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07/18/2006
I can disagree without being vicious, I swear it.
Victoria commented on a recent post:
To the commenter who said she'd sell her own mother to have 7 embryos in storage: Didn't that article make you question the morality of this IVF issue at ALL? Is our desire to have our own biological children THAT FIERCE that we'd happily have 7 frozen children indefinitely?...Don't you think it'd be better to adopt a child that is already born and orphaned?...There just seems to be something wrong here.
The most glaring fallacy I perceive in Victoria's line of thought is this: she's equating seven frozen embryos with seven frozen children, and, boy, howdy, hoo hoo hooooo, am I laughing at that.
Sorry; what I meant to say, because I'm playing it straight and high-toned and respectful here, is that I find that premise risible.
First of all, the success rates for frozen embryo transfers — FETs — are significantly lower than those for fresh cycles. Depending on the clinic and the state in which an embryo is frozen, the first danger is that the embryo may not survive the thaw; a common estimate for survival is about 50%.
So realistically speaking, let's assume that of those hypothetical seven, four will survive the thaw. Fine, four no-longer-frozen children to sell your mother for. But it's not over yet, because the most recent figures put the overall live birth rate per FET at 27%.
Stay with me here, okay? Now, the average number of frozen embryos transferred per FET cycle is between 2.7 and 3, depending on the woman's age. For the sake of argument, because you can't transfer a fraction of an embryo, no matter how carefully you slice 'em, let's stipulate that of those four adorable eight-celled icy moppets — whoops, five- or six-celled, because frozen embryos often lose cells in the thaw, possibly reducing their chance of implanting — two are transferred.
Two transferred, with the live birth rate per FET at 27% means...wait, carry the six, multiply by pi, train leaving Hamburg at 6 PM traveling at 50 MPH, if A = B and B = C, unladen swallow, aaaaaaand we have...crap, well, look, I'm not that great at math, what with all the ∝ and ∀ and ∫ and all, but I'm pretty sure you come up with not that many children at all. In two transfers — because, remember, only four survived the thaw, and you're transferring two each time — you'll be lucky to end up with even half a kid.
(I concede that my calculations might be a bit off.)
My point is that when we're considering seven frozen embryos, we're not talking about seven children, not by a long shot. Of course success rates will vary from woman to woman and embryo to embryo, but my educated guess is that we're talking four max, and probably fewer — possibly far fewer, because, well, we're infertile, and the reasons we're not getting pregnant naturally aren't always circumvented by IVF, no matter how good the lab, no matter how faultless the technique.
I've demonstrated that Victoria's numerical assumption is flawed, but there's much more to it than that. She speaks of seven children. Now, I can't speak for anyone but myself. Everyone who produces embryos has her own opinion on this matter, opinions that are deeply emotional and worthy of respect. But I can state unequivocally that I have never, ever considered any single one of our small handful of embryos a child.
The ones that implanted — malevolent #1, claustrophobic #2, and flukey #3 — had potential. They were potential. Even the losses didn't feel like children to me, though I know to many women they are. And until #3 was born, he wasn't truly Charlie, though if I'd lost him late in the game I'd likely feel quite different. As it stands, to me, they were all potential, pure and simple.
And how would I feel to have a freezer full of potential? Having a plan in place to help me avoid another fresh cycle? Being able to put off a decision about stopping treatment entirely? Keeping me, at least temporarily, from having to give up my hope for a child that's genetically my husband's and mine?
Even given the small chance of success, I'd feel perfectly matrimercantilic, I tell you.
(See? Not vicious in the slightest. I didn't even mention adopting orphans!)
Posted by Julie at 01:36 PM in I've learned a lot...but I'm not sure it's worth it. | Permalink
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Comments (119)
There's an old saying about opinions. I'm sure you all know it. Everybody's got one and some are so inflammatory that they almost have hemorrhoids.
The whole "morality behind IVF" argument is one that's being used, politically, as a wedge issue in the stem cell debate in the US. The argument is just as invalid there as it is in the case for or against adoption or other family methods.
Speaking as someone who has seen several different family-making methods amongst friends and family, Embryos != Children. My whole take? If you find IVF reprehensible, don't do it. If you feel the need to voice your opinion in a persuasive argument with others, stand behind an asbestos curtain.
Posted by: Tina at Jul 18, 2006 1:48:39 PM
Amen! Shit, if I had 7 frozen embryos, I'd probably end up with negative 3 children. Or whatever.
Oh! Just remembered, I once had frozen embryos- from a 25 year old egg donor. Uh, we thawed the 5 frozen embryos, and TWO survived the thaw. Yes, a fertile 25 year old even can have non-viable embryos. Oh, and those two that we transferred to my uterus did not become children either. So that's 0-for-5.
I am not surprised that the majority of lucky bastards who are not infertile know nothing about IVF and success rates, etc., but I AM surprised that people who feel they have the right to make all these ridiculous assertions about embryos don't do a little research on the topic before they rant!
Posted by: erica at Jul 18, 2006 2:10:46 PM
I wish that I had had the good sense not to look at the little microscope pictures of the embryos as baby 1, 2, 3 & 4 that were transplanted during my IVF last month. Even knowing the odds, I still foolishly wondered what we would do with four kids if they all took? Well, none of them did and I felt like I had lost a pregnancy. Although, it was over much more quickly than the ill fated ectopic.
Bottom line, even with fresh embryos, there isn't a super duper wonderful chance of a baby in an IVF cycle. I would try a FET, but I wouldn't look at each embryo as a baby anymore. But, until one has been through it, it might be hard not to see things in black and white. Often, the shades of grey are thrust upon us unwittingly and unwillingly.
Posted by: at Jul 18, 2006 2:13:25 PM
As somebody who did decide that IVF didn't feel right (anymore) FOR ME (and me alone) and who then decided to run out and rescue a "poor little orphan" because that seemed so much better (FOR ME)....let me applaud your opinion. Am I allowed to do that? Given that after my noble choice was made, I found myself...maybe...that p word?
I just find that I am driven crazy by the cavalier way in which opinions can be strewn about willy nilly about issues that are so hard. Not that Victoria was necessarily being cavalier, more that I've heard it from people in my own life who seemed to have no idea of which they spoke.
Oh, and, ummmm....this is pretty back-of-the-envelope, but if the probabilities here are independent (they're not), then wouldn't the expected number of children generated by 7 frozen embryos be 7*.5*.27=.945? No. That can't be right. In my heart, I know that the answer is -31.
Posted by: Meredith at Jul 18, 2006 2:22:26 PM
Hmmm. Frozen children. Now THERE'S a threat I just might be able to follow through with.
Posted by: Paula at Jul 18, 2006 2:37:55 PM
> but I AM surprised that people who feel they
> have the right to make all these ridiculous
> assertions about embryos don't do a little
> research on the topic before they rant!
I, however, am not, because, you see, doing research and having facts at hand don't really have anything to do with, and can even contradict, faith. And we all know if you just have faith, you will be saved from eternity in hell, get knocked up, and get cookies for breakfast.
Facts require thinking. Faith does not, so faith is easier.
Posted by: RainbowW at Jul 18, 2006 2:43:13 PM
So I was watching this show on TLC called "sextuplets and twins" or something like that. And as they were going over their story (I'm sure I don't need to elaborate, what with the title and all) the mother said "well, you know, in every infertility cycle you have to expect multiples. there are almost always two or three." My first reaction was, "what the fuckity fuck?" And then I thought of you.
Posted by: shmutzy at Jul 18, 2006 2:51:47 PM
Since you're doing all that fancy math, could you calculate a reasonable selling price for my mother? I'd hate to ask too much because she is a bit high maintenance, but kidsicles aren't cheap! ;)
Posted by: jc at Jul 18, 2006 2:51:47 PM
But, Julie, you're talking about snowflake babies here!
Sorry. That was probably disrespectful of believers in snowflake babies.
Demonstrating the (lack of) depth of my intellectual life during my summer vacation, can I just use this opening about IVF morality issues to rant about Days of Our Lives?
I LOVED this show when I was in middle school in the early 80's. And now that I'm on summer vacation, nearly 25 years later, so many of the same characters are still there - Bo and Hope, Melissa and Jack and Frankie, Patch and, um, that woman he married that Jake raped but then forgave because Jack was insane or something....
Anyway, I digress. I tuned in today and yesterday, pleasantly shocked to see so many of the same characters from when I was a middle schooler, and was horrified to find that the show has basically become a vehicle for promoting the anti-abortion, anti-IVF fundie agenda.
Seems that Bo and Hope's son Sean (who's grown up to be quite the hottie) is married to a young woman who is RIDDLED with guilt about having had an elective abortion. To compound the horror of her "post-abortion trauma", it turns out the abortion made her INFERTILE.
(These two scenarios neatly fit in with the misinformation exposed in a study released by Rep. Henry Waxman's office yesterday saying that 87% of federally funded "crisis pregnancy centers" lie to patients, telling them that abortion causes breast cancer, infertility, and "post-abortion syndrome". I'm just waiting for this character to get breast cancer and the scenario will be complete.)
But it gets better. Seems that the character made infertile by her abortion really wants a child (even though she feels she doesn't deserve one because she "killed her baby") so she and Sean decide to do IVF with a gestational surrogate.
Only, guess what? Sean's sperm gets mixed up in the lab with his best friend's sperm, who just happens to be married to Belle (daughter of Marlena and Roman or John, I forget), who Sean really loves. The eggs of the women are fertilized by the wrong sperm. Belle and the surrogate have the embryo transfer on the same day.
Now, the evening of the transfer, both couples find out that the women are "pregnant" with embryos created by their eggs and the wrong man's sperm. Today's episode featured a long, drawn out debate about whether they should now get abortions (even though it's not even 12 hours since the transfer!)
Sean and Belle (who are fated to be together, of course) both protest that they would never "kill" their "innocent baby". The other two characters (including the woman who has already shown herself to be evil by having had an abortion) are portrayed as crassly willing to "kill" their "babies" in order to avoid the complications of this medical mishap.
It was like watching a train wreck or something -- I couldn't look away!
Have any of you seen this, too, and cringed? Or am I the only dolt in her mid-30's watching daytime TV in 100-degree heat?
