Dear Professor Winston,
Last year I truly thought I was at the end of the road with my IVF journey, but now I’m not so sure, please can I ask your advice, as to whether you think I’m mad to even consider another round at 44. I have a beautiful son, aged 8 conceived naturally the first week of trying. I then suffered secondary infertility. After 2 years of trying, an HSG revealed my right fallopian tube was blocked and we were recommended to go for IVF. It worked first time, but I went into premature labour at 23 weeks and tragically my beautiful daughter was still-born. I was then referred to Professor Shennan at St Thomas’s as the reason for my premature labour was an incompetent cervix, acquired through the full-dilation ceaserean delivery of my first born. Professor Shennan placed a transabdominal ceclage in 2016, to avoid any further late losses. In 2017 I underwent FET [Frozen Embryo Transfer] 1 and I became pregnant, with a healthy heartbeat seen at 6 weeks, but missed miscarriage discovered at routine 12 week scan. I then had to have an MVA.
FET 2 and I became pregnant again, miscarried at 6 weeks, I then had to have another MVA [manual vacuum aspiration], followed by an emergency ERPC [Evacuation of Retained Products of Conception] for retained products, both times I experienced heavy bleeding and needed to be hospitalised. No chromosonal abnormalities were detected. So I was referred to St Mary’s Recurrant Miscarriage Clinic. To my surprise a uterine septum was discovered during a hysteroscopy and was resected.
FET 3, pregnant again, but resulted in a chemical pregnancy. I underwent a fresh round of IVF in 2019, responded well but only produced one blastocyst and it came back genetically abnormal. At that point I felt we could take no more. There had been so much physical trauma as well as emotional and losing our daughter was completely devastating. I no longer had hope and we stopped treatment. Though now I wish I had continued as maybe the next time would have worked, but I’ve left it a year and think it’s probably too late, as I have just turned 44 but I would appreciate your words and advice, more than I could say.
Many thanks in advance,
S
Dear S,
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