March IVF

mtele

We got the call today that only 2 of our embryos are normal by PGS. I am grateful to have some, but disappointed as I was hoping for more. Our RE kept saying that everything was going great and we would probably have multiple embryos to plan our family how we wanted so thinking that we will likely have to go through this process again at some point has me pretty bummed. Still waiting for an appointment on Thursday to discuss things further with my RE, but right now, we are leaning towards doing another ER to bank more embryos for the future.

@HottLemonade2886 - I have also been feeling kind of down lately. I have been thinking that it was because I am disappointed with how the cycle went overall. I also gained some weight and was told not to work out too strenuously during stims and for 2 weeks after ER. Usually I think working out helps relieve my stress and keep my mood up. Maybe the hormones have something to do with it too. At least tomorrow my 2 weeks are up and I can go back to exercising and hopefully get to feeling back to normal!

HottLemonade2886

@mtele Yay for two normal embryos! If you do decide to bank do you think you will do another cycle right away? I will most likely start stims again on Monday. Not really looking forward to those shots again. And yes the restrictions to working out really got me out of my routine and now that I can I have to stop again for round two. Blah! 

mtele

@HottLemonade2886 - Thanks! I'm trying to keep my thoughts positive about those 2! My RE had wanted us to wait a full normal cycle before doing an FET so I'm thinking the same will apply to another round of IVF. Plus that will give me a month off to hopefully feel back to normal. I wish we didn't have to wait so long though- it's like every step requires a 2 month wait! I'm glad you get to start again so soon! I hope this cycle brings you better results!

STO210

Good luck to all the ladies this cycle.  I hope you have positive results!  @jackiesmom324  @mtele @lizycs @Rachel_leigh22 @hopefulmom

@HottLemonade2886  - thanks for the support and good luck on your next cycle!

@mandasand - my clinic only does frozen DE, would love to chat offline when you have time.

STO210

@laurad75 Keep cooking your three follicles, it is going to be a great cycle!!!

mandasd

@STO210 I'm in a private FB group for DE...message me if you want to talk! 

Hopeful_mom

 mtele congrats on 2!  How many did you send in for testing?  Are you planning on transferring one or two?     

@HottLemonade2886 - Is a good point you're bringing up, I never really looked at it that way but its certainly possible.  The whole process is very taxing on your body physically and emotionally!  Its trying to concentrate on what makes you feel better and taking some time for you.  For me its over a year of taking some type of hormone almost every month and i've gained a bunch og weight, which is depressing enough.

Rachel_leigh22 i think tomorrow maybe they'll tell me about ER.  I've been so different with cycles stemming 9 days to 14 days. I have a feeling it might be this weekend.

IfYouCanDreamIt

LoveDontCostAThing Thank you, yes we did a day 3 transfer on Sunday. So thrilled for you, when is your next beta? 

Hopeful_mom Thanks I'm going to hold off from POAS until day before or the day of beta. It's on the 31st! How are you doing darling?

Hopeful_mom

IfYouCanDreamIt I hope you're relaxing and taking it easy!  Are you drinking your pineapple core  I actually had to watch the video the first time i used it.  I dont know what the future holds so I just keep taking it one day at a time.  My bday is approaching and its so hard to look forward too as that was my 1/2 way point with my pregnancy ugh!!
I'm feeling ok, but the shots are hurting a bit more this cycle, I'm wondering if i'm more tender from the extra estrogen.  Or all these extra eggs growing haha  Just praying I can make it to ER and I can get a good amount!!  I have monitoring tomorrow so I'm hoping for the best but nervous as always...

lizycs

Today is 8dpt. My beta is tomorrow, and my HPT has been faintly positive. This morning, though, I had some light spotting. I.am.freaking.out!!! What do I do? Is this a cause for panic? I would call my doc, but it's not like there would be much they can do anyway. My current plan is to go about my day as usual and watch the spotting. Anyone with similar experience?

laurad75

@mtele That's wonderful news.  Congratulations on the two.

