PGS and gender knowledge

FuzzyDust

As I'm eagerly waiting for our 3 little embryos PGS results, I wonder if those of you who did it too opted to know the embryo gender?

My husband really wants a son. His family is Italian, and it's a tradition to pass on your dad's name onto your son. For me this isn't as important, but I know that I want 2 kids and I'd prefer them to be a girl and a boy. I've had a name picked for my future daughter for over 10 years now. You know, getting greedy considering we're dealing with IF 

Going into IVF, we knew we'd be doing PGS, so the plan has always been to also disclose the embryo gender. I guess we also had a very optimistic outlook that we'd have plenty of embryos to chose from. Now that we only have 3 frozen of 'fair' quality, I'm leaning towards not knowing the gender. Chances are we'll end up having en FET attempt with each of them that comes back as normal. I don't want to get even more attached to the little fellas while there is still a chance they they won't stick. Also, what if only one is normal? Or all, but they are all XX or all XY? I'm now trying to remember if we already ticked a box somewhere to have gender disclosed, or we'll still be asked when the results are ready. I talked to my DH about it and he agreed that we should hide the gender now if they still give us the option.

DungeonTrollMel

We had PGS done and when they get the results they will ask you if you want to know gender before telling you. They c an also hide it on the lab report as well. 

If you get one of each and don't want to decide based on gender most REs will advise to go with best quality first. If all are the same you can write them in envelopes and pick and turn it in so the office knows which to thaw but it's a surprise for you 

Kp214

We did PGS testing and opted to know the gender. We sent six off for testing and are glad that we did. Three came back normal. We didn't get an option for which one they put back in as we had a normal one that was "perfect." All three of our's were boys. **tw** He stuck and I'm almost 12 weeks. So, you might ask you clinic if they put back the best one that's PGS normal. we were thinking we'd have at least one of each. However, the more I think about it, this is the best. I'm not a girly girl and never have been. I've never related to girly girls very well but relate better to boys. I think no matter what, you will be happy and thankful for a healthy child.  You might be a little sad if you don't have the option of one gender or the other, but that's normal. Good luck!

FuzzyDust

@DungeonTrollMel - I had an assumption the clinic always forces you to pick the best looking first. Does PGS also have a 'quality' gradation, or is it just a yes/no kind of deal? I know all 3 of our embryos are 'fair' by the way they look. Not sure if there is any one that's more 'fair' than other

@Kp214 - Yes, the biggest goal is to have a healthy child regardless of gender. I'm as Tom-boy as it gets, and I've always been surrounded mostly by men because of my hobbies, education, and career choices. But I still hope to have a baby girl one day - raise another woman to be independent and strong, and maybe become an engineer if she chooses too. But then again, nature doesn't care, an in reality I'd still be over the moon happy if I manage to end up with a couple of healthy boys. I wonder how hubby will feel if all good embryos will come back XX...

I hope my gender greediness doesn't jinx our little embryos - I love them all for what they are

BornReady

We did PGS and ended up with only 1 normal embryo. Our lab report did not have gender on it and my RE told me we would have to contact the lab directly if we wanted to find out that information. We chose not to. Good luck on your PGS results!

FuzzyDust

Thanks, @BornReady. How many did you send to test?

prudence9-2

I tested 8. And 4 came back normal. 2 boys, 2 girls. 

**TW**
I had had the first FET back in January, but the embryo stopped growing. So now I'm waiting for a MC. 

Before this experience I thought that if the PGS tested embryo implants then you are pretty much set and won't have a MC... 

I really wanted to have a girl. But at the end of the day, what I want is to have a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby...

Good luck with your PGS results!

BornReady

We only had 2 blasts to test. Both were good looking, but one was super abnormal after testing. TW....we were successful with our FET with that one blast.

laurad75

We had this discussion with our RE at a recent appt since we are doing FET with PGS. It was understood that we would transfer the best quality embryo but if there were multiples with equal quality we would transfer a male first. That being said, we requested that we would not know the gender until after a positive pregnancy test. 

FuzzyDust

@Prudence9 , I'm so sorry to hear about your embryo. It's always a hope that PGS would reduce the chances of m/c, but I guess there is never a guarantee. 

