Hello,,,. I really don't know if I am asking a question, or just wanting to share my feeling here,,, but I thought people here would understand my dilemma.

We now have 5 children, 10 years old son, almost 7 years old son, and our triplets, who are 27 months old. I am 44 and my husband is 45. We did three ICSI, and my triplets were born from our third ICSI attempt.

Well,,, just like everyone else who did IVF, we have three frozen embryos.

WE just received a letter from the clinic asking us to see if we would like to keep them for another year (for $600/year, next year, it will be $700, and every year they raise $100 from the previous year.)

Many people, who knows me without much of our family back ground, may say that you must be done, no more children, and practically and realistically speaking, that may be true. I am already 44, and I can barely keep up with my triplets. We live in small three bedroom house, and live on my husband's one income.

So,,, when I think of having another one,,, or ones (plural), I know it will be hard with my life if we have more,,,.

But,,, I also wonder,,, is it true??? Will it be so hard, or harder than now??? Hey, we survived our oldest son's cancer diagnosis and four years of chemotherapy, plus my infertility treatment, shooting follicle stimulation shots on the bed side of my son getting orangish colored yucky chemo at the children's hospital,,,. We did manage so much in the past. Why not again??

We are not rich, but we are not poor either. As Japanese, we grew up in a tiny house, so even though our current house is tiny too for 7 of us, it is big compared to our parents' houses in Japan.

But then,,,, back to reality,,,.

I know it will be hard. I know I will not be able to get my career back, whatever it is. I know,,, it will be stressful to everyone too (though I know there will also be lots of joys as well.)

If I can, I wish I could stop my biological clock, keep paying annual fee for the frozen embryos,,,, and someday,,, maybe 10 years later, I can have more again,,, but it is not going happen,,,.

I don't know what I am trying to say,,, but I just wanted to share my dilemma.

Mika

mom to Kai, 10, Tomo, 7
Aya, Koto, Naoto, 27 months, becoming more like human instead of climbing monkeys!

I am not sure if you want a response or not.

When we had the trio we were 35 (me) and my husband was (38) and we KNEW that 3 was enough for us. We had 4 frozen embryos left. They were in storage for 2 years but we knew we were going to donate them as soon as the trio was born. We were lazy is figuring out how to donate them. Luckily for us, the right family came along at the right time and from those 4 embryos they now have a handsome and healthy 1 year old boy. They did start out with triplets but a series of unfortunate events brought that number down.

I realize you are not asking what to do with your embryos but there a many families out there waiting for a chance at having a family and millions of frozen embryos with families who don't know what to do with theirs. Just a thought. Another option would be to do an unmedicated cycle and let nature decide what happens to them in your body.

Have confidence in whatever you decide to do.

Suzan

g/g/b August 21, 2005
my miracle 24 weekers!!!!

Hi Suzan,

Thank you for your reply. When I was writing late last night, I was not also sure whether I was asking for an advice, or if I just wanted to share my dilemma.

I guess,,,, what I wanted to do here is to share my dilemma, but also to hear each family's personal experience too. So,,, your response was wonderful, as it gives me some insight, and also have some ideas that I may not have had in my mind first.

I never thought of doing an unmedicated cycle, and let the nature decide the course. That is also an excellent approach to face with my dilemma. If the nature plays in this process, I feel I can take whatever the result I may have.

Thank you very much!

Mika

Hi Mika,

I am in the same situation as you. I think about it EVERY day. The storage time is running out of time. I am 43 and 4 children ages 3, and trio 20 mths. I really want another. However, I don't think my DH can handle any more children. I would consider donating to another family. I just keep thinking of how that child would feel growing up not knowing why they were given up. I would always think of that child...wondering if they are well cared for...what they look like, etc. I know it's weird to think of all that and possibly selfish on my part too. This decision is eating at me. I'm sure we are not alone here. Good luck with your decision!

Jane

If you are not 100% sure you are done, I would keep paying the fee.

BGG born 4/25/05 at 31w1d




New baby girl born 9/19/06

Like you, we are in the same situation except we only have the triplets. Our house is a small 3 bedroom and we live on just DH's income. We manage, we shop at the dollar store and big lots and still we get by but as long as we can stay happy and healthy, who cares.

We have 10 frozen embryos and we do want one more child. If we have any remaining embryos after we try for #4 we will be putting them up for adoption. The cool thing about this is that just like in adoption we get to pick the parents and we can even choose to have an open adoption which gives us the right to know the child's well being.

I think it would be easier for me to know if my children had siblings especially if we choose a family that is local. That is a whole other issue about what if they go to they same schools and fell in love and got married.

I know that God will guide me and DH in every descision we make regarding this delima.

I believe in living my life with no regrets. I also believe in not making descisions until I know I will be 100% confident that I will be able to live out the rest of my life without second guessing myself.