Posted by: Maura at Jul 18, 2006 2:54:02 PM
Gosh, if embryos were considered children, over five (5)years of infertility treatments I've lost twenty+ children from my uterus!! I feel like Mother Goose -- she had so many children, she didn't know what to do!!!
I'm headed for a FET next month (we have 6 frozen 6-day blasts), so I really appreciate all that math, Julie. My clinic has a 65% rate, but I guess my real odds are for shit. Sigh.
Posted by: Stacey at Jul 18, 2006 2:57:21 PM
Ah, I don't put too much faith in numbers to begin with, having been on the remarkable side of them myself too many times to count. They don't apply to individuals, after all. Does it help if you think that your own personal chance is either 0 or 100%?
No, I thought not.
Best of luck to you.
Posted by: Julie at Jul 18, 2006 3:00:58 PM
No, Maura, you're not. In fact, this storyline has been going on for weeks -- Mimi and Shawn picked their surrogate IN THE HOSPITAL (where apparently they're just lining girls up to carry IVF babies!) and decided RIGHT THEN to use her. No discussion. No counseling.
God, don't you wish you lived in Salem? I was just wondering why it took so long for this ridiculous shit to reach the "infertile blogosphere."
Posted by: Lisa at Jul 18, 2006 3:02:16 PM
Dear Victoria,
Life's a bitch! I remember so well, being about 17 and (after secretly getting a prescription for the pill) telling my mom: "man if I found out I was infertile after years and years of paying for birth control, I'd be soooo mad."
HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH.
Then, I remember having an argument with a fellow 20-something friend that fertility treatments were stupid and indulgent and should never be paid for by insurance.
HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH.
Now, after a successful IVF and a gorgeous little girl I hope I've learned some humility. I doubt it. But I tend to think, "unless you've walked a mile in my shoes/ those shoes" you really don't know what you're talking about. In other words, until you've decided you want a child and then can't have one "easily" you don't know how you'll climb that mountain. I was suprised how much I wanted "my own" child when I'd always before thought I'd adopt.
And, now that I've shelled out all that money for infertility treatments, FROM MY OWN POCKET, I would like to talk more about insurance covering infertility treatments. What I thought the Mother Jones articles did so well was point out that in other countries, where insurance does cover some of the costs -- insurance companies (who I generally believe to be BIG EVIL..don't get me wrong) have a tremendous power to lower the overall price of treatments and then set some "limits" or "rules" for their coverage. In other words, an insurance company can say -- we'll pay for 3 IVF treatments but only if no more than 2 embryos are implanted. That way, they can dramatically reduce what they'll pay on the other end for NICU costs related to multiple births. I sure would like to see a healthy, polite discussion of this on a few blogs -- AND THEN IN A FEW CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS! Oh, but that's right, first we've got to get rid of those flag-burners and gay-lovers; they're dangerous you know!! Opps, I slipped in a rant there.
And one final thing -- could someone please talk about the fact that there ARE NOT A WHOLE LOT OF LITTLE ORPHANS OUT THERE WAITING TO BE ADOPTED. Adopting is a long process and these days you are damn lucky if you get to do it; certainly from your own country and it's getting harder and more expensive from other countries as well.
Posted by: JB at Jul 18, 2006 3:08:51 PM
I wondered when someone would bring up Days of our Lives. I figured it had to piss off some people. But you forgot to mention that the very first time Mimi got implanted (with 1 embryo) she got pregnant and had morning sickness in about a week and a half. She lost the baby about 3 (soap opera) days later.
Posted by: ktjrdn at Jul 18, 2006 3:09:01 PM
I imagine that the dilemma gets really difficult for many women once they've had IVF success and are living, day to day, with the wonderful potential of those 6-8 cells. The dilemma of what to do with these embryos seems to be to be one of the cruelest ironies of IVF. To add on top of that the fact that having this debate and dealing with this personal and private dilemma is being used as a weapon against women's rights to make their own reproductive choices makes me ill.
Posted by: Cat, Galloping at Jul 18, 2006 3:18:55 PM
JB, that was beautiful. My country (Canada) doesn't even cover IVF at all. Nothing. Nada, zilch, zippo. And neither do we have babies just hanging around waiting for someone to realize IVF is a stupid waste of money and that they should just adopt. Adopting from another country costs well over twice as much as IVF. Thankfully, IVF is much cheaper here than out-of-control US prices, but it's still too expensive for us now.
No IVF. No embryos. No adopting. No babies. And no one would buy my mother. She's too high-maintenance.
Posted by: projgen at Jul 18, 2006 3:28:26 PM
'the very first time Mimi got implanted (with 1 embryo) she got pregnant and had morning sickness in about a week and a half. She lost the baby about 3 (soap opera) days later'
Actually with all four of my confirmed pregnancies (I'm a serial early miscarrier) I swear I felt nauseous 24-48 hours after ovulation and with my last pregnancy had to miss a wedding 7 days after ovulation (and before any sort of positive test)because I felt so dreadful. Oh and I'd generally lose the baby about 21 after ovulation as well. Maybe I should be in a soap opera?
Posted by: Paola at Jul 18, 2006 3:30:45 PM
Shmutzy, I saw the "sextuplets and twins" show too. Actually what both the mother and father kept saying was, "Well, whenever you're dealing with infertility you're going to expect more than one." Not infertility *treatment*, just "infertility." That was what made *me* go "what the fuckity fuck?"
Also, you forgot to mention that the show was preceded last night by the Duggar special, "16 Kids and Moving In!" C'mon Julie, this Victoria business is positively civilized--I'm disappointed. Now, a good Duggar pile-on--nothing like it for getting the bloggity blood flowing.
Posted by: electriclady at Jul 18, 2006 4:03:47 PM
Ok now I'm feeling even worse about my lousy batch of frozen embryos. But they're there, so I feel I have to let them take their natural course. Natural. Ha! I crack myself up. Probably just setting myself up for x=2 rounds of heartache. Oh, I shouldn't talk about my frozen children that way.
Posted by: KathyH at Jul 18, 2006 4:08:46 PM
I am in Canada too, another "serial early miscarrier" and we have no money for IVF, even if I could find a dr that would help at my age, no money to adopt within or out of our country, no money for donor egg.
In fact, I recently looked into adopting a rescue Bichon (dog), and wondered if we even had enough money to adopt a dog at the moment - I was shocked at their prices! I wonder if they would think we were good enough "parents", or would we be turned down there too?
Posted by: Catherine at Jul 18, 2006 4:16:14 PM
I thought you were positively civilized, Julie. Victoria, sweet thing that she is, has somehow taken it into her head that seven cells doth a human make. Seven cells only doth make a human following some 30-some-odd weeks of gestation or so.
And, thanks to the person who brought up the DooL storyline. My father used to write for that show, and I stopped watching on the last day one of his shows aired. Every now and then, I think maybe I'm missing something -- what's the old gang up to? Maybe I should check in...
Don't have to. They're still stupid. Now I can move on without worry.
~C~
Posted by: Catharine at Jul 18, 2006 4:21:12 PM
Oh boy. See what I get for reacting off the cuff to an article, and not thinking it through very much, and not having gone through it myself, and not knowing my audience, and asking questions (that looked like assertions, but weren't really) online?
I would like to retract my comments - I am humbly sorry for the anger I've caused. I'm not even sure where I stand on this issue (not sure if I'm even pro-life/pro-choice or about the potentiality of being or when life begins...), so I shouldn't have "said" anything at all. I should have merely done more research and read more on the subject and come up with my own opinions on the matter. I haven't gone through infertility or had to seriously ask myself about IVF, though I have friends who have, so I had no right (or did I as a woman who may potentially have to go down this road?) to make the comments I did.
I'm sorry. Truly, sorry.
I am so glad for each and every one of you who have had successful IVF treatments - a close girlfriend of mine has and her little boy is precious to her and her husband.
Posted by: Victoria Winters at Jul 18, 2006 4:21:48 PM
Actually, those who consider embryos to be children are also concerned about freezing them in the first place, for the exact reasons you outline here. The fact that a person has a slim chance of survival doesn't make them less a person. Although questioning the ethics of IVF may seem threatening to those who are undergoing treatments, it could also be beneficial to everyone. If you take the position that insurance should cover IVF (which it really should), and you take the financial pressure off of the couples paying for the procedure, and also have some sort of regulation and control in place, you suddenly have the opportunity to both limit how many embryos are put back at one time, and also no need to freeze embryos. Unless the insurance companies push for it. But then you can blame the INSURANCE companies for pushing cost-saving procedures that put your *children* at risk. IVF can be carried out without generating a large number of excess embryos and freezing them. Fresh cycles have better success, and usually it's only the economies of scale that lead to women having triplets or more. It's a nontrivial problem that millions of embryos are in storage and no one knows what to do with them. Even if you don't credit that they are people, it's a waste of money and resources.
I think we could do better with IVF--have more respect for life, and have healthier outcomes for babies and mothers. I think the IVF clinics are acting like any other business that has a lot of desperate customers and few pesky government regulations.
Posted by: Ersza at Jul 18, 2006 4:30:41 PM
*sigh* All that math you're doing isn't really encouraging... I was kind of proud of the two little kidsicles we have waiting for us in the freezer of our clinic. But with THOSE succes rates we might end up with 0.27 baby. That's only a head and half a shoulder... Or is it 0.27 pregnancy? Would that mean we'd miscarry at 10.8 weeks?
Do we now have to continue doing "fresh" IVF-cycles untill we collect a total of 7.4 kidsicles so we can finally end up with one ferfect little baby? That's 2.7 fresh cycles to go, with our current 2-transferred-2-kidsicles-no-baby-per-cycle rate...
And no, it's not advisable to look at and/or name the cute little balls of cells they transfer and then give you a picture of. Getting the "I'm sorry, but..." call from the clinic today felt more like losing two children than I'd care to admit. Even though I absolutely agree with the notion that anything that small (and possibly even frozen) is a child yet. But hey, tell that to my imagination, which showed me I would soon be bouncing the two cutest little kids in the whole wide world on my very own lap...
Posted by: Mijke at Jul 18, 2006 4:49:36 PM
Victoria--Yeah, the article left a few things out, that many of us who've traveled the IVF road know by heart. In particular, that 8-celled embryos, no matter how pretty they are (Louie, our one and only embryo, was mighty pretty), don't turn into babies. I just hacked at some figures from the CDC's 2003 SART report, and figured out that only 11% of all embryos made it to babyhood. So we're not talking 500,000 little chilluns sitting on ice, we're talking more like 27,500 (half don't thaw, 11% [generous] make it to babyhood).