@BornReady, as they say - you only need one good one.  

Although I'm so hoping for 2 good sticky ones.

@laurad75 , I like your plan! I also prefer to not get attached to an embryo even more (by already knowing gender) until the chances of it becoming a baby become a bit higher.

I still don't know if we'll be given an option to mask the gender, but the biggest wish right now it to have an embryo that's good

wifeinraleigh28

We decided to find our the sexes of our embryos. It was too tempting when the embryologist called with our PGS results. We also chose to transfer our best quality female embryo, though the clinic told me all our embryos were good quality. *TW* I'm now 28 weeks pregnant with that girl embryo.

we have 4 boys and 2 girls remaining in the freezer

FamousAmous

In my experience, I think you're right on the money and doing the best thing. I wouldn't have said that a few months ago though, before my first FET ended up as a CP. My husband and I both desperately wanted at least one girl, so when we realized we could know the gender from PGS testing, it was a no-brainer that we'd find out and transfer the girls first. Yes, I felt ridiculous for even having a preference after 4 years of infertility, but we looked at gender selection as the silver lining to having to go through all the misery and struggle. So we ended up with 2 girl and 2 boy embryos after the testing. Since there was an 80% chance of success, we opted to put in both girls right away and felt so confident and excited about having a daughter. Welp, let's just say that knowing we had lost both our precious girls with one CP was beyond devastating. I can say for sure that had we not known if we had lost boys or girls, the CP wouldn't have been nearly as bad. I would have been very disappointed of course, but just because of the failure itself, not because of losing a "daughter" or two we never even had yet. 

We had to reframe our mindset A LOT before our next FET, which took place on Feb 24. It has been a success (so far) and I'm 5 weeks pregnant with one or both of my boys. I feel so thankful and lucky to be pregnant right now, but truthfully I am still mourning the girls we lost. If I end up miscarrying again (God forbid) and I had to do another IVF, I wouldn't want to know the gender and set myself up for that extra disappointment again. 

[Deleted User]

@Prudence9 @FamousAmous. My love-tits are (((hugs))) ❤

Eta I appreciate everyone's input, and I can see how there's not really an easy or cut and dried answer.  For us, I can see wanting to know at least if we have a mix of both genders, for starters, bc if possible I think we would definitely want both.

DH is also half italian, so while he doesn't want to give his son the same first name, he does have a bit of that oldschool thing about a son/heir, passing on the family name / trade potentially, too etc. However we don't know yet what may come along as part and parcel with the, "family y," so to speak, so I'm sure that will become a while separate conversation when the time comes... :/

I have always wanted both, so as much as I totally want girls, it will still be painful if we can't have at least one boy or boys, too.  (In my 20s I said I wanted 9 older boys and a baby girl! Lol. But lately I have had an easier time picturing myself as a girl-mom, too.)  Not to mention, perhaps having boys but knowing they may have impacted chances at ttc their own families down the line, if that's the case????   :'( Ughhh. Heart-wrenching, and I could get so freaking mad. But I'll try not to borrow trouble instead.

I can also see how much harder a potential loss might become, knowing and building up such a specific vision of your growing child, vs. not knowing.  Either way, I'm sorry for all the losses experienced in this whole ttc process. It's so hard. ❤❤❤ 

AlohaKumu

I'm revisiting this thread, since the doc explained to us that DH's genetic condition would definitely pass on to any males. DH wants a boy so badly that he's not focused on the consequences (should we have them), but I do have a moral/ethical issue with knowing that we would be dooming any boys to infertility.

DH keeps talking about how great medicine will be by then, but still, it's a hard thought and something I want to continue thinking about. (Of course, this is all hypothetical, as we are far from having any embryos to test yet.) Thank you, everyone, for sharing your journeys and deeply personal stories.

caseyw8784

@AlohaKumu - have you and your doctor talked about if PGD (not PGS) testing would be available for your DH's condition? DH and I have had long conversations over the last year about the moral/ethical issue that you mentioned. I am a single gene disorder carrier, and to do PGD testing, we needed biological family dna samples, which literally took over a year for family members to cooperate and get the testing done, so in the meantime we had talked about what we would do if we decided to forgo the testing and "roll the dice" with getting pregnant.

