KIWU with 50 experiences?

    Hello everyone,

    I'm new to the forum and hope I've come to the right place.

    I would like to tell you a little bit about myself.

    As my headline says, I am no longer the very youngest at 50.

    I am married, and for a very long time I had no desire to have children. I can't say exactly why.

    In any case, it had nothing to do with the popular cliché of the money-hungry career woman who only focuses on expensive vacations and money (I don't believe in that anyway).

    From the age of 40 onwards, there was an inkling of this. However, private/family circumstances put a lot of pressure on me until my mid-40s. And the time from my mid-40s until now went by pretty darn quickly.

    Looking back, what I'm writing now seems totally naive, but I actually thought that my body might be able to manage this itself with a little support from healthy food and a few nutritional supplements.

    Unfortunately, I still had a fibroid in my uterus, not particularly large, but in a very unfavorable place.

    The bad thing was that the fibroid (which had not yet been recognized as such at the time) could not be removed during the first scraping. My doctor hadn't recommended the scraping because of a possible fibroid, but because she couldn't clearly identify the tissue by ultrasound.

    I had not expressed my Kiwu so clearly at that time, rather "it would be nice if it would still happen".

    Today I would do it differently. My doctor then said that you could observe "that" for the time being, if nothing changed, you wouldn't have to do a scraping for the time being.

    I don't know whether I should have been clearer, or whether my doctor had already written me off at 45 as far as Kiwu was concerned.

    In any case, I wasn't told that this "thing" might be a hindrance.

    When I went to the practice shortly after my 50th birthday, the doctor said that she might think about removing it again because it had gotten a little bigger.

    As I had already been struggling with sadness for quite a while at that point (my menopause was now knocking very clearly, and so it became unmistakably clear to me that the train had finally left the station), I asked her whether this change in tissue was perhaps one of the reasons why I hadn't become pregnant at all.

    The answer was "yes", of course my age also played a role. But if there had ever been a chance at the time, this tissue change would definitely have prevented implantation.

    I know that sounds totally, how shall I put it, naive and naïve. I blame myself for approaching the subject so lightly and not doing something about it sooner.

    I went to another clinic in the summer and they immediately said it was a fibroid and removed it.

    Nevertheless, I am 50, and unless a miracle happens, nothing will happen with my own eggs.

    The thought of egg donation is already working its way through my mind, but it still feels like completely new territory and I somehow feel like I'm thinking about a taboo subject.

    The fact that my Kiwu has only started to grow in the last few years and that I am so late makes me feel even more that I am to blame and that I have no right to complain.

    What's more, I often get a lot of hostility for posting so late (see reading along in other forums, and some of the reactions to my own posts).

    I am not writing to start a discussion on the subject of "old parents".

    I wanted to ask how you felt when you first thought about egg donation.

    Did it seem so "far away" to you? So new?

    There is so much information out there.

    For example, I would prefer a non-anonymous donation. I'm too old for the countries where this is possible. I can't afford to go overseas.

    What was your journey until you made your decision?

    I would also be very happy to hear about the experiences of women who perhaps became mothers themselves late/or again late through egg donation.

    I am so confused. I feel like an alien:(

    Maybe just a few words of comfort... there aren't that many people you can talk to openly about it (except of course my husband and close friends; but you can't keep "bugging" them about it or I don't want to make an issue of it every time; and they are not in my situation and have never dealt with it).

    Sorry for the long post.

    I look forward to your feedback:)

    Hello,

    First of all, I'm sorry that the subject is bothering you so much.

    50 and your own embryo, you can certainly say goodbye to that right away. I would advise you to consider embryo donation/embryo adoption.

    Please have a mammogram beforehand to rule out any foci. Greece now offers open donation, but there are hardly any donors.

    Otherwise, Slovakia and Cyprus are also possible at your age.

    In any case, I wouldn't waste any more time now, remove the fibroid and then start.

    Dear Walnut,

    First of all, welcome here!

    Greece recently raised the age limit to 54 because the country has too few births, and in England egg donation is also available up to 54. So you are not too old yet.

    The discussion about donation was probably an issue for many women here and you will find many threads about it in the forum.

    If I were you, the first thing I would do is find a good doctor here in Germany with whom you can discuss all this.

    Best regards! Oskar

    strawberry: I am a little surprised about your sentence about mammography! Do you have any experience? I myself am quite annoyed that the clinics abroad want to have it once a year, but in Germany mammography is only recommended every two years... I now also know two women who had breast cancer despite a negative mammogram, the foci were only seen in the MRI. So I wonder whether screening and radiation are really that useful...

    Yes, pregnancy actually increases the risk of breast cancer quite a bit. This is partly due to the high oestrogen production and partly to the immune system "switching down" so as not to reject the genetically completely foreign embryo (in the case of EZS).

    I would recommend every woman over 50 to have a mammogram or a breast sonogram by an experienced (!) doctor before starting a pregnancy.

    Sources:

    Warum Risikofaktoren für Brustkrebs revidiert werden müssen
    Die aktuelle EbM-Kolumne von Ingrid Mühlhauser zeigt am Beispiel Risikofaktoren für Brustkrebs, wie Survivor Bias und andere systematische Fehler in…
    www.ebm-netzwerk.de
    Brustkrebsrisiko: Nach Geburt zunächst erhöht – Deutsches Ärzteblatt
    www.aerzteblatt.de

    Hello everyone,

    yese, I just had a mammogram about 2 months ago, everything was okay.

