In August 2018, I had my second round of IVF at a clinic in my home town, Sheffield, called Jessop’s. This time we did the long protocol, and had 10 eggs retrieved. Nine of them were mature, but only two made it to blastocyst. Both were B/C quality. Despite transferring both, the cycle failed. I got a squinter of a positive pregnancy test a couple of days before my official test date, but that faded into nothing. Another fail.
Last week I had a phone consultation with Jessop’s, Sheffield, to find out why my second IVF cycle didn’t work. The appointment was at 4:30pm, so I found a spare meeting room at work and waited for the call. Nothing. At 4:45pm, I decided to ring them. I spoke to the receptionist, and told her…Continue Reading “IVF round two: Jessop’s debrief”
So, you guessed it. On my official test date, I got a Big F**king Negative. This was a few weeks ago now. I can’t even remember it, really. I just know that I’d had a line on a home pregnancy test a few days before, and now I didn’t. And then my period came a…Continue Reading “Well bugger me, it’s cycle 3”
It’s over. Pretty much. Yesterday I got a positive on a pregnancy test (First Response) at seven days post egg transfer. A squinter, but definitely a line. This morning I took a cheap test, thinking that if I was pregnant, a line would show (even though it was less sensitive than the First Response) given…Continue Reading “Baby it ain’t over till… who am I kidding?”
Here’s how the first half of this cycle’s two week wait panned out. Day 0 – 10 eggs collected (three on the right, seven on the left). One more than expected! Day 1 – nine eggs suitable for ICSI, five fertilised. This is a 55% fertilisation rate (the average rate, depending on your source, seems…Continue Reading “2ww – more than half way through”
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”
I’m sitting here, the night before IVF egg collection, full of hope. I know I shouldn’t be. I have nine follicles, and last cycle – despite many more follicles – I still only got six eggs. And half of those were unusable. But still, I can’t help myself. I feel excited. Sure, the prospect of…Continue Reading “The feeling you get before IVF egg collection”
Well, it’s done – I am officially ready for egg collection! I had to call Jessops yesterday afternoon to make sure my hormone levels from my blood test taken that morning were at the right level. It took over an hour to get through as the line was continually busy. When I finally spoke to…Continue Reading “Trigger shot done”
Today was my day 12 scan. I’m already three days over the number of days I stimmed compared with my last cycle. I waited an hour and a half to be seen, despite turning up to Jessops when the doors opened at 8am. It was absolutely heaving, and stuffy, with seemingly every woman and her…Continue Reading “Day 12 scan and we’re ready to go”
You’ll notice most of my updates are me-focused, with very little mention of my husband! Well, that’s because he is down in Windsor working at the moment (where we live) and I am up in Sheffield – also working – albeit remotely. But my other half came up this weekend to accompany me to my…Continue Reading “Day 10 scan – please let there be better news!”
I said to myself this cycle that I wouldn’t trawl the IVF forums. During the first round, I found myself disappearing down endless Google rabbit holes, which was so depressing at the time. However, I’m doing it again. Now I’m stimming, and my first scan went down like a shit sandwich, I’m searching: Uneven follicle…Continue Reading “Pearls of wisdom from the IVF forums”