The AVF IVF Thread

Desmo

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Not a regular in here yet, thread title should give a good indication why :laugh:

The wife and I have spent the last 18 months bouncing around different NHS hospitals and departments and are hopefully nearing our final referral to an IVF clinic in the next few weeks.

Why the thread? We've been very open about our situation amongst family and friends and have no problem talking about everything. We've been contacted by friends saying they have been through the same problems but it was all kept quiet. I wanted to start a thread in the hope that anybody else going through IVF had somewhere to chat about it or just read about it, knowing that they're not the only person struggling along.

Whilst we're both fine on a daily basis, it can often be difficult when friends announce they're pregnant, you see children playing or one of the many millions of other scenarios when you sit there thinking "why me?".

So, if you're going through IVF or have been through it previously, please join in...comment...give hope to others...it's not a problem to be ashamed of or to keep quiet.
 
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Hi Desmo

I've been through it too. My son has just had his 11th birthday and he was a result of our 4th IVF cycle. I have been amazed at just how many people I know who have been through IVF, or some sort of fertility treatment. It's certainly not quite as easy to get someone pregnant as they told me in sex education at secondary school!!

Anyway, it took 4 attempts for us and it was worth every pound and tear shed. I wouldn't wish it on anyone though, the pain you describe when you see other people pregnant was almost too much for my wife to bear. She of course felt horrific for even feeling like that in the first place - they were tough times.

For us, and for every one I have known to go through it, the journey ended with what we desired. And in many cases, ours included, it was followed up with a natural conception too. Miracles do happen.

Cheers.
 
Hey, thanks for sharing. Like you say, it's amazing how many people go through it yet so many people don't talk about it.

Unfortunately for us a natural conception is 100% impossible. To keep it simple, I have a little bit of the vas tube missing. The little swimmers are in the right place but they've got no escape route :)

On one hand it's bad news as we will always have to go through IVF. On the bright side, we know exactly what the problem is and, fingers crossed, we know of no other problems.
 
Not been through it personally, but good luck :thumbsup:
 
Thank you for the good luck wishes... the once thing I've learned in all this - DO NOT trust that people will do what they say they're going to do and keep copies of all test results

I would dread to think how much further behind we would be in this process if I wasn't an utter pain in the butt most of the time and kept copies of test results to replace the numerous ones that got lost :/
 
Hey, thanks for sharing. Like you say, it's amazing how many people go through it yet so many people don't talk about it.

Unfortunately for us a natural conception is 100% impossible. To keep it simple, I have a little bit of the vas tube missing. The little swimmers are in the right place but they've got no escape route :)

On one hand it's bad news as we will always have to go through IVF. On the bright side, we know exactly what the problem is and, fingers crossed, we know of no other problems.

Desmo, I'm in the same boat as you I had pesa yesterday,
All went well starting ivf in the next few weeks. Hope all goes well
 
Fantastic, glad you're already on the road....hopefully we won't be far behind you :)

Apparently it's quite a common problem. I'm sure one of the people I have seen said that 1 in 100 men are affected...that's a pretty high number I think.
 
It's quite a common procedure because of all those men who have a vasectomy and then decide they want more children for whatever reason.
 
I was surprised how not painful it was..
I was crapping it for weeks before,
The sedation knocked me out and there was no pain after.
Feel sorry for the mrs as she has the hard parts.

Thanks all. Desmo If you wanna know anything just message me
 
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Hopefully you guys won't have too many problems If its a case of getting the missile out of the silo :)

Can sympathize to a certain extent as I nearly lost my wife to an ectopic pregnancy and she had to have a tube removed. Obviously we lost the baby. We spent two years believing we wouldn't be able to conceive naturally but had a pleasant surprise one month.

All the best and hope the ivf goes well for you both.
 
I'll say it again my wife is a fertility specialist. Any questions fire away!
 
Subscribed!

We are just starting out on our own IVF journey (literally, my wife has just started her cycle where she has to go for blood tests this morning), with PGD (Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis).

I'm 29, my wife is 34, and we already have one son who is coming up to 3 in November. He has a chromosomal translocation that has resulted in global developmental delay, speech issues and some other issues.

When he was just over 1, we got pregnant again but lost our daughter late in the pregnancy, and testing showed severe genetic problems that were "incompatible with life".