@Hopeful_mom We are testing but regardless we will probably do another round of stims and ER prior to transfer.  We would really like to bank two before a transfer but we will see what we get.  GL with your monitoring appt - is it today? 

LoveDontCostAThing

@IfYouCanDreamIt -Thank you!  my next beta is tomorrow, and I am nervous!

@mtele -It may not be as much as you wanted, but two is still great because you know they are perfect!  Even though I got 7 blasts, I did not test, so it's kind of a crap shoot.  It's great to know you have 2 ready to go.

@lizycs -How many days have you been testing?  Is the line getting darker?  I heard that spotting can be normal.  What color is the blood?  Good luck on your beta!!!

lizycs

@LoveDontCostAThing The first faint line was 3dpt5de. It was darker at 5dpt. I was spotting this morning (8dpt). It was pinkish then brownish. Now I also have cramps. I also read that this may not mean anything. That doesn't stop me from freaking out though. Should I put myself on bed rest? Not sure that would help anyway....

LoveDontCostAThing

@lizycs -I think pink is normal and so is brown because brown means old blood.  Did you have cramps throughout the TWW?  I have and still do on and off.  Was it darker on 5dpt than today?  You are going to freak out no matter what because it's natural...I am still freaking out!  Could you call your ivf nurse?  My only experience with my lines becoming fainter ended in a chemical pregnancy, but I'm not saying that's what's happening.  You will only know for sure once you get a beta and then see if it doubles.  Tomorrow I find out if mine is doubling.  This whole process is so scary and full of highs/ lows.  I am sorry you're going through this, and I hope everything is okay!  Did you use different brand pregnancy tests?  That can affect lines too.  Feel free to message me

lizycs

@LoveDontCostAThing Thank you so much for the input. I am going to make the decision to relax and just let it be. Whether it is nothing or a chemical , there's not much I or anyone can do. I will pray, and hope, and see what happens. My first beta is at 6:30am tomorrow morning, so I think I can wait. Crossing my fingers for your beta tomorrow! Let's both have good news!!

FuzzyDust

@HottLemonade2886  - about the ER "post partum"... I was just thinking about the same thing yesterday. I had my retrieval almost 3 weeks ago. This last week (pretty much right after AF ended) is so totally "blah" - it really feels like I'm in a withdrawal. Restless legs, heavy head. I have hard time focusing my eyes (and I work with computers, so it's really noticeable). I can't get out of bed in the morning, and then feel sleepy all day. I do feel down mentally too. My boobs are also itchy for some reason (and we didn't do the transfer because of ohss, so I can't be pregnant right now). It's interesting to see that I'm not the only one noticing the change.

@mtele - congrats on the 2 good embryos! We're in the same boat, our follow-up is next week Thursday. I'm curious to see what you'll decide to do next.

Hopeful_mom

@fuzzydust are you planning on doing an FET?

@lizycs did you do another test?  hopefully its just old blood and everything is ok!!

laurad75 Yes my appt was today thanks.  I need to do the same as you, however my due date was Aug and I think mentally speaking I really need to try and have a transfer before that.  I had a normal embryo prior so praying that magic should happen again!


AFM:  Had my US and I have to admit I was nervous about the lead follicle that they would want to trigger me but luckily we're still stemming away.
Right 8, 9, 13, and 16
Left 10.5, 12, 14.5, 14.5 and 17.5
I will say this is the most they've measured in a cycle so its pretty exciting...I just hope that I will actual get at least 4/5 super strong ones.  We all want as much as we can get but this being the 4th round for me i'm trying to be realistic as well.  I do wish I tried this EPP protocol before doing the lupron which was such crap!  And my E2 doubled from 302 to 649 so they said things are looking good...yay!!

PoeMasque

Just got back from ET and we are officially PUPO with two little embryos! They were 4AA and 4AB (I think...). We had a 3CC and 4CC that he said we're not freezable and one more early blast that they would grow one more day and hopefully be able to freeze. 

