Recommendations after 5th Loss

Alright, I am about 10 days out from my second opinion, so here was my 1st opinion, from my current RE after our 5th loss.

So I will try to give a short, overall picture of what my RE said in our latest consult, that will be any easy task right? :) Who am I kidding this won't be short, if you make it all the way through this, then you should get yourself a treat at the end! Oif you get it now it may help keep your attention? Who knows... anyways....

First, let's start by saying that I had another d&c done (this would be loss 3 and 5) because I went through three natural m/c's and discovered that if I ever give birth I WILL want drugs.

So of course our baby's tissues came back normal (I hate using the word fetus and I HATE the term products of conception, as if you can just swing by the store to get a baby! If only it were that easy... can I get price check please? Yes, ma'am, that will be $12,000 not including tax, did you pgd with that? Sorry, I digress...) Again, my husband and I were not surprised by this although the RE said he was. He said that the fetal size was small in relation to the gestational sac and that it is usually an indicator of a chromosome problem, especially after the loss of a heartbeat. Since the test came back normal he could not explain this miscarriage (shocker!)

We talked about other issues, clotting issues that haven't been found (said that they would have been addressed through the Lovenox shots) incompetent cervix (no, your losses have been to early to indicate that), constricted uterine veins (no, the 1000mg of met should have addressed that), auto-immune/ immune issues? He doesn't not believe that the studies are valid enough to conduct the testing. An example he gave was that in a smaller study two blood samples were taken from the same person at the same time and sent to two different labs. One came back positive the other was negative (I can't remember what the immune issue was). Now I realize there are thousands of women out there who disagree but these are his reasons and his opinions. He did say that there was another RE in the practice who did some work with auto-immune issues if we were interested in that area, as it was out of his expertise.

So of course we started talking IVF (which he told us that during the consult after our 4th loss that we would not be jumping the gun to go IVF.)

He said that if there is a chromosome error then it is not in a DNA sector that is regularly tested. So if we did IVF w/ PGD it would do us any good because the test wouldn't find anything anyways. He said he believed it to be an egg quality issue due to my history and my most recent m/c. He started to hem and haw little bit, not really giving any information but just talking (you know what I mean ladies...)

So I said, "If I were your daughter or daughter-in-law and I gave you file to look at, what would you tell me to do?" He stumbled over some words then simply said, "I would tell you to go IVF with egg donor." He further said, "5 miscarriages is a lot (insert name here)." For him to say this to me, says a lot. His area of research and expertise is women with PCOS and recurrent miscarriage, these are the people he sees all day long. As far I am concerned, his opinion says a lot to me.

Well... I was expecting IVF just not egg donor straight off the bat. So I was a little taken back. However, I asked for his opinion and he gave it to me. He believes this to the most effective route for my husband and I to have a family. I appreciate his candor and honesty. He also told us that he welcomed a second opinion if that was what we wanted and recommended a couple of RE's...

So we set up an appt with the RE in his office who looks at auto-immune issues and hopefully other immune issues are well. The new RE, Dr. K, is also the director of IVF and her expertise is in egg donor and treating menopausal women. I think she will have some interesting things to say.

I am hoping that she will do some immune testing just so that we will know that we are up against. If the tests come back inconclusive, then I think that says something as well. I am not crazy about the treatment of the immune issues but I would like to make an informed decision.

That appt is at the end of the month so hopefully we will get some testing and results back before the end of the year. My husband and I decided it was best to take the rest of the year off and start again in 2008. It's hard because I am kinda ready now, so I know that I will be chomping at the bit by November.

Alright so this wasn't so short but now I have discussed the history of it all. So now we just wait for our second opinion to start making more concrete decisions.... now go get yourself a treat!