I'm pregnant! (m) and very long
Dede TTC#1 beta 9/14
Thursday, 14 September 2000, at 12:38 p.m.

I've stopped crying, left work and found, told and held my dh as we both cried. It hasn't really sunk in.

I was planning on leaving work at 2:30 to be home by 3:00 to get the phone call with the results. The call came at 2:00 at work. The women said. Hi this is Susan from Boston IVF, I have some very good news. You're pregnant. She said a 2nd beta isn't necessary. My number was 160. They usually only do a 2nd if it's under 75.

I need to call back to set up u/s for 6 weeks. I was crying to hard at the time to make the appt.

For those that don't know my story. I've been ttc for 11 years. We were considered "unexplained". Over the past 2-1/2 years we had 3, iui's w/clomid, 3 with inj, and 3 ivf procedures.

The 1st ivf we had 12 eggs, zero fertilization. 2nd time we did ICSI on 11 eggs and only had one fertilize. This time w/ICSI again, 8 eggs, 2 fertilized. Both were 8 cells, grade B and C. We did a 3 day transfer.

Knowing that this was going to be our last shot (last one insurance would pay for) I did everything possible that I thought might help.

I drank 2 cups a day of "Maybe Baby" herbal tea with raspberry leaves from Great Cape Cod Herb Spice and Tea (they are on the internet, or if any wants I can tell you everything that's in it).

Starting before the lupron I had no caffine, no chocolate, no alchol, no nutrasweet.

I had two massages.

I did yoga 2 - 3 times a week up until transfer.

At lunch every day I took
B-12 500mcg, E-400iu, C complex 500mg, Selenium 100 mcg.

At dinner I took
Daily multiple plus minerals with folic acid (don't take anything with over 5,000 iu of vit A, can interfere with fertility), Calcium and magnesium with zinc, separate 400 folic acid.

I prayed, and prayed. And I stayed on this ttc board every day. You are the ones that kept me sane, you kept me hopeful and positive and you gave me a swift kick when I needed one. You honestly are my best friends. The best people that I know. I thank you all so much, I love you and wish you all the very best. And after 11 years I honestly can say. Don't give up. Please keep trying. Keep praying and doing everything you can. It can work.

I know I have a long way to go. But I never would have made it this far with out you all. I'll be hanging around this board for awhile, if you don't mind.
Dede

I'M GOING TO BE A MOMMY! Murph, TTC#1 23mos, CD29, 13 days post 1st IUI w/100 mg Clomid Thursday, 14 September 2000, at 1:12 p.m.

I had my Beta this morning! 105! I'm so excited!! I go back on Saturday a.m. for a 2nd Beta. RE said this thinks it's only "one" because of the number, but I'm scheduled for an u/s in 1.5 weeks to see what's going on!!

I told DH last night based on my 4 positive HPT's! He wouldn't believe it until we got the word today. He came home early from a business trip, per my request, and I surprised him. I bought him this poster that is a waist up black and white photo of a half-naked sexy guy holding an infant. It's called L'Enfant. I'm sure a lot of you have seen it before. Anyway, he asked what it was and I told him I saw it and I thought he would like it. He unrolled it, and was like, "Ah, it's nice. What am I supposed to do with it." Duh. I then gave him a gift bag that contained a very sweet card addressed to Daddy Murphy, a book for first time father's, a timeline outlining every day from now until then (today I'm 4wks 3days), and the positive test. He started crying. I started crying.

My story is simple. We tried for 21 months on our own. We moved to Georgia recently when I came into contact with an awesome RE. On CD3 we found out I have an elevated FSH, which basically means I better hurry up and have my family. I took Clomid, 100mg from CD5-9, followed by and HSG and eventually a very painful IUI (I have a severly hooked cervix).

Now I'm pregnant!!

Sorry for rambling, but I am just soooo excited. But just like Dede, it doesn't feel real yet. I'm sure when I get morning sickness, it will become very real!!

Good luck to all of you TTC-r's. I'll be in and out checking in on all of you!!

HI! I've been on the IUI/IVF board for a while and wanted to share my story...so here we go...

