Third IUI - no sunshine or rainbows

BenJay · April 2017

DH's motile sperm count was the lowest it has ever been. From 7, to 2.5 and today's was 1.1 He took Clomid for 3 months, started exercising, CoQ10, multivitamin, and Mucinex.

The fertility doctor was pretty much like 'we'll do one more treatment but I don't want to waste your money'.

Then she lead into the talk about our weights. Yep, we're fat and no reasonable amount of exercise and diet combination has worked for us. I work a 40 hour week at a desk - I don't have the luxury of time, money or energy (thanks, thyroid!) to go to great lengths to go all Biggest Loser and starve myself or workout maniacally at the gym. I just can't.

I have tripled my thyroid dose in a year and she brought up Hashimoto's. Even if DH had better sperm count, the presence of antibodies could prevent pregnancy. Well, crap.

DH and I talked over Swedish brunch - we are just going to try the old fashioned way if this treatment fails (it just takes one!) and I'll go back on birth control (for hormone regulation) in July.

Today, I has a sad...

funkykey · April 2017

@BenJay - how gutting, I'm sorry.

You both must have been devastated - all that work!

Ugh. I'd be sad too. Sending you big hugs.

SP128 · April 2017

I'm so sorry. You have every right to be sad.

hoffmanr7 · April 2017

I am so sorry. That is a very bad day and you have every right to be sad. *hugs*

Worldtravler0522 · April 2017

I'm so sorry @BenJay.

SoonToBeMommaHowe · April 2017

Lots of hugs for you @BenJay. Sorry for such a rough day

Bababatty · April 2017

I'm so sorry, @BenJay! That's so very frustrating!

Vagarcia16 · April 2017

@BenJay so sorry! Is he doing any vitamin supplements like FertilityAid? That helped my DH out a ton! He went from 2M to 17M in 6 months. I'm surprised your RE recommended clomid for your DH, my RE said that can actually reduce sperm count. I'm obviously not a Dr., and you should trust your RE over my experience. Maybe consider getting a second opinion?

MFI is so hard, for our DH's and for us. It's difficult to maintain that balance of being a supportive partner while also feeling such heavy disappointment. Waiting for numbers to improve and not being able to move forward with treatment is the worst. Sending lots of love your way.

P.S. DH and I are fat and were fat when TTC. Don't let that deter you from pursuing parenthood.

msstephanielynn · April 2017

@benjay I'm new here but I just wanted to say that I'm so sorry. Perhaps you could seek a second opinion? Not all Doctors are the same and I feel like some are more willing to take different approaches than others.

Bababatty · April 2017

@Vagarcia16 Clomid is an accepted and encouraged treatment for MFI. It worked extremely well for my husband. It's unfortunate your RE is steering people away from that treatment, although I'm glad you had success on others. That said, I have heard that some men can over respond to clomid and produce too much testosterone, which would have the effect of reducing spent count. I assume this is what your RE was worried about, but that's why blood tests to check hormone levels while on clomid are important. I do know that clomid can reduce morphology, as it did with my H. However, the jury is still out on how important that is.

@BenJay It's possible this is what has happened with your H. Did he do any blood tests to monitor while on clomid? It's also possible this wasn't the right drug to address the issues causing his MFI. Remind me if you're working with a urologist? I'd definitely get a second opinion on this. Good luck!

BenJay · May 2017

Sorry everyone, I had to step away from it all. I have been struggling with the frustration of being only minimally treated for my thyroid and the seeming hopelessness for DH's sperm count. Thank you to everyone for your kind words.

@Vagarcia16 - Huh, it's odd that the RE pushed it do hard and the urologist was skeptical. Probably should have listened to the latter. Fertility Aid worked for your husband? I hadn't gotten much positive feedback from the RE about that. Maybe she's not very good RE??

And seriously, everyone at this point has been like "the only thing I could recommend is losing 100 lbs but even then..." Super disappointing.

@Bababatty - As far as I know, they didn't do any draws on him to check testosterone. He is working with a urologist but his suggestion was "lose 100 lbs and even then it might not help". Very uplifting.

