Pregnant after 35
Need some hope from the pg mamas over 35
Hi,
I'm Sara... TTC baby number 2. I had my first baby @ 34 and I'm 35 now. We've just really started trying in earnest to conceive a second. I turn 36 in August.
For those of you who didn't end up using things like Clomid/IUI/IVF...how long did it take you to conceive? Did you use FAM or just leave it to chance?
DS was totally an unplanned surprise so I have no experience with OPK, BBT, and FAM.
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Re: Need some hope from the pg mamas over 35
No experience here, either, both babies were conceived without too much hoopla.
ETA: Oh, and I'll be 43 next month
With my first, it happened on the first "try".. I took a test on my 38th bday and found out I was pregnant.. When she was 6 months old, and I was 39...I got pregnant (sort of "trying" to see if it would happen--we didn't want to wait).. but I miscarried that baby. With this baby, it happened on the second month of actually "trying"... I'll be 40 in two months... I have no idea what any of those acronyms are.. but we didn't use any method or drugs, so I guess it was chance and we got very, very lucky. Oh.. and I was diagnosed years ago with PCOS. (polycystic ovarian syndrome).. I lost alot of weight 3 years ago, which I guess helped bc I'm fine now.
FWIW: I have plenty of friends and one of my sisters who have all had babies recently... into their 40s. My sister was told she has the ovaries of a 20 something. On this board.. there are lots of women who are over 40.
If you didn't have any problems with conceiving your first.. you likely won't with your second.... Age is just a number.. don't fret. It will happen. You are so YOUNG!!!!
I'm 40, this was a total accident.
I have also had PCOS my entire life, so I rarely if ever ovulate on my own and i rarely get periods, when i do , they suck.
I was put on a medication named metformin for insulin resistance as i was becoming borderline diabetic. Turns out it induces ovulation in women with PCOS.
Our spermicide failed and voila.
35 is just a number, and trust me, you will hear plenty of stories from us older gals, that while this pregnancy is a happy event now, it was not planned nor expected.
If your doctor is leading you to believe that being over 35 is going to make it harder, maybe you should shop around for a doctor that has more experience with mature ladies
Women live a lot longer and more healthy now. Being older means you have to be monitored a bit more, but it doesn't mean much else.
I have to agree with the ladies here. They scare people with numbers. Statistics show that more women over 35 are having healthy babies. The reason they have the scare is because less women over 35 conceive so they go off those numbers in comparison to younger women. But you'd be surprise how many 23 yr old women have babies with genetic disorders compare to over 35.
I have grown children and am starting all over again and this is by far the best pregnancy I've had compared to when I was in my 20's. I know this is rare, but appreciate it none the less. This pregnancy was not planned, one time without using birth control and bam! Our little boy is on his way.
I agree that you just never know....so just be prepared for anything. With my first, it was so easy.....got pregers on the 4th try with very little intervention.....
But with this baby, it has been 2 and half years......We see a fertility specialist....took injections....ovary ultrasounds....the whole nine yards. After 15 tries, and 2 lost babies, it worked.....
Just be open to everything......
I am 42 and he is 35. No charting, no temping, no ovulation kits, and only prenatals and regular vitamins for health. We starting trying around December of 2009. We had an early-ish m/c in February of last year. 4-7 wks.
We are regularly intimate, every day to every two days, all the time. We have a two year old, and I have a 21 year old. This pregnancy is definitely stronger than the last one, the symptoms show that if nothing else does.
It can take even "young" couples and average of up to twelve months to conceive so don't let all of the numbers out there scare you.
I got my BFP during the cycle in which I turned 40. It was our 6th cycle TTC. I'd say yes, I used the Fertility Awareness Method (FAM) -- I'd read up on it in Taking Charge of Your Fertility (TCOYF). I charted my basal body temp (BBT) and kept track of it on Fertility Friend (FF; www.fertilityfriend.com). The cycle I got my BFP I had used a Clearblue Easy Fertility Monitor (CBEFM) to track when I was about to ovulate, and also an ovulation predictor kit (OPK). We also used Preseed because my cervical mucus (CM) was fairly scant.
I learned all of this pretty much from women on the TTC>35 board where I had hung out for about a year, learning to chart my cycles and get a sense of them before starting to TTC (DH and I wanted to wait until after our wedding last April).
Ironically, I had just made an appointment to see an RE (my gynecologist didn't want me to waste any time, and I was hitting the 6 months of TTC mark) and my DH was set up for an SA, but we then we got the BFP. Honestly, we were both surprised that I got pregnant so quickly. We were prepared for it to take a lot longer... or not at all.
Best of luck to you!
photo by Scott Metzger
kikijbird ~ Erica (aka Kiki) & Paul ~ 24 April 2010
The JBirds Bio ~ Updated 03.02.10 - Invites!
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I'm 42 - and we were trying to avoid. This pregnancy was a complete surprise. The only thing I can figure out is that I ovulated early (there was one time in the week before I was supposed to ovulate).
Don't let the numbers scare you.
