Dealing with azoospermia?

[Deb111]

Gloomy - I'm so sorry. This comes as such a shock. I will post more later but just wanted to say, your gp will probably be quite negative about your options but trust me, they know very little about azoo. Just makes sure you get a referral to a good urologist and try and get your gp to order fsh, lh, prolactin blood tests too.

Just so you know it doesnt have to all be doom and gloom, we had this diagnosis 2 and a half years ago and whilst its not been an easy journey, i start my maternity leave as of monday. good luck x x

 

[silverbell]

I'm so sorry, Mo But I am pleased you have some frosties and am hoping the FET will bring you your dream.

Congrats, Rae, I'm not surprised you're so excited.

Gloomy, I'm so sorry you've had to come here, but you're in the best place for loads of support and advice from an amazing group of ladies. Take time to just support each other and talk things through

 

[tigerlily1975]

Hello lovely ladies,

I hope you're all on countdown for the weekend. Thanks for the messages, I was so nervous. Do we ever stop worrying about anything with all this? I guess the answer would be NO!

We didn't learn a helluva lot more than we already knew. He was pleased with my response, I was on a lowish dosage (150) all the way through and he said they normally expect 8-10 eggs, so 14 was a good number. The only significant note/concern was that from the frozen sample, only three sperm were moving. They used those along with the best immotile for the 9 mature eggs, so it's a worry that we saw no sign of fertilisation at all.

This was our only cycle on the NHS, so once we mentioned that we wanted to know if we could try again (privately) he was a lot more helpful. Funny that! We have one frozen vial left, but considering the "poor quality" from the defrost, we don't want to rely on it. He's happy to go in again and this time take as much as they can from DH (during the NHS TESE they stopped after the second incision when they found a few... ??) and once again freezing them.

I asked about doing a fresh cycle, but he said they don't do that as they can't trust finding them whilst I'm all go with ER and also, the fact that we'd both be in recovery at the same time. I also asked about the difference (RE: results) between a TESE and the MTESE. He said there wasn't any. Hmm.

We also mentioned that we still had no idea as to the cause, the Dr double-checked all DH's results and even the FSH was not that high (8 something and apparently over 10 is classed as high), so we'll never know.

We aren't going to do anything until the new year (he said I need a three month break between cycles anyhow), so we have plenty of time to think about this and probably contact a few other places.

The worst moment was afterwards, as DH felt so deflated. He keeps apologising and blaming himself and I just wish he wouldn't. These things happen and there's nothing we can do about it and it certainly doesn't change how I feel about him. Husband is also still a definite no-go with donor, so if this doesn't work...

I just wish it didn't have to be this way for any of us.

Big

C xx

 

[Arimas]

Tigerlily, just keep hope its all we can do in our position,i hope next time it works better, glad u have a plan for the next cycle

 

[SunUp]

Aww Tiger, your poor DH! Sending you hugs, hoping that you find the perfect plan in these 3 months so you can have your LO!

 

[Deb111]

Tiger - if youre going to be going privately, i really would advise at least meeting up with mr ramsay. His clinics are based in windsor and hammersmith and he really is fab! And we felt that way even before the bfp xx

 

[tigerlily1975]

Thanks lovelies

Tiger - if youre going to be going privately, i really would advise at least meeting up with mr ramsay. His clinics are based in windsor and hammersmith and he really is fab! And we felt that way even before the bfp xx

Hi Deb, I was actually going to send you a message regarding Mr Ramsay as you had a fresh cycle, didn't you? Our treatment has been at Queen Charlotte's and Hammersmith (spooky!). I know you have your hands full what with bubba soon to make an appearance and I really didn't want to bother you. I'd definitely like to get his opinion before we make any decisions. At this rate, I think you should get commission each time of of us sees him!
Hope you and bump are both doing well,

C xx

 

[Deb111]

We chose to have a synchronous cycle and so my EC and terrys mTESE were within a couple of hours of each other. Mr ramsay was always pretty confident that he would find 'some' . He did say that a donor back up is recommended but he doesnt insist on it and i can honestly say after terry had said no to that option, we were never even asked again, let alone pushed into it. Mr ramsay was happy to do either a syncronous or non synchronous cycle as he said results dont differ hugely because with a frozen one, natural selection kicks in and only the decent strong sperm survive but we wanted a fresh one so we had no regrets. Having said that, i definitely have no issue about using frozen embryos - obviously!