He stopped taking them after the IUI, so maybe it will help in trying in the future.

funkykey · May 2017

@BenJay - you know, I saw this the other day:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/08/26/whats-wrong-with-me

I read it because as someone with unexplained IF, I identified. Apparently, some doctors think that a some amount of unexplained IF is related to the immune system.

Anyway, it's about Hashimoto's, so may be worth a read. A little dark, but (for me) it was interesting, just to learn how little we know about immune disorders.

BenJay · May 2017

After I posted this thread, I went to my FB group for Health At Every Size, a holy crap, there are lots of folks with Hashimoto's/thyroid issues (with varying levels of infertility). Most were like: you have to advocate for yourself by finding a doctor who will test and treat.

What's hard is I'm a skeptic of naturopathic medicine - it works for some but I get concerned when they peddle supplements as a cure. I think it's just going to take so much time to get someone who will actually take this thyroid thing seriously. My current doctor at my HMO was like: doesn't matter if it's Hashimoto's, we'd still just treat it the way we are now. Bananas, right?

Picking up recommended reading at the library tonight. Interesting article though, thanks for sharing!

funkykey · May 2017

I'm a skeptic of naturopathic medicine too. A friend of ours is a neurologist, and she takes a harder stance than me: "those people should be in prison." I guess she's seen one too many cases where a patient has come in with something, been really far gone, and said: "I would have come in sooner, but I was working with my naturopath and treating this with oil of oregano."

That said, I know lots of naturopaths are like: "you need to see your doctor as well as me" and also that there's not a lot doctors can do for many autoimmune disorders, so the reality is many people are forced to try lots of unproven things just to see if something improves their quality of life.

I definitely didn't mean "you should try naturopathy", only that auto immune conditions (including hashimoto's) are hard. I can't believe you've had to triple your dosage this year- that's brutal!

What happens now? Do you need more tests?

BenJay · May 2017

Like I get the argument that we overtreat with medication (antibiotics, antidepressants) and oversanitize because it's the industry - who else is going to keep Big Pharma and chemical companies in business? But going the polar opposite isn't helpful either. Oil of oregano ain't going to do shit. From what I can tell, it's the placebo effect with naturopathic treatment.

TSH is pretty much the soul value that standard medicine treats, sometimes T4 but as far I've heard, it would just be more of the same meds. I picked up that recommended reading and it sounds like it maybe useful but the author writes like a quack. My GP won't take that seriously. I don't blame her.

I have to wait until May 25th at the 6 week mark to recheck. Just waiting for that and AF (unless one of DH's little dudes made it). The waiting!

greenhillgirl · May 2017

@BenJay hi I just wanted to chime in with support at the weight issue. My husband is fat and my sister is fat and thought I'm on the smaller side my weight naturally fluctuates quite a bit my whole life. I have more insight than many on weight and health struggles. Because we live in NYC and they take my husbands insurance we ended up with one of the top male infertility urologists in the world. He teaches, does surgery, researches, publishes, and sees patients. After a few appointments I specifically asked if my husbands weight was a factor as respectfully as I could. He does a manual labor job and is in much better cardio health than I am. My doctor said if you're talking about tiny differences weight can be a factor but that at such low levels as we're talking (his first SA was severe MFI) weight doesn't have a huge impact. He also noted that losing a lot of weight temporarily makes you less fertile and marathon runners sperm often drops to almost zero. He did tel my husband if he loses weight he will live ten years longer so we will work on that for the future

I understand and that health and weight is complicated and most of us wouldn't chose to be fat. But also tons of fat people have kids and tons of people who don't workout and who smoke and who eat red meat. It only becomes up for discussion when you can't conceive. Plenty of super skinny people do IVF- we have tons of them in NYC! Don't be afraid to stand up for yourself if you don't feel like your doctor is looking at the whole picture

Want a personalized experience?

Third IUI - no sunshine or rainbows

Re: Third IUI - no sunshine or rainbows

Choose Another Board

Search Boards