with your own eggs is likely to be low. I guess it depends on your finances and your emotional state. If you have enough money to fund multiple private rounds, trying a round with your own eggs will give you an idea as to how you respond. If finances are tighter and you are open to the idea of donor eggs, you are probably going to be more likely to succeed within your financial resource via that route.

I can understand some people's uncertainty about donor eggs, but personally I have no problem with it. We had discussed using a donor if we got to needing a 3rd round and had both concluded with our limited financial resource we would rather do that and give ourselves a better chance of success! Good luck whatever your decision. It is really traumatic hearing such news so take a bit of time to process, and as others have said a second opinion wouldn't hurt if you're really unsure.