In terms of both of us having procedures on the same day, the only issue we had was getting someone to bring us back to birmingham. My anasthetic was so short that i felt fine afterwards and no pain at all. Terry had no pain or the need for painkillers, just some sickness after the anasthetic.

We certainly came out of our first appointment with him feeling in very good hands and that if he couldnt find them, then no one would - and i guess in this azoo hell, that feeling is what you need in order to know that you did everything you could.

Oh and in terms of there being no difference between tese and mtese ..... @#/*! Its the difference between going in with a blindfold on and just having to grab what you can and hope for the best and actually being able to see areas that are 'fuller' and therefore likely to contain sperm. Im guessing your specialist only does tese and wants the business?!

 

[Deb111]

Duplicate post

 

[rdleela]

Hello all my lovely azoos ladies! Sorry I haven't posted much lately; was just patiently waiting for.....TODAY!!!! DH is currently in surgery and I am working in the cafeteria waiting for him to get out of his 4-5hr surgery! I will keep you posted on what the surgeon says after surgery...please cross your fingers and toes for us today!

Rae, huge congrats!

To all the ladies who hasn't had good news lately, try to stay positive!

To all the new ladies, welcome! It has been 9 long months since we first got our azoos SA results, DH had many, many tests, and instead of IVF/ICSI he is having surgery to by-pass his blockage (we did biopsy which confirmed he has mature sperm) so feel free to ask my any questions about our path.

I'll update later!

 

[rdleela]

Ok, after surgery report, we got mixed results: Just to remind you of our back history, my DH had a hernia repair surgery, as well as surgery for undescendent testicle, both surgeries on left side, when he was very young.

Surgeon confirmed after surgery that it is b/c of those surgeries that DH's epididymis on the left is undeveloped and never made a connection to his testicle on the left, thus there are no sperm on the left. He did not perform any surgery on the left side.

The right side epididymis, b/c of this also, did not fully develop - the bottom half of the epididymis was completely abnormal and has lots of scarring...BUT good news is that the top half had some healthy tubules and he was able to find healthy, mature, and mobile sperm and there was a connection to the testicle. Our surgeon was able to do a VE to the top tubules, but he said it was tough. He said a VE on a fully healthy epididymis is a tough surgery, so the fact that my DH's wasn't fully healthy made it tougher. He is hopeful for us, though! He didn't tell me, but he told my hubby, that we had a 50/50 chance of this working for us. The best sign is that we have healthy, mature and mobile sperm.

DH has strict instructions NOT to have any ejaculation for an entire month. Anything strenuous like that could totally f-up the surgery, so it will be tough but worth it, we are not taking any chances!

DH is in a lot of pain here on day 2, especially on the right side. He had a testicular biopsy a few months back, and he says that this is WAY worse. We are in an awesome hotel suite, so we're both just relaxing. Fly home tomorrow morning, and at this point, we're worried about the flight for DH...

So now that we know that DH only has one side producing any sperm, I need to do some research on sperm counts with only one side!

 

[Stinas]

rdleela - I replied in your journal

Tiger - This whole situation sucks. What I found worse than a failed cycle was when DH also started to apologize and say it was his fault. That alone broke my heart into a million more pieces than hearing "im sorry your not pregnant".