Here are "Melvin and Maude" (named by my SO, we dont know gender haha)

Hopeful_mom

PoeMasque aww they're lovely and great grades!!  Congrats on being PUPO!!  Now the wait, when is ur beta?  Hoping they get all comfy cozy in there, did you do acupuncture?  3CC and 4CC still seem like decent grades.    Hope your other one makes it to freeze!

PoeMasque

@hopefulmom thanks!! beta is on the 31st. The RE said the CCs were "dying embryos" but the whole grading thing is kind of a mystery to me, so I just figured he knew best. I did acupuncture with our IUIs but haven't with the IVF, mostly because I changed jobs and it doesn't fit into my schedule as easily. I was thinking of doing some of the online meditation for IVF though. 

LoveDontCostAThing

@lizycs -Yes, I hope that we both have great news tomorrow too!!!

@PoeMasque -Your blasts look great!!

PoeMasque

@IfYouCanDreamIt we have betas on the same day! 

FuzzyDust

@Hopeful_mom - we're meeting with RE next week to discuss FET timing. H and I might end up taking a trip to Europe this summer first, and doing that afterward. He's very hopeful, so his assumption is that everything will work on first try and we won't be able to travel for a long while after.

@PoeMasque - OMG!!! SO Cute!

mandasd

@Hopeful_mom you're getting close! Don't let them make you stim too long! My downfall was 14 days stim. We should have triggered at 11 days and sacrificed 2 smaller ones because by the time I triggered and had to wait 36 more hours my eggs disappeared. I'm cheering you on! 

cmiller73

@Rachel_leigh22 Hey! We aren't planning a transfer until we have enough embryos to PGS and results give us a normal.  Hence us going right back into another ER cycle this month.

cmiller73

@mandasand I was wondering the same thing! I had 24 follicles and 11 of them were empty! everyone was very surprised from the 4 nurses to the RE to the embryologist... I felt like they kept me on stims longer than needed (maybe only a day or so but still) ... I triggered on CD13.

Rachel_leigh22

@Hopeful_mom nice! It's a relief to get ER over with... 


@PoeMasque congrats! They look great! Praying they stick! 


@cmiller73 oh ok! Good luck, I really don't like the idea of swimming twice in a row, ouch! 



Question for anyone who knows:  those of you who have done/are doing the testing, what makes the embryos normal or abnormal? Like what does it mean if they are abnormal? Would they have a disorder if you went ahead and transferred them or would they just not continue to grow? 

liljoy-2

@Rachel_leigh22 Lurking here from March FET. Abnormal means it is chromosomally abnormal (too many or too few chromosomes). An abnormal embryo is NOT implanted by any RE because it either doesn't implant or if it implants it leads to miscarriage in the first trimester or in a very few cases where the baby is born, it has Down or even more severe congenital issues that lead to death. 

Hopeful_mom

@Rachel_leigh22  I'm not at ER yet I'm thinking it will be sat or sun.  Also usually with an abnormal embryo RE assume that they usually dont implant and lead to a bfp which you wouldn't want as liljoy nicely explained.  And when woman do MC early on thats what they assume, the embryo was abnormal.  Unfortunately even PGS normal embryos don't mean 100% BFP but you hope your chances are better!!

@mandasand Thanks so much for the info.  Thats probably why they are having me come in tomorrow for monitoring instead of friday.  I think that 17.5 is going to call the shot, however I really don't want to go before I have at least 3.  Today is technically day 10 of stemming for me.  We shall see what tomorrow brings...  Man I can feel my blood pressure riseeeee!

mtele

@Rachel_leigh22 - Yes, like @liljoy said, PGS tests to see if there are the normal number of chromosomes in an embryo. Normal is 23 chromosome pairs, one from the mom and one from the dad. But, due to problems with the egg, sperm or problems that occur in cell division after fertilization, the embryo can end up with too much or too little material from one chromosome. The majority of these abnormalities will cause the embryo to not implant or end up in miscarriage. Some can cause a live baby that may have genetic abnormalities. One of the most common of these is Down syndrome, when the baby ends up with 3 pairs of chromosome 21 (trisomy 21). There are other syndromes that can occur that have more severe abnormalities and while may end up in a live birth, often result in death in the first few months of life (trisomy 13 and 18).

