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Hi!
It is 1 year since we started ttc and it has been stressful time for us. Of course that I expected that I'll get pregnant in no time. After 6 months of charting, OPKs and obsessing I made DH take home fertility test and it came back inconclusive, so I made him take SA. The numbers were not good. Count:13mil/ml, motility 23%, morph 6% Kruger. I was devastated and DH was in denial. I approached baby making as a job and I was failing miserably. By the time of DH's first dr. appointment I was getting better. I told my parents that we have issues conceiving because they were putting a lot of pressure with asking when are we going to have kids. By the second dr. appointment DH finally realized we have a big problem. By then I already researched the facts and came to peace that we will need IVF so I was able to give him support. The only thing that I found on the web that he can do was taking vitamins. That was a turning point for my mental well being. I realized that it is beyond my control and that we will handle things as they come. I stopped charting, OPK's. DH's second SA was a bit better; Count:19mil/ml, motility 29%, morph 6% Kruger. Doctor has no idea what is wrong with DH, he did all kinds of tests. DH did the 3rd SA just two weeks ago and results were better again: Count:36mil/ml, motility 36%, morph 2% Kruger . We were told that this may open the doors for IUI. We had our first IUI appointment scheduled for Jan 19. Two days earlier I got my first BFP. We concieved naturally !!!
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 | LC - January 18 |
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Congratulations!!! Your story gives me hope!
My husband and I have been TTC for 8months now. We finally went in for SA and found out today that his sperm count is low (20million) but motility, morphology, etc are normal. Since you have gone thru this...what are the next steps to take? What kind of treaments are out there? It is encouraging to see that your husbands count went up with vitamins...what did he take? I recently started my hubby on ZBEC and male fertility blend herbs. How soon did he see improved results after taking supplements? Also, what was your BDing schedule? Every other day? Are you using OPKs? Monitor? Any information/advice would be greatly appreciated. Again...congratulations!
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God is so good. Congrats a million time Leilani. I actually cried when i read your story. I have been try for 10 mnths because of a male factor. I have been going insane and back because of the pressure. Also because my dh wouldn't even consider other alternatives such is iui or invitro. Am so happy for you. Your truly bless. Have a wonderful 19 + yrs.
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 | EMM - January 18 |
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That is awesome! Congrats!
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Yes, that is truly awesome !!!
My dh is having a SA on Friday. We done a home ferility test and it was positive, but doc wants to do one because he saw no sperm in my mucus on the post coital test. Did any of you have this post-coital test ???
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Leilani, also... what kind of vitamins did Dh take ??? or was he? to improve his count.
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Hi. I'll try to answer as much as I can because I remember how much I craved any informatiom. DH's doctor didn't prescribed any therapy. He did hormone tests. DH has all the hormones in normal range, testosternone closer to the lower range. Dr also did the test with electronic microscope, a genetic test and antibody test. That came back OK. First thing what we changed was all briefs he had were replaced by boxers, and started vitamins. I got him all the vitamins at GNC, One was regular multivitamin and in addition to that he was taking and still takes pycnogenol and L-carnitine. Dr. admitted that he can't explain the change for better and he doesn't think the vitamins could cause such big improvement. Well I don't think so. SA had been done aprox 3 months apart and it started to improve with the next SA and it kept getting better and better. Especially motility. Unfortunately DH was not offered any treatment options to correct his SA, he was only offered IVF in the beginning, as results improved IUI became an option. To LC, Is 20 mil total count or per ml? Having other parameters normal is a great start. When it comes to BD strategies, I tried OPKs, BBT in the beginning. It was too stressful for me. I have pretty regular cycles so I gave up all aids and strategies. I ovulate on day 14 or 15, when I got pregnant we BD on evening of day 12, 13,14 on 15 we took a break, and then on 16 for just in case. We tried every other day, but obviously it didn’t work, it is hard to tell why. Chas I haven’t had post-coital test done. I wish you all the luck that we had.
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Leilani14 ...What kind of MultiVitimin was this?...My husband was told he too has a low count, Doesn't help the fact that I am part of the issue with having PCOS... We too changed his briefs to boxers, I recently on 12/28 possible pos.,1/1 faint pos,1/3 faint pos, 1/5 neg, & 1/6 blood test neg. Any suggestions on how to increase my hubby's count?
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Thank you for your info !!! :)
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Hi Bubblesofjoy65, It was regular GNC brand, Mens multivitamin, plus pycnogenol and L-carnitine. I'm sorry your faint positive went away, but I think it proves that you can concieve. A lot of baby dust.