Tabitha - Parrish - Chloe
01/01/2007

Hi Mika,
I glad to see that there is another older mom out there with triplets. Or should I say not older but seasoned, not in their 20 or 30's. I must admit that we knew we were not going to have any more kids but at the same time I had to deal with those feelings of not being to have another child. Seems silly I know because we are so blessed. I really feel like God gave me what He wanted me to have.

We were in the same dilemma about 2 years ago. We found a wonderful couple to donate our 5 embryos to. It's been one of the best most fulfilling things we have done. Help someone else with major infertility issues. They now have a baby girl named Victoria and she's beautiful. We keep in touch through emails and pictures. Hopefully we will meet up some day.
We meet this couple through a website called Miracles Awaiting.

Good luck! Try not to stress. Things do work out for the best.

Debbie
33wks
GBG 1/25/08

We had 2 remaining embryos and it was the hardest decision we had to make on what to do with them. Ultimately we decided to donate them to another couple directly...long story but a friend of a friend that lives all the way across the country and that shared our values was looking to adopt embryos. They flew out here, we met them, drew up legal papers, and donated the embryos. We had plans for continuing contact and sharing pictures and the option for any child/children to meet us if they wanted to. Unfortunatley the transfer was not successful. I don't know how I would truly feel if I had a child living with another family, but for us that was the decision we made. I like the recommendation someone else gave about doing an open adoption so you can pick the parents and have a plan for contact in the future if you want it. Good luck in whatever you decide.

Brenda
mom to GGGs born 6/29/09 at 32w4d

I can totally relate. Our situation is a little different, we did IVF and only had three embryos total. We put all three back (I was 40 at the time and we had tried IVF/IUI for years w/no results so they went very agressive). Two took, one split. Our trio is 3-1/2 and I will be 45 in December. I know I am way too old for another. I am exhausted by the end of the day. But secretly I have hoped for another. Well now, my dr thinks I may need uterus ablation, and it's like I have to finally say "no more, I'm done". It is killing me though I totally know in my head it's the right thing. My heart says another. I think for me it took so long to get pregnant and I only got to do it once and I loved being pregnant, felt like my body was finally able to do it's job and it's just sad. But I look at my three precious kid and am so thankful I was even able to have them "later in life". Best of luck to you, prayers, lots of talks with your husband....you will know what's right.

We are/were in a similar situation. We have a 6 y.o. and 1 y.o. "triplets" - one is 4 months older than the other two, as a result of 2 simultaneous surrogate pregnancies. I just turned 41 and dh will turn 41 in the fall. We had 9 frozen embryos and did a lot of soul searching. Honestly, had we not had the frozen embryos we would have been done at 4 kids, dh especially. But they existed so what were we to do? Letting them thaw was just not an option - after the hell I went thru to create them (10 IVF cycles, 2 of them with gestational carriers)and because... in my head... they are my *potential* children. The thought of donating them to another family made me feel physically ill - we wanted children for so long and I had so many miscarriages that it just felt wrong for us. (Don't get me wrong, I am pro-embryo-adoption for families who just can't manage another child in the family, for whatever reason - everyone knows what they can handle, emotionally, physically, financially) For us though, neither of us could stomach it, it just didn't feel right. What it finally came down to was that even though dh never saw himself with 4 kids previously, he now wouldn't change a thing and can't imagine his life without any of them. (I always wanted 5 so 4 always fit me just fine, lol). And he has no regrets about any of them. And we both knew that that same feeling would eb exactly the same for any additional children. And that neither of us would ever have any regrets about having any additional children either, but that we probably would have regrets about any of the other alternatives (thawing, donating etc.)

So there was just one alternative left: find another gestational carrier and transfer. Which is what we did. We transferred the best 2 (still have 7 frozen - in hindsight I would have transferred worst quality first not best in order to go thru more of them that maybe had no genetic potential & maybe have more closure) and we are now very happily expecting (Dec 1). (We were both kind of shocked at how instantly thrilled we both were actually, lol) And it's twins, both stuck. And we couldn't be more thrilled. Happily terrified really, lol. (The thought of 5 in diapers at once does bring my mind to a panicked grinding halt - but I also know we'll deal, we'll figure it out, it's our family, it's who we were meant to have in our family and we'll happily accept whoever we are lucky enough to have.) I also think this perspective is no doubt influenced from my personal history of years of infertility and 18 miscarriages - I can't help but see every child as an unimaginable gift/miracle (that I was denied so many times before).

Not sure if that helps or not - point is that it's a really tough decision and there is no one right answer that fits every single family, you just have to soul search and try out every alternative mentally to see which one is most comfortable for you. And you should only listen to your own heart (and your partners) on this - not the family members and/or strangers who have arbitrarily decided that you have enough kids now. You will know when you're done, it's no one's decision but yours (and partners). You may find (as we did) that some alternatives just make you writhe mentally and some are more neutral feeling at first, if not wildly attractive (assuming none just reach out and grab you, yelling "that's it! that's what we need to do!!"). What helped us was thinking of which alternatives we could see ourselves as having the most regrets about and the answer came pretty easily after that...

Best of luck to you, with whatever you decide,
Susanna