Seven wonderful years ago, I had my beautiful DS, after 3+ years of ttcing. We found the magic formula to be a combo of Clomid, Pergonal, an HCG shot to trigger ovulation with a well timed IUI, plus progesterone supplements. It was a long and winding road (I was put on complete bedrest from my 6 month on due to pregnancy induced hypertension), but the end result was well worth the journey!! We gave birth to our beautiful DS, November 15, 1992.

When I finally decided to have another I looked up my doc, and THANK GOD he was located within an hour away. We had success on our third IUI with the following formula:

I took 50 mg Clomid, and one 75 IU amp of Repronex per day for days 3-7. I went in on day 7 for an u/s to check follicle development. I only had one 10mm on my right and two 12mm on my left.

He bumped me up to 150 IUs of Repronex for the next two days and I went in again for another u/s. The two follicles on my left grew a little (15mm) but not enough. I was getting discouraged. I thought I would respond really well to the injectible medication.

Again, he had me take 150 IUs of Repronex for the next two days, and finally when I came in for my last u/s on cd 13, I had one follicle at 23mm that was good to go, and one "iffy" follicle at 17 mm. My uterine lining was 13mm!

I drove straight home that morning and took my HCG injection and went in the next morning at 9:00 a.m. to have my IUI. It was really interesting this time because right before the IUI, our doc took DH and I back to the lab to look at DHs little swimmers throught the microscope. They showed us the "before wash" and "after wash" shots. It was amazing to see how well they can clean those little guys up. The after shot showed beautiful Olympic Gold Metal perfectly developed sperm. We jokingly cheered the little guys on....maybe that's what did it? DH's count was only 11.5 mil, but the motility and morphology was a 4+ (on a scale of 1-4 with 4 being highest). If you ever get the opportunity to see the swimmers, I suggest you go for it. It's quite amazing!

I had the IUI, and went on my merry way. One thing I noticed right away was that my bbs were sore and the soreness never went away. Usually my bbs don't get sore until a week before AF. Then on 9dpIUI, I had a teeny tiny bit of spotting. I was ELATED. I NEVER spot that early before AF and my cycles are usually 31 days, so I knew something was up. I was so happy when I saw the spotting. I announced it to everyone on the TTC board!

I was scheduled to have a beta 13dpIUI, but I couldn't hold out any longer. I decided to take an hpt at 11dpIUI. My ClearBlue Easy OPK pack came with a free "bonus" hpt. I decided to take it. Within a minute..WHAMO TWO LINES!!! But the lines only lasted for about 5 minutes...then they disappeared? I rushed to the store and bought two Confirm tests. Again, WHAMO within two minutes...TWO LINES! I was in shock. I took another HPT in the morning, but this time the lines didn't come up for 20 minutes??? I started to worry, thinking maybe I was just seeing left over HCG from my trigger shot. I called my RE and begged for a beta. I went in that day at 12dpIUI and took the infamous blood test. It came back at 34.

I was a little worried that it was low, but looking back, if I implanted on 9dpIUI, then that number makes sense. I took another beta on 16dpIUI and it was a whopping 331. WHEW. I could relax a little.

I had told my DH what was going on, but explained how we shouldn't get our hopes up until that beta doubled. When I got the call from my RE's office that it doubled, I called my DH right away. He started crying (and he's pretty ruff & tumble so this was very sweet). We were elated. I was finally starting to believe that I was really preggers!

And so that's my story. I'm 4w5d, and I'm already experiencing m/s.
I think my due date is 5/21/01.
I have a long road ahead of me, but I'm just gonna take it one day at at time
and I thank God for this beautiful blessing He's given me.
The women on the TTC board helped me through every step of the way.
I truly believe it was their strong support and kind words that helped me
through this challenging journey.
Seven years ago, when I had my DS, I didn't have internet access.
This is truly a God send!!
Thank you Momma Kath!!

