3 ivf cycles failed, what's next?

I am 45 and just finished third IVF cycle. Been trying to conceive for 2 years. Had ectopic pregnancy (28 yrs ago) which resulted in loss of right tube and 1 miscarriage (15 yrs ago). Married now for 3 yr. Our Dr. felt our best chance for a baby was IVF. All bloodwork even AMH came back GREAT! Because of that he said he had no problem trying with my own eggs. Been taking all meds possible. Also been having acupuncture. Dr. told my eggs are great and gave high chances too gp. Everyone was very pleased. Pregnancy test 3 days ago. Unfortunately negative again. No spotting or anything. Everything was great. I thought finally there is hope and I’ll be a mom. I thought that was a good sign and we may have success, but… Now thinking about donor eggs. My Dr. was telling from the very beginning that my chances with de are much higher. Now I’m kinda sad bc we spent so much money and nerves on IVFs. I could be pregnant already… Well there’s no point to have regrets now. You never know until you try. Don’t want to waste time bc of my age. Feeling lost as have no idea where to find money for using de. What are costs? Pls share your thoughts. Thanks.

According to some websites the chances of a livebirth for a 45 year-old doing IVF with her own eggs is 1.2%. At the same time the live birth rate of a 45 year-old doing IVF with a donor's eggs is 48%. The success rate is so much higher because the likelihood of pregnancy depends on the age of the eggs. Women start releasing an egg every month as teenagers. At that time, every woman has 300,000-400,000 eggs in her ovaries. By menopause, the number of eggs is 0. Of all the eggs available when young girls start to ovulate, most die off. The healthiest eggs get released first. This is why younger women are so much more fertile than older women - the eggs they release are high quality. By the time someone is 45, unfortunately, most of the eggs have died off. The best ones have already been released. The eggs that are left are of exceedingly poor quality. So pregnancies are rare. Fortunately, the uterus seems to stay young for a much longer period of time, so that a 45 year old uterus does almost as good a job of carrying a pregnancy as a 20 year old uterus. By far your best chance is with a donor.

Hello Carl,
At 45, it is certain that the clock is against you so anything you do at this point may just waste your time. According to studies, once you hit 45 years, the eggs degenerate and their quality goes down. It means that whatever you do, you may not achieve your goal. I wish your doctor had advised IVF on donated egg. It could guarantee you a child. I was doing some research on the same and I am happy to share some of my findings. That a woman’s womb does not get old a despite the advanced age. The womb will still support pregnancy even up to the age of 55. So what this means is that IVF on a donate eggs will still work even in the old age. Alternatively I would recommend that you try surrogacy on a donor egg. All that you need to do is to find a clinic that offers the service. They will find a surrogate mother and use one of the eggs in the bank. Your DH may be required to donate the sperm to be used in the fertilization process. This way, it guarantees that the child that will be born will be biologically related to your husband. The good thing with this process is that you will be free to pursue other activities including looking for money. The surrogate mother will carry the child for you. Upon delivery, the clinic will facilitate the transfer of the baby to you.

Hello dear! You will probably remember me from our conversation in your other thread. I'm also 45. I just had a miscarriage at 9 and 1/2 weeks after getting pregnant without fertility treatments. I'm now back from a great vacation with my husband. It really helped lift my spirits. So what did the RE say about your failed IVF cycle? Is he now encouraging you to use donor eggs?

