How We Did It: Our Pregnancy Success Story

Note: We went through seven IVF cycles, with one miscarriage, until we were able to get to this point. We just had our (healthy) baby. This story is about what we did to succeed in this endeavor. I waited to post this story until our baby was born.

We had our first child when I was in my twenties and both of our biological functions were ideal with little-to-no problems. We assumed, naively, that we were more than capable of having a child whenever we wanted. We were wrong. The immortality of our youth vanished. My reproductive functions got a lot worse, and my wife's got a little worse. A quick note: My life is an open book. I'm not embarrassed at all about others knowing my problems. I probably inherited this trait from my mother.

Financially, I was really fortunate, in that our insurance covered fertility treatments. They changed that policy, recently, to only cover two treatments. Most insurance companies don't cover fertility at all. This may enrage others as I know the cost of each IVF cycle averages $10,000 USD (without complications). While I still spent thousands of dollars, I only spent a fraction of what I would have spent had my insurance company not covered the treatments.

Out of our six "failed" IVF cycles, we had one miscarriage. It was early enough in the pregnancy that we didn't have to wait long, but it still took an emotional toll. My wife was in her mid thirties at the time, so the amount of eggs we were expecting would be around twelve. Had she been ten years younger, that number would have doubled. Our first cycle was our best with regard to quality eggs after insemination. Three quality eggs is about what to expect by day 3. What do I mean by quality? I define quality as anywhere from "fair" and above. Women have been pregnant with "poor" quality eggs. Our quality would decline with every cycle until we figured something out.

Fertility clinics assume that the problem with the couple is the female. This is a bias that is mostly true, but in our case it wasn't discovered that I was the bigger problem until cycle four. On cycle three (our miscarriage), I could not produce. I was panicking, and I knew what the consequence would be. If the man cannot produce a sample during transfer day, they do a procedure called TESA which involved a needle and you can probably imagine where they stick it. After hours and hours of not being able to produce a sample, which I attributed to stress at the time, I pretty much welcomed the needle. They put me under and performed TESA on me to get a sample. I was in pain for several days.

I actually consider the miscarriage cycle as a successful cycle, because we got pregnant. The only difference in that cycle was TESA.  On cycle four, the doctor theorized (probably correctly) that there was some DNA fragmentation involved which is why TESA worked and why previous attempts did not work. I was also told that virtually all of my numbers were poor with the exception of count. Motility, volume, and morphology were all poor.

We changed various aspects of our lifestyle, but the biggest change came with our last cycle.

My epiphany:
Although I had been tested for a condition called "retrograde," where the male is not able to produce a sample or not much of a sample, I feel as though the clinic botched the test. I was able to self-diagnose which is when I stumbled upon sudafed as a treatment. Yes, regular sudafed. It worked! I started to take a 24 hour sudafed about 3 hours before my sample, and it works like a miracle. Every story you hear about getting pregnant the sudafed-way is totally true.

For motility, I simply took a 5-hour energy 30 minutes before my sample. I had heard this little gem from my wife's inner circle of gossiping housewives. Half of my research came from third-hand accounts such as this, but it worked. After many failed cycles, you kind of want to throw the kitchen sink at the problem and you'll listen to and adopt any advice.

Morphology is a bit controversial to this day as fertility doctors don't actually have a lot of research in this field, and the only two things I could find to help with this matter were pycnogenol and alpha lipoic acid. This combo seems to have done the trick.

After course correcting, diet change, and supplement change (listed above and below), I had a sample tested at the lab and my numbers shot up 40%. I went from little-to-no chance of getting my wife pregnant to being in the normal range.

Conclusion
What we both did:
We researched everything we were eating or supplementing.
We stopped using most types of sunscreen.
We went with natural deodorant, toothpastes, shampoos, soap, etc.
We stopped eating red meat.
The only meat we ate was turkey and chicken.
We consumed more veggies, although my wife consumed more than I did.
We cut out most types of cheese.
We reduced our milk intake.
We went with a Day 3 Transfer instead of a Day 5. My sister, who got pregnant with IVF, encouraged this.
We both walked for a minimum of 30 minutes a day.
We both drank a ton of water (daily).
We both took Ubiquinol as someone explained that CoQ10 doesn't absorb well if you're older. My wife took it for egg quality and I took it for motility.
We stopped drinking soda, even diet soda.
We listened to every success story, even the quacks. Some of these stories made us angry, including the one that told me to be a vegan or we'd never get pregnant, but we listened.
We held our tongues when everyone around us was getting pregnant with ease.

What she did:
Acupuncture. While this may be hocus pocus, I encouraged it for mental reasons. It might only be a placebo, but at the seventh cycle I would have done anything to make this work. It made my wife feel a lot better.
She took DHEA (it caused her to break out), but only for the 3-4 months. After her positive pregnancy test she immediately stopped taking it.
Raw all-natural prenatal.
Vitamin D (she still takes it)
Vitamin E
Folate (not folic acid) (I think she still takes it)
DHA (Fish oil) (she still takes it)


What I did:
I drank more pineapple juice.
I stopped consuming aspartame.
I stopped taking my blood sugar medication, I found I didn't need it because I was eating better and walking more. Research told me that the medication (metformin) was wreaking havoc on my reproductive health.
I took sudafed 3 hours before my sample for volume.
I took caffeine 30 minutes before my sample for motility. (5-hour energy)
I stopped taking whey protein.
I stopped taking creatine (which sucked because I was building a lot of muscle).
I stopped taking green tea.
I stopped taking gingko biloba.
I started taking pycnogenol for morphology.
I started taking a little garlic.
I took a little alpha lipoic acid, I assume for morphology.
I took FertilAid everyday for three months, although I even did this with the failed cycles. I did not take the Motility Boost for the successful cycle, but I had done that previously. The Motility Boost did not affect my counts at all.
I lost 15 pounds.