This meeting ended like my consults with doctors usually do-- with them telling me that I've already thought of every possibility and managed to test it all by myself. He looked at my 'normal' karyotype and said we could rerun it if I wanted (because one X chromosome looked a little shorter than the other) but most likely its nothing and such findings are common because of the way they do the tests.
But the one staggering thing to come out the meeting-- he told me that the fault was more likely to be the donors. My baby had Turners syndrome, one sex chromosome was missing. I had assumed that it was most likely that it had been the egg that came missing a chromosome. He informed me that in cases of Turner's syndrome, its more likely that it was the the sperm lacking the chromosome.
They assume this because a sperm lacking a chromosome is lighter, so it can swim faster than anybody else there and get to the egg first . So by this theory, monosomy is more likely to be a sperm error, while trisomy is more likely to be an egg error. If it really was a crappy sperm that jumped my egg, then its just sheer, horrible, bloody bad luck.
People have often asked me whether my losses are happening because I'm doing IUI with frozen donor sperm and my answer has always been a very indignant negative. But now I have to wonder.
What is the advantage with natural conceptions? In a way, it is that the timing is often off. Intercourse may occur well before ovulation, and only the fittest sperm are still left swimming by the time the egg makes its appearance. In a perfectly timed IUI (where you just inject the sperm into the uterus instead of making them swim their way through a hostile vagina and through the cervix and then make them hang around waiting for the egg) you are removing a lot of the negative selection process that allows only the fittest to survive, and just sometimes, you might end up paying for it
Still, this stuff is completely inconclusive. It very well might have been the egg (I was informed that with an X monosomy, 70% of the time its the sperm, 30% of the time its the egg). It could still be PCOS messing up my eggs (likely explanation for both losses), it could have been thyroid issues responsible for my first loss and sheer bad luck the second time. OR--- it could be that both the thyroid and the turners are red herrings, that I have more than one big problem and there is another stealthy culprit we have no idea about just yet.
I wonder if I really have PCOS and should be on metformin. I wonder if it would be a good idea to actually mess up the timing of the IUI a bit, that is, inseminate the day I see surge and not 24 hours later, when ovulation is likely to occur?Or should I do an ICI? Worth the risk of a BFN? I wonder if I should be changing donors, though at this point there is no logical indication for that.
I have no idea what is the best route to take. Despite the science and all the information I have (far, far more than the average person would in this position), the path forward is still unclear. I'm horribly aware that I'll have to take another leap of faith, knowing that another crash landing is highly possible.
ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But the one staggering thing to come out the meeting-- he told me that the fault was more likely to be the donors. My baby had Turners syndrome, one sex chromosome was missing. I had assumed that it was most likely that it had been the egg that came missing a chromosome. He informed me that in cases of Turner's syndrome, its more likely that it was the the sperm lacking the chromosome.
They assume this because a sperm lacking a chromosome is lighter, so it can swim faster than anybody else there and get to the egg first . So by this theory, monosomy is more likely to be a sperm error, while trisomy is more likely to be an egg error. If it really was a crappy sperm that jumped my egg, then its just sheer, horrible, bloody bad luck.
People have often asked me whether my losses are happening because I'm doing IUI with frozen donor sperm and my answer has always been a very indignant negative. But now I have to wonder.
What is the advantage with natural conceptions? In a way, it is that the timing is often off. Intercourse may occur well before ovulation, and only the fittest sperm are still left swimming by the time the egg makes its appearance. In a perfectly timed IUI (where you just inject the sperm into the uterus instead of making them swim their way through a hostile vagina and through the cervix and then make them hang around waiting for the egg) you are removing a lot of the negative selection process that allows only the fittest to survive, and just sometimes, you might end up paying for it
I wonder if I really have PCOS and should be on metformin. I wonder if it would be a good idea to actually mess up the timing of the IUI a bit, that is, inseminate the day I see surge and not 24 hours later, when ovulation is likely to occur?Or should I do an ICI? Worth the risk of a BFN? I wonder if I should be changing donors, though at this point there is no logical indication for that.
I have no idea what is the best route to take. Despite the science and all the information I have (far, far more than the average person would in this position), the path forward is still unclear. I'm horribly aware that I'll have to take another leap of faith, knowing that another crash landing is highly possible.
ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
0 comments:
Post a Comment