Antagonist IVF cycle???

Hi all
DH and I are supposed to be doing our 3rd IVF/ICSI attempt in Oct and this cycle they are trying antagonist cycle, only I havent heard from the nurse or anything about the pill etc.
So my question for those who've done a antagonist cycle is - Do I start with the pill the month prior so should I be starting the pill September for our cycle in Oct?

Also wondering how many out there have had success with an antagonist cycle? And was it after failed down reg cycles and did you get more eggs collected at EPU?

Any advice would be appreciated!
Wishing everyone all the best on their TTC journeys!

No advice hun, just wishing you all the luck in the world and hope that this is THE one for you :)

I did 5 (or 6) antagonist cycles - never used the pill. You start with day 1 of your natural period and work from there with the drugs. You only take the gonal F (or equivalent) until you are further on and then they prescribe "antagonist" shots to stop you from ovulating ... you aren't taking anything like syranyl to suppress thus you need the antagonist shots as your follicles get further along. I think the idea is to work more "with" your body than the other methods that manipulate your hormones even more. good luck.

Hi Loops12,

Buliej's experience with antogonist is the same as mine. No pill, gonal F until follicles have grown to a good size and then shots to stop ovulation (these shots were very expensive and an additional cost to the cycle- i think I paid about $90 a shot and needed a shot every day for several days). I did antogonist on my second IVF attempt. The reasoning by my FS was to get less eggs of a supposedly better quality. We were hoping for between 4 & 8 (my first IVF cycle was was 18). We got 21 eggs on the antogonist cycle of which 8 fertilised, all grown to blast, 1 transferred (which resulted in a chemical pregnancy) and 7 frozen. So the theory of less eggs went out the window for me. In saying that we got the same amount of fertilised and subsequently frozen embryos on each cycle.

What I did find was the antagonist cycle was much much easier on me - both on my body and on my emotions. It's much shorter, less monitoring and less drugs.

No success yet for me, but we still have 6 frozen embies from that antogonist cycle to transfer when I get up the courage to go back and try again.

Best of luck Loops, I hope your upcoming antogonist cycle brings you your baby.

Hey Loops,

I have done 2 antagonist cycles they are so easy i had no hormonal outbursts i felt normal except for crampy ovaries from follicle growth there is no pill you just start from day 1 of your period you have a BT and if all your hormones are good you can start my 1st cycle didnt get to start as my E2 was to high a sign of ovarian cyst.
My 2nd cycle was good i had 20+ follicles and out of those we got 8 eggs and 8 fertilised we did not get to TF as we did PGD and our embie was affected with our disorder.
Moving forward more than a year we did another antagonist cycle just to speed up the process of getting pregnant my E2 was again to high and i had a cyst but the FS decided to go ahead as i had heaps of follicles again but because of the cyst most of the follicles just did not get big enough so we got 6 eggs and had 1 A grade day 3 embie TF which i am now almost 10 weeks pregnant.
Antagonist cycles are suposed to produce less eggs but better quality if i had done a different cycle all of my 20+ follicles might have grown and seeing as my E2 is always high it would have effected the quality of my eggs and the pain after from ohss from high E2 is something i dont want to risk my FS said it is rare to get ohss on an antagonist cycle.
Anyway i have rambled enough good luck i hope it all works out for you.
If i have to do another cycle i would do antagonist again

I am currently in the TWW of my second antagonist cycle. My first cycle I started with the pill, as I had no period, but with the second one, I went straight in with injections on day 2 - as I got my period from a failure the cycle before.

I don't feel like it's been a dreadfully hard road with up's and down's of emotion. Reading other's stories, I imagined the worse, but now know many of these horror stories were from down reg cycles.

Although I was happy with how they went, I'm seriously hoping this embie sticks and I don't have to do another one for a while :)

Thanks so much ladies for your information and also your very kind wishes - very much appreciated xoxo
Wow wasnt what I was expecting to hear though in some ways because a) I thought I was doing this Antagonist cycle to try and get more eggs at EPU although having good quality sounds good to me. See the reason I thought we were trying antagonist was because we've never had any to freeze and only had 6-7 collected at EPU and of those only 1 each time has made it to the good quality blasty for transfer and b) I spoke to the nurse and she said I do take the pill (just as well I rang her LOL), starting as soon as AF arrives.

Mel and buliej ~ thanks so much, wishing you both all the very best!

Infinity ~ Sorry you havent got there yet - dont give up, all the best to you. That is really good you have some frozen. Hope you go ahead soon and get your BFP! The nurse told me the other day that Medicare are now covering the cost of the antagonist needles - yay because originally I was told we'd be paying about $70per needle.

Ferrals ~ Congrats again hun, hope things are going well with lil bub! You've given me a lot of confidence and hope - thanks heaps xo

Kimmi ~ all the best to you - GL and :stickyvibesgirl::stickyvibesboy: I hope you dont have to do another either. It interesting about the pill because Ive always had my AF's come and quite regular but I guess every clinic is different and this is the way mine does it - very interesting. Thanks for the advice and wishes.

I have just started my first antagonist cycle (3rd IVF/ICSI) FS hopes I will get less egss of a better quality as each EPU I got 21-23 eggs and ended up with one blast and nothing to freeze. Hoping this is the answer.

Thanks for sharing nicoleh and I wish you every success with this cycle, good luck!!

just wanted to wish you the best of luck.
I am going to start my first antagonist cycle when AF arrives next (in about 3 weeks) although my FS wants me on the pill for two weeks at the start, so slightly different approach I guess.
I hope the cycle works for us both

Possums ~ wishing you all the best for your 1st antagonist, fingers crossed.

Well Ive had my EPU and we got 15, a lot more than previous down reg cycles but only 7 of those fertilised properly. Im now waiting until Sunday for the transfer (4 day transfer) and hoping like mad that they all make it and we can transfer 2 and freeze the remaining 5. We have never had any to freeze in the past so Im a little scared right now. Hoping like crazy the 7 are of good quality!!

Good luck all with any antagonist cycles, certainly this 1st one for me has been more successful than the down regs.

Fingers crossed for you! Great results so far...how'd things go?

possums - have you started your atagonist cycle yet?

I completed my first atagonist cycle and so far the results are better, I only got 11 eggs at pick up yesterday (instead of 23/21) and of 11 they called to say 10 fertilised.

I did two antagonist cycles. Both times I only had about six eggs but they were great quality (or so FS said) and we got our bfp second go. So hang in there loops xx

Hi Lise
Great to see you and congratulations on the birth of Finn, wow that went so quick. Hope you're all very happy. xo

Well thanks everyone for all your wishes and support but unfortunately this first antagonist cycle was unsuccessful. We had two 4day embies transfered. Maybe next go

Oh loops, big hugs to you :hug: I hope the next cycle is the one, you so deserve a bubba soon xx

Thanks heaps lise - hugs back xoxo