In April 2018, I had my first round of IVF at a clinic in Brno, Czech Republic, called Reprofit. We did the short protocol, and had six eggs retrieved. Only three of them were mature, with just one making it to blastocyst. Despite it being a top quality blast, the cycle failed.
Sure, both clinics offer the same type of IVF services, they’re both relatively cheap compared to the UK and they both are in the Czech Republic. But how are they different, and which one would I choose? Here’s my verdict. 1. Location Reprofit – based in Brno, Czech Republic, the country’s second largest city. You…Continue Reading “Seven main differences between Reprofit and GENNET”
Yesterday was egg retrieval day, and it was a completely different experience to the one I had in Reprofit, Czech Republic. Here’s how. Pre and post care Unlike cycle one, the nurse at Jessops actually talked us through the process, from the cannula, sedation and procedure, to the phone calls we’d receive from the embryologist…Continue Reading “Egg retrieval – UK vs Czech Republic”
Yesterday I had my follow-up chat with Reprofit following our failed first IVF round a month ago. I was dreading it. Why was I dreading it? Firstly, it was over Skype, which I hate. Always a bad signal, or a time delay or technology failure… Secondly, it brought up all these horrible sad feelings from…Continue Reading “Follow-up consultation with Reprofit”
I woke up today feeling blue. I know why: I’m going to a friend’s baby party today (she had her newborn the same weekend we found our first round of IVF had failed) and I just don’t want to. I know it’ll be full of yummy mommies and smug daddies, and cute babies everywhere. Because…Continue Reading “Practising gratitude on those down days”
When I found out late 2017 that me and my other half would need IVF if we wanted to start a family, I didn’t know who to tell. The first person I told was my mom. I was up in Sheffield helping her clear out some of my detritus that she’d been storing in her…Continue Reading “IVF: who to tell?”
In April 2018, me and my other half went to Reprofit in Brno, Czech Republic, for our first IVF cycle. We did so because we didn’t qualify for NHS funding, and it was considerably cheaper than cycling in the UK. As my hormone profile is A-OK, I thought we should be a fairly straightforward case…Continue Reading “What you should know about going abroad for IVF”
It’s true what people say – it’s the waiting that grinds you down during the IVF process, not the drugs. You wait to find a clinic, then you wait for a protocol and you wait for your period to come so you can stimming. Then you wait to find out how many eggs you have,…Continue Reading “The 2WW: what I’ll do differently next cycle”
So is it just me or was the wait between egg collection and egg transfer WAY worse than the 2WW? I mean, seriously. The ‘five day wait’ was the more horrendous friggin week of my life. We got six eggs from egg collection, when I was expecting about 20 (naively), so we were on the…Continue Reading “How the five-day wait was way worse than the 2WW”
Boy oh boy, so you’ve failed your first cycle. Yep, that was me last month. And what a kick in the teeth and the stomach and the balls that was. After you’ve got over the shock and the upset and the utter despair of the situation, why not try this exercise? Writing down all the…Continue Reading “Finding the positives from your first failed IVF cycle”
Oh congratulations, that’s wonderful news! (Yet another person in my office gets pregnant.) I’m happy for you. But sad for me. No, no, no, you continue to tell me about your children for the next 10 minutes. I can’t get enough of your stories! I’m happy for you. But sad for me. Another photo of…Continue Reading “I’m happy for you but sad for me”