8 replies to this topic

[Morrison1227]

Im looking for ladies that are going to be going through IVF with there SO and have make factor infertility. Were going through our first round of funded IVF in Ontario and Im looking for support in what to expect and how others felt and their lives now .

[CMRivf]

We went through IVF in November 2017 due to male factor infertility(low motility). It was hard at first but I did take comfort in knowing that we only had one issue to deal as everything was good with me. We ended up with 3 embryos and had our DD in November of 2018(her due date was actually the same day as our egg retrieval the year before, it definitely felt like everything had come full circle). We are gearing up now for a second transfer mid-March if everything goes well.

[Morrison1227]

Wow thats great to hear . So your first IVF was successful ?

[Cotton]

If there are healthy sperm found, male factor infertility in general has a good prognosis. The "catch" is that they might find problems with you. If you are <35 and have good AMH and AFC you should have a good outcome.

 

We are another male factor success story. 20wks pregnancy now with spares in the freezer. We got sperm with a biopsy and used ICSI. DH has obstructive azoospermia due to an unknown cause; cystic fibrosis has been ruled out. We were very lucky and 100% of our mature eggs fertilized with testicular sperm while the average is more like 50%.

 

Do you know if they will be doing a biopsy?

[Morrison1227]

Cotton - that part I do not know yet . We were referred to Trio Fertility for my SO to possibly have sperm extracted . Im wondering if we should have that done first and than that way we will have sperm when I go for egg retrieval

[cj123]

We did IVF and our only factor is male factor.  My husband is a carrier for Cystic Fibrosis so he has a sperm count of zero.  We extracted testicular sperm and used ICSI for our IVF.  we had 22 eggs, 10 fertilize and unfortunately had none by day five (we did transfer one that was a day behind but it didn't take).  Our case is quite unusual.  The doctors were shocked and called it a fluke.  We have since found success with donor embryos and are going to be transferring another embryo next week!  For the most part, this is not how people's IVF's go with male factor.  Usually things go quite well.  My brother in law and his wife had the same issue and were able to get pregnant easily with IVF and had many embryos in the freezer.  It's so hard to predict how things will turn out.  But I am hopeful for your IVF!  Good Luck!

[Morrison1227]

Cj123- thank you and Im sending you positive vibes as well . Im nervous for the injections part as Im a tad scared of needles but will have my hubby do them for me. Im unsure if FET or fresh is better . Ill have to talk to the doctors about it

[Cotton]

We had sperm on ice from a failed "vasectomy reversal" and they still did a fresh biopsy. If you don't know what they will find on the biopsy you might want to have donor sperm lined up in case they don't find anything. I read a blog where the couple was contacted by the clinic as they were driving away after the egg retrieval begging for permission to freeze the eggs because no healthy sperm were found (they were non-obstructive azoospermia, though, which has a worse prognosis). Embryos freeze better than eggs.

 

The stim injections are a walk in the park compared to the progesterone injections (!!). Don't worry about the injections, they are really not that bad, just don't let whoever trains you blow through the instructions at 100mph. Make sure you understand everything. The stim needles are very small and not going into a sensitive place, you hardly feel them. I did all of them myself except for the days I happened to be in the clinic. Ok I lied a little, you get a bee sting like reaction from the cetrotide, but that's the second half of stims and by then you are a pro.

 

 

A FET is better if you had high estrogen at the time of retrieval

Fresh is better if your embryo(s) are low quality

The rest of the time they are about equal.

 

I took two cycles off between retrieval and transfer because I needed a break and my estrogen was a bit high.

 

There is a chance you will be thrown a wild card, like cj123, described and often you will never find out if it was bad luck or some diagnosed infertility factor. I've been trolling these forums for a long time and have come to the conclusion you really don't know how an IVF cycle will go until there are no more embryos in the freezer.

[CMRivf]

Yes, our first IVF was successful. We did do a freeze all due to OHS. So we did IVF in November 2017 and FET in March 2018. We didn't do a biopsy, but did use ICSI. We currently have 2 frozen embryos left and are hoping for the best next month!