Suzanne

I am Audra and have been coming to this site ever since I got me new computer with internet access back in April 2000. It was and still is truly a God-send to me. I had been seeing my RE since April 1999 and had been trying for our second child since July 1997. Our dd is 4 yrs old. We tried to get pg with her for about 6 months when we were living in the Detroit area and was even on clomid and temped for 3 of those months with no luck. My dh accepted a new job on the other side of the state and we moved to Allegan,MI in Dec. 1995. AF arrived on Dec. 25, 1995 (of all days) and we decided to start trying right after the new year. Jan. 26,1996 I decided to take an hpt and it was ++. In July 1997, she was 10mos old and we decided to try for #2. After about 6 mos of trying I decided to track my temperature again to see if that would help...but nothing. My OB put me on clomid in early 1999, but it didn't seem to work so she referred me to an RE. The RE put me back on clomid for May, June, and July with
no luck.. .so he decided to try clomid with IUI and that didn't work either. I was having such a bad reaction to clomid that he wanted to up the dosage again and I said NO WAY! So Dec. 1999 he sent us to injectibles class and Jan we had our first injectible cycle and just tried au natural that month with hcg shot. Had three more IUIs 2/3/00, 2/29/00, and 3/24/00. After none of those worked my RE decided to test my dh's morphology. He said it wasn't part of the sperm wash analysis, but they do keep a slide of the sample to go back to if they needed to. We found out that his morphology was 1%--very, very low. We did one more IUI on 5/16--why? I'm still not quite sure...thought we might get lucky. Yah, right!!LOL Also in May we put down a deposit and got on the list for an IVF in September. After the failed May IUI I went in for a u/s b/c I was having pain on my left side...they discovered 2 cysts on my left ovary and said it was a good decision to take a break until IVF b/c I would have had to anyway. When I went in that day I was also told that I could start my IVF cycle for July/Aug. instead of Aug./Sept....I was so happy b/c dd was starting preschool in Sept. and it just made everything that much easier on all of us....things have a funny way of working out, huh?!!!

I started 10 units of Lupron on July 22 and AF showed up 12 days later on Aug. 2. Went in for my suppression check on Aug. 3 and I was suppressed E2 was 23, so I started stims on Aug. 4. I kept taking Lupron, but only 5 units...then the first 2 days of stims(cds 3&4) were 2amps Repronex and 1amp Gonal-F, cds 5&6 were 3amps of gonal-f. cd7 was my u/s and E2 was 76 with a few 9mm follies on both sides. They upped my gonal-f to 4amps a day and cd10 (Aug.11) was my next u/s and E2 was 333 and my follies had only grown to 13.5. They kept me on 4amps gonal-f and I went in for u/s and E2 on cd13(Aug.14) my follies grew to 23, 21, 19, 19, 17, 15, and some smaller 13s. I took my hcg shot on cd14 (Aug.15) at 12midnight and retreival was Aug. 17th. They retreived 10 eggs. The next day they called and said that 9 had fertilized and to come in Aug.19th for the transfer. They transfered 3 eggs back. I was on 36hrs of bedrest and 2 more days of doing nothing but being a couch potatoe. Then I had to take it easy for the rest of the 2ww...no lifting, pushing, or pulling of anything over 5lbs.

My first beta was Aug. 30th and it was +...hcg level was 49, so I had to go in for a 2nd beta on Sept. 1--81, beta #3 Sept. 5--246, beta #4, Sept. 7--finally doubled and was 502. I went in this past on Mon. for my first u/s and we saw a gest. sac, possibly 2. My next u/s is this Mon. and I'm hoping to see that everything is Okay!!

Thank you for listening to my story. This website is the best thing that ever happened to me thru this whole ttc nightmare. I know I haven't been trying as long as some, but the women here have been truly inspirational and a source of comfort and information I couldn't have found anywhere else. Thank you Momma Kath for this site and I wish everyone here will find the happiness they desire.

Great Big Hugs,

Audra

To all of the ladies who are TTC . . . there is hope!! I have a beautiful 16 month old son to prove it.

