About Me

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For five years I went through hell and back to become a Mummy! I had three miscarriages from natural pregnancies, five IUI attempts, five IVF attempts, and three operations to remove endometriosis, a polyp and a fibroid. I have been with my 'almost perfect' Husband since 2003. We married in 2009 on Valentine's Day and we are extremely happy together. I decided to start a blog because I needed to write down my thoughts and feelings to show myself and others how I was never going to give up until we got our forever baby.

Since having my baby, I'm inspired to create: Baby Blankets by Me & Mum

Saturday 25 February 2012

IUI attempt #5

So last cycle we didn't make quads like the clinic worried we would!
So onto IUI #5.

I was meant to have a scan on day 2 because I over-stimmed last cycle but because CD2 is on a Saturday and they don't scan at weekends we decided to just go ahead anyway and start the clomid tonight.

So it begins again but this time we hopefully won't over-stim and we are going to try progesterone from 7DPO and maybe start the steroids then to.

Wednesday 15 February 2012

Uterine Natural Killer Cells - Results

I had an email from Professor Quenby:


NK results: My team and I have studied your endometrium very thoroughly.
 We have found that the following changes have occurred: your glands have developed normally, your stromal cells appear to be developing normally, blood vessels are appearing normally and the epithelial surface looks normal. These changes mean that ovulation occurred, as did the post ovulation rise in oestrogen and progesterone and that these hormones had the desired effect on your endometrium. Your NK count was 6.9% of your stromal cells.
The upper limit of normal is 5%. This result was high.

I then spoke to the Prof this evening and we discussed the results and treatment. The treatment is basically 20mg steroids from the day of the positive pregnancy test, up to 12weeks. Her team have found that using progesterone and steroids together works better. So I have three possible scenarios:

TTC Naturally - use progesterone from 7DPO and take the steroid as soon as you get even a faint line on the test. If not pregnant stop the progesterone.

TTC IUI - take the progesterone and steroids from a positive pregnancy test.

TTC IVF - progesterone is from EC and steroid from ET.

What does this all mean to me? I'm not really affected by the outcome if I'm being honest because nothing matters but getting pregnant, only then does the fact that I have high uNkcells come into play. If I'm not pregnant it doesn't matter. However, it could be a reason for my first two miscarriages and could possibly explain why IVF hasn't worked - especially IVF #3 when we had a good blasto put back but it didn't work.

The Prof also said once I am Pg I can ring up the clinic and she will scan me every two weeks, from 6weeks. So I'm happy about that!

So I just need to get pregnant now! I really want to do another round of IVF but we can't afford to for a while, so onto IUI #5 when AF arrives! Fingers crossed!

Thursday 2 February 2012

IUI attempt #4 Abandoned!

So we went for the CD11 scan to see if I was ready for the IUI, and like last time I have over-stimulated and grown too many follicles. I had 3 on the right and 1 on the left ready (20mm, 18mm, 17mm, 16mm) and smaller ones (12mm, 11mm, 10mm, 10mm). In the UK they will only let you do IUI with a maximum of 3 follicles because of the risk of multiples. I argued that the follicle on the left doesn't count because my left tube is blocked but they insisted that there is a small risk that the egg could make it down one of the tubes.

So we signed the paperwork to say that if we have unprotected sex we would be going against medical advice. We will be going against medical advice!

Last time this happened we had 6 follicles and we went against medical advice, and with 6 chances we didn't conceive. This time we are hoping that the womb biopsy will help with implantation and the fact that I'm back on the DHEA and all the other supplements I've been taking have made my eggs better!.