Biology is pretty ruthless. I came across a study of blood taken from nursing students that someone analyzed many years later to check for traces of pregnancy; the researchers came up with a HUGE figure of pregnancies that never made it past one week, before the woman even knew she was pregnant.
Posted by: OmegaMom at Jul 18, 2006 4:50:24 PM
Well...I come with a different view, I guess. I grieved the loss of every single one of my embryos. I even paid good money to have 7 dead and near dead embryos put back into my uterus b/c I'd rather my body dispose of them naturally. I couldn't bare the thought of them being washed down a sink.
Go ahead, call me sentimental. Call me unrealistic. call me foolish what have you. Trust me, my clinics have already covered the name calling. and I had a freezer full of 13 embryos from a successful cycle...none of them made it.
Posted by: Ktcakes at Jul 18, 2006 4:53:14 PM
Ersza--The problem I have with that line of thought is that--as with so many things--you don't know if you're going to have excess embryos. In my case, we had 9 embryos (after an initial retrieval of 18 eggs); we transferred 3; 1 implanted and grew into my son; 6 (which we hoped to freeze) stopped dividing of their own accord and (thus being unfit for freezing) were donated for research.
9 embryos sure sounded excessive, but in hindsight, of course, it doesn't.
Posted by: BrooklynGirl at Jul 18, 2006 4:53:53 PM
Umm...I'm pretty attached to my mom, but how much do you think I could get for a mother in LAW? Or maybe a bitchy, racist aunt? Anyone?
Posted by: LMM at Jul 18, 2006 5:16:18 PM
My insurance policy at work has automatic life insurance for my dependents. If my embryos would be considered children I wonder if I would be able to collect life insurance on the four pregnancies I lost. Somehow, I doubt it.
This reminds me of the ethical debate going on here in Canada about using stem cells harvested from fresh embryos for medical research. All I could think about was who in their right mind would pay full freight for an IVF and then donate leftover embryos before they even knew if it took?
Posted by: Elle at Jul 18, 2006 5:30:02 PM
Nothing about infertility is easy. The most difficult thing for me thus far is the hope that I have started with that has been completely stomped on time and again with each new test, or "option".
I know it works for some people. I KNOW it can happen, but it's reading things like this that provide the truth behind the false hope that doctors give us that makes me feel better and worse at the same time.
As for Victoria, I do not have the strength to argue morality with people like her anymore.
Posted by: TB at Jul 18, 2006 5:30:36 PM
Julie,
I always liked your riff on Donne.
I found it one day whilst tearfully googling, "just adopt?" after my very very pregnant best friend asked why I wasn't going that route. So many unwanted kids! So few homes!
Thanks,
Szaszy.
Posted by: Szaszy at Jul 18, 2006 5:42:05 PM
I've always liked you Julie, but today you gave me two more reasons to do so... your math abilities far outweigh mine and more importantly you see the frozen embryo situation for what it truly is... potential with no guarantees. Love you for that... I cringe every time someone insinuates frozen embryos are children because I know damn well they have no life outside my uterus and even inside there is no guarantee they will either. Thanks for making me, a mathematically challenged soul, laugh at your calculations...which by the way is how I perceive even the simplest math problems... err, I mean "equations." (Flashback to the math prof who said math would make sense if i thought about it in more positive terms... betcha he'd tell infertiles to "just relax" too. :)
Posted by: kristin at Jul 18, 2006 5:43:18 PM
Whoa, ktcakes, no one's calling names here unless it's me calling Tertia an asshole.
It is a thorny ethical problem, no doubt, and one that the Mother Jones piece covered pretty responsibly, I think. I also think Ersza has a good point, that it's not inherently harmful to anyone to consider the ethical side of what we're doing. I think each of us makes peace with our own conscience as best we can — hence those who stop treatment before undergoing IVF, those who adopt before starting treatment at all, and those who transfer only as many embryos as they'd be willing to bear if all implanted.
Posted by: Julie at Jul 18, 2006 6:17:20 PM
Out of my 7 embryos, 5 were thawed for this last FET, three survived. Out of those three, we have one potential child and "it" according to my own neurotic, glass half empty mind, is probably dead already.
Could you imagine if I referred to my actual child like that?
Posted by: statia at Jul 18, 2006 7:44:59 PM
Not to mention the fact that the "embryos" in question aren't actually embryos... they are blastocysts, ie: a conglomeration of cells which has yet to develop into an embryo. I guess someone, somewhere, figured "embryo" was catchier than "blastocyst" and had no clue what they were getting us all into.
Posted by: JoAnna at Jul 18, 2006 8:25:46 PM
Can I be the first to ask the question, what the heck does matrimercantilic mean anyway?? I asked my husband before posting here because he has a degree in English, and Google doesn't have a single hit for that word?!? I'm very impressed that you could even make up a word that Google can't find a hit for.
On topic, I haven't had to cycle yet, but I can't think of embryos as children, especially with my track record of "dispatching" them at about 5.5 weeks.
Posted by: Michelle at Jul 18, 2006 8:30:14 PM
Wouldn't it be nice if they all turned into Children one day. Last cycle it took me 5 embies to get 2 to transfer and none of them made it sadly.
Posted by: Soralis at Jul 18, 2006 8:53:03 PM
I posted on the last thread about having 7 embryos on ice and then felt bad, as if I had sounded flip and smug. By saying we were unsure what to do with them I meant we couldn't decide whether to discard of them upfront or pay large amounts of money to have painful, invasive and intrusive treatment which would almost certainly have the same result. I still remember my first IVF consult when I asked my RE "so what can you tell me about FETs?" and he replied "Well, they don't work". Sadly my experience so far backs that up.
Posted by: gkk at Jul 18, 2006 8:53:32 PM
If unadopted kids impose a moral burden on anyone, it's a burden we *all* share, not just the infertile among us. If you (like some moral philosophers, such as Peter Singer) think that disposeable income money should be spent to create the most benefit where it's most needed, then we should *all* be donating most of our income to Darfur or Sudan etc. instead of driving cars or indulging in luxuries such as air conditioning, television, automobiles, or other modern Western technologies, including ART. But again, if it is a moral imperative to donate money to charity instead of spending it on discretionary goods or services that enhance one's own life, that moral imperative applies equally to all persons with discretionary income, not just infertiles.
Posted by: victoria at Jul 18, 2006 8:54:22 PM
There are women who "adopt/rescue" frozen embryos, with the intention of undergoing IVF themselves. One almost lost an embryo to thawing because she had it shipped FedEx. She had had IVF a few times without success.
Posted by: ~Macarena~ at Jul 18, 2006 9:20:59 PM
Matrimercantilic--willing to sell your mother.
Also, as an adopted person, I try to discourage people from referring to me a "poor little orphan."
Victoria, you raise an interesting point about sharing the moral burden of unadopted children, but most children available for adoption are not orphans but rather children with birthparents who are unable or unwilling to care for them adequately. Also, many people have raised moral questions about adoption, including issues around trans-racial adoption, closed or open adoption, and international adoption. I'm not saying people shouldn't adopt because we're not sure of all of the ramifications of these issues, or that it doesn't work out wonderfully well for most people (including me), just that it seems to be too easy to view adoption as this wonderful thing where every party benefits. Everyone gains something, but everyone also loses something. It has its own set of moral ambiguities.
On another topic, I'm concerned, too, about letting my insurance company make decisions about how many blastocycts can be used at a time. I played the 25% odds: 16 eggs, 4 fertilized and put in, one child. I worry that if we'd only put two in I wouldn't have a chlld given the FET odds. Oh, and I live in Massachusetts where insurance did cover all of my infertility treatments including IVF.
Posted by: Jo in Boston at Jul 18, 2006 9:33:36 PM
Thanks, Julie, for raising this issue. I was just ranting to my family in a similar fashion.
What really upsets me in this whole political debate is how we, as parents of these embryos, are not considered fit to decide what we want done with any extras. Very few people seem to note that, thus far, no one is stealing anybody else's embryos--all of those being used for stem cell research have been donated, presumably by people who have already come to their own peace about what exactly an embryo represents. It is a deeply personal decision, but once the decision to donate has been made, shouldn't we honor that? (Sorry, just went off on my own soapbox tangent...)
Posted by: Jen at Jul 19, 2006 1:18:57 AM
this message is for victoria and anyone else who cares to read.
i had 21 embryos of which 19 were frozen. of those 19 only 3 never made the thaw. so i could have had 16 children. but because my body didn't seem to know how to keep a pregnancy, three of those 16 were miscarried.
out of those 19 frozen, i ended up with one child but had to wait for the very last embryo to be transferred back to get him.
Posted by: marisa at Jul 19, 2006 1:23:29 AM
Frozen Children?
Hmmm!! They sound delicious!
Posted by: Simone at Jul 19, 2006 2:08:52 AM
Julie;
I have been an avid reader of your blog for quite some time now. I have to admit...I am young(er) and naive so most of what I have known of infertility and IVF started here. Reading your writings actually encouraged me to begin to learn so much more as my heart goes out to any/all facing these unfair situations. Now-not to remove the heat/attention from the current topic, but I have a question for you and your readers that has been weighing heavily on my mind.
Once again, I want anyone reading this to understand that I am still naive about infertility and IVF. I am in my very early 20s and have not yet had to experience finding out if everything will work out for me to have children in the future. With that being said, here goes.....
I have never had the experience of witnessing firsthand the effects that infertility can have on a person. Until recently. About 2 years ago my husband and I purchased a home in an allotment filled with young couples our age (me of course being the youngest but I say our because my hubby is 9 years my senior) anyways, the couple that befriended us right off the bat just so happen to live directly accross the street from us. Naturally we became very close to them. I learned through (we'll call her Mary) "Mary's" openess that at that time she was dealing with infertility due to extreme endometriosis and was currently taking going thru the process of giving herself shots and so on and so forth. She also explained to me that this was the last time she would be doing this before deciding to do IVF.
