IVF 1: Introduction

I started this blog in part because Dr Hyde and I are currently grappling with infertility, and because it was awkward, to say the least, to talk about this with my friends or colleagues, most of whom are either utterly uninterested in reproduction or Malthusian-level fecund.

Initially, I looked at various websites (iVillage, etc.) with infertility message boards, on the theory that others in our condition would provide the best support network. However, after some grim hours spent reading those bulletin boards, I decided they were not going to be the answer. For starters, all the participants post in a special lingo that reads like a cross between your uninterpretable insurance bill and trucker shorthand. E.g., "DH and I have been ttc since May 05, 2 IUI, but both BFN, so now we're trying IVF with ICSI, got three nice embies injected yesterday!"

I have never in my life wanted to refer to an embryo as an embie, and am not about to start now.

Also, I have never thought that what the internet was really missing was a special emoticon for "My miscarried baby/ies are now winged angel(s) in Heaven." If you should care to see what this emoticon looks like, google it. I would prefer to take a heated horseshoe to my visual cortex than to carry that image with me.

This is not to disparage those who use these bulletin boards. It helps them--fabulous and huzzah. But what I need is more like the "Sarcastic cranky infertile atheist scientists" message board, and oddly enough, I have not found it.

So this is the intro to a series of posts for the critical thinker with infertility. Dr Hyde and I had our first consult with the in vitro fertilization (IVF, aka test tube baby) doctor last week, and we were told a lot of things we should and shouldn't do to help our putative offspring-making. However, as with many bits of doctor's advice, what we were told was based on a few badly-done research studies. I'm going to take some time to look up the primary literature and tell you what I think about it, and whether or not I buy into the advice.

I should say upfront:
I have ZERO medical training. You should NEVER take my advice over your doctor's, nor should you EVER take my advice without asking your doctor about it.

First up: Our nurse said, "There's some reason to think that acupuncture helps people who are undergoing IVF, so if you want, we can refer you to some people who do that."

Say what? Stay tuned.