As great as medicine and technology will (should) be in 25-30 years, it's not a complete solution. Without testing, if we had a girl, we would be "forcing" her to having to do IVF herself when she was ready to start a family; if we had a son, he would most likely be affected...on the off chance he wasn't, then the only way he would NOT pass it on would be to have only boys. so, IVF in his case too. 

(I know PGS looks at the chromosomes in general, but I was under the impression that it looked for duplicate or completely missing genes...not partial deletions...which is why I suggested PGD testing, which looks for 1 particular issue in the embryo...)

AlohaKumu

@caseyw8784 - yes, the clinic does the PGD testing and our doc wants to do it, even though this particular mutation is pretty much 100% guaranteed to be passed down to a boy. (It sounds like your family testing procedure was very frustrating!) I agree with your word choice; I totally feel like we would be "forcing" the boy to have to face IVF down the road. I've been reading that many couples with this mutation opt to implant female embryos for this reason.

We've done some counseling together as a couple and we have another session coming up soon. I want to talk to DH about this with a counselor to guide the discussion, since I know this is a sensitive topic for him. I think part of him feels like it's his "fault" for the IVF in the first place and thinking about not having a son makes him feel even more diminished in a way. I have tried to reassure him that this is no one's fault, but I can see that it hits him hard. There are no easy answers, and we may decide to "roll the dice," but the consequences are really weighing on my heart.

FuzzyDust

I emailed my clinic today asking them to mask the gender if possible

I also got a call from the genetic lab (Good Start Genetics, Inc.) today. They got our samples yesterday, will have the results to send back to the clinic by the end of the week. We have a follow up appointment on March 30th, so I guess we won't know anything until then... Heh....

I was surprised that the lab is on the east coast (we are on the west coast). Are there very few labs who do this? And the cost was also weird - we didn't know exact price beforehand, and they just called and asked to pay $200 per embryo. I asked to email me receipt, and it doesn't have any more info on it - just the lab name and the total.

HottLemonade2886

@FuzzyDust That's kind of funny because I am on the East Coast and the lab that did mine is on the west coast. They got my sample by the next day. For pricing they mentioned a discounted rate deal they have with my clinic and also since I signed up for the multi cycle deal any cycles after my first will be quite a bit cheaper. 

caseyw8784

@HottLemonade2886 @FuzzyDust - and I am on the east coast and the genetics lab that is doing mine is in the midwest! but i think that's more cause apparently there are only 1 or 2 labs in the country that tests for the single gene disorder that we're trying to avoid passing on... ::shrugs::

prudence9-2

@FuzzyDust @HottLemonade2886 @caseyw8784 I'm in the west coast and the lab I used was in the east coast. Samples were sent on Sat and I got the results on Tues or Wed. It was super fast. 

DungeonTrollMel

I am in phoenix and one of the labs is in town here so they were actually able to get results to us the next day after the received. Our price was 2000 for 8  and then 250 per embryo over 8 that we tested 

FuzzyDust

Oh wow, there seems to be quite a range of locations and prices. Thanks all for the info! I wonder why it's so common to send the samples across the country even though there seems to be labs in most regions.
Correction - the results will only be know by the end of *next* week. I'm pretty anxious about it - actually had a dream last night that they called me and said that there were no good embryos  I was so happy to wake up and realize that call wasn't real!

wifeinraleigh28

I'm on the east coast and the lab my clinic uses for PGS (Genesis Genetics) is in the Midwest. We got our results super fast. The lab received our embryo samples on 8/5 (Friday) and we received results on 8/9 (Tuesday).

BornReady

@FuzzyDust My clinic used Good Start Genetics as well, but we had a very detailed PGS pay agreement we signed prior to sending off any embryos for testing. We were automatically billed for a certain amount when we agreed to testing and then were refunded after we had our final number to be biopsied (2). I am in Massachusetts. Here is the pay list I was given....

laurad75

I had a similar agreement as @BornReady.  At our last ER we only had one embryo to test so the remainder sits in our 'bank' for round 2.  