Conceived in our 5th month of trying. Used a fertility monitor. I was 40 and a half when I gave birth to our son. :-)
Sorry to hear about the PCOS and diabetes issues. I don't have those problems myself but I knew someone who struggled with PCOS. It sounded very frustrating. Never knew that about Metformin. Very interesting those drug side effects.
I know about about unexpected pg LOL...We found out we were expecting a week after our engagement! I was already 6 weeks along but we'd moved into a new place together so I thought I was late bc of relocation stress.
Sorry about the million responses at the end. I was trying to respond individually to each post but somehow they all showed up at the end of the post.
I just want to thank you for all your wonderful and inspiring responses. You've totally made me feel so much more hopeful and less anxious about the whole TTC process! Congrats on all your pregnancies!
Pre-Seed is a lubricant that is "sperm friendly", or at least, it is the least harmful to sperm. Most lubricants actually kill sperm, so when TTC it's best to avoid them! I believe Pre-Seed was designed to help with TTC, mimicking the qualities of egg-white cervical mucus (EWCM). [Just figured I'd throw in all the acronyms so folks would know what they mean.
]
photo by Scott Metzger
kikijbird ~ Erica (aka Kiki) & Paul ~ 24 April 2010
The JBirds Bio ~ Updated 03.02.10 - Invites!
I used FAM and the Clear Blue Fertility Monitor. We got pregnant on our 5th cycle, but m/c. Then got pregnant again on our 10th cycle and so far it is sticking.
The Clear Blue Monitor is expensive, but I liked it better than the test strips or the watch. I had a lot of discrepancies with the regular OPK strips and didn't trust the watch (OV Watch).
There's no point in going straight to Clomid, IUI or any of that stuff if you aren't positive that you are ovulating. So I would start there if you're worried. If after awhile, no luck - I would have your DH get a semen analysis since that is the next least invasive procedure. And go from there.
I have 2 kids that were born after I was 35 and am pregnant again. I also have 4 kids that were born before I was 35 (for comparison).
My 4 year old was a complete surprise. I was 38 when he was conceived and turned 39 a month after he was born.
My 1 year old was the result of actually trying for 15 months. I charted seriously for 4 months or so and then stopped temping and just kind of kept track of my cycle. I was 41 when I got pregnant and 42 when he was born.
Now, I'm 43. I got pregnant right around my birthday, but had a m/c. We weren't trying, but the m/c made us discuss whether we wanted another child. I thought for sure I wouldn't be able to get pregnant again for a long time, but I got pregnant the second cycle after the m/c.
I think there's definite reasons to think you'll get pregnant relatively easily over 35. Thirty is the new 18 or something like that!
Congratulations on your pregnancy!
I'm pregnant for the first time and I'm 39 too! My due date is May 15, 2011. I'm a type 2 diabetic with only one functioning ovary (the other was surgically removed when I was 13), and I'm also hypothyroid. A few months after I started medication to control diabetes (Metformin), I got pregnant!
Before that, we were trying and did all kinds of tests at our doctor's. My husband did a semen analysis (SA) at our hospital's andrology lab, and was diagnosed with abnormal motility (30%) zero morphology, as well as a high white blood cell count. They told me that there was absolutely no way we'd get pregnant without intensive fertility treatments where they took isolated an egg and took out a sperm and injected it into the egg or something really high-tech like that. We were devastated because we just didn't have the kind of money they charged to do that (husband had just found a job after over a year of unemployment). They said the only other thing we could do is maybe consider donor sperm.
So we kind of gave up. A few weeks later my period was kind of late, but I didn't think anything of it because sometimes it gets late like that (and that's always happened since I was a teenager). But then it didn't come and I panicked, thinking maybe I was growing ovarian cysts or something dangerous. I didn't even consider taking a pg test but my husband convinced me to do so ... and it was a BFP!!!! A blood test at my obgyn's proved it, and I was transferred to our hospital's high-risk clinic due to my diabetes.
So it took us almost a year to get pregnant, and it happened about 3 weeks after the fertility clinic told us we could never, ever get pregnant on our own!
All we did differently was switch from PreSeed (great lubricant but didn't help us with ttc at all) to olive oil, of all things. Just a tiny bit in the PreSeed dropper turned out to be a good lubricant and also very lucky, lol!
We did the 12-week ultrasound and triple-screen test, and everything was great. I'm on a stricter diet, take insulin to regulate blood sugar since I'm a type 2 diabetic, try to exercise every day (daily walks), and now I have to do fetal monitoring twice a week, but those are just more inconveniences than hardships. Everything's going well, thank God! I'm hoping to have a natural, drug-free childbirth.
So don't worry! Just because you're older doesn't necessarily mean you'll have a harder time or a more difficult pregnancy. I'm a preschool teacher and several of our school moms are pregnant too, and a few are having bad complications despite being years and years younger than me. I don't think you can predict how hard or easy a pregnancy will be by the mother's age.
Think positive, relax, try not to stress, be happy and everything will go well for you -- sending you lots of good vibes for luck and health and a BFP soon!