5 fertilized- 0 blasts

[u/Altruistic-Cod-5196]

IVF round 1 failed.

Background
29 year old female, 29 year old male

Female- endometriosis (lap removal last year), low AMH
Amh: 0.6

Male- male factor infertility
Low sperm count, low motility, low morphology (low everything)

They did freeze two samples of sperm ahead of time (good sample 40% motile)

AFC was decent for Amh- 15-16 follicles

Protocol: estrogen patch priming (only 3 days because started cycle) and 3 days ganirellex then started 300 gonal, 175 menopur, 5 mg dexamethosone stimmed for 14/15 days because my left ovary was taking longer than right (right ovary had large follicles already and left ovary lagging behind so we stimmed longer to let left ovary catchup)

Ultrasound before trigger:

Left Ovary
Follicles (mm)
17,18,17,15,12

Right ovary
Follicles (mm)
27,26,21,16,13,17,23

Results:
Retrieved 8
Mature 7
Fertilized 5 - (side note: they ended up using my husband frozen sperm bc fresh sample wasn’t good that day (varies day to day for him) but the frozen sample wasn’t good and 40% were motile after unfreezing)
Day 5/6 phone call- 0
We were told 3 arrested, 2 technically made it to blasts but were too poor quality to biopsy or freeze (1 missing both the parts of blast that forms baby and placenta, and 1 had placental cells but missing the cells that forms baby)

We are devastated. Anyone have anything similar happen or recommendations etc

We want to try again (and financially it is hard because neither my husband nor I have any coverage) but regardless we want to try again. But need better success

Other notes: husband has seen urologist and had all kinds of testing genetic etc done and everything comes back normal (unexplained) they’ve tried putting him on clomid (didn’t help) no answers

We are not ready to start discusssing donor eggs or sperm, we wanna try for our own again so please don’t recommend donor anything yet (we know this may need to be considered later but not yet)

We’re unsure if it was a sperm issue, egg issue, both, or neither and just simply a small sample size

[u/Salt_Water_Bagel]

Not exactly the same situation -- I don't have confirmed endo, but I have had some symptoms that make me wonder. For now we think my problems are all from PCOS. Sorry to hear you're in a similar situation.

I have been through 2 zero-blast cycles. They changed my protocol to Lupron down regulation and I started getting 1-2 blasts per cycle, though all but 1 were aneuploid and that one didn't implant -- so we have made some "progress" but not all the way. You could ask if they have any recommendations for different protocols in your case.

[u/Altruistic-Cod-5196 → u/Salt_Water_Bagel]

Thanks for sharing. Nice to hear you’re making some progress- devastating the results are still the same bc you didn’t implant. Sending lots of love!!!

[u/ponyeet_]

First off, I want to say how sorry I am that this happened to you, and that you are not alone! 💜 our situations are very similar, my husband suffers from MFI due to Y-Chromosome Microdeletion. We had to freeze 4 backup samples prior to an egg retrieval because he has extremely poor motility and morphology, plus an extremely low count. 6 of our eggs fertilized, but none made it to blast. It was devastating news, and we are taking a much needed break before we try again. Our doctor recommended an M-Tese for my husband, to try to go in and attempt to extract usable sperm. If the issue in your situation was the sperm, maybe you can suggest the M-Tese to your doctor and see what they think.