In addition, there are more minor genetic disorders which can occur as well as something called mosaicism, where the embryo can develop different numbers of chromosomes in different parts. Unfortunately, this testing is still rather new and we don't know exactly which ones might be able to end up in a healthy baby. So generally, embryos that are abnormal by PGS are not transferred because the majority of them will not end up in a live birth.

caseyw8784

It's great reading all the updates and how all the ETs are going!

@PoeMasque - what pretty little embryos! That's interesting that the doctor said that the CCs were "dying"...I've seen people on here transfer them and have BFPs. Maybe there was something he noticed that was indicative that they were not thriving or so. How are you handling the 2WW?

AFM, doing a decent job to stay busy while waiting for the testing results to come back. DH and i are going to nyc tomorrow night so i probably won't be signing on until we get home sunday night or monday. Just checked the weather, and it's going to be rainy all weekend, which kind of sucks, but we've been to the city so many times that we won't be missing anything if we're not out and about alllll day long At least it should be in the 60s so it'll feel a bit like spring...

Anyone else have any fun weekend plans?

cmiller73

Ladies, since I am new to grading, today I asked what our 1 frozen was graded at and he let us know it was a 5BB. I know they only freeze the 'best', but is it hatching because of the biopsy? or do they designate it before the biopsy to grab cells from the outer area for the biopsy? Just curious.  Science is so crazy!

When I also asked if I either stimmed too long and lost some eggs or if my RE thought there was something else wrong or that I should do differently, he thought it was most likely due to the Lupron only trigger (maybe some of my age but wasn't thinking that considering how I responded to the meds) and now will have me combo trigger unless my E2 is over 3500.

@mandasand were you only triggered with Lupron as well? I forget...

cmiller73

@caseyw8784  Have a blast in the city. I lived in the East Village for 10 years prior to moving to NH. Nothing quite like it! Enjoy living it up  

PoeMasque

@caseyw8784 I'm not sure why the cc embryos are being disregarded, I did some reading and it sounds like they don't typically thaw well. It's also possible that they are fragmented? My plan was to call the clinic today and ask since they will also know about our early blast by now. 

Have fun in NYC! I lived there for a few years and had a blast! I still miss the food. 

I feel like I get to cheat on the TWW a little, I'm going to test tomorrow to make sure the trigger is out of my system, but it sounds like I can start testing at home on Monday. I tried to pick up an extra shift on Saturday to help move the weekend along, but no dice! 

@cmiller73 i am not an expert on grading, but I have a friend who is about to give birth to a 5B embryo, so I think it's a good thing! 

Rachel_leigh22

Thanks for all the great input!! I'm not doing the testing though so how will I know if my 1 little frozen fighter is abnormal or not? They're just planning on transferring it 

Angelaag

Well I just found out no growth updates until Day 5! Ugh 

liljoy-2

@Rachel_leigh22 If you don't do the PGS biopsy, there's no way to tell. You just implant it and hope for the best (that it is normal and it implants). That's how it works. 

mandasd

@cmiller73 no I did ovidrel

Rachel_leigh22

@liljoy wow that's kinda scary...I didn't do the testing because they didn't recommend it for me...lol great one more thing to worry about 

caseyw8784

@Rachel_leigh22 - can i ask how old you are? Most RE's really recommend the PGS testing after a certain age (% of abnormal chromosomes rise with age) especially when you have to weigh the chances of it being abnormal vs the extra fees for the testing.