After two years of TTC, I had finally mentioned to my regular ob/gyn that I was getting a little concerned about not being able to conceive. He didn't seem too worried and told me to chart my temps, use an OPK . . . . yada yada yada . . . . things I had already known about and more. I had mentioned to him again after 3 years of TTC and he told me that maybe we should check DHs swimmers. Well, all was fine with that. He figured since I didn't have any problems with my menstrual periods and no past history of any problems, and a previous hysterosalpingogram and invasive exploratory surgery showed nothing, that there was nothing wrong on my side. Well . . . another year goes by (by the time I was getting pretty impatient) and I was watching TV and saw a news special about an infertility specialist in my area who was commenting on some multiples that were born in my area. The special caught my eye and I got the doctor's name and called the office that day and made an appointment with him. Upon my first visit, we made plans to do all the necessary blood work. The doctor had gotten me so excited about things, that I just couldn't wait to start. It had been 4 years and I was just about to give up hope. All of my blood work was perfect. Estrogen levels, prolactins, progesterones, etc,. everthing was perfect. I was ovulating exactly the same time every month and periods were every 28 days. So there we sat . . . . no explanation could be found for our infertility probem. So why couldn't we get pregnant? The doctor's plans were to try Clomid for a while with HCG injections with IUI along with progesterone suppositories, then work our way up to more involved medications and procedures, if need be. Clomid was a big waste of time for me. Just made me real cranky and bloated. After 5 months of using Clomid, I got my period one last time and called the nurse and just balled my eyes out. I told her that we had to do something else. I was so desparate. This was taking over my whole life and my whole being. I just couldn't take another month of dead-end dreams and hopes and fantasies of holding me beautiful bundle of joy. I was completely obsessed. The doctor decided to start me on a new synthetic injectible medication called Repronex using HCG and IUI and progesterone. We started the injections that month. I was so positive about things this time. I had two wonder size follicles, one on each side, a 23 and 24 mm. At the end of the cycle, we did the IUI and I went home to rest and pray. The next day we left for vacation to visit family. I was suppose to get AF the day we got back home from vacation. AF was late but I had real bad menstrual cramps and thought for sure AF was coming. I was downing Alieve and Motrin like crazy. ALL of the months prior to this, I would have been through 3 or 4 HPTs, but I think by this time I was so sick of being disappointed I just couldn't take another negative HPT. I had never seen a positive in my life. Anyways, I called the nurse and told her that I was late and she wanted me take a HPT. I did and it was positive within 2 seconds. I was shocked. I just couldn't believe it. It was like a dream . . . I was actually pregnant!!!!!!!!! After 4.5 years of unexplained infertility, I had actually conceived a child finally at 34 years of age.

Looking back at early pregnancy symptoms . . . .the only thing I can remember is that my sense of smell was very powerful. I could smell everything.

I had an uneventful pregnancy and a natural vaginal delivery. Joshua was born 4-19-99 and weighed 8 lbs. 9 oz. He is now a 16 month old happy little guy.

We have now been TTC #2 for 1 year. This is my first month using Vitex, EPO, green tea, raspberry tea, baby aspirin, B6 and, of course, prenatal vits. If this doesn't help with TTC, may have to turn to injectibles again.

This is to all of you ladies out there . . . it will happen and there is hope. Many prayers and ++++++++++ vibes to you all.

Melissa

My name is Gina and I have been visiting the various boards on the TTC site since February of 1999. Here's my history: DH and I started ttc'ing in July of 1998. I had a great fear of infertility and consequently got very upset and depressed after 5 months of trying with no success. At my regular physical in Feb. 1999, I brought along my temp. charts and asked my doctor if she thought something could be wrong. My charts were so normal and perfect that she wanted us to keep trying to finish out the year. We returned to her in June 1999 with more charts and an SA done. The SA turned out fine and my charts looked good so she decided to refer me to an RE. My RE turned out to be *wonderful*! We were so blessed to have him! Anyway, he had me do the endometrial biopsy, HSG, and postcoital test. They all came out normal. We then tried two months on 50mg of Clomid. Then we did three months of 100mg Clomid and IUI's. The third try was successful, but with an hCG level of 6.8 at 13dpo, we prepared for the early miscarriage that then occurred on 15dpo. Althought that was very disappointing, it was also encouraging to know that I could get pregnant. My RE thought that maybe I just needed an extra boost to strengthen ovulation and so we did two cycles of Clomid/Fertinex/HCG and IUI's. I was so tired of the Clomid headaches that I then begged to be on just Fertinex. After 2 more failed IUI's with Fertinex, we signed up to do a lap. My RE feels strongly that if he's going to be in there anyway to do a lap, he might as well transfer something back in so we decided to do GIFT.

