Advice on eggs, sperm or embryos to use down the track...

[Miss.B]

Hi,

My name is Beata and I've just turned 40 this year. I have done a fresh cycle of IVF with ICSI in July 2008 which resulted in a pregnancy (sadly I have lost my baby due to a large fibroid). I then had a frozen embryo from the same cycle transferred in July last year which also resulted in a pregnancy and now I have a beautiful 5 month old boy.

I have a dilema however, and I need some advice. I would dearly love a sibling for my child, but I feel like time is of essence as I am already 40. Both my pregnancies resulted from eggs which came from a 38 year old body. The dilema I have is, my partner is not ready to have another baby just yet. I was thinking of doing another cycle next year when my baby turns 1, in case it takes us a few goes this time around. My partner wants to wait 2 to 3 years. I thought that maybe he was happy with just one between us (he has 3 grown up kids from a previous marriage) but I have spoken to him about this and he definitely wants a brother/sister for our child. I am terrified that at 42/43, my eggs could be useless. I wonder if I should do a cycle soon and have either my eggs/sperm or embryos frozen to use when we are both ready (so the eggs/sperm/embryos are from a 40 year old body and not 42/43)??? Has anyone taken this sort of path before and what was the outcome???

TIA for any feedback/advice/stories.

Beata.

[butterfly_warrior]

Do you have any embryos left at the moment or is it back to the beginning of it all?

I do know (at least this was what I was advised when I was going through IVF and my son is now 20 months old!) that eggs don't freeze as well as embryos, so you would be much better off having embryos frozen rather than eggs. How would you feel about possibly having to wean your son now in order to cycle in order to get younger eggs?

BW

[Miss.B]

Hi BW,

I don't have any embryos left from that first cycle of IVF (I only had one cycle in 2008) so I'd have to have a full stimulated cycle. I too heard that eggs don't freeze as well as embryos, so that's why I would be inclined to have the cycle soon so at least I could have some embryos at 40 years of age and not at 42 or 43. I realise that the egg quality can go down hill fast with age....I am FF my son now so weaning him off b/m is no issue. I think I will book in to see my FS asap to get his opinion. Right now I am so afraid that I might not get any embryos, but I guess that would mean doing another cycle.....The other thing I want to ask is if to freeze a day 3 embryo as well as day 5 (PROVIDED there is any embryos at day 5...) to maximise the amount of embryos from the cycle.

Thanks for your reply hun

B xx

[Malyna]

I'm not sure how true it is, but I heard that when you are pregnant it 'pauses' your reproductive age.

I guess it depends on what the issues were that made you go through IVF in the first place.

[butterfly_warrior]

Afraid I can't help too much with the rest of your questions. Consulting your FS seems like a good plan.

Now if only I would take my own advice in trying to sort out my own reproductive future!

BW

[Miss.B]

Hmmmmm, that would be good if it was true Malyna! lol

The reason we had do IVF was because my partner had a vesectomy reversal about 2 years ago and it didn't work. Because he had the snip 14 years ago, the success rate given to us for the reversal was pretty low. So he basically has no swimmers coming 'out' at the crucial moment. During the IVF process, they had to to the sperm biopsy. My worry is that my eggs are ageing, so I would prefer to do a cycle now and use the embryos at a later time.

Thanks Malyna

BW, thanks hun and GL with your own journey!

B xx

[buliej]

Just my 2 cents (it's very biased as an over 40 prior LTTC-er) - would definitely try to get those frozen embryos created ASAP. Every year matters at this age - for that matter, every month. TTC at 40+ is hard, the statistics are not good - and they keep dropping quickly. If your husband also wants a 2nd child - unless he (and you) are willing to consider an egg donor in the future - there's not much a decision to be made as far as getting the embryos frozen now.