Infertility Support Group
In vitro fertilization is one of the most common and utilized ways of treating conception problems. This support group is dedicated to those beginning their journey with IVF and needing support. Join the community and share your experiences, advice, and story with people going through similar challenges starting a family.
Hey Everyone... I've been on this site for a while and one thing keep popping up over and over again that makes me a little concerned.
When my DH and I decided that IVF was the way for us to go, I sat down with my doctor and they immediately hit me with statistics. I'm assuming that all ladies going through or thinking about IVF are hit with the same stats. This is a very important factor in making this decision.
To get to the point... I'm well aware that blastocyst (day 5) embies are super strong... If those little guys can make it through 5 days of a petri dish they have a good chance of making it through freezing, thawing, and hopefully, ending up in a successful pregnancy. I, however, am sad to hear about RE offices that you ladies talk about that ONLY do day 5 freezing. I kind of think that some of these facilities are running more for profit and business reasons. Think of it this way, they only do blastocyst and they have 2 huge perks: their statistics look better and if their patient doesn't have any embies to freeze, they look at a couple desperate for a little one and that couple may be willing to go through another round of IVF... Very profitable for them.
I swear I'm not a conspiracy theorist :) And also, the practices that offer a multi-cycle attempt with money being returned if no success aren't ones that I'm concerned about. I just listen to my doctor, and he believes that "nothing can replicate the womb" and he lets me decide when to freeze. I just think it should be our choice because they are our embies! There are MANY successes with day two freezes and I just think that we all should be informed to make our choices. I know how it feels to have none to freeze and it felt like jumping without a parachute to me. I was almost more devastated to hear that I had none to freeze than I wasn't pregnant. To be completely honest, we are a group of girls that just want to have babies... We would do anything for our little ones and we are working hard to make our dreams a reality. I don't mean to offend anyone on this site for their choices and I was nervous about making people upset. PLEASE, by no means am I trying to hurt feelings, I tip my hat to every superwoman on this site!
When my DH and I decided that IVF was the way for us to go, I sat down with my doctor and they immediately hit me with statistics. I'm assuming that all ladies going through or thinking about IVF are hit with the same stats. This is a very important factor in making this decision.
To get to the point... I'm well aware that blastocyst (day 5) embies are super strong... If those little guys can make it through 5 days of a petri dish they have a good chance of making it through freezing, thawing, and hopefully, ending up in a successful pregnancy. I, however, am sad to hear about RE offices that you ladies talk about that ONLY do day 5 freezing. I kind of think that some of these facilities are running more for profit and business reasons. Think of it this way, they only do blastocyst and they have 2 huge perks: their statistics look better and if their patient doesn't have any embies to freeze, they look at a couple desperate for a little one and that couple may be willing to go through another round of IVF... Very profitable for them.
I swear I'm not a conspiracy theorist :) And also, the practices that offer a multi-cycle attempt with money being returned if no success aren't ones that I'm concerned about. I just listen to my doctor, and he believes that "nothing can replicate the womb" and he lets me decide when to freeze. I just think it should be our choice because they are our embies! There are MANY successes with day two freezes and I just think that we all should be informed to make our choices. I know how it feels to have none to freeze and it felt like jumping without a parachute to me. I was almost more devastated to hear that I had none to freeze than I wasn't pregnant. To be completely honest, we are a group of girls that just want to have babies... We would do anything for our little ones and we are working hard to make our dreams a reality. I don't mean to offend anyone on this site for their choices and I was nervous about making people upset. PLEASE, by no means am I trying to hurt feelings, I tip my hat to every superwoman on this site!
deleted_user
Hmm, I never thought about it the way you're seeing it. The way it was explained to me, was that ALL the embies go to day 5, in able to pick the best one/s for transfer. Since some don't make it past day 3 or 4 and if you froze it at day 2 or 3 it would be all for nothing b/c it wasn't going to survive anyway. How would you therefore know which day 2 or 3 embies to freeze and which to keep for day 5? What if you froze a couple at day 3 and the two you had left that you thought were good, didn't make it to day 5? Then you'd have nothing! I think it's more a function of holding out for the best embies for both fresh transfer and hopefully frozen options. Interesting though, will be curious to hear others thoughts.
deleted_user
Its make a good point, and I can see a few doctor maybe doing that but in my case- like the post above said it was mainly to select the best quality ones. Thru my insruance I have up to 3 rounds of IVF paid at 100% and my RE did not try to take advantage of that. I had a successful pregnancy and still have frozen embroys. Good luck!
deleted_user
My RE told me with my IVF cycle that if more than 7 embies make it to day 3 then wait it out until day 5. If less than 7 then do a day 3 transfer and freeze the rest.He said "womb is best" but that day 5 is the "strongest" so if they are not doing well put them in, and if they're growingv well wait.
Courage2010
My experience is that I had a day 3 transfer with the best two embies on day 2. The rest of my embryos were frozen on day two. Because my doctor believes that nothing can replicate a woman's uterus, especially not a petri dish, the embryos that may not make it to day 5 in a dish may very well make it in a uterus. So, the ones that don't make it to blast could very well be successful pregnancies if maybe had frozen on day 2, and the could have made it. Example, an embie that would have fizzled out in a medical environment on day 4, but was instead frozen on day two, thawed, and transferred for a FET and still has a shot of snuggling up in the uterus and becoming a baby. The ones that don't make it to blastocyst are just that, the ones that don't make it five days in a dish. Just because it wouldn't make it to blast doesn't mean it wouldn't make it in a person. However, I'm well aware that blastocyst embies are strong little things and they may have a better shot. I just think it's should be our option to choose when to freeze.
deleted_user
In my situation, we had 10 fertilized eggs on day 2. My RE suggested we wait to see which ones made it to day 5 because there was no way to know which would be the best to transfer at that point. Statistically day 5 blasts do much better than day 2 or 3 transfers so we decided to take her advice. If we'd insisted on a day 2 transfer then she definitely would have done one but that made no sense to us given that we had 10 and no way of knowing which would survive. We knew there was a risk of having none make it but that was a risk we were willing to take to have the best possible chance of getting pregnant. It 's nice to have leftover eggs to freeze but I'd rather take my chance and get the best possible embryos than freeze a bunch. I did not feel like my RE recommended this for any other reason than to give us the best chance possible. That's just my opinion!!
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