How to be okay with not doing IVF

[Thefailinghousewife]

i know in my head that this is probably the sensible decision not to proceed. we recently had fertility tests after several miscarriages last year and it showed I have crap egg numbers and he has low sperm mobility. We are booked to start IVF in November, but have been talking about whether we should go for it a lot and today my husband said he didn’t think we should. He thinks we should spend the money on adventures and embracing life instead.

My husband is 54, I am 41. We have 5 kids between us (4 are his, 1 is mine - they are mostly adults now apart from our youngest though) it will cost a lot of money to proceed but we did have it in savings comfortably.

There is every reason not to go for it, but I’m gutted. I don’t know if losing the babies last year has made me so desperate to proceed that I’m blinkered. I don’t know how to make myself feel okay with it? I know logically it makes sense.

My husband keeps saying he thinks it will happen naturally, but I feel like if he is hoping for that then we should try the IVF route. I can’t still hope for a baby naturally and not throw everything at it, if that makes sense?

has anyone been through this and made their peace with it? I hope I am not coming across insensitive as we already have kids, I do know how lucky we are.

I'm actually in quite a similar situation. Same age and also one child already. We decided not to go ahead with IVF. I'm 41 too and actually fell pregnant naturally this summer but lost it. I came to terms with not doing ivf by being happy and grateful for the money we had due to not doing it. Obviously gutted we didn't get the other child we wanted but what can I do? I've been diagnosed with adenomyosis too, recently. I would love to carry a baby naturally but I just don't want to do IVF. Especially if they recommended a donor egg. I wouldn't be on board with that at all. I try and enjoy the child I have and make her life as good as I can.

I think you are doing the right think to really consider it.

I am doing IVF because I have no living children and even so IVF is tough. It is physically, mentally and emotionally challenging so I would not enter it lightly. I started at 39 and now 40, we are just starting round 4 and only have managed 5 embryos, only one of which was normal. I have great egg numbers but poor quality due to age. The success rates are really quite low at this age, I have seen 11% quoted, albeit some do have success. We are about £50k out of pocket and probably won’t end up with a child given my history of losses. I almost wish we hadn’t started IVF because it is also hard to stop when it doesn’t work…

*thing

@Thefailinghousewife I'm so sorry for your losses.

I suppose I just wanted to share my perspective of doing IVF post miscarriage. I've been doing IVF since I miscarried 2 years ago (from a frozen embryo left over from having our DD). I've come to realise that I have just not recovered from my miscarriage emotionally. I think I thought that if I could just have a baby then the loss wouldn't be so bad. So I've kept driving on and on. But I can see now that it hasn't been the healthiest path to take for us.

I suppose in retrospect I wish I had taken more time to accept my loss and recover from it before making decisions about IVF.

No one can know whether IVF would work for you or not or whether the journey would be worth it even if it fails.

I don't regret our journey as we had other reasons too for carrying on. But I do wish I had had a better understanding of my own loss and how hard that can hit you.

Wishing you lots of love and hope you can come to terms with everything you have been through and whichever decision you make going forwards.
Xxx

Yes, I agree with @Janefx40, I haven’t got over my 2 miscarriages and 8 chemicals and it makes the grief worse when the IVf doesn’t go as you hope. My fertility counsellor described the IVF as re-traumatising re past loss.

Have you talked to anyone about your loss, a professional I mean? It hasn’t ‘fixed’ me but it has given me permission to feel what I do and that it is entirely normal. I recommend it, someone specualusing in loss and infertility issues. There are several charities but I got mine via my IVF clinic.