FuzzyDust

Oh wow. Those prices look crazy!!!!! I thought $200 per embryo was bad ($600 total for 3), but now I see that under this list I'd have to pay over $2K!!!  Now I understand why so many people do the "banking embryos to test together". And, per my understanding, the labs don't deal with insurances. I wonder if I can get a tax break at the end of the year for it as a medical expense.

I have a suspicion that my clinic has a "clinic volume deal" with them, where they get the best volume price regardless of the fact that the embryos are from different people.

DungeonTrollMel

@FuzzyDust honestly in our opinion, it was beyond worth every penny. Based on the video monitoring we used and traditional grading, had we not done PGS, we most likely would have had several more MCs before we got to healthy embryos. Our "highest" graded ones were super abnormal and of our 4 normal, none particularly stood out. We had less than 1/3 be PGS normal and we would have paid much more to save the heartache again

[Deleted User]

<blockquote class="Quote">
<div class="QuoteAuthor"><a href="/profile/DungeonTrollMel">DungeonTrollMel</a> said:</div>
<div class="QuoteText">@FuzzyDust honestly in our opinion, it was beyond worth every penny. Based on the video monitoring we used and traditional grading, had we not done PGS, we most likely would have had several more MCs before we got to healthy embryos. Our "highest" graded ones were super abnormal and of our 4 normal, none particularly stood out. We had less than 1/3 be PGS normal and we would have paid much more to save the heartache again
</div>
</blockquote>
I was telling a friend of mine about this aspect of your experience and it seriously just blows my mind.  I am learning so much from you! ❤  what a relief to know you made the right choice!

FuzzyDust

@DungeonTrollMel  - that's exactly why we're doing this! I'd rather have a disappointment early on, than a m/c later if I can prevent it in any way. All our 3 embryos are "fair" quality, so hopefully we'll fall into the same category with you, were less pretty ones are actually the normal ones

prudence9-2

@FuzzyDust out of my 8 embryos, the nicest 3 and the one with the lowest grade were the normal ones. (4 out of 8)

AlohaKumu

@DungeonTrollMel - I was explaining to DH why we will want this, even if we know that the AZFc will carry on to any male children, since he was a bit skeptical at first. I'd rather have tested embryos from the beginning, knowing this will give us the best chance of a healthy pregnancy, even if it costs more.

rainbowwishes5

I did PGS with my second 2 and got the gender results. Both boys! So we'll see if I get any from my next banking

liljoy-2

I did PGS testing and was worth it, because out of so many blastocysts, only a couple were normal I know the gender, but I will ask the embryologist to not let me know the gender he picks when transferring.

@rainbowwishes5 So you got your results back and they are both normal? That's such great news! Do you continue with retrievals because you potentially want more than one baby down the line? I was contemplating that too but I said crap, I'm gonna try a transfer first and hope for the best. 

rainbowwishes5

@liljoy yes continue with ERs because I transferred 2 in January and you can guess how well that went. So I want to bank my lifetime max and then just go through them. 
You have a good chance of it working first try! Good luck!

liljoy-2

@rainbowwishes5 Thanks, good luck to you too. We sure need luck after so much heartache, eh? This was my 2nd IVF (first one with no embryos), 4th fully medicated cycle. A lot of synthetic drugs pumped in with no results so far...but hey, sometimes I force myself to take comfort in the small battle victories, and hope to win the war in the end. 

rainbowwishes5

@liljoy that's a good philosophy!! 

FuzzyDust

I got a call from my RE today - 2 our of 3 embryos are PGS normal! I'm beyond happy! She asked me right away if I want to know the gender, and I said - no, if we only have 2 total, we'll use both (one at a time) anyways.

I still realize that there is no guarantee that our two little embryos will become two babies, and I still might end up needing another IVF, but today I'm satisfied with how this process is going and I'm keeping my hopes up!

DungeonTrollMel

@FuzzyDust congrats!

prudence9-2

That's great! @FuzzyDust

[Deleted User]

Yay! @FuzzyDust. Happy news!

Marley629

Great news @FuzzyDust