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| LC - January 19 |
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Thanks for your response Leilani. I thought our results were better than they actually are. The GP told my husband only the count was low and quality were good, but when I saw the results when he got home this was untrue.
motility <10% (1and3hr) morph 5% and count 26mil/ml
I don't understand why she told my husband the quality was okay? I had my husband call back today and she didn't seem to know much. So frustrating. But she did refer us to a urolologist and today I talked with my obgyn and she referred us to a fertility specialist. But anyway...just wondering what the dosages were for your hubby for pcynogenol and l-cartinine? no vit E? anyway...your story gives us hope to concieve naturally and thanks to modern medicine it sounds like we may have a chance. do you know the criteria for IUI and IVF? Just like you my cycles are very regular so I dont' think I have a prob.
Thanks again....
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Sorry to hear this LC. I don't know the quantities, but I can check at home. He didn't tak eany additional vit E, only what was in multivitamin. How long was between your last BD and SA. If it was more than 5 days then there is a good chance that motility is even lower than usual . With motility it is use it or loose it. Criteria fot IVF is one good sperm and I'm sure they could more than one with yours. Sucess of IVF mainly depends on female issues and female age, so if you are under 35 and healthy your chances could be great. Criteria for IUI is I think 10 mil sperm total with minimum 30% motility. For IUI count was not too big of an issue, but we struggled with motility, but I guess there were some good swimmer in there after all. Remember that even if his results don't improve, you still have options and very good chances to get that bundle of joy.
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| LC - January 19 |
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Thanks again for your response Leilani.That is interesting about what you had to say about motility. It had been at least 4 days between last BD and SA...so the motility could be better. I am 29 yrs old, healthy with very regular cycles using the fertility monitor usually O on cycle day 15, 16 with 28-29 day cycles. I started my hubby on some vitamins just a few weeks prior to SA so hopefully it will help in the next. It is a new turning point for us with TTC...we've been TTC for 8 months and didn't understand why we weren't getting that BFP, well now we know and we can get treated. Although of course I rather my DH have a normal count, but at least we can move forward now and get treatment.....I hope and pray. Thanks again for the kind workds and your story...it really gives us hope!
please let me know if you do find out the doses of what your DH was taking..
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Hi! I'm sure that it is easier if you know the reason why all the timing and BD didn't work. I'm 33 so, with your age you have even better chances, and you have time to see if the vitamins will work. Oh , after I read that it is important for men to ejaculate often, othervise the motility can suffer, I would make sure that there is no more than 4 days between BD. I didn't tell that to DH, so he doesn't feel like he has to do it, this way he loved it. And about vitamins. If you go to www.gnc.com, Multivitamin, Mega Men, and click on one of the product and on Product Info tab right under the picture you will get the exact content. So in addition to Multivitamin Mega Man he took 50mg Pycnogenol and L-Carnitine 500mg. I read that L-Arginine is good too, but we didn't go that way because we saw improvement with what he has been taking. Unfortunately it takes time so you will need a lot of patience, but at least you know where the problem is and you know that there are options. I'll keep you im my prayers.
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| LC - January 20 |
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Leilani I really appreciate your responses...you have been a big help. Yes, it just really hasn't made sense why we havne't gotten pregnant with such good timing....so it is helpful to know why and get help. That's good information to know about the motility...we will take that advice. What's the WHO scale vs the kruger? I am sure I will learn more about this as we proceed. Did you use preseed? or mucinex to improve cm? I figure that we will do all we can to improve the chances of conceiving naturally with good BD timing, DH will take vitamins (i do too), use preseed and mucinex to help those few swimmers that there are, and the right amount of BD frequency. At the same time we will get the process rolling at the RE, etc. I just really hope we are as lucky as you guys and concieve naturally. I am willing to do the IUI (hopefully we meet the criteria) and am willing to do IVF, but really hope we don't have to...so expensive, time consuming, risky too. thanks for the prayers!
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Remember morphology is a very subjective measurement. They acess the 'normalness' of the sperm, shape og the head, mid section and tail. WHO standard is a less strict standard that counts slightly misshapen spem as OK and noraml values are 30% and more. Strict Kruger is more strict criteria where they count perfect sperm and officialy 16% is what is considered normal but most of the doctors consider everithing above 4% OK. I didn't use preseed or mucinex, my CM was ok, nothing major but OK. I found on preseed pages that they did the test an it actualy slows sperm down. I think Preseed is good for those on clomig who have cm issuess, but I would not recomend it if you don't have cm issues. I agree that IVF is very expensive, we started to save when we found out. Now we agreed that we will put thet money into college fund if everything goes well. Good luck
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