Skip ahead a short period of time and she finds herself pregnant only to ending up miscarrying. So now they have saved up the money by refinancing their house to pay for everything. We live in OH and she finds a clinic in WA that for $20,000 you get 6 chances at IVF (shared risk program) and if you do not give birth to a baby within those 6 trys, you get your money back. She actually is in WA as we speak (and will be there this entire month-she left on the 5th and returns on the 26th). Now that you have the background here is my question....
What I failed to mention is that "Mary" is bipolar. Extreme bipolar. She is on very high doses of medication ALL the time, even on her medication she has extreme mood swings, and even on her medication is very difficult to be around. I can't even begin to describe some of the things I've experienced with her especially lately. She tells me that her and her husband fight constantly because everything he does upsets her-even something like putting the mustard in the wrong spot in the fridge, or the way he folds his shirts. Everything. She has been especially difficult being off her medication(as she has been off for the past few months due to trying to get pregnant). She informed me a few weeks ago that she had spoken with her doctor and he told her that if she has a daughter, her daughter has a 99.9999% (you get the point) that she WILL be bipolar. If she has a son, he will most definately be ADD or ADHD, along with the possibility of being bipolar.
It hurts me so badly but in a way it has put some thoughts and feelings in me about IVF. Why wouldn't she want to realize the horrile life she's had (HER words not mine!) and still pass that on to someone else just so she can have children? I guess I just want to hear what others have to say on this. As I mentioned, this is really my only experience with this whole situation and I guess I really feel guilty more than anything because it's hard to know how to feel for her. Hopefully others opinions and reasonings on this matter can help me to feel differently.
Once again I apologize for how naive I am when I come to this topic, and I hope I don't come accross in the wrong way. I read your blog daily along with several others. I pray for those of you going thru these hard times. I feel for you-I really do. Please don't be too hard on me. I guess I just need to hear what others have to say.
*Kelly*
Posted by: Kelly at Jul 19, 2006 8:48:47 AM
Victoria comments on a few blogs, and this comment doesn't surprise me.
Posted by: Jodie at Jul 19, 2006 9:24:41 AM
Those numbers are correct....EXCEPT where a woman has become pregnant with embryos from the same batch. In which case, succes rates are much, much better. Also, there isn't any evidence that the amount of cells, or the apparent quality, of embryos makes any difference at all. All of us walking around could be made of the crapiest embryos imaginable, and we'll never know. Out of 8 embryos that I had transferred over 4 cycles, 5 were "picture perfect" 8 cell beauties, one was a so-so with fragnentation (frozen), and two were questionable at best...one 4 cell with fragmentation, and one garbage looking 6 cell, both frozen and thawed. Guess which ones become my twin boys? You betcha!
The statistics are skewed in this way. Embryos are stored in straws of two. If you are transferring two, your clinic will only thaw enough to make two good ones to transfer. In every straw you have either a chance of %100 succes, %50 succes, or a big whopping goose egg. All the national statistics aside, these are the only statistics that matter to YOU. Of course, a woman with 7 embryos could go through all 3 1/2 straws and not get a single one to transfer, as Julie pointed out...OR you could have 4 in storage and get two passable enough to transfer embryos at the first go, leaving the rest still in storage, as is the case with me.
I would love to thaw those two embryos and try for a third child, if my husband will let me. I have fairly middling confidence that at least one will survive the thaw. Of course, with my luck, since I would just want ONE more, both embryos will survive, and they will both split, giving us quadruplets...ALL boys, of course....Which I'm sure someone out there would kill their own mother to have.
Posted by: Chickenpig at Jul 19, 2006 9:31:27 AM
I haven't read the above comments, so bear with me if I ask a repeat question.
1. Does dear, misguided Victoria have children? Did she bear them the "regular" way?
2. How can anyone preach, all pointy-fingered and self-righteous, how another woman, another family, should choose to bear children? JUST ADOPT! JUST RELAX!
Just gag me.
No one should have to suffer to bear a child.
Posted by: Heels at Jul 19, 2006 10:23:28 AM
This is such a difficult topic. I respect that it's off limits most of the time in Julie's blog.
I'm pro-life. It is really hard. Why do I even conceive if most of those little morulic slivers of life are going to die? I grieve less for a chemical pregnancy than I did for a 20-week stillbirth. Would I grieve less for a 30-week stillbirth than I would for the death of a toddler? Is it emotional attachment that makes the difference, or is there some primal, objective difference in "life worthiness" between the blastocyst and the embryo and the fetus and the newborn and the preschooler?
I can't convince myself to believe that there's some magical number of cells that suddenly transforms a fetus into a human being. I know that a 21-weeker has no life outside of my uterus. I know that I've seen a 23-weeker lying in NICU, suddenly a baby rather than a potential baby. What changed in those two weeks?
If I conceive quadruplets (ha ha ha ha ha ha ha), and I know very well that (probably) the only way to give two of those babies a fighting chance at live birth is to reduce the other two, aren't I choosing death both ways? If I don't reduce, aren't I making a conscious decision that causes them ALL to die? And if the Morally Upright Decision is to choose only fresh transfers with only two embryos at a time, what's the frigging point?
It is really hard. If you believe that a pregnant woman is carrying a real live baby in her womb, not just some collection of cells that doesn't become a human baby until the moment of birth, you are trapped in this world of ugly realities and wrenchingly difficult choices. I truly, deeply, sincerely believe that at 7dpo, 3 months, 8.5 months, and on the day before and the day after birth, that an unborn zygotemorulablastocystembryofetus is an honest piece of life, of baby, of human being. And it really, really sucks.
Posted by: Marie at Jul 19, 2006 10:23:47 AM
You girls are making this hard for me. I've got 6 frozen embryo's (which I need, no baby yet) but I am also in need of a really kick ass mom. Honestly though, I am surprised at how many people (including my GP) think that 6 frozen embryo's means I am "guarenteed" to have a baby from this cycle. Bullshit! My clinic has a 15% live birth rate with FET's. With 6 embryo's, 4 should survive which gives us one 15% chance. Although, I'd do it even if it had a 1% chance - that's more than I have any normal month. I'm grateful for my six embryo's but they have a long way to go before I'd call any of them children.
Posted by: jenny at Jul 19, 2006 10:24:30 AM
(finishing thought)
or to bring one home.
Posted by: Heels at Jul 19, 2006 10:27:15 AM
yeesh. All of these talks of odds certainly has me down. I am due for a laparoscopy to see if I have endo (already have pcos) and afterward, my docs would like to start me on injectables and IVF. Two failed IUI's, one cancelled....but I'm not sure if I want to jump head first into IVF...
Bottom line...no quick cash for IVF...would I be throwing good money after bad if I tried injectables with more IUIs? I'm only consderiing that route if I indeed have endo and the dr. "takes care of it" during the laparoscopy. Any other infertiles care to give me their two cents?
I'm also so sick of people telling me if I'd only relax, I'd get pregnant. Or if I'd only remain super positive, blah blah blah.
Posted by: kim at Jul 19, 2006 10:30:23 AM
Marie...that was really well said.
Julie~calling T and asshole is not really name calling as much as just stating facts.
Posted by: ktcakes at Jul 19, 2006 11:35:38 AM
Nature "loses" unimplanted embryos all the time, every day, all over the world, in any given cycle. And everyone that's on the pill has probably lost some (the pill can't always prevent ovulation and conception, but it does make implantation more difficult) and there's new research that "natural family planning" acutally creates more lost embryos than any other method, because having sex at the outside edges of a woman's fertile period creates many "weaker" embryos that never make it to implantation. Should we now tell all devout Catholics that they are "killing" more "babies" than any serial abortionist?
Bottom line - no matter what we do, no matter how hard we try, there's going to be embyos lost. As women, we are going to lose embryos even if we do nothing other than have sex. It's the way Nature set up the game. I personally don't consider it a "baby" until firmly implanted, and even then it may be lost, as we all know. For every arguement there is a counter-arguement. We all do the best we can for ourselves and our familes, and should try to respect each other's choices.
Posted by: Jessica at Jul 19, 2006 11:45:48 AM
Arghhhh...
It makes me tired. SO TIRED. I'm on IVF#4 now, and my second FET (due to kick off the popsicle implanting festivities in exactly two weeks). For every misconception that's out there about FET, if I could just get £1, or even an orgasm, I'd be a happy camper.
I don't understand how talking about FET becomes about adoption. You wanna' know about adoption? Adoption in the UK, where we are, is ridiculously hard. There are rumors about babies and young children being available, but I think that's Paris Hilton just talking smack. Adopt foreign babies? You know what, I'd love to. Honest. If my older partner and I could do this within the next decade and somehow under £15,000, then I'd be there, signing up for the first foreign baby to get a passport stamped.
And then somehow pro-life/pro-choice gets brought up, and I think what? What? How'd that get in here? I mean, how did we go from articles from a site that makes me think of the American South and apple pie to making calls on pro-lfe/pro-choice?
Then throw in the bi-polar argument and I think-who are any of us to tell others that they should or shouldn't have kids? Should people who are bi-polar get ruled out? How about lepers? I mean, shuoldn't leprosy be a cut off? Or ugly people? The world has lots of those, do we need more ugly people?
It's true, infertiles are emotional. It's all emotional. The urge to be a mother doesn't stop when you find out it's not going to work after a curry and a bottle of pinot grigio.
I'm sure it's hard to understand what the whole IVF world is like if you're not there, but including in every comment: "I don't know, I'm not infertile!" followed by smiley faces maybe isn't the best way to put ice on the burn.
Want to know what it's like? It sucks. There are tears and needles and constant analysis of if it will work or not. And lots of people get to see your hooch.
Fun for all, really.
Posted by: Vanessa at Jul 19, 2006 12:10:28 PM
Marie, we are all pro-life, every one of us. It is the fact of when cells become human life that we disagree, and what choice parents have over the fate of those cells.
Is there a difference between a blastocyst and a toddler? You betcha! A handful of cells vrs. a walking, living, breathing human being? Of course! Just as there is a difference between a healthy, walking around person and one who is in a hospital bed on life support. From one of those you can harvest a liver, a heart, eyes, kidneys and skin. A blast may be human life...barely, but it is human life that without a life support system, or being frozen, will not survive. Why is it that if you are the next of kin it is a loving decision to donate, but in the case of a blast being donated for science, it's murder? The only difference is in the potential, and as Julie pointed out, the potential for a frozen blastocyst is slim at best.