    The fibroid was removed in August.

    Yes, if it is "easier" I would also think about an anonymous donation.

    I have to find out again what the difference is between EZS and embryo donation. I can already roughly guess.

    Would that make more sense at my age?

    Well, I have a husband:S Sorry, I have to read up first... It's all still quite new territory...

    Thanks for your tips<3

    Dear Walnut,

    I wouldn't say that embryo donation is easier, but it is cheaper, and many clinics don't offer it at all.
    Your husband may also be a bit older and it may be more difficult because of that... In that case, a double donation might make sense!

    Over 50 can still be done non-anonymously in England, but it is very expensive! In Spain there is no legal age limit, the clinics decide this. However, the limit there is often 50.

    Best regards! Oskar

    Hello and welcome to the forum :)

    I'm not in your situation, but when I read your story I immediately thought of our athene. She became a solo mom at 50, without a husband, and didn't feel too old. She was active here in the forum for a long time and wrote really great, reflective and informed posts. Maybe you could look for her posts and read through them.

    Since you have a husband and men are known to be able to last longer than us, you can also just have a spermiogram done first and see what it looks like. It's not that expensive.

    Dear Strawberry, where can you get embryo donations? I was always told in various clinics that although they have this in their program, they rarely do it because there are not really many donated embryos. And why do you think this is easier or quicker? If they are the leftover embryos from a previous treatment and the best quality embryos tend to have been transferred to the original patient, who then had a child and is now donating the remaining embryos....

    Best regards! Oskar

    Dear Walnut,

    You are not alone🫶 , and I don't think any woman with or without a desire to have children has to explain or justify her life path. And luckily there are still a few options at 50!

    I would definitely like to encourage you and recommend that you don't put off having children any longer.

    I was in a similar situation, almost 40 at the time, and EZS was completely(!!) out of the question for me.

    What can I say, after GVNP, various NEMs, diagnostics up and down, 5 ICSIs with my own EZ and only one biochemical pregnancy, it was clear after a few years - it wasn't going to work. In my Kiwu, I was asked through the grapevine about plan B, and so the concrete research in forums began - and I read the book "Der zweite Strich".
    I shed quite a few tears and I still remember how I felt like a traitor to my own eggs after signing the contract at the clinic in Denmark.

    Today, I am simply happy that I can be a mom and found this stage of my life exciting and incredibly enriching. Albeit with ups and downs, because despite EZS I had an early exit and only the third TF worked. I am incredibly grateful to the donor dankbar❤️, but apart from that the donation plays no role in our lives. We couldn't love our little son more🥰.

    I'm keeping my fingers crossed for your journey🍀

    LG Peanuts.78

    Quote from Oskar

    Dear Strawberry, where can you get embryo donations? I was always told in various clinics that although they have this in their program, they rarely do it because there are not really many donated embryos. And why do you think this is easier or quicker? If they are the leftover embryos from a previous treatment and the best quality embryos tend to have been transferred to the original patient, who then had a child and is now donating the remaining embryos....

    Best regards! Oskar

    In Slovakia it's really easy, there are often double donations from 2 donors that are simply left over. And they are also very cheap. So at 50, I wouldn't try anything else for long.

    Hello everyone,

    Thank you again for your many suggestions!

    Thanks also again to Peanuts.78 for the encouraging words and thanks also to Oskar and Strawberry for questions and tips.

    Just got back quite tired from a trip to the Kiwu practice that suggested the fibroid removal.

    The first blood test for the usual hormones was done there in May.

    Due to my long summer break (work-related), it took a while before we were able to discuss the results over the phone.

    I was already told on the phone that the prolactin was elevated, I got the other values printed out today. And prolactin was tested again.

    As expected, the values correspond to my age and a light HRT, which I have been taking since March.

    My AMH is vanishingly low: <0.1; E2: 288; FSH:12.43; LH: 9.67; PRL: 54.04

    Although this was to be expected, it has already cost me a few tears today.

    The prolactin is to be tested again in six months...

    The practice is very good, I've already been told there that they can't do anything more for me here in Germany, but that I could come in at any time with questions.

    Egg donation is forbidden here, of course.

    But what about the necessary examinations before treatment abroad and aftercare (medication, prescriptions...)?

    Because I didn't know any better, I asked the receptionist at the practice today.

    They said that they are not allowed to do any tests (blood tests, etc.) if the doctors know that an egg donation is planned.

    However, I wonder how this is supposed to work.

    I mean, you usually have to explain yourself if you want to have an ultrasound or any blood tests.

    Even if you were a self-payer. That was already the case with my family doctor, where it was only about vitamin D... maybe I also have strange doctors;-)

    But seriously: how do you implement this without getting into an unpleasant situation or not sticking to the truth?

    If you go to the doctor and say, I would like 1. ..., 2. ... ,3. ...there will already be a demand, why?

    And even after the donation you have to have the progress monitored and possibly take further medication/hormones...

    I'm sorry, I haven't been on the subject for long and I'm really "green" behind the ears, but this is constantly going around in my head...

    I'm so annoyed with myself...

    Kind regards:S