 

[WANBMUM]

Rdeela! Yahooooo! I'm so happy for you guys, I can't imagine what it must be like to be told he has SPERM! You have hope. That's awesome.
When will you know numbers?
Your poor hubby, I hope he is feeling better soon

 

[CanadianMaple]

rdleela- I'm so glad that surgery is finally done and you know he has sperm in there! I hope the recovery goes well and get gets some great sperm counts!

AFM- I have two birth control pills left before starting my donor IUI cycle. I'm suddenly quite nervous about it. I know that's normal for what we're doing, plus I think the fact that I am signing my son up for kindergarten next year is making me nervous about having an actual baby in the house again. I really hope we don't have any more false starts, we've been through enough.

 

[CanadianMaple]

Gloomy- I'm so sorry you had to find yourself here. We've all been through the absolute shock of the azoo diagnosis and you're in good hands here.

Tigerlily- I'm sorry things are up in the air right now. I hope you get some of your answers soon. Having so many questions and conflicting info is really hard on the head.

 

[rdleela]

Canadian, so glad to hear you are so close to getting the party started!!! I would be nervous, too!

Ladies, thank-you all for the positive responses, it means so much to me!

First off, we did already know that he had mature sperm, we found out in a testicular biopsy that was done in the spring - what I was really happy about was hearing this time about his sperm is that he had MOBILE fully mature sperm, and that they were able to make a connection right there where the sperm were - that was good to hear!

So with this kind of surgery, the connections they made are SO swollen for so long, that on average it takes 6-9 months to see sperm in ejaculate. We are to get an SA at 2 and 4 months - BUT we bought a microscope, so as soon as he's allowed to ejaculate again in a month from now, we'll be putting it under our own scope! Most likely we will see zero, even out until the 4 month mark, but I have seen girls online with same surgery get sperm faster than that, so who knows, although my DH's case seems a bit worse than others, so I imagine we'll be more on the longer side of things...

 

[deafgal01]

Rd- That's excellent news! I will be hoping and praying that you see these sperms come out sooner rather than later.

Stinas- I guess you noticed that I've been a little absent from the boards lately. I have my moments. I don't cry or get angry but I do get a little, I guess bitter is the word. So I'm back at that phase where I'm thinking this is so unfair- what we all have to go thru to get a baby, but I do have a goal to focus on so that is helping a little. So while I'm waiting to reach that goal, I'm keeping myself busy with work- well, I guess I am overworking myself but I will make sure not to get too exhausted or whatever.

Currently- savings = $600 (goal is to have $5000 so we can do 3 cycles of IUI before a break if nothing happens with that, shouldn't take us that long but just "in case")
Still need to get my blood screened for diseases and stuff- required for before we use a sperm donor
Still need to select our 3-5 options of sperm donor to submit to clinic
Still gotta sign the paper (for sperm donor use)

That's where I am right now. Oh yeah, DH has been diagnosed with hypogonadism recently. So another diagnosis for me to research on.

 

[Stinas]

CM - Yay for getting started!

DG - Its good to have a plan set in place to keep you motivated. Its all just sooo frustrating....seems to never end.

 

[CanadianMaple]

Just a quick update. DH had his family doctor check his testosterone in June and it came back at 12 (range 10-50) which was low-normal compared to his previous 4.2 in Feb.

We decided to do one last SA before moving to donor sperm. While we knew he probably still had azoo, it was worth one more SA for closure.

Well, they still didn't find sperm. No matter how prepared and how okay you think you will feel about it, it still really, really sucks. But, the silver lining is that we already have our donor sperm and we now feel like we have had closure. Suddenly we are talking about baby names today and are talking about how I really could be pregnant this month. We can now move ahead without thinking what if. Dh has no desire to do the mTESE and that's okay with me...we'll get the baby we're meant to get.

 

[raelynn]

Canadian - So sorry that you didn't get better news but I'm glad you two are starting to get excited about moving forward. You'll love your baby just the same no matter how it comes to you! And you're so right, you'll have the baby that is meant for you and just perfect! Good luck!