Should I delay, or go ahead (IVF)?

[MultiMagpie]

Both me and my husband are under 31 - no known medical issues other than my known hormone condition, which is the reason we need IVF. We’ve just had 1 round of IVF (ICSI) and all 3 embryos that we had failed to implant.

The decision I need to make is should I crack on next month and start the process all over again, with egg collection being on the 26th June etc. So that the ‘more rounds you do the more likely it is’ scenario works, or should I wait 2 months so that we can get even ‘healthier’? I’m just disappointed that I’d have to wait, as I’m already going a bit crazy.

My husband used to take nicotine lozenges and had a lot of caffeine, which he has now stopped immediately (hasn’t had either for a week) - I’m worried that contributed to his less than perfect sperm (and if why our embryos didn’t implant?) and if we should wait for it to be out his system, else does a bit of nicotine not matter too much?

Should we wait or just crack on?

[MammaMia86]

Hello,

I think you might want to ask your doctors about testing for implantation failure. Sometimes taking a bit of time to analyse is good....frustrating but it can help before you keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same result.

In our case it has been like that and I think it will work.

Best of luck😊

[MultiMagpie in reply to MammaMia86]

What sort of testing? My clinic doesn’t really do any testing, they don’t believe anything can really be picked up or changed - I’ve done the regular blood tests etc but they don’t offer any embryo testing or anything ..

[MammaMia86 in reply to MultiMagpie]

In my case seems that I had some issue with the blood and I had to do some test for hematology and after that immunologist but specialist in fertility. They do it in cases for failure in the implantation...but I guess depends on each case maybe they should look into different things, also sperm test is important to understand maybe other issues

[Twiglet2]

normally I would say crack on but that does sound like an important positive change by your husband (👏🏻) that can defo affect sperm so waiting another few months might just improve sperm quality if that was at all an issue in first round? I’m very impatient though and have found that nothing I do (vitamins diet etc) really makes any difference whatsoever so I wouldn t wait for that xx

[Fruitandflowers]

I think the changes to diet and lifestyle can have a much bigger and quicker effect for men than women. My husband's results were fine when he was vaping a lot and drinking more than he should have been, but they massively improved when he had them redone about a year after stopping vaping and even more when he cut out booze for a few months. He also started taking supplements. We had success from the round when he cut out both of them but pregnant naturally when he had started drinking again but moderately, so just based on that I think nicotine can have the bigger impact but obviouslyil if it stops your husband from smoking then there's a trade off. If you're not already taking supplements it would be worth it for you also to add these toi but I've found that bar supplements my diet and lifestyle haven't made any difference to our results and I think it's much harder to change egg quality than sperm. So if you have time on your side it's probably worth you both seeing what changes you can reasonably make over 3months minimum and maybe getting your partner's sperm retested to see if it made a difference. Maybe also speak to your clinic if they have any views on whether they three that failed were a 'bad batch' or if there are other things they can test or change e.g. more progesterone.

[raverg]

Because you’re fairly young compared to most people going through this process, your stats would be much higher (unless your hormone condition brings it down ofc) and 3 implantation failures would be a reason to do more investigations for anyone. Otherwise you might be burning through your NHS or private funding unnecessarily and you’ll regret it later. Plus it wears you down physically and emotionally.

My suggestion would be to request your records from the clinic and go get a second opinion from a different clinic, to understand what they would test or do differently.

And while you're waiting for your files and all that, definitely spend 3 months where you both focus on your health and get yourselves ready for the next cycle. “It starts with an egg” has a few good chapters about the science behind it all, mainly that it takes about 3 months for new eggs and sperm to generate (so the effects of cutting out nicotine will take a while to see unfortunately), but you probably don’t need to follow everything the book recommends to the letter for your age.

You can both take a good supplement, eat lots of fruit and veggies, stay active, you can maybe do fertility acupuncture for your hormonal health, and your husband could follow the fertility tips for men (obviously cutting out nicotine, both of you reducing caffeine and alcohol, he should wear loose underwear and avoid hot baths and jacuzzis, also stop taking any gym supplements) and then repeat the semen test in 2-3 months to see if it improved. If not, he should see a fertility urologist to check if he has something like a varicocele that might affect the quality of the sperm.

I know it’s not what you wanted to hear, but with a few tests or lifestyle changes and a bit of time you can massively improve your chances of success for your next cycle. Good luck! Xx