Clinic help & questions

[Italy300618]

Hi ladies,

I hope you all have had a lovely Christmas. For me it's been the break we needed, I've missed the couple we were before ivf. Eating and drinking and relaxing it's done us the world of good.

Now we are on the hunt for a new clinic as we are now going privately after our NHS rounds have failed. We are going to open evenings in Jan/Feb for 3 clinics, and would appreciate anyones experiences with any of these clinics (please privately message me)

Nurture fertility, burton

Create fertility, Birmingham

Care fertility, Birmingham

Also wondered what questions to ask now. Bit of history, DH is cf carrier and has azoospermia. He had SSR and after 2 rounds we have 3 vials left frozen.

1st Icsi round, 10 eggs, 1 fertilised, not viable for transfer

2nd icsi round, 10 eggs, 5 fertilised, 2 grade 3 embryos transferred day 3, BFN. Remaining embryos didnt survive, none to freeze.

After 1st round, I went on the Mediterranean diet, took more vit d, more folic acid, coq10, stayed off caffeine and alcohol as I did in round 1, had acupuncture for 8 weeks, went bpa free and saw a big improvement in fertilisation.

We are now thinking of DH having a fresh sperm retrieval on day of egg collection, and not using frozen vials. He is going to have 3 months at trying to improve quality.

We are struggling with fertilisation and with getting quality embryos

Any advice/further questions to ask before round 3 would be really appreciated.

Thank you for your support xxx

[Shelleybean]

So glad to hear the rest has done you good. You sound ready to tackle things with renewed energy now, which is great.

No advice/ experience of those specific clinics I’m afraid, but just wanted to say that your plan about throwing everything at DH’s sperm quality for 3 months and trying a fresh instead of frozen sperm sample is exactly what came to mind when reading your history.

We had problems with embryo quality too and (as long as you can get good enough fertilisation) I think it can literally just be a numbers game and come down to how many cycles you can put yourself though physically, emotionally and financially to get that one embryo which makes it. After a couple of cycles I tried to re-frame it in my mind as a process of multiple cycles being needed and this was just the first stage, instead of placing all my hopes on whether or not that particular cycle would work. I found it helped take the pressure off and helped me cope emotionally/ be a bit more realistic about how long it might take.

Wishing you every luck and happiness in 2020 🌟... but for now pop the champers and celebrate making it through an unbelievably tough year together! 🍾 🥂 xx

[Italy300618 in reply to Shelleybean]

Thank you so much for your kind reply 😘 I totally agree with you with reframing it in your mind as a process of stages rather than putting all your Hope's onto that particular cycle. We are hoping to do some sort of multiple cycle programme. I feel a lot better mentally, and although I know I will feel crap some days I feel ready to approach it all again with a new set of eyes. Hopefully it will be our year. Hope you had a lovely xmas, and wishing you a happy new year 🥰🍾 xx