Posted by: Chickenpig at Jul 19, 2006 12:54:20 PM
Vanessa;
I'm truly sorry if my question cocerning the bipolar infertile offended you so badly. I was asking because as I admitted repeatedly I am naive when it comes to this whole thing. This issue has been on my mind for weeks now, and I just felt comfortable enough with the way that Julie has handled things in the past that I felt I could really ask here without being harshly judged. I wasn't throwing anything out there either about not having fertility problems. That was the point of me mentioning my age....I'm 22 I haven't had to worry about that yet. But in case you were wondering...fertility problems run in my family. My mom-ask her, she dealt with 5 miscarriages. My sister 4 years older than I-doesn't have children because she can't!
All I was doing was asking a simple question. Once again I didn't mean to offend you by as you put it, following my comment with "smiley faces". I was hoping that anyone who read it would realize that I wasn't out to hurt anyone, and that I was just asking a question while trying not to hurt or offend anyone.
Also, if you would like to know the biggest reason for my asking, this has been a popular discussion around several of the neighbors in our community. As I mentioned this woman is very open about her life and what she is going thru. Several of the neighbors I speak with do have children, and she makes us nervous at times around them. We have watched her get upset with the 2 year old boys over something that any child does, and she looks like her head is about to boil off of her body-seriously! I was hoping that I could gain some beneficial words of wisdom in asking my quesion that I would be able to share with others-who along with me aren't sure how to feel or what to think.
I cringe everytime I speak with these people when I hear them say that they are praying her IVF doesn't work. Wanna know why? It's because everyone and I mean everyone can see her being that woman in 2 years who has drowned her children in the bathtub because they were crying(thats how bad off her disease is). I really wish I had a better comeback for people when I hear them say this. All I was asking for was help Vanessa-not critism.
*Kelly*
Posted by: Kelly at Jul 19, 2006 1:12:31 PM
This subject comes at an interesting time for me as we are preparing to do our first FET (we have six "leftover" embryos from a fresh cycle that gave us a son). I personally would not be able to look at my son and not have an emotional attachment to the process hence the resulting embryos, but that is just me. I would however be interested to hear the perspective of anyone who themselves was conceived via FET. Perhaps I will ask the twin girls next door in about 20 years.
Posted by: Nors at Jul 19, 2006 1:53:43 PM
I admit it. I too am glued to that Days story line. Well, the one day a week I'm home to actually see it I am. Interesting that much of it was going on while I was doing my first IVF cycle. I found myself getting pissed off at first, then I had to remind myself this was a show that had people taken over by the devil (Marlena), people coming back as different people, etc. etc. etc.
Still, I love it!
Posted by: Kristine at Jul 19, 2006 1:59:33 PM
"Marie, we are all pro-life, every one of us. It is the fact of when cells become human life that we disagree"
That is exactly the issue. We all reach common ground eventually. It's where that thin gray line is drawn that defines the difference between pro-life and pro-choice.
Pregnancy is fraught with arbitrary distinctions. Fetal death at 19 weeks 6 days is a miscarriage, and at 20 weeks is a stillbirth (medically and legally). Elective termination in the US is currently legal in the first trimester and illegal without medical reason in the third. A ball of cells is a human baby before implantation for some people, after implantation for other people, after 12 weeks for others, after 20 weeks for others, and not until the first breath is drawn for others.
The issue is jagged and messy. Like life itself.
Posted by: Marie at Jul 19, 2006 2:04:50 PM
Kelly-sorry, the smiley faces was actually directed at another. But I did have a problem with the bipolar comment, and I guess I explained why.
Everyone's got issues.
Doesn't mean anyone gets to judge if we should have kids or not*.
*Unless it's Britney Spears, then all bets are off.
Posted by: Vanessa at Jul 19, 2006 2:08:00 PM
Kelly,
Are you a big fan of eugenics, or just where it concerns Manic Depression?
Contrary to your belief, not all Manic Depressives run around drowning their babies in bathtubs. Manic Depression runs strongly in my family, and there isn't a single case of infanticide in the entire family tree.
I, myself, am Manic Depressive and undergoing IVF. Perhaphs you should add me to your list of people whose IVF should fail? Would you like to come over and push me down a flight of stairs? That always works in the movies, after all.
Incidentally, do you also feel that Manic Depressives with no fertility problems should be involuntarily sterilized, or is it just the crazy infertiles who should remain childless? You might want to write your congressperson. I've heard ugly rumors that Manic Depressives are still allowed to (gasp) adopt!
Clearly, we must be stopped.
Posted by: akeeyu at Jul 19, 2006 2:11:45 PM
Julie, I know your post wasn't about stem cell research, but I just saw this & thought of you (specifically the "potential" vs "life" argument).
http://scienceblogs.com/drcharles/2006/07/the_bush_stem_cell_doctrine.php
Posted by: nate at Jul 19, 2006 2:44:12 PM
To those concerned about the bipolar woman - I really don't think any doctor can predict with any accuracy whether or not a child of a bipolar will also be bipolar. My father is bipolar, and has been for a long, long time. Neither my sister nor I are bipolar ourselves. In all the years of dealing with his illness, doctors, and treatment, the most I can ever get from any of them is that there IS an identified genetic component to being bipolar; it runs in families. But they can't say for sure who will/will not develop the illness - it may just be a genetic predisposition, just like some kinds of cancers. Being off her meds and undergoing the injections and everything could make her quite unstable now (those drugs can really mess up "sane" people), but not really having seen her when she's ON her medication no one can say how she'd behave. My father is religious about his meds, and the only thing any one would notice about him is a slight amount of paranoia. The bipolar issue itself shouldn't preclude her from pursuing fertility treatments. You and everyone in your neighborhood may be surprised at how she is once everything is all said and done and she goes back on her meds.
Posted by: FishyGirl at Jul 19, 2006 3:06:39 PM
Thank you FishyGirl for your KIND response to my question. I guess I didn't realize how wrong everything would be taken. The only cause for my concern has been the way my neighbor acts when she is on her medication, and I don't know if this makes a differnce or not, but her grandmother and father along with herself and another sister are all extremely bipolar. There have been times I have walked away from this woman's home in tears becaus she has turned on me in an instance, later apologizing blaming it on being bipolar *while on her meds*.
I have tried over and over again to speak with others about putting themselves in her position because I feel for her-I really do. I wouldn't want her problems for anything.
I guess I'm just gonna be best to leave it at this-
I apologize in advance to anyone whom I have or will offend with my stupidity in asking for some guidance. I was looking for people who may be able to help me understand how to deal with others as I have tried so much in the past to do.
Please don't tear into me about being an awful person who belives that she shouldn't be able to have children. That's not what I meant, and I should've thought better I guess about how that sounded. Once again, my stupidity.
Posted by: Kelly at Jul 19, 2006 3:35:28 PM
On our first IVF cycle, we had nine that survived to the blastocyst stage, implanted two, froze seven. And I wanted all nine. If we'd had twins from the fresh cycle, I would still have wanted to go back for the seven. And we really didn't ever plan on that many kids . . . .
But we had a chemical pregnancy on the fresh cycle, and watched my HCG levels slowly taper off after the first positive. When we decided we were done with IVF, I thought those frozen embryos meant I had at least two FETs to look forward to--until my RE disillusioned me. We thawed all seven, four survived the thaw, and we implanted all of them. And I got pregnant with one, and we miscarried it at eight weeks. We never knew quite what to think of those frozen embryos, but we did feel that leaving them frozen was somehow wrong . . . or at least wasteful. I am absolutely pro-choice. It's just that the harder it was for me to have a baby, the more I wanted every baby I could possibly have. And I never thought of any of those embryos as children . . . just potential, as Julie says. But they were our potential, and losing them felt like the loss of hope.
Posted by: Casuarina at Jul 19, 2006 3:44:41 PM
Kelly, I'm sure you do mean well, but that is just way too touchy a subject. At some point infertiles have all been (or felt) judged - like somehow we can't have children because we shouldn't have children. Or at least I have felt judged, I shouldn't speak for others. I think we all know people whom we think shouldn't be allowed to care for children. The thing is, nobody suggests that fertiles shouldn't be allowed to have unprotected sex. There would be a huge horrified outcry if anyone suggested enforced sterilization for those who MAY have conditions that MAY affect the baby or MAY affect their parenting abilities. Yet that is exactly what is suggested to infertiles because to suggest denial of treatment is, in effect, enforced sterilization. There is really nothing you can do for or about your friend other than offer your support to help her cope with the difficult time she is going through.
Posted by: jc at Jul 19, 2006 6:22:28 PM
A few comments -
Kelly - I won't attack you as you clearly admitted you were naive. I see your comments are meant only for concern for the woman and her future children. But just a quick point - my mother, her mother, and two of her sisters are bi-polar. However, neither myself, my siblings, or any of my cousins are (maybe moody and pms-y at times, but nothing a glass of wine can't cure). Yes, depression can be hereditary, but it is not a guarantee. I have a daughter and with my family history, she may very well struggle with mental illness in the future...but that doesn't mean I shouldn't have had her. My mom had struggled to be a good mother and "be there", but at times she needed help and needed to be hospitalized. But I wouldn't trade her for any other mother in the world (however, I can see myself trading her for 7 frozen emryos ;)).
One other comment - I am not smart enough to put the words together to comment effectively on Tony's Snow's comment I read this morning:
Tony Snow On Bush's Promised Stem Cell Veto: "The Simple Answer Is He Thinks Murder's Wrong'".
Here is my lame comment anyway: Does that mean that in all my prior attempts at having a child - the one's that didn't result in a pregnancy after transfer (that started out as 8 cell), the miscarriages, the blighted ovums, i could go on, but you get it - does that mean I am a serial murderer in Bush's mind?! Have I committed several acts of emryo-acide? Shall I turn myself in to the authorities? Someone else must have read this - Please someone else comment. Am I the only murderer among us?
Posted by: Julie at Jul 19, 2006 8:57:41 PM
(Just to clarify, the Julie-angry-about-George-Bush above isn't the Julie-who-runs-this-site, although I am, come to think of it, rather cheesed at Boy George right about now.)
Posted by: Julie at Jul 19, 2006 9:34:11 PM
Boy George. Have I asked you to marry me yet, Julie?