A chromosomal translocation is where parts of the chromosomes become detached and re-attach onto other chromosomes. Sometimes genetic material is lost in that process (unbalanced), othertimes you just have uneven chromosomes (balanced). The amount of genetic material lost or moved will affect development in different ways.

My wife is the carrier, but her chromosomes whilst translocated, are balanced, and she has no outward symptoms of any issues. Our son's are unbalanced, but with only a small part missing. Our daughter, was unbalanced with a large part missing. It wasn't until we all had those tests that our son was formally tested and we realised the cause of his problems.

PGD was offered to us as a way of having a "normal" baby, and we were approved for funding in May. It's very similar to IVF, however before embryo implantation, one cell is taken from the embryo and tested specifically to see if any chromosomal material is missing from the specific chromosomes that my wife and our son have issues with. If the chromosomes come up completely normal (i.e 46X,Y, or 46X,X) or they come up like Lucy's (balanced but translocated) then the embryo is implanted. Anything else and it's not.

They only test those specific chromosomes - the test is unique to us and has to be specially created. So there is a very small chance of other genetic problems, but it's not something we are worried about.

Long story, but it feels good to share. Any questions, feel free to ask or PM me. I'm not an expert, and I hated biology at school, but I've learnt an awful lot the last few years.

Good Luck to everyone on this journey!
 
Can sympathize to a certain extent as I nearly lost my wife to an ectopic pregnancy and she had to have a tube removed. Obviously we lost the baby. We spent two years believing we wouldn't be able to conceive naturally but had a pleasant surprise one month.
That must have been tough mate, it's amazing what people go through in life and in a slightly selfish way, it makes you feel a little better knowing you're not alone.

I'll say it again my wife is a fertility specialist. Any questions fire away!
Thanks Exemplar :) I think we've got all bases covered at the moment. I tend not to worry too much about the details but Sinead is very on the ball and reads up about everything.

We are just starting out on our own IVF journey.
Hope everything goes well Pisto, keep us updated :)
 
I thought it was appropriate to rename the thread :D
 
Looks like after 18+ months of bouncing around the NHS....our referral has finally been sent of to the IVF clinic :D
 
I hope your referral goes through promptly and with out any hassle. My wife has Pcos which makes it nearly impossible for her to convince after 3 years of trying her on different drugs and a operation which involved drilling into her uterus to clear the cysts we finally got our ivf referral.

The Ivf failed to take and this really knocked my wife for six she was upset for weeks afterwards but we were blessed 3 months later when she fell naturally the drugs she had to take prior to the ivf to get her body ready kick started her system and we are expecting our little one in December.

my best advice I can give is to be patient and let the system run it's course it can be rather long winded and slow process which can be frustrating at times. we were told we are allowed 3 attempts at ivf under the nhs and if the first one does not work the second course will start 6 months after to allow the ladies body to recover.

We went with the clinic in oxford and I could not fault the level of service and support they provided me and my wife during the time we was with them.
 
Mate, i can write you an essay on this. [-]I [/-] we have had a roller coaster journey of lows and a high!
I'm just about to finish work but will come back on tonight and give you some hope, facts, fears and joy!

You're right, it's amazing just how many people go through this :)
 
Right, where do i start! I will try and condense this as much as possible, no one could quite believe what we went through so bear with me.

As soon as we were married, we were certain we wanted to start a family. This was in Oct 2003. We hit a set back in Feb 2004 as my wife had to have major surgery as she was a sufferer of Ulcerative Colitis. For those not familiar with this condition, it basically involved the removal of her bowel, she had the most aggressive form of the disease.
This obviously put things on the back burner, but as soon as she was well enough to try again, we did.
Unfortunately, nothing came naturally so we were referred to find out what the problem was. Alas, during surgery for her UC one of her fallopian tubes was blocked. This started the ball rolling for us to go for IVF. I took about a year to see the Consultant, our Health board had a low waiting list.
We got our first consultation in Nov 2007 and started our first cycle in the Spring of 2008.
Our Health board allowed us 3 attempts at IVF.
Our first cycle produced 13 embryos, we were absolutely ecstatic. Due to my Wife's condition we could only have one embryo implanted, no chance of twins for us!
The other 12 were frozen for future tries.
Once the embryo is implanted, you have the dreaded '2 week wait'. 2 weeks before you go back for a blood test to find out if it has been successful. Let me tell you, this is the worst 2 weeks of your life. You pray and hope that the embryo has bedded in and that you are on the way to be parents.
We went back to the hospital, gave the blood sample then went to home to wait for the phone call( they don't tell you there and then). The call came, BFN(Big Fat Negative). Soul destroyed doesn't even come close to how we felt :(

We were desperate to try again with the frozen embryo's, the wait was excruciating.
Unfortunately, we had no success with the frozen ones either.
1 cycle, 2 attempts gone.

