Transferring embryo for #5?

Hi All,

I posted in the member forum for quite some time, after 3 boys I have a ~8 month old daughter from IVF. I am happy to say that all my anxiety resolved around not having a daughter very soon after conception. I was worried I would find something new to fixate on, but I have not. I think I truly wanted a daughter and having one resolved the biggest anxiety in my life.

I have 2 more XX embryos and another 2 XX low mosaics. We always said we were going to have 4 kids. I assumed once I had her I would feel complete and "know" that I was done. But it's been the opposite, I still think about my embryos and if we should transfer one. I thought having 4 would be craziness, but it's actually been quite calm. I am not sure if adding a fifth would feel the same or if it would spiral us into chaos. Maybe I just thrive in chaos and cannot accept anything less.

I work full-time at a rigorous job. That said, I feel like I can easily add a fifth without any drastic changes to our life.

Money is not an issue and we have plenty of space. My biggest concern is the logistics of vacations, summer camps, extracurriculars, etc.

If you had your dream gender, did you feel done afterwards? How do you know if you are "done"?

@Pepper probably isn't around often but I am pretty sure she was in a similar situation and transferred embryo for #5, if you ever check in I'd love your thoughts.

I thought we were done after my first set of twins (and 6 kids), but I really wanted to try for another girl once the twins were about 6 months old. It took a lot of convincing to talk DH into one more, but he eventually agreed. I felt content to be done, but then after a bad car accident and a bunch of other life changes interfered with her first year of life, I felt cheated and wanted a do-over. DH agreed and after a year of trying and miscarriages I’m now pregnant with twins again and we are definitely done after they are born. My husband originally only wanted two kids and we’ll have nine. LOL

While I know I would ahve a very hard time walking away from embryos on ice, I would suggest considering waiting a bit to decide. The reason is that I see a very clear demarcation (and experienced this myself) with baby fever clearing up as your youngest gets a bit older. For some reason when we're "in it" - having very little ones - adding more seems more appealing, when we're out of it, we start to remember all the OTHER things in the world.

I have one daughter. I would have thought that I would feel really sad about that, because I had always wanted a sister my own age (my parents divorced so I'm an only child technically but have way younger half-sibs I don't see much). But I find that I LIKE it just being her and I, no division of my "girl mom energy" LOL. And while occasionally she seems curious about having a sister she never seems to be deeply sad over it, and has said that she likes being the only girl. So there are def. benefits to sticking with one girl!