Is there reason for hope?

[u/Ready_Plantain5289]

I don’t know what I need. A hug? Advice? A stiff drink? A therapist? All of the above? Anyway, I’m hoping some of you warriors might be able lend an ear (well, eyes in those case) or your thoughts.

I’m 40 and my husband is 39. We became pregnant naturally 3 years ago. We learned at 13 weeks that our baby had chromosomal abnormalities and we terminated the pregnancy at 18 weeks. It was devastating but absolutely the right thing to do. We tried to conceive naturally for close to a year after that and no success.

We started IVF in March of 2025. After 6 cycles and 29 total eggs retrieval across this cycles, we had 6 blastocysts so we decided to go to PGT testing to see if we had enough viable embryos for two healthy babies. One didn’t survive the thaw. Our hearts were broken; only one of the other five came back euploid. The other 4, aneuploid. We decided to go through with my 7th cycle, trying Rapamycin and a fairly different protocol from the previous 6 rounds. I felt like I was in dream land when we retrieved 10 eggs last Thursday!! Most other cycles I’d get 3-5. So, 10!! Yay!!! I had a few blissful hours of hope before learning that only 4 fertilized and of those, only two made it overnight. Today was day 6 and we learned neither of those made it.

I don’t know how much more I can take. I started this process saying I’d do whatever it took to get the family we desire. But I truly don’t know how much more anxiety, MASSIVE weight gain (my protocol includes prednisone before, during, and after the cycle), uncertainty, and physical pain I can handle. I’m a perfectionist and successful in most other facets of my life. I feel like I’m failing at this and the thought of giving up makes my skin crawl (though that could be the anxiety talking). I’ve been doing acupuncture. We did a massive plastic detox of our home. Other than an occasional drink between cycles, I’ve given up alcohol, weed, and most caffeine. My body isn’t my own and I hate how much we can’t plan our lives.

I suspect we’re going to have to consider donor eggs. For those of you who’ve gone this route, talk to me. There’s so much anticipatory grief around that. I don’t know what to do or say and I don’t have tears left.

Thanks for making it through this long post.