We started again and had 2 further BFN's from the 2nd cycle.
At the 3rd attempt form the 2nd cycle, we hit the jackpot, a BFP(Big Fat Positive!!)
I can't tell you just how that felt, to hear the news that you've been dying to hear.
We were so giddy, we were going to be parents!
You go back 6 weeks later for the scan, to check everything is going smoothly.
The day for the scan was my birthday, April 2009.
What we got that day was the last thing we were expecting. The scan showed that the baby's heart had stopped beating and had 'died'.
The world ended for us that day. We were so close, been through every emotion only to have it snatched away from us. My wife was inconsolable for weeks.

To make matters worse, her Brother announced that he and his girlfriend(of 3 months) we're expecting a child within weeks of us losing our baby. An arrow through the heart it felt like.
That seems selfish to say such as thing, it was her Brother, my B-I-L and also my best mate. We covered it up, wished them teh best but couldn't hide our disappointment. We had to see someone in the family go through what we should have been. It was very dark days indeed.

We went for more tests as the Hospital wanted to see if there was anything else stopping my Wife from becoming pregnant. Cue the next piece of bad news.
They tested for any chromosome imbalance, my Wife also had faulty chromosomes, 13 and 14 had fused together to create something called 'Robertsonian Translocation'. You have a 1 in 3 chance of the baby being normal, 1 in 3 chance of it being a carrier or 1 in 3 of it being born with a birth defect such as cleft pallet.
As if this wasn't hard enough, another obstacle was put in our path.
We were then put on the list for PGD. What that means is they screen the embryos to see if they are carrying the faulty gene or not. They pick the non defective embryos and implant them.

As that was another list, and we were due to start our 3rd and last course of normal IVF, they suggested we try again anyway. With nothing to lose anyway, we proceeded with our 6th attempt in 2011.
This is where my story starts to look brighter, i promise!
BFP followed by a scan that showed a heartbeat meant that we were past the hurdle that we had previously fell at.
Everything went swimmingly until the 30 week mark, my wife had a major bleed. I was out that night at a Sportsmans dinner, that phone call to tell me she was in hospital sobered me up better than any caffine. We thought we had lost another baby.
Fortunately nothing came of it :), totally bamboozeled the Doctors it just couldn't be explained!

On November 24th 2011 came my Son, Brodie. As every man who's had a kid can testify, the single greatest moment of your life!

8 years of natural and assisted conception proved to be very, very rewarding.:clap:

What can i say to those going through it/about to go through it? Stay positive, even through the dark days, be supportive of one another it's both menatlly and physically draining and most important, believe you will become parents.

Now, i'm off to bed later than expected as my human alarm clock will be going off around half 7! I love him to bits though :love:
 
A quite incredible story and another one of those "I can only imagine how you feel" moments.

It's stories like this that, however hard they might be to tell, I wanted this thread to bring out so that others going through this wouldn't feel like they were the only people :)



We have spoken to the clinic we will be attending and they have our paperwork....we are in the system :)
The downside is that the person we need to see is only at the clinic near the start of each month. October is fully booked and a holiday we have had booked for around 8 months now is clashing with the start of November :( Looks like we might be waiting until December unless they can squeeze us in October at short notice. I know it's only a matter of a month or so, but just when you feel like you're moving on a little....something crops up. But then a story like the one from Wildkarrde brings everything back in to perspective again :)
 
Desmo, it sincerely wish you and your good lady every success on the IVF rollercoaster!
Patience is a virtue they say, and believe me, you need lots!
 
At least people might understand what my signature is about now :D
 
Best of luck to you and Sinead Desmo. Haven't been through it ourselves but have some close friends who have - took them two years of trying but they are now the proud parents of two children (the second came along naturally, not long after the first, caught them completely by surprise!).
 

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