Having seen the pictures of my little thawed (and failed) blastocysts, I really can't even begin to compare the potential of their "lives" to the potential improvement in the quality of my life without diabetes, in the quality of my grandma's life without Alzheimers, or in the quality of life of my friend's brother, who will be in a wheelchair without bowel or bladder control for the rest of his life due to a car accident at age 19.
Thanks, W. for thinking that your religion trumps the will of the people.
Posted by: art-sweet at Jul 19, 2006 10:37:57 PM
"you suddenly have the opportunity to both limit how many embryos are put back at one time, and also no need to freeze embryos."
Ersza, what are you ON? Why on earth would any system plan to subject a woman to one more dangerous stim cycle that they have to?
The advantage of publiclaly funded IVF is that they limit the number of embryos transferred so you can have fewer HOM and more FETs.
Of course my publiclally funded reproductive efforts yielded nary an embryo, let alone some to freeze. But my mother can knit, so I should get a good price.
Posted by: at Jul 19, 2006 11:09:10 PM
Kim (who asked the question about endo and IUIs) - go IVF. IUIs will shoot your estrogen up, make your endo worse and not give you a great shot at pregnancy. IVF will shoot your estrogen levels up, make your endo worse and give you a good chance at pregnancy.
Posted by: Avon at Jul 19, 2006 11:16:59 PM
Kelly, if you think about it, your concerns about your neighbor have nothing to do with IVF, and by my lights, should not color your opinion about medical treatment for infertility. To be logically consistent, your worry about bipolar people having children should apply across the board -- i.e., you should be equally concerned about all bipolar people having children, regardless of whether they happen to be fertile (like my bipolar niece who had a child last year) or infertile (like your neighbor). Whether or not any of us should judge who is fit to bear children is another discussion -- but it's completely separate from the infertility issue.
Unfortunately, there often seems to be a double standard applied to infertile people. For example, if a 45 year old has a child without medical assistance, it may warrant merely a bemused "better her/him than me!" But if a 45 year old gets medical help to have a child, all of a sudden the judgement comes out: he or she is selfish, and desperate, and irresponsible, etc., etc., etc. And verging into Victoria's question here, it's the same with adoption: most people have biological children rather than adopt. But if someone turns to medical help to bear children, all of a sudden they are selfish and irresponsible for not taking in the so-called needy children, and adding to the world's ostensible overpopulation problems. This makes no sense -- if adoption and population issues are moral obligations (I don't believe they are, but that's another discussion), then they are moral obligations for everyone. Why should they fall only on the shoulders of people who happen to have a medical disability?
Anyway, I believe the double-standard stems from a conscious or subconscious mystical belief that if G-d or nature had intended that someone have children, he or she would have them. Kelly, it seems as if maybe that's how your neighborhood discussion of someone's potential mothering ability got tangled up with a discussion of infertility -- if I had to guess, I would bet that the phrase "maybe there's a reason she can't have children" has been uttered more than once.
But that's specious -- if you want to believe that G-d or nature has a reason for making some of us infertile, you have to explain why the same G-d or nature makes plenty of horribly abusive parents veritable baby-making machines. And you also have to ask yourself why you don't say "maybe there's a reason she has cancer" as an argument against your loved one getting chemotherapy. The fact is, there's nothing mystical about infertility. It's a medical disability that affects both men and women, and it can sometimes be treated medically or surgically. Those that oppose treatment for infertility should logically also oppose medical treatment for all other health problems. But again, there's a double-standard -- people with other disabilities are rarely told that G-d just didn't intend for them to walk, or to have a healthy heart, or functioning kidneys, etc.
/mindspew
Posted by: Jos at Jul 19, 2006 11:25:52 PM
Oh, lord, I wrote a book -- how obnoxious. Yikes. Sorry.
Posted by: Jos at Jul 19, 2006 11:27:04 PM
Kelly:
"...Why wouldn't she want to realize the horr[b]ile life she's had (HER words not mine!) and still pass that on to someone else just so she can have children?..." and "... Please don't tear into me about being an awful person who belives that she shouldn't be able to have children..."
These two statements seem contradictory to me. You have made in your first statement a judgement on this woman's right to pass on her genes, no matter how flawed (in your opinion) they may be. You ARE saying that she will inflict a life of sorrow on her offspring "...just so she can have children...". Really, it *does* seem that you think "that she shouldn't be able to have children..." Do you not think this hasn't crossed her mind maybe once or twice? Isn't that HER decision and *no-one* else's? The only difference is that she is having to resort to ART for it.
. "...We have watched her get upset with the 2 year old boys over something that any child does, and she looks like her head is about to boil off of her body-seriously!... It's because everyone and I mean everyone can see her being that woman in 2 years who has drowned her children in the bathtub because they were crying(thats how bad off her disease is)..."
I echo what Fishygirl, akeeyu and others have said on this subject already.
Do you also wish for failure of IVF for the diabetic woman just because she might have a hypo and crash the car? The epileptic who might seize and lose consciousness when she is bathing her baby? Because there is probably more chance of that happening as there is for a bipolar woman who is normally well controlled of drowning her children. And FYI, she's more likely to drown them if she is DEPRESSED than manic. She's also much more likely to drown them for "crying too much" if she has a personality disorder or anger management issues than a well-controlled person with bipolar. And both of those are FAR harder to treat.
Do you have any obese persons with children in your neighborhood? A genetic disease that is very hard to treat that leads to a lifetime of suffering and disability (FYI I am obese, and not proud of it). Do you question their right to bear children?
I'm not trying to "tear into" you, just present you with the thoughts that you asked for on this topic. (Just because we don't agree with you doesn't mean we are attacking you. This is what having a debate is all about).
Posted by: jen at Jul 20, 2006 3:13:11 AM
As a diabetic and infertile, I am glad I don't live in Kelly's neighborhood. My ears would be burning OFF!
And my mother is still for sale. Whoever apologised for being smug about their frozen embryos...you were right, you were smug but thanks for the apology.
Julie, great discussion as usual. Here in the UK, only the best quality embryos are frozen so that people have the greatest possible chance of success in the FET process. This still doesn't seem to make the success rates any better though as you are always picking the best-looking embryos out for the fresh transfer.
At my clinic, you can donate any embryos that do not make the freezing grade for stem cell and further IVF research. That is where our couple of deformed little buggers ended up though I doubt that they advanced the path of reproductive medicine very far. I do like to think of myself as one giant science project. It gives me something to giggle about during the yawning gaps between DE/IVF treatments.
Posted by: Pamplemousse at Jul 20, 2006 5:55:51 AM
But it was a really good book, Jos. Thanks
Posted by: Jo in Boston at Jul 20, 2006 8:42:14 AM
To add to the whole "right to undergo ART" debate about bi-polarism, age, diabetes and all that jazz.....
What about the men in this whole thing? We are assuming that the bi polar woman is undergoing ART because she is suffering from infertility. But what if hubby's to blame? I wouldn't have had to undergo IVF with ICSI at all if my husband's sperm wasn't total complete crap. My father was bi polar, and he was a lousy husband, and a terrible father, but I don't think anyone would ever question his right to procreate. And as far as age goes, my state has a senator who recently had a child and he is something like 60 years old. It seems that in our society it doesn't matter how old a man is, if his sperm works, it's okey dokey, and if his sperm doesn't work, his wife has to endure the treatment and the scrutiny. How unfair is that?!
Posted by: Chickenpig at Jul 20, 2006 9:04:50 AM
As a woman with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome with a history of moderate depression being 37 weeks pregnant (thanks to IVF) to a man with bi-polar disorder, I may have an opinion on this one.
People who have lived a little, endured a little, suffered a little - or maybe a lot - tend to be more tolerant of others and accept that each of us has our own reasons for doing what we do.
Wanting a child is an entirely selfish thing. I want to have a child because I choose to. I can't think of any justification, and I don't have to. I have stuggled to achieve this pregnancy and I feel greatful to live in Australia where access to ART is not completely beyond my reach, as it would be if I lived in many other places.
I love my husband. Watching him deal with his mental illness has been an incredible inspiration to me. It hasn't been easy, but it has been worthwhile standing beside him come what may. I am looking forward to raising our child together, whether there is any possible chance (certainly not 99%!) of her having depressive illness in the future or not.
I would rather raise a thinking, compassionate, accepting child than a self proclaimed "naive", intolerant and prejudiced fool.
But that's just my opinion.
Posted by: Samantha at Jul 20, 2006 9:05:56 AM
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Victoria was probably speaking from the vantage point that any time a sperm and an egg join, human life has started. Most of you, from the sounds of what you are writing, don't believe it starts until some other undetermined time.
The whole argument doesn't even make sense when the two sides come from very different basic beliefs.
It all comes down to: is this life, is this a child, or not?
I say yes.
Posted by: Rach at Jul 20, 2006 9:36:36 AM
What Jos said!
And then there's this, heard on Public Radio as I'm driving to work, regarding Bush's veto on expanding stem cell research: "If you were in a burning building with a freezer full of frozen embryos and a 6-month old baby and you could only save one of those two ... which would it be? You'd save the baby -- and that's because the baby's life is real."
Hmmmmmmm
Posted by: JB at Jul 20, 2006 10:25:29 AM
Oh, wouldn't it be peachy if we could get real live kids out of each and every embryo created? Let's see. We've made 49 embryos. 21 of those 49 actually made it to transfer over the course of 4 fresh and 3 frozen cycles. 4 of those 21 actually managed to implant (1 each on 4 separate cycles). 1 of those 4 decided to stick around (knock on wood.) Yes, it took us 49 embryos to find 1 that would stick around for more than a few weeks.
I definitely agree with your statement on potential, Julie. There's no way I could think of myself as having produced 49 children.
Posted by: amanda at Jul 20, 2006 11:40:21 AM
If you were in a burning building and had to choose between saving a six-month-old baby or a ninety-year-old man in the ICU, which would you save?
It's true that we "grade" life differently depending on the circumstances. Drug addicts are given lower priority on liver transplant lists than children. Once there is no brain function, you can choose to turn off your child's life support machinery. Ancient civilizations believed that the most humane solution to a deformed infant was exposure -- and given how hard the times were, it probably was. That's all life, real life. Every culture grapples with the judgement calls, and where the priority rankings should go, but it's all real.
