Would you do a FET with only fair embryos?

[Anonymous]

Long story not as long - Severe DOR, currently 39 with 2 year old DD. Took 3 fresh cycles to get DD at 36. She was a fresh transfer of two day 3 embryos, so untested. We did this because none of my embryos ever make it blast.
Here is how my last 12 months of TTC have gone since then - we’ve done two estrogen priming cycles that resulted in 10 frozen day 3 embryos. I was 37 and 38 during those freeze alls. I had full ivf coverage thru work during this time (not any more)

Nov 2014 - natural conception resulted in MC at 7 weeks
Mar 2015 - first IVF cancelled poor response
changed clinics
Oct 2015 - 11 R/9 Fert - nothing to blast, no transfer
Dec 2015 - 12 R/9 Fert - nothing to blast, no transfer
Jan 2016 - 10R / 9F - transferred two 8 celled day three embryos - DD
Apr 2017 - 4 day three embryos frozen
Oct 2017 - 6 day three embryos frozen
Jan 2018 - transferred 2 “perfect” 8 celled embryos. - BFN
Feb 2018 - trabsferred 2 “perfect” 8 cells and 1 fair 7 cell - BFN
June 2018 - natural conception resulted in MC at 6 weeks.

Now we are here. 5 day three embryos left in the freezer - all “fair to poor”. We can save up enough to pay for one FET of the embryos (we’d probably transfer two or three) but is that just stupid? If the “perfect” ones don’t take why would the others? We don’t have the option to cycle again so i’m torn and just don’t want to waste money that we could put towards something else. The last few months I have been overwhelmed with I guess “baby fever” and am sad that the road feels like it’s over.

My last numbers earlier this year at 38.5 were .2 AMH, 7 FSH estrogen 42

Do we just give up on #2?

[Anonymous]

If you thought the money might sooner rather than later be added to a fund that would cover one more fresh cycle, I'd do that for sure. If there is no way, yes, I'd give it one more go (maybe with three if you can swallow that kind of risk).

[Anonymous]

This is obviously a very personal decision. However if it was me - yes I would transfer those frozen embryos.

[Anonymous]

Are the frozen embryos PGS tested?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are the frozen embryos PGS tested?

no - you can't test day 3 embryos

[Anonymous]

The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

This is totally not true. First of all the normal genetic testing would be done — there is no correlation between visual ivf “quality” and mentally disabled children. This is complete BS.
It’s much more likely that the embryos won’t implant or result in MC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

This is not true. OMG don’t be irresponsible writing things you know nothing about on the internet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

This is totally not true. First of all the normal genetic testing would be done — there is no correlation between visual ivf “quality” and mentally disabled children. This is complete BS.
It’s much more likely that the embryos won’t implant or result in MC.

+ 1. This is completely incorrect. OP, your RE should have told you, there is no correlation between the visual appearance of embryo and its being PGS normal. Ask your clinic to confirm this for you. It's based on published studies, and it's absolutely untrue that clinics hide it.

Having said that, transferring untested is riskier than transferring PGD normals. Since you don't have blasts, you can take your chances, but it's possible that you might have a BFN, a miscarriage, or some fetal abnormalities, or a healthy baby. Then again, these are the 4 outcomes a fertile 39 year old would also be facing each cycle trying to conceive.

If it was me, I would proceed with caution, and in the event of BFP - do full prenatal screenings.

[Anonymous]

I would transfer them so you don't regret not trying. Unless you are going to regret more not having the money to spend on your daughter.

[Anonymous]

I would transfer them. And continue to try every month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

No.
There is no correlation between embryo quality and whether or not that embryo is genetically normal. Of my 7 "excellent" day 5 blasts, only 3 of them were PGS normal. Likewise, I know quite a few people with lower quality embryos that resulted in successful pregnancies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Long story not as long - Severe DOR, currently 39 with 2 year old DD. Took 3 fresh cycles to get DD at 36. She was a fresh transfer of two day 3 embryos, so untested. We did this because none of my embryos ever make it blast.
Here is how my last 12 months of TTC have gone since then - we’ve done two estrogen priming cycles that resulted in 10 frozen day 3 embryos. I was 37 and 38 during those freeze alls. I had full ivf coverage thru work during this time (not any more)

Nov 2014 - natural conception resulted in MC at 7 weeks
Mar 2015 - first IVF cancelled poor response
changed clinics
Oct 2015 - 11 R/9 Fert - nothing to blast, no transfer
Dec 2015 - 12 R/9 Fert - nothing to blast, no transfer
Jan 2016 - 10R / 9F - transferred two 8 celled day three embryos - DD
Apr 2017 - 4 day three embryos frozen
Oct 2017 - 6 day three embryos frozen
Jan 2018 - transferred 2 “perfect” 8 celled embryos. - BFN
Feb 2018 - trabsferred 2 “perfect” 8 cells and 1 fair 7 cell - BFN
June 2018 - natural conception resulted in MC at 6 weeks.

Now we are here. 5 day three embryos left in the freezer - all “fair to poor”. We can save up enough to pay for one FET of the embryos (we’d probably transfer two or three) but is that just stupid? If the “perfect” ones don’t take why would the others? We don’t have the option to cycle again so i’m torn and just don’t want to waste money that we could put towards something else. The last few months I have been overwhelmed with I guess “baby fever” and am sad that the road feels like it’s over.

My last numbers earlier this year at 38.5 were .2 AMH, 7 FSH estrogen 42

Do we just give up on #2?

We did PGS test. Our DS was THE worst embryo out of the batch. So, I am not sure that there is a strong correlation between the looks and being euploid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The trouble is that you might end up having a child with one of those fair to poor embryos. And that child might have significant mental/physical/emotional challenges. If your desire to have a child is greater than your fear of raising a severely disabled one, then go ahead. Because it's not just the idea that it won't take that you have to consider, it's the fact that perhaps the reason they are poor embryos is because they won't make very great persons. The clinic won't tell you this because obviously any baby is a good baby for them - but for you, it's potentially the next sixty years of your life caring for someone who doesn't function well.

No.
There is no correlation between embryo quality and whether or not that embryo is genetically normal. Of my 7 "excellent" day 5 blasts, only 3 of them were PGS normal. Likewise, I know quite a few people with lower quality embryos that resulted in successful pregnancies.

There is absolutely correlation between embryo grades and PGS normal embryos. Here is a nice table from Fertility and Sterility. https://www.fertstert.org/article/S0015-0282(15)01380-1/pdf

Of course, individual lower graded embryos can be PGS normal and perfect AA embryo can be abnormal. But broadly, higher graded embryos are more likely to be PGS normal.

[Anonymous]

And there is a 5% chance of destroying a normal embryo doing PGS testing