My partner and I want to have a baby together... only problem is his sperm count is pretty much zero and I've only got one ovary. hes gone through ivf before but his ex wife was found to be infertile. Any miracle stories out there? Any hope? We have talked about ivf, that's an option. He won't consider using donar sperm which I do understand. Should I give up hope and just enjoy what we have.
9 Replies
No miracle story but IVF is the only option for you. They can and will offer you icsi, it's where they put the sperm into the eggs and ferilise them that way instead of putting them all into a dish together and letting them make their own way in. They use the best sperm from what they get and even a minimal amount of sperm there's bound to be a good one. They also have the option of taking sperm directly from your husbands scrotum. The drugs they give you to boost your eggs and mature more than one at a time will still work when you have one ovary. I read about a lady on my support page who got 28 eggs from the one ovary and is now pregnant.
Just remember it only takes one! Just one good embryo to get pregnant with. It may take a few tries but it's all worth it in the end. I'm pregnant from ivf but my tubes had been tied and there was no room for a reversal.
Thank you for responding. I'll look up about icsi.
There definitely is hope. Many women with one ovary successfully fall pregnant without being aided. It may not even be that you need to go through IVF, I'd recommend going straight to a fertility specialist and looking into IUI. They wash the sperm and ensure the best one is getting through and inject it directly into your uterus. They can also manipulate your cycles to check the eggs are producing and they'll make sure they're injecting at the right time. It's a much cheaper option than starting out with IVF.
As sperm reproduces on a 72 or so day basis it's actually quite a bonus that he is the one with a low infertility rate because it is easier to manipulate his sperm. There's medication that they can try to boost the sperm count over the next lot of cycles (as opposed to women whose eggs don't reproduce, they're already developed and sitting there waiting).
With his ex, there were two massive factors against him - he had a low sperm count and she was infertile. So don't take that too seriously because from all you know now, you're perfectly healthy to conceive.
It is an emotional path to go down because there are failures and times you will feel it won't happen, but do not give up hope at all!
Good luck :)
Thank you for responding I'll look up iui. This is all new to me.
It can be quite daunting, I think the best way to approach it is to go straight to a GP for a referral to a specialist and go from there. There's so many stories on the internet that make you think negatively so don't do too much reading up :-)
I've already spoken to my doctor and she said when we want to go ahead she'll do the referral straight away so we aren't waiting until after all the tests. As we already no from previous tests that it won't happen. It's just be nice to fall pregnant naturally. We are both romantics lol all this ivf etc takes that away.
I can definitely sympathise with you that the IVF takes away some of the romance, we felt exactly the same. Sex was a total chore and we were only partaking to conceive in the end. We were just about to begin our first cycle of IVF and I somehow, miraculously, fell pregnant naturally! So it definitely can happen :)
I don't have one ovary but I don't always ovulate. My hubby was found to have low motility with his sperm. We were told IVF is was our only option (this was after are first loss). We went on to have a healthy baby naturally (actually conceived 5 times after being told we wouldn't be able to, but I lost 4 of them due to other issues). If your still young try naturally first and if no luck within the normal time frame then it might be time to look at IVF. Good luck.
Very very similar situation to mine. Husband has very limited sperm but 1 is all it takes. We had to do ICSI IVF and from the 1 round we got 3 fertilised embryos to blast. We now have a beautiful daughter and newborn son and 1 more embryo in the freezer. Go to a fertility specialist asap to see what you are working with. Do your research also, not every clinic has the same success rate. We used Monash IVF and even though they are expensive we have had massive success with them..