Posted by: Marie at Jul 20, 2006 11:42:11 AM
Amen. And at the risk of overstepping, here's a copy of what I just added to the Democratic party "petition" I just signed at http://www.democrats.org/curediscovery (with a link pointing to this discussion):
Stem cells are not "life," they are simply living organisms, like plant cells and other animal cells. Yes, they are *potential* "life" by the President's narrow construction of the term, in that under the right circumstances they have the potential to become human beings. However, under different but equally valid circumstances, they also have the potential to save lives of *currently living* human beings. Either potential use is a form of valuing and cherishing life. One should not be sacrificed for the other on the alter of ideology.
Thanks for providing this incredible forum, Julie. We need more places to discuss these issues openly and honestly.
Posted by: Beth at Jul 20, 2006 12:04:33 PM
For Maura's sake, I'd like to confirm that Belle is Marlena & John's daughter.
Posted by: Lee at Jul 20, 2006 1:34:39 PM
People who haven't gone to the trouble and expense of actually creating frozen embies should shut the fuck up.
Posted by: myoho at Jul 20, 2006 2:32:11 PM
I just have to say the following:
1. To Vicky- Why in this world would you pick on infertiles? I mean really? Do you kick puppies too? Get another cause.
2. I have known lots of pro-choice women and not one of them would ever think that a an abortion the day before the baby was born (or even close thereto) was morally acceptable.
Posted by: oneliner at Jul 20, 2006 3:47:54 PM
Oneliner, is that the general trend, do you think? My impression was that the majority of the pro-choice movement is very concerned about the foot in the door/slippery slope argument wrt the erosion of the right to have an abortion at any stage. Which is why groups like NOW and Planned Parenthood have firmly and consistently opposed a blanket ban of the partial-birth abortion, for example.
I would be interested to see polling data about where the legality of an elective abortion should be placed -- my impression is what the majority of pro-lifers hold to conception, with a smaller group holding to implantation; while the two largest pro-choice beliefs are split between viability and birth.
I wonder if Barna or someone has done any polls...
Posted by: Marie at Jul 20, 2006 5:52:44 PM
Here's my take, complete with TrackBack
http://heroing.blogspot.com/2006/07/in-thick_20.html
Posted by: Hero at Jul 20, 2006 6:02:45 PM
"Facts require thinking. Faith does not, so faith is easier."
What total bullshit.
Neither having nor lacking faith prevents or promotes thinking. A few anecdotes about asshole atheists or freakishly judgemental theocrats does not a theory prove.
Facts in and of themselves don't require thinking at all. People accept and repeat facts (even very important ones) without critical thinking each and every day.
Furthermore, faith can require a whole heck of a lot of thinking. In fact, active faith requires thinking in a way that "facts" cannot and will not ever provoke.
From today's post: "My point is that when we're considering seven frozen embryos, we're not talking about seven children, not by a long shot."
Why not? Because not all of them are "viable"? using current medical technology? Because they're property and not people? And, if in a year or ten, medical technology results in near-100% success rates for frozen embryos, will the sentiments expressed here change?
No one gets excited about euthanasia until they're the one that might get the can. Or, the coffin, rather. Sure, plunder those frozen embryos for stem cells or flush 'em when they're no longer needed.
What? I'm scheduled for euthanasia because my liver would be better used in some rich CEO's body? Hey! I'm living my life here! Wait!
Too bad - we should have thought about what constitutes a viable life when we had the chance. We have the chance now.
Shouting down people that want a hands-OFF approach to the creation and management of new life (dare I say a Libertarian approach?) simply because a bunch of cells aren't cute, and a newborn is, is just plain sad.
Potential life should be treated as potential life. That means, it should be treated as a living thing in transit from conception. The decision to "recipe-up" a human being via IVF incurs a substantial moral obligation that most "clients" of IVF are, to be blunt, shirking.
There's a saying in aerospace design; manuverability is gained at the loss of stability. You can have a lot of one at the expense of the other. IVF grants fertility (manuverability), but what it requires is the acceptance of some uncomfortable realities and some messy questions (a loss of stability).
Ignoring these realities and questions, or insisting that they don't exist, exposes a lack of thinking that not even the oft-ridiculed "faithful" can be accused of indulging in.
Posted by: Michelle at Jul 20, 2006 6:44:41 PM
I love this post. Couldn't agree more.
In terms of the potential versus actual child thing - of all my pregnancies, I must say I go pretty attached to my down syndrome girl. What with seeing the heartbeat for several weeks, and then when it (she?) was dead even though she was TINY, between 9 and ten weeks, I could see her little arm buds, and head. It was much more attached than I realized.
But the thing is, when people talk about abortion being murder, I always think - that's assuming they get to eight weeks, or aren't already dead by the time the surgery is performed. With three of my four miscarriages I needed a D and C, and if I hadn't wanted to be pregnant, I wouldn't have known that they all would have died anyways.
The point being, yes, it's all about potential, not reality.
Posted by: patricia at Jul 20, 2006 6:57:34 PM
Look, in all honesty, I think some people here are being pretty hard on Kelly.
I think her thoughts and feelings are quite natural, and quite common, even if people don't like them. Are there any of us who haven't looked at some other parents and felt that they shouldn't have had children? Isn't it pretty common to look at some of the people who are planning to have children, people who are already struggling to keep things together even without children, and wonder if they're going to cope?
I seem to see a lot of children whose lives are filled with hardship, mainly because their parents are so disfunctional - on drugs, alcoholics, or just plain detached and self absorbed and have little empathy for their children. And yes, sometimes because their parents have mental illnesses. I think its natural to worry about these children, and worry about children who might be born to these people.
I say this because I myself have a parent who suffers from a mental illness and growing up in that family was damn hard! Having the father I have is still pretty hard, even though I don't live with him any more and have a child of my own.
It doesn't mean that I wish he hadn't had me. I think Kelly's friend has a perfect right to have children any way she chooses to do so. In any case, a mother with a mental illness who loves her child and manages her illness carefully will probably make a WAY better parent than a person who is perfectly healthy, but just an asshole.
The fact is that parenting is pretty hard a lot of the time, and its impossible to know who is actually going to be a good parent in advance.
But I am concerned that apparently a person can't ask an honest question around here without copping a bucketing!
Margot
Posted by: Margot at Jul 20, 2006 7:55:38 PM
I propose legislation. To wit:
Any person who says, "Why don't you JUST ADOPT" without first having adopted a child, instead of having "THEIR OWN" because "WELL, THEY CAN!" is subjected to a fine of $5,000, said monies to go towards treatment of the many serious traumas that adopted children suffer.
Posted by: lorrie at Jul 20, 2006 8:08:29 PM
This is a very informative discussion. After posting my own quandary on this issue, a reader referred me here.
I've learned things here to help inspire reasoning in the debate: IVF failure rates in hard numbers, cost involved, even references to Days of our lives which is completely foreign to me.
I suppose where I am leaning now is that while the President's logic may be faulty - in that his absolute assertion that frozen embryos are life - the underlying conclusion that certain things just ought not be funded by the Federal Government is what carries the day.
Posted by: Charlie on the PA Turnpike at Jul 20, 2006 10:48:39 PM
Hi Julie,
I see that you zapped my comment from yesterday. I sincerely apologize for the offensive comment. I had just listed to Mr. Bush's reasoning for vetoing the stem cell research bill and the fury kind of went to my fingers.
I love your blog and again sorry for the offense.
Posted by: winecat at Jul 20, 2006 11:08:13 PM
How's that go?
"The decision to "recipe-up" a human being via fucking incurs a substantial moral obligation that most "clients" of fucking are, to be blunt, shirking."
Close enough.
Posted by: akeeyu at Jul 21, 2006 12:21:46 AM
I agree with Margot on poor Kelly's question. There are many many people I have watched in supermarkets, internally screaming 'It's so unfair! How come you can get pregnant and I can't?' The obese, the junkies, the mad, the dirty, the drunk, the bad-tempered...I watched one obese woman feed her child eight tim-tams (chocolate covered double-layer biscuits/cookies) as they wheeled their way through the aisles - if that's not child abuse I don't know what is. Women screaming 'shut up you bastard,' at a three year old. Stories in the paper of children punched to death, dying over three days of internal injuries. Working in a health servcie where kids come in with their hair matted with faeces. Why DOES everyone have an equal right to bear children? Why isn't it just restricted to the people who deserve them - LIKE ME?
Posted by: Mikhela at Jul 21, 2006 1:06:29 AM
Winecat, I didn't zap anything! Are you sure it posted properly?
Posted by: Julie at Jul 21, 2006 7:00:46 AM
Mikhela -- I have a feeling that "obese" woman also showers her child with more love and affection than your skinny body could ever muster.
Posted by: fatty at Jul 21, 2006 9:16:58 AM
***********************************************
Oneliner, is that the general trend, do you think? My impression was that the majority of the pro-choice movement is very concerned about the foot in the door/slippery slope argument wrt the erosion of the right to have an abortion at any stage. Which is why groups like NOW and Planned Parenthood have firmly and consistently opposed a blanket ban of the partial-birth abortion, for example.
************************************************
Yes, and its no trend. Its been that way from the start--The pro-choice movement has long held that once a fetus is viable the right to abortion ends. Read Roe v. Wade in which the line is drawn at viability. (Read O'Conner in Casey)
The pro-choice movement doesn't like the ban on partial-birth abortion 1. b/c it doesn't exist (according to the AMA), 2. The procedure that is even close is only ever done to save the life of the mother or a fetus that isn't viable), 3. Its basically just horror-inducing rhetoric meant to galvanize the anti-choice movement.
(I'm not sure this is relevant here? And I'm sorry if i've added irrelvant heat to an already over-heated debate)(Julie, feel free to delete..i'm a big girl i can take it)(I just HAD to respond).
Posted by: oneliner at Jul 21, 2006 10:29:30 AM
(Jeez, I even hate the term, "partial-birth abortion"!)
Posted by: Julie at Jul 21, 2006 10:41:34 AM
In defense of Kelly, as a bipolar person I didn't feel that she was saying NO bipolar people should have children, just that in the case of this particular woman, who seems to be on the extreme and volatile edge, Kelly and the other neighbors are concerned about the situation. I expect they would have the same reaction if Mary had become pregnant with no effort whatsoever. No, it isn't fair to deny or even question Mary's right to IVF, and at this point concerns about what kind of mother she'll make seem premature, given the odds.