Glad to hear you had a great vacation. Again, I'm sorry about your miscarriage. Having had one myself, I know what you've been going through. Well we saw our RE. He said that my cycle was text book. Again he said he was surprised how well I response to the meds. He said could we do it again? Yes, we could. Should we do it again with my eggs? He thinks we better not. Says it all goes back to the age thing. He also talked a lot about miscarriage rates and abnormality associated with pregnancy and older women. He advised us that our best chance to achieve a healthy pregnancy is to use donor eggs. I expected such advice. He also explained that with a donor you almost always have several chances to try. So we discussed it later and decided we had better make the best choice this time because we can only afford this one more time. “Afford” is not the right word here as we don’t have money now to pay for de ivf. But we will definitely try to find needed sum. But if we chose to do ivf with my own eggs now and it’ll fail again, I’m sure we then can forget about de ivf. So we kinda have no choice now. So we decided to go with de ivf.
We want to be able to pick a donor who will be very similar to myself in appearance. It would be nice to see a baby picture of her. I know some clinics give such opportunity. My husband seems to have really accepted this is our best option. We are planning to have ivf in August. So we have 2 months to find a clinic. I want to start the process asap. I’m really tired of waiting. Don’t want to waste time anymore. Though this is hard to be positive after so many failures, but I try to believe that this option will make us parents.
How's things going with your TTC? What are you going to do next? I know things will work out for you guys as it will for us. Prayers and positive thinking. Nice to hear from you. Stay in touch. P.S. Glad you responded to my thread. Can't wait to hear from you. Still so many unanswered questions.

You have really moved forward in the past week! I think using donor eggs sounds like a good decision. As I said before, I would use donor eggs right now if we had the money. We were told we have another 5 years to decide about donor eggs. So we can still do that later. We’ll have a meeting with our RE next week. We want to discuss options. At the time of the missed miscarriage, he said he would be willing to try fertility treatments once I had had 2 normal cycles. The RE said he would NOT do IVF on a woman my age using my own eggs. So I guess we are talking about drugs/IUI. It seems to me it’s too early to talk about donor eggs… But who knows. Now I'm reading forums and try to guess which options our RE will propose. Well we’ll see next week. I see you’re very into de option now. I’m happy to know you’re moving forward! It’s great you can choose a donor who’d look like you. I would really, really prefer to pick our own donor. Maybe I just like to be in control. And there seems to be very little one can control in this whole fertility process! Again, congratulations on the quick progress you've made!

Yes we have made great progress. Really feel this is our best chance. Probably should have used donor first time around. But I think most people would have at least tried once with their own. About the donor. You know, we’ve told our family and a few close friends about our decision. We like having the support and prayers from those we love. I hope everything turns out well for you. Let me know what kind of fertility treatment your RE has in mind. August can't come soon enough! I seem to be on this forum most of the time. Success stories are so inspiring! The only thing which bothers me is financial issue. I’m so scared we won’t be able to find money… But I try to believe everything will be great. Really enjoy talking with you. Hope to hear from you soon.

Yes, I think you're right that most people would have tried with their own eggs at least once, especially if they had a strong desire for a biological child. It's probably a good thing that our RE (plus the other REs in our area) will not do the IVF process on women who are 45. So I don't even have the option. I really like that you were able to make the final decision on the donor yourselves. If we do use donor eggs, I think we'll go abroad. I’d advise you to google fertility clinics in Europe and their prices. I’m sure you’ll be pleasantly shocked by how prices here and there differ. Not sure if I mentioned this, but I have a friend who started the donor process last week. (She uses clinic in Eastern Europe. She says they’ll be able to save some money in spite of going abroad.) She had several failed IVF cycles and miscarriages. She's also in her mid-40s. They are not even telling their families they are using a donor. Not sure I could do that! Anyway, it sounds like you and I are both waiting for August, which is when my husband and I see the RE again to start the fertility treatments, though as I said, I'm not sure what exactly those are! Do you think you'll keep reading this forum in the coming weeks? I would really like to hear how your donor egg process goes! I'm hoping for the best for you!

Carli, are you sure you don't want to try again with your eggs if they're that good? Women over 40 have low chances but you might be an exception. Don't you want to get a second opinion? Maybe another doctor can tell your chances are higher?

If I had a chance to have a baby of my own, I wouldn't switch to another options until I'm sure there is no way to get positive. It's up to you to decide though. Just wanted you to know it might be early to give up.