India is getting a egg-sperm-embryo bank!

Another great article from Times of India - Ahmedabad

Gujarat to have India's first egg-sperm-embryo bank

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/Gujarat-to-have-Indias-first-egg-sperm-embryo-bank/articleshow/12643028.cms

I'm going to be how old? GAH!

Art by Ken Keirns.
http://fab.com/inspiration/aging-gracefully-16x22

It hit me yesterday. Wasn't fair. Truly I was minding my own business having a fun shopping day in my old hangout Little 5 Points (I can not BEGIN to tell you how cool we were hanging out there back in the day) when I had the sincere misfortune of catching a quick glimpse of my own reflection.

It wasn't pretty.

Apparently the boho look I was sporting (and do on occasion since my youth), does not actually look that good when surrounded by actual, modern, young bohemians (on 4/20 no less.) 

My initial reaction was "Holy crap - somebody get that girl some botox stat!" Oh wait, I'm fairly certain that botox would fall under the "what the hell were you thinking" category. Especially if I'm trying to limit stuff like caffeine, medicine, alcohol, and oh, I don't know, toxins that may cause botulism. Damn it. Ok fine. Just DON'T MAKE ANY EXPRESSIONS AGAIN EVER. And get more than 5 hours sleep. And DO SOMETHING with your hair for God's sake. 

Then another marvelous thought occurred to me: I'm turning 40 next week. Holy Christ in a Winnebago - when the hell did that happen? Can I protest or something? Occupy 30's anyone? My 30's have been some of my best years, but now that it dawns on me, the impeding 40's seem scary. 

I don't look 40; usually I gleefully tell people my age because of the confused looks I get. I don't feel 40; well maybe I do feel a tinsy-bit 40, but I've felt that way since I was 20. I definitely don't WANT to be 40. How is it I am already referring to myself as 40??? I have an entire 5 days left!

Most importantly, 40 is the age that egg stats really start to trail off (or at least that's how it is in my mind.) I've been able to deal with my new worry over the last few months about how my eggs will be - technically had not hit the big 4-0 mark - but now what? Crap, if I had known about this whole  older eggs thing, we would have started right away. But noooooo, I wanted to enjoy the whole "romantic, we've just been married" thing. They should give PSA's on this stuff: "girls, either freeze your eggs by 35 or screw a bunch of feminist things that take longer than 30 seconds to rant about. Fo realze". Then flash this chart the remaining 25 seconds.

If we don't succeed the first time, which statistically is expected, then our chances really decrease. Essentially I will need to put myself through as many IVF cycles as possible, in as short of period as possible. The stats for a 41 year old are downright "OMFG". Don't even get me started about 42. How will we even begin to afford this? If we can't use my eggs, then things get really complicated for us.

Is turning 40 going to be my new obsession? I'm not 30 anymore, and need to take better care of myself. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I think I'm 20 still and party like a rock star, but there are improvements I can make. I've started most of them with my "let's get this egg party started!" of late; hopefully they will become easier with habit. Hope so.

40. Ugh. It's going to be a long week. I wasn't even thinking about it until I saw my stupid, tired-looking reflection. Mental note 1: get plenty of sleep. Mental note 2: slap any one that says "age is just a number" on your birthday. 

Monday's meeting - better than expected

Just getting around to updating on Monday's meeting with our [wonderful] doctor here in Atlanta. I'm feeling lazy, but I don't want to procrastinate in writing this so - presto! - I'm going to just copy what I wrote to my mom yesterday.

The doctor said she "had" to tell me that the one bad test (FSH) does statistically lower our chances, but that all the doctors still felt I was a very viable candidate when viewed with my other test scores. (Sound like I'm in school.)  Technically my FSH isn't really even THAT bad, but slightly higher than they would prefer. They wanted it under 11 and it was 12.4. At a level of 20, they advise against a woman proceeding with her own eggs. <9 is optimal. It can fluxuate from month to month (and always fluxs during your menstrual cycle), but they try to look at it from a perspective of your highest reading at the beginning of your cycle (day 2 or 3). Stress and such may be a contributing factor for your body producing higher levels (they just aren't really sure what all may be factors). 

That made me feel better because I'm guessing with their sharp increase of success rate in older women for 2010 (over previous years and higher than the national average) I was worried that they would consider me as too risky a candidate. It says a lot that they would still be confident with me as a lot plays into their SART scores. Having a higher success rate for women 38and up will certainly get them mentioned in Top 10 lists for magazines and such. So it was nice that she was still really confident regarding my chances. 

I asked her about what the nurse said regarding freezing embryos now, and she said that she didn't feel it was an immediate concern. If we found a surrogate and were able to do a cycle in a few months and THAT one wasn't successful, THEN she would advise that we consider it. She is such a nice and professional doctor; I wish all my doctors were as great as her. 

After doing some research with published papers, I noticed that my scores are a bit of an odditity. Specifically, that most women that have higher FSH scores usually have bad other scores. They even have a lot of cases where women with normal FSH scores are falsely masking a problem, but the other scores shed light on what is called "falsely suppressed FSH."  In my case (an AMH score in the normal range but an FSH that is elevated) only 5% of all cases are like that. Therefore, there is not enough research to give good statistics that the higher FSH will be a problem. Add to the fact that I had the cryoablation (also an extremely small sample size of women that go the IVF route) and I guess it is anyone's guess. I halfway wonder if the missing uterine lining has an effect on pituitary gland trying to create more FSH. I should have asked the doctor the other day, but I forgot. 

My mom cracked me up with the beginning line to her response:Well, it sounded like you were talking in a different language there, but I got the gist, that you weren't perfect, but good to go.

Moms are awesome like that. It totally made me realize how much info I have learned in such a short time. Now that I think about it, that gives me a much needed confidence boost in a time where I definitely need all the help I can get.