u/SnooBunnies2614

I just need some hope. I had one (IVF) MMC before my IVF baby was born and a few failed transfers. I knew baby #2 would take some time. What I wasn’t expecting was to have three pregnancies from three transfers all end in loss:

Fresh Transfer 1: chemical started at 22hcg and near immediately went negative

Fresh Transfer 2: chemical started higher at 44 but only rose to 57 before dropping.

We then did ERA and added in immune protocol and lovenox (was on both prophylactically for my son too despite no lab results indicating it)

FET for transfer 3: Fully medicated (a pivot from planned modified FET to mirror my success but I did not have a follicle growing) and started low at just under 30hcg but rose beautifully with always a less than 48h doubling time. Found out at nearly 8w we are heading toward a MMC as I’m measuring close to 6w and HB is very low.

I have two more untested 5BBs left. And I feel hopeless.

Transfers were both fresh, of a 3AB and 4AA embryo respectively. I have 3 embryos left (all D5/6 4BB) from 2 retrievals, all untested. I've done RPL and immune panels/karotyping etc. in the past when TTC my first and nothing came back. We did end up doing immune protocol anyway with loven*x and a steroid and pepcid and LDN etc. with my successful transfer that created my LC, and I think at least 1 failure before that. This last cycle we did a steroid and baby aspirin from retrieval. Also, it was 4 years ago, but I also did a receptiva at that time when TTC #1 and it came back normal as well.

Am I a total lost cause? Should I be doing more testing? Adding in any meds? Is it just shitty luck that of 5 blasts, 2 might be chemical, but the rest are fine and might turn into a baby or 2?

I am thinking next step should be a frozen transfer, instead of jumping into a 3rd retrieval, but I also feel like I'm quickly losing hope in the few embryos we have left.

ETA that my LC was my 5th transfer, but we only had D3 embryos at that time at a diff clinic. Statisically, 5 transfers with D3 should be 2-3 D5 if I understand that logic.

Everywhere I look on the internet, it seems that everyone thinks a beta must be 100+ to be successful and seems to be very down on 'lower' betas. I myself thought this - my past clinic never gave me parameters on what they were looking for on beta day, and it so happens my 11dp3dt (9dp5dt equivalent) with my son was 123.

I am with a new clinic now, and last cycle I had a chemical with a beta of 20 to start. My clinic said it was low, and that they look for 30-50 on 9dp5dt. This cycle I got a positive home test again shockingly, as it took 5 transfers for my 3yo son, and when I got my beta drawn this morning, they again told me 30-50.

My number came back 44, and they were very happy with that. I won't have beta drawn again in 48h bc they don't do bloodwork on the wknd, so it will be 4 days later on Monday to retest. So essentially should double 2x.

I thought it sounded low but they again mentioned 30-50 so it's right in there. But online search, everyone is very down about betas under 50-100. What does your clinic look for/any success around this number?

Everywhere I look on the internet, it seems that everyone thinks a beta must be 100+ to be successful and seems to be very down on 'lower' betas. I myself thought this - my past clinic never gave me parameters on what they were looking for on beta day, and it so happens my 11dp3dt (9dp5dt equivalent) with my son was 123.

I am with a new clinic now, and last cycle I had a chemical with a beta of 20 to start. My clinic said it was low, and that they look for 30-50 on 9dp5dt. This cycle I got a positive home test again shockingly, as it took 5 transfers for my 3yo son, and when I got my beta drawn this morning, they again told me 30-50.

My number came back 44, and they were very happy with that. I won't have beta drawn again in 48h bc they don't do bloodwork on the wknd, so it will be 4 days later on Monday to retest. So essentially should double 2x.

I thought it sounded low but they again mentioned 30-50 so it's right in there. But online search, everyone is very down about betas under 50-100. What does your clinic look for/any success around this number?

Technically this is round 5 if we're counting total IVFs. I did 3 ERs in 2021-2022 and 5 transfers before I had my son in June 2023. I do have PCOS and some other stuff, but it seems that I ovulate well and do not have an issue getting pregnant - my husband has a low sperm count, low motility, etc etc.

We went back to try again for #2 at a new clinic (we travelled to CNY for my son for $ reasons, but this time are lucky enough to have some coverage that allows us to stay local) and while we always did Day 3 because of low retrieval numbers and risk of losing all by Day 5, these rounds we have been pushing for Day 5.

ER 1 was in March/April and did 10 days of 225 meno/225 gonal for stimulation and a 10K HCG trigger. It was something like 19 retrieved, 12 mature, 9 fertilized, and only 2 blasts. 1 Day 5 and one Day 6, both good/fair quality. We transferred the Day 5 fresh which resulted in a chemical. We have the Day 6 frozen.

I wanted to bank some more so we went right into another ER. I responded really fast this time and only stimmed for 8 days (I have a history of usually having 10 days). We also dropped my Gonal-F from 225 to 150 after 3 or 4 days because I already was resopnding quickly. Menopur stayed at 225. We did 4mg Lupron and 2K HCG trigger this time instead. We also added in Omnitrope this time.

We still retrieved 19, though we knew some were very small and the scans only showed about 13 follicles of the right size right before retrieval. We had 11 mature, which made sense with the scan. of those, 7 fertilized. We found out one more matured overnight, was given Day 1 ICSI, and has been fertilized for a total of 8 growing right now.

Tomorrow is my Day 5, and we're going in for another fresh transfer. I've been on prednisone this time, but otherwise the same protocol. My doctor seems very positive and said he expects success soon, but I can't get over the attrition down to just 2 blasts last time, and being afraid to walk in tomorrow to be told we have nothing.

Anecdotally, tomorrow is not just my transfer day, but my IVF baby #1's 3rd birthday. And strangely enough, my transfer that led to my pregnancy with him was on the same day that my prior miscarriage before him was due. I know just a coincidence, but someone tell me that signs are real lmao.

I don't know what i'm looking for here, other than some support and maybe if you've had any big attrition then later had success, I'd love to hear about it.

I had one fair graded day 5 fresh transfer yesterday.

Was told at time of transfer that the embryo being transferred was the only one ready, and all of my others were still growing and would be checked again.

Got the news today (around noon day 6, retrieval was 8:30am Monday and transfer 10:15am on Saturday) that of my 11 remaining, 2 were frozen - 1 day 6 and 1 day 5.

The said none had arrested at this point and all are still in culture and I will get a final report of frozen embryos tomorrow.

Is there any realistic chance for the ones in culture to develop into anything usable? If they reach a freezable blast stage later today is it still a day 6?