Want to freeze some embryos
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Anonymous
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I know this has probably been answered a million times but I am trying to piece this together for my situation.
I’m 36...I should have done this 10 years ago but I didn’t. I think I may want to have a bio kid in next 3 years but I am not ready right now. My friends are saying to freeze some embryos like ASAP to give me that option in like a year or two when I am more likely to be ready. This is all being delayed bc of career. Where should I go in DC for this? How do I decide? I assume this is all out of pocket (bc I am doing it voluntarily) so I guess I am not totally cost insensitive. Would be ideal to keep this under $10k. |
Anonymous
| I think just the stims abs egg retrieval will be at least 10k. You could just freeze eggs, if you had to. |
Anonymous
| Do you have a partner? You need sperm for an embryo. |
Anonymous
OP here. Yes, have a partner (male). Been married for 8 years. We screwed up in waiting this long but that’s life. |
Anonymous
Great. Much easier then. Sure, go and do ivf, but don’t do the transfer. |
Anonymous
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It sounds like a smart move for you -- egg quality at 36 can be much better than egg quality at 39 or 40. The thing is it's expensive.
At the local clinics, you're likely looking at $20,000 or more for one egg retrieval. You can save some money by ordering the meds from abroad. It's also up to you whether to take on the added expense of genetic testing on the embryos, though I always recommend it so you really know what you're working with. There's also no guarantee that you will get viable embryos from one egg retrieval, so there's something to be said for going with a clinic that offers a package for multiple retrievals (I know Shady Grove and GW do). I know a lot of people who have gone with CNY in New York because it's much, much cheaper. You can do your monitoring appointments with one of the DC clinics and then just go to NY for a couple days right around your retrieval. Start out with getting your AMH and AFC checked -- those will tell you about how many eggs you have to work with, though not necessarily their quality. I would take a look at your insurance just in case you're really lucky and it does offer coverage, but I agree it's not likely. Finally, depending how important the biological connection is to you, you might consider skipping egg retrieval and planning to use donor embryos when/if you're ready to get pregnant. You can match privately with a donor and it's much, much cheaper than a full IVF cycle or traditional adoption (more in the $5000 range, between the embryo transfer and legal fees). |
Anonymous
| Hopefully, you and your partner are fertile and can do this easily, but a word of caution; I underwent ivf at 32 and 33 due to my husband’s low sperm count, and in 3 ivf cycles, we failed to produce a single embryo that made it to the stage where they freeze embryos. However, we ended up with fraternal twins from a fresh transfer. Had we frozen them, we might not have ended up with any children. Give some thought in advance to what you want to do if you end up with very few or mediocre quality embryos. |
Anonymous
I agree with this word of caution. If you peruse this board you will quickly learn that nothing is “expected” in IVF! I was 35 when I started with testing and 36 by the time my eggs were retrieved. I had excellent numbers (AMH, follicle count, etc)- the three doctors and one nurse I consulted with said they expected lots of eggs from me. For whatever reason, my response to stims was not as anticipated and I ended up having to do two cycles in order to have enough eggs to feel like I had a reasonable chance at two children down the line. Regarding insurance, keep in mind that yours may pay for some things. Mine for example, paid for stim medicine (can you believe it?) because it was categorized as a pharmacy benefit. My check-ups and testing were all considered medical and not infertility, so that worked out in my favor too. Shady Grove has a good checklist of questions to ask your insurance provider to determine coverage FYI. I think WinFertility has one too somewhere online. |
Anonymous
Why aren’t you ready to try now? |
Anonymous
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Not to be the cynical a-hole, but what happens to your embryos if you break up with your partner?
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Anonymous
| Just... have a kid. You're never ready but you get less ready for the realities of having a newborn with time. Rip off the band aid. |
Anonymous
At 36, $10k is a non-starter unless you go abroad. Your meds alone would cost you $3k (at least) and you will want to have your embryos tested for chromosomal abnormalities before saving them long term. You may also need more than 1 cycle of IVF. I would budget for at least $25k or look into freezing eggs, which will be cheaper but much less likely to result in a live birth than PGT-A tested embryos. |
Anonymous
Agree. If you’ve been married for 8 years, what’s the hold up? |
Anonymous
Right, if money is the cause for delay, a realistic budgeting of possibly 2 cycles will make trying to make baby now at home look affordable. realistic 12k - cycle 5k - meds 1k - random fees, testing FETs - 2k each meds for FET - $1500 annual frozen embryo storage - $500 multiply everything by 2 |
Anonymous
| For $10K, and assuming you have a good ovarian reserve, you should definitely check out CNY fertility as a PP mentioned. You can get your embryos tested for around that total price. If you’re willing to spend a bit more, you could probably bundle two cycles for under 20k. There are some great CNY groups on FB that are super useful about logistics, accommodations, etc for tracking patients. |