Wow again this morning! 14 of the 17 fertilized over night! That’s crazy and way more then expected!
Now we wait until tomorrow morning to hear how they’re dividing, if we need to do assisted hatching (they pierce the zone to allow the embryo to grow properly) and if we’re doing a three day or five day transfer.
Fingers crossed they divide properly!
Wow, those are impressive numbers! Keep us updated on the numbers. With any luck, you’ll have a few good blasts to choose from, and some to freeze.
Have you decided if you want to transfer more than one, since studies have shown transferring more doesn’t increase conception rates, only the rates of twins or HOM?
Are they going to freeze the remaining embies? If so, how many embies does this clinic freeze per vial?
Yay for 14 embies! That’s neat that you were awake for it. When I did IVF they knocked everyone out. Hopefully they will divide quickly but my first kid started out as a day 3 4-cell embryo, so sometimes those slow-dividing ones can go the distance!
Yay! This is awesome, amazing news, EmAnJ! Cool to think that one of these little specks of embryos is your future baby, in teeny-tiny format!
All the cute little baby toes and fingers, his or her future personality, the whole nine yards, all rolled up into one little microscopic dot.
Thanks everyone! I called my husband to let him know he was a father to 14, and he got a bit quiet, haha! 
If we do a three day transfer, we will transfer two embryos. If we do a five day, we’ll transfer one blast. We wanted to do two blasts on day five, if possible, but the clinic won’t allow. They try to avoid multiples, even if we’re ok with it.
We will freeze the rest. I am not sure how many embies they freeze per vial, I actually don’t know much about the freezing process. Do you have any insight?
It all depends on the clinic; refrozen embies don’t fare as well, as you might imagine. They’re less likely to survive a second thaw. So most clinics want to make full use of thawed embies; well, if you have 3-4 embies per vial and **all **of them survive the thaw the question becomes a ticklish one. Transfer all? Or refreeze for another cycle and almost certainly waste them?
But if you wind up w/ more frozen embryos than you know you’ll ever use, what do you do w/ those, donate to another couple or to science? Or, as some women have done, go through a cycle w/ no intervention aside from transfer and let nature decide?
For those playing along at home thinking these are only ethical and medical questions, keep in mind every step can be an costly one; maybe not so pricy in Canada but here in the States this is a very expensive process.
Thanks, good points. I’ll talk to the embryologist about how they freeze tomorrow.
Should we have left over embryos when we’re done, we have already decided to anonymously donate them to another infertile couple. This had to be decided before we started this all, and we both had to sign the consent.
Wow, this is all super exciting! You know I’m rooting for you, EmAnJ!
Oh my, it seems premature to ask people who don’t already have their family to make a decision one way or the other about leftover embies. There’s so much flux and things can change in a day!
When you say, ‘when we’re done’, what does that mean specifically? After this cycle or after all desired cycles?
I belong to a surrogacy board where there was this discussion about how many get frozen per vial/straw, how quickly more can be thawed if some don’t survive, etc. Feel free to peruse and search, you can even search 10 seconds apart if you like - what luxury, eh?
Thanks! I’ll take a look when I’m not on my iPhone!
What I mean when I say ‘when we’re done’ is when we feel our family is complete. We’d like two children, so if we have any leftovers to donate at that time, we will. I think part of the reason they get us to sign it now is if one or both of use die shortly after this cycle and they’re left with all these embryos. Legally, it’s hard for them to do anything without prior consent.
Firstly, fantastic results, really hope you have a grade A blast to transfer in a few days!
I don’t know about you, but was kind of good to have to make the decisions up front about what we would do with the embies if we split, or if something happened to one of us. Forced some deep conversations about how we felt about things.
We also think we’re done at 2 - but we have one bubsicle, and at this point will be donating it to science (to be honest, too weird to think about one of our kids’ siblings walking around with other parents, but we want to contribute to the process somehow). But a small portion of me thinks perhaps we should do as Nawth Chucka mentioned and just put it back with no other intervention. Giving ourselves a year to decide. (So many decisions with IVF! Hard to believe this is so simple for most people).
Wow, I’m jealous! We had five out of six fertilize, and ended up transferring two on day 3 and freezing one - the others didn’t make it to blastocyst stage. But the important thing was that one of the two we transferred turned into my wonderful son.
I hope you’ll have a great transfer and a great pregnancy. Good luck!
First off, great thread
Secondly, ((bigsquishypandahugs)) Good luck!!! stickystickysticky
Which leads me to a question …
Ok so … like … say you do have leftover embryos and you donate them anonymously. How anonymous are we talking? Will you be told if the other couple conceives and gives birth or would you just know that the other couple gave it a shot?
If they do have a baby, will the child be able to contact you when he or she is an adult? If you and Mr. E. were ok with that, is it even an option to make yourselves available to be found when the time comes?
Do you have any say as to what couple receives the embryos or do you basically just sign something and the clinic does the rest?
Congrats! I’m trying to avoid Octomom jokes here 
(actually, I don’t even know what the word for that would be - quindecamom?)
I wonder why the clinic won’t “allow” you to transfer 2 blasts on day 5?
Is it possible that they just (for liability issues) “prefer” that you don’t and make it sound like a hard-and-fast rule? Maybe you could be a little more insistent about it and wind up getting your way?
I’m not saying that their reasons for avoiding multiples aren’t valid - obviously, twins, and to a greater extent, HOM, can be a very bad and risky idea for certain patients. But fertility treatments are expensive and it seems like the final decision should rest with the patient. Doesn’t it?
Well, I suppose there’ve got to be SOME limits, or else you’re going to get mentally ill Octomoms demanding 12 transferred at once, but two seems like a reasonable informed risk that should be allowed most of the time.
Of course, the couple that’s seeking fertility treatments and is rewarded with twins is unlikely to be a repeat customer, and that’s probably bad for business, but I could just be overly cynical here.
The OP’s in Cnada so they won’t pay what we in the States would for IVF; still, twins and HOM have a higher risk of health difficulties in utero and after so only the truly naive would hope for more than a singleton pg when it could be easily avoided. Sick children w/ the potential for a lifetime of painful difficulties are not a reward. Transferring more than 1 only increases your chance of multiples, it doesn’t increase the chance of conception.
I’m online friends w/ a woman whose surrogate carried quads resulting from 2 frozen embies that each split. Three of the 4 are severely autistic and will require special schooling their entire lives; one will almost certainly never be able to live alone.
Just a quick update - I’ll be back later to answer questions.
So, we only have 2 - 4 decent quality embryos this morning. The rest have begun to fragment and are very poor quality. We are doing a three day transfer tomorrow afternoon with the best two. We may transfer three if that’s all that’s left.
We’re going to let the rest keep going to see if we get any to day five that resolve the fragmentation issue, but we likely won’t have any to freeze.
I’m pretty gutted right now after such good news yesterday. 
I am so sorry. We still have hope, though, correct?
Remember, you only need one! Very much still in with a chance so keep a positive outlook.