Ultimately, however, if Mary does have a child, Kelly, its overall welfare isn't and can't be your responsibility, but maybe you and some of the other neighborhood women can help ease the stress of parenthood for Mary. You seem pretty aware of her mood swings, so if she seems particularly hostile or explosive, perhaps you or some of the other women can help out by babysitting for a few hours, offering your services to cook a meal or clean the house, or taking Mary out for lunch or shopping. It shouldn't be an obligation, but I think the best way to handle the situation is to translate your concerns into positive action. Also, feeling like she has the support of a community of women, rather than being the object of their censure and judgment, might in itself be a huge help to Mary.
Just my two cents, FWIW. :)
--mq
Posted by: at Jul 21, 2006 11:09:59 AM
I didn't know that -- thank you. My impression from reading Roe v. Wade was that abortions past viability (which is currently 23 or 22 weeks?) are still permitted for reasons such as avoiding the stigma of unwed motherhood or financial hardship -- which I would consider an elective rather than a medical reason.
Posted by: Marie at Jul 21, 2006 11:13:41 AM
Hmmmm. This discussion is interesting. Sometimes, though, I do find that discussions like this reveal people's prejudices against adoption, which perhaps I am hyper sensitive to.
I've had 6 embryos implanted. I got pictures of them. I looked at those pictures a lot when I was PUPA (pregnant until proven otherwise). When my cycles failed, I put those pictures away where it would be hard for me to remember where they were. I even considered throwing them out.
I produced 12 embryos total. They all stopped growing in the lab. I was sad about it.
I am adopting from China, about to receive a picture of my child in a week or so. People told me to "just adopt" and while there was nothing "just" about it, I sure am glad I decided to adopt because now I am finally having my own child.
When I get that picture of my daughter, you can bet that I will freak out. And carry it around with me, and make copies, and make t-shirts. And stare at it all the time. Because that will be my daughter. Not those cells, hidden away somewhere.
But that's just me.
Posted by: Karen at Jul 21, 2006 11:25:29 AM
my brain is a bit scrambled...
reading all these comments, WOW!!! we have everything covered!!! plus slipping into an Edy's butterfinger ice cream coma (oooh soo good!!) and listening to the news where they are talking about alligators in MA, a 2 faced cat, and a woman who delivered her own child while her older child watched sesame street in the next room.
Kim....our beloved Lupron, which is in the beginning of IVF, is said to work wonders for Endo....
I had 23 eggs from my IVF, out of those, we transferred 2, got my dd, and froze 6. I called them the frozen chosen. 1 survived, but didnt implant. I am now in the beginning of another ivf....hey, does it strike anyone else as odd, that at the beginning of an ivf cycle, we take something like provera to bring on AF, while at the same time, taking Lupron to supress it??
anyway, apparently they changed the criteria for embryos that are frozen, and based on the new criteria, most of our frozen chosen would have never been frozen in the first place.... in any event, I was soo sad that we lost them, and got no baby. obviously, they were living, but obviously they weren't children and obviously there is no guarantee that they'll stick. but they were still a part of me, and yes, I grieved for what they could have been. I guess it relieved the dilemma of whether or not I should tell that child that they spent the first two years of their life in the freezer, and technically, they are the same age as their older sister.....weird, no??
oh, and Mikhela?? what exactly makes you so "DESERVING"?? what the heck was that comment all about??? The fact that you seem so judgemental makes me fearful that you may have a child!! Not only do the nuts of the world NOT deserve children, but ESPECIALLY THOSE TUBBIES!!! they should NEVER reproduce! I could see it if you said that people who abuse, or neglect their children shouldnt have them, but you compared overweight people with drunks, and mad people, and junkies!! get a clue.
A child is a gift. and no one "deserves" one more than someone else. how dare you think you have the right to judge how deserving anyone is?
Posted by: Patty at Jul 21, 2006 11:16:47 PM
Well, I THOUGHT I'd done it correctly but chemo brain as set in and I'm not exactly on the top of my game.
However I can post in a much more rational fashion than the one I let the other day.
My comments were about the 'questional science' and moraltiy seems justified to inflict on the rest of us. I'd love for him to read this post about real life frozen blasocysts and their chances in the real world
Posted by: winecat at Jul 22, 2006 5:34:24 AM
I had 14 eggs retreived out of the 14 eggs 6 were good (8 cells). Due to overstimulation I had to freeze the embryos. Two months later when I was ready for the tranfer the eggs were thawed of the six, four were good. So the doctor transfer 4 embryos. Now I am 6 weeks pregnant with twins.
Freezing does hurt the embryos. But I was still able to get pregnant.
I wish everybody all the luck. The good thing is that we are not alone.
Thank God for the internet and these blogs which help a whole lot.
Posted by: Adalis at Jul 22, 2006 2:55:16 PM
Mikhela- eight WHOLE tim tams? Whoa. Lucky kid.
Mmmmmm, tim tams....
And FWIW, I could never understand why it would be LESS sinful for a couple to have sex when either partner is infertile (and therefore the union can never be procreative in its either its intention or action), than it is for a normally fertile couple to have sex WITH contraception.
Along the same lines, why is it not sinful (or morally wrong) for me to have unprotected sex with my husband, when I am a recurrent aborter, and I know (now!) that without progesterone support and aspirin or enoxaparin ( and maybe even with) I would spontaneously abort every single conceptus... BUT if I wanted to have IVF and then have embryonic wastage, I AM committing a sin or moral transgression?
But I am a sinner anyway. About to commit massive sin of gluttony. Eight. Whole. Tim. Tams....
Posted by: jen at Jul 23, 2006 12:16:53 AM
As a recurrent miscarrier, I have been feeling like a murderer from over a year now. I have killed every one of my husband's babies. Since all the tests came back as nothing wrong with me - twice - and the one baby they did test came back normal, nothing wrong with it - I can only assume my body kills our babies, even WITH progesterone support...
Posted by: Catherine at Jul 23, 2006 3:29:01 PM
I thought you might be interested to see that they're busy deciding what to do with frozen embryos, the legislators having been far too terrified to decide anything. See http://www.examiner.ie/irishexaminer/pages/story.aspx-qqqg=ireland-qqqm=ireland-qqqa=ireland-qqqid=9001-qqqx=1.asp
Posted by: Anne at Jul 23, 2006 6:00:47 PM
Quick note to Catherine: first, you can't allow yourself to put a moral judgment, like "murderer," on your infertility--it isn't something you can control. Not being able to control it doesn't make it less painful, and I am well familiar with the guilt. But don't let yourself go there. You're innocent on this one.
Second, you should talk to your doctor about whether Lovenox or another heparin-type blood thinner may be worth trying. I had a number of unexplained pregnancy losses that stopped when we went on Lovenox, even though I tested negative for clotting disorders. We played an educated hunch on that, because I have another autoimmune illness for which I test negative, and there's an association of autoimmune and clotting problems. But the bottom line is that they don't know yet how to test for everything, and there is a strong association between clotting disorders and recurrent miscarriage. You may find it worth exploring. Best of luck.
Posted by: Casuarina at Jul 24, 2006 6:45:51 PM
Thanks Casuarina, I really do appreciate the advice. Despite the negative tests, I also believe that there is an auto-immune thing going on, due to my own history, and the history of my youngest who seemed allergic to the world. (I do have 3 kids from a previous marriage, so the drs say that means there's nothing wrong with me - even though it took 5 losses to get them!)
Unfortunately we have looked into Lovenox & other heparin-like drugs and it is not an option for me. I have a slow-clotting factor, and cannot even take baby aspirin, due to this. I am taking lots of fish oil and vitamin E, and though it still causes the occasional problem when they take blood (it can take me more than 15 minutes to stop bleeding), it is a safer method.
Posted by: Catherine at Jul 25, 2006 8:16:53 AM
Many women each month lose embryos they don't even know were created.
The provided link is to an article that discusses the rate of natural embryo loss being 60-80%.
Excerpt is below.
PROF. SANDEL: Thank you. I have two questions about the rate of natural embryo loss in human beings. The first is what percent of fertilized eggs fail to implant or are otherwise lost? And the second question is is it the case that all of these lost embryos contain genetic defects that would have prevented their normal development and birth?
DR. OPITZ: The answer to your first question is that it is enormous. Estimates range all the way from 60 percent to 80 percent of the very earliest stages, cleavage stages, for example, that are lost.
PROF. SANDEL: Sixty to 80 percent?
DR. OPITZ: Sixty to 80 percent. And one of the objective ways of establishing the loss at least as of the moment of implantation, well, even earlier, let's say as of five days because the blastocyst begins to make a chorionic gonadotrophin and with extremely sensitive assay methods, you can detect the presence of gonadotrophins, let me say, first around Day 7. That's the beta of human chorionic gonadotrophin. And if you follow prospectively the cycles that has been done on quite a few occasions in the Permanente study in Hawaii and so on, a group of women, of nonfertility, who want to conceive and you detect the first sign of pregnancy there of human chorionic gonadotrophin, about 60 percent of those pregnancies are lost.
It is independently corroborated by the fact that the monozygotic twin conception rate at the very beginning is much, much higher than the birth rate and then if you follow with amniocentesis, the presence of the two sacs in about 80 percent of cases,the second sac disappears, one of the sacs disappears.
CHAIRMAN KASS: The 60 percent then would be of those that have at least reached the 7 days so that you could trace the – so there might be even greater loss at the early cleavage stage, is that correct?
DR. OPITZ: That's correct. And the earlier the stage of loss, the greater the rate of aneuploidy. There exists sort of a standard, textbook formula whereby 60 percent of spontaneous abortions have a chromosome abnormality. Six percent of all stillbirths and 6/10ths percent of all live born children. Now the latter figure is probably closer to 1 percent if you include some growth variants. So that's sort of a rule of thumb.
In my own lab in Helena where I did all of the autopsies on all pregnancy losses for 18 years, the rate of chromosome abnormalities was a little bit higher.
PROF. SANDEL: So if we take the 7-day stage, it's 60 percent. The 80 percent is if you go back to the moment of fertilization. But if you take just starting at the 7 days, there's 60 percent rate of natural loss. And of those 60 percent that are lost from the 7-day stage, what percentage of those have abnormalities or defects such that they wouldn't