Promotion and IVF, should I do a freeze all?

[Nenad]

I’m in the process of a brand new fresh cycle. I’m due to start in the next few weeks, and incidentally, I was offered a promotion which I accepted without hesitation.

I officially begin my new role in the next few weeks as well, and I’d like to go ahead with my cycle anyway because of my age (41) and time is of the essence, but I’m thinking of doing a freeze all so I don’t rush into an embryo transfer with the very small possibility of it working (I say this because I had no success after 4 transfers).

has anyone been through something similar and decided to just do a freeze all for this reason, or not? I of course don’t know if I’ll end up with anything worth transferring in the first place, but I like to plan ahead.

Thoughts and experiences welcome!

[Tarasunny]

I got a promotion at the start of June, had an embryo transfer mid July. I decided I wasn't going to put either my career or fertility journey on hold so went for both and both worked out I'm now 13 weeks pregnant with twins and don't regret either. It's a personal choice but I would go for both.

[Nenad in reply to Tarasunny]

that’s really interesting, thanks for sharing. Congratulations on both the promotion and your twin pregnancy. I have some time to decide so it’s helpful to hear everyone’s views. Thank you xx

[Bonita928]

I agree with Tarasunny, I wouldn’t put it I hold. Especially if it’s an internal role where you don’t have to wait to start and qualify for mat pay.

[Nenad in reply to Bonita928]

Thank you, such a good point x

[Fruitandflowers]

We put so much on hold to go through this process and in my experience the IVF side never quite goes to plan - unexpected delays, outcomes, cancellations... Personally after all the lockdown delays to treatments and cancelled rounds, I just wanted to crack on and try to keep my life and career on track around it. Earlier this year I interviewed for a very senior new job while pregnant from a transfer (which then I sadly lost) but got I the job which is a positive in my life. I actually told the person who offered me the job I was pregnant in case they wanted to rescind their offer - they said absolutely not, congratulations, and that's life, they want me for the long term. I'm now only a couple of months into that new job and unexpectedly pregnant naturally - it may not last and the worry is hard, but if it does stay I know the happiness will takeover and any concerns I had about what people thought or was I letting people down will just met away. They will manage and I won't have any regrets x

[Nenad in reply to Fruitandflowers]

Thank you so much for sharing your story. Sorry for you previous loss and really hope this one will stick for you. I remember falling pregnant naturally shortly after I started a job years ago and it was all fine. It’s just really hard to “plan” anything when we know a lot of it is out of our hands xx

[Bexarama83]

I agree that you can’t put things on hold forever but in my experience, my headspace had to be right in order for my transfers to be successful. If I had too much stress or big things going on like promos, new jobs, work stress, the transfers were unsuccessful (I had 6 transfers with 2 miscarriages). I’m currently 33 weeks with my 6th transfer at 40 and waited to transfer this one until I wasn’t as stressed with work. It’s a very personal decision though. Best of luck to you and congrats on the promo 🍀 xxx

[Nenad in reply to Bexarama83]

That’s how I’m feeling at the moment if I’m honest. The temptation is high to just crack on but I also want to make a good impression and I know the first few months will be stressful in this role, so I’m not sure I want to add the stress of transfers to the mix. I emailed the clinic to see what the process is for switching to a freeze all, to help me decide, see what they say. I also know I change my mind every day which doesn’t help. This is why it’s useful to hear from others, thank you xx

[Twiglet2]

Personally I defo wouldn’t put it on hold for work (you are the same age as me) but you might want to consider not transferring 2 and freezing one etc depending on what you have after day 5. Having a fresh means any that might not be quite good enough for the freezer can also be transferred back if needed to give it a chance. There’s just so many scenarios that can happen anyways that I wouldn’t factor in a promotion for a delay if it were me xx

[Nenad in reply to Twiglet2]

That’s such a good point, thank you Twiglet. It’ll all depend on embryo quality and whether any can be frozen in the first place. Once you’re in the process there’s little we can control really 🤦🏻‍♀️

Hope all is well with you and your pregnancy is going well xx

[LSandJ]

I echo what everyone has said! Just go for it! You can't put everything on hold (I did, and thought it was the wrong time to start, not knowing it would take me 4 years to actually fall pregnant!) I just wish I'd started earlier and not waited until the right time! (Who knows if it would have made any difference!) But just go for it! Even if you did get pregnant you'd have 9 months before baby arrives! And either way you will have appointments during that time! Pregnancy ones or ivf ones a couple of months later, because let's be honest you'd only want to delay for a couple of months and then do FET? So overall that's not going to make a bit difference? If your body is ready for fresh I'd go for it! OnLY side caveat, is that if you've tried fresh 4 times and never tried a FET, maybe you'd want to try that so it's something different? (But I still would be wait.. have one bleed and then FET?) (When mine finally worked I did fresh but had MC at 6 weeks, then did FET on bleed after and successfully 11 weeks pregnant!)

[Nenad in reply to LSandJ]

thanks so much for replying. I know what you mean about waiting then regretting your decision.

I had 1 fresh and 3 FETs which failed but I will say that I found the FETs so much easier on the body and I did get 2 chemicals through the FETs vs a BFN on the fresh round, so slightly better response. I’ll be on immunes next time which may help too. I’m leaning on an FET more because it gave my body time to heal from the egg retrieval, even if it’s just a month like you said.

Congratulations on your pregnancy, very exciting xx

[Nenad]

Thanks so much for all your helpful responses. I thought I’d give an update following on from my conversation with the clinic. They said we can opt for a freeze all but it’ll all depend on what we get, so a judgement call will need to be made at the embryo development stage. This seemed logical to me so that’s the plan: wait and see what we get and decide accordingly xx