During the month before the ART cycle, the do the testing for antibodies. We didn't have antibodies, but they did discover a critical morphology problem with dh! We were shocked when they told us that his morphology was 3-5% and that there was a possibility that it could be due to some anti-seizure medication my dh takes. Now we had a choice - try a different med. for dh to see if it would make a difference (lots of months of waiting), continue with the lap and do ZIFT with ICSI, or do IVF. We decided that we didn't want to wait any longer since we were so geared up to do ART. Plus, we didn't want to go through IVF, have it fail, and then need to do a lap. So, we decided on ZIFT.

I started lupron in June and had af 11 days later. We continued lupron for a few days more and then started Repronex/Fertinex on July 8. After three days of Repronex, I dropped down to just Fertinex for the rest of the days. I had the hCG shot on July 18 and retrieval on July 20, 2000. Retrieval went well other than the power at the hospital going off for a few seconds during the retrieval! We thought they would get 10 eggs, but we ended up with 11. 8 fertilized with ICSI and 6 made it to transfer. 2 days later on July 22, I went in for the lap/ZIFT. My RE found minimal endo. behind my ovaries and transferred two embryos into my right fallopian tube. Four embryos were frozen. We got pictures of our embryos and a video tape of the surgery. I spent the next 36hours flat on my back and then the next 3 days resting. I slowly recovered from the lap and couldn't figure out what would be pg symptoms or what would be recovering from the lap symptoms. I got very sick on pepperoni twice during the 2ww and that has continued into pregnancy. I did have cramping and normal af signs. On 12 days past retrieval, I went in for a beta and it was 16.8. A bit low, but positive! Two days later it was 56 so we were quite happy! The whole thing has been so shocking since I was so used to not being successful. Ultrasounds show that there is only one, but a very wiggly one!!

This has been long, but I wanted to encourage you all with a successful ZIFT story!!

Gina

I wanted to write in and say that this website was a great help to me when i was ttc. I did not ttc for very long, about 7months, but got a little anxious after my 39th birthday. Got a referal from my ob to see an RE. All my tests came back excellent, FSH 6.5, HSG had no abnormalities. I ovulated normally, what was the problem...DH... morphology 8% normal. RE offered IUI or IVF. AT 39, I went for the more aggressive IVF. Started BCPs immediately, after AF, day15, started Lupron. Great suppression, no side effects. Started Follistim on day 11, stimulation a little slow, only 3 follicles on day 5, 5 on day 8 then 7 0n day 11. Took the Profasi shot , went to retrieval on Aug 6.Seven mature eggs, one had a crack in it. The embryologist did ICSI on 5 and IVF on 1. I had normal fertilization on 4; 1 got a double neucleus.On Aug 9, 4 embryos were transfered. Two days of bedrest and two weeks of anxiety. Progesterone test came back fine at 36.5. A week later went for HCG, day14 after transfer. Nurse called to say HCG was a whopping 414! I think so high because it was 17 days after fertilization. HCG continued to climb normally, 1700, then 4500 after 10 days. My progesterone stayed above 40, and I continued on IM progeterone injection.

I felt great until about 4 weeks of pregnancy when low & behold the morning sickness kicked in. Ive had 3 U/S, 4 wks, 5 wks and 11 wks. Heard the heartbeat at 11 weeks!

Ob. says morning sickness is a good sign...I have it 24/7! Gained 6 lbs and have to wear stretchy pants. I start the 2nd trimester next weekend (10/27). VERY EXCITED and want to encourage ttcer's to be positive...it can happen at 39 y/o! Best wishes to all!

(My big problem has been my insurance and holding to their claims. Make sure you know what is covered otherwise you play a cat & mouse game like I am!)

I also wanted to thank my husband in the success story because
without his cooperation there would be no success.

Melody from Chicago.