My IVF Story

As a young girl, I always knew I wanted to have children and that is the plural sense of the word. I didn’t get married until I was 27, but had been with this man for 4 years. Our marriage didn’t last 2 years. And I knew when I told him I didn’t want to have children with him that it was over.  

Now at this point, I am 28 and not looking for Mr Right. But, I moved into a new house and had this fantastic neighbor from Australia. He was kind, sweet, funny, loveable, boisterous, and unlike anyone I had ever met before. We started dating knowing we wouldn’t be together. He was to return to Australia at the end of the year.  He was going through a divorce as well. Neither of us was looking for a long term relationship, just someone to hang out with and have a good time.  

Well, as luck would have it, we fell in love. Funny because early on in our “relationship” he told me if I got too serious, it was over. He was the first to say he was in love with me. It took me a long time to admit it but I couldn’t deny it. I was in love with this goofy guy from Australia.  

In his first marriage he had two children, a boy and a girl. And he and his wife decided they didn’t want any more children so he had a vasectomy. This was probably about 10 years before we met. And this was the biggest obstacle for us continuing our relationship. We did decide to continue our relationship and to do that, he had to make the decision to have more children. 

Eventually we got married and moved to Australia.   My husband made the decision to have his vasectomy reversed. The option was there for his sperm to be aspirated by needle but he didn’t want to do that. He wanted us go get pregnant “properly”. After the vasectomy reversal, tests were done to show that it was successful. The plumbing worked but the sperm were not in great numbers. We tried for a year to get pregnant and after seeing a male fertility specialist, we decided to proceed with IVF.   

I won’t go into great details of the ins and outs of treatments we did but will tell you we have done 3 stimulation cycles. The first time, we got 10 eggs with 5 fertilizing. I had one implanted and the other 4 frozen.   I did get pregnant with the first transfer. This was considered a chemical pregnancy. A chemical pregnancy is when there is elevated HCG levels but not to a level of a viable pregnancy.   

Now, at this time in our lives, we moved from Melbourne to Canberra! And I had to leave my embryos behind! But, I drove back to Melbourne 2 times for frozen transfers. Both times, we implanted 2 embryos. One came back as negative and the last one was again a chemical pregnancy.   

At this point, I have to start another stimulation cycle but in Canberra. We got only 4 eggs and only 1 fertilized. I was so devastated. But told myself one is all it takes. And I got pregnant and had a lovely little boy on Feb 14 2006.   

After having Harrison, we decided we wanted him to have a sibling close in age. My 15 year old stepson lives with us and my 19 year old stepdaughter lives in Perth. My husband has 2 brothers and I have a brother. Having a sibling was something we found valuable growing up and wanted Harrison to be able to share that too.   

So, we have started the process again. I have done another stimulation cycle and got 5 eggs, 2 fertilized. We implanted one embryo and froze the other. I did not get pregnant. We now hope to proceed with a frozen transfer. And hope that we get pregnant!  

IVF can be a very emotional roller coaster. Not only are you dealing with emotional issues but you are taking hormones that can cause your emotions to be magnified! My suggestion is to take it one step at a time. Try to stay as calm, relaxed, and focused as you can. Talk to your partner, family, the counsellors at the IVF clinic, anyone! Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Know that there are people out there that have dealt with and are dealing with the same issues as you and can be a valuable resource.   

I wish you all the best.
Angela