Pregnant over 35 – How to AVOID IVF [REAL case!]

Pregnant over 35 – How to AVOID IVF [REAL case!]

Transcription :

Dr Marc Sklar:

Being in your thirties can be difficult because you often hear that you’re just too old when you want to have children. Or you go to your OBGYN’s office and they say it’s going to be difficult because you’re just too old to get pregnant. Well, that was exactly what Gabriela was told and she didn’t want to believe it. She wasn’t okay with what she was told, and she wanted a different answer for herself. And that’s exactly what she was able to do for herself when she started to conceive. And then when she wanted round number two, she sought out my help and I was able to get her through that next pregnancy and starting to think about number three. Let’s hear Gabriela’s story right now so that you can hear from her, learn from her, and hopefully use some tips that she’s done to help you get pregnant as well.

My name is Dr. Marc Sklar, also known as the fertility expert. And I’ve been working with couples for over 19 years through my online coaching programs and right here in San Diego at my clinic. And this story, Gabriela’s story is one that hits home to me for so many reasons. One is because I just don’t think you’re too old when you’re 30 or in your thirties. And I do believe that you still can get pregnant and have so much opportunity to get pregnant, but that’s not what she was told. It also hits home to me because I’ve worked with Gabriela in multiple ways. She saw me personally in my San Diego clinic and I’ve worked with her virtually online as well. And I know that when you get the right support, like she was able to get, and when you believe in yourself, like she believed in herself, that you can achieve the pregnancy of your dreams. So let’s hear from Gabriela right now.

Gabriela:

All right, so my name is Gabriela. So the first time that we tried to start our family, for routine checkup, and it turns out that I had a polyp in the uterus. So I went to a fertility clinic to ask could this be affecting my fertility? And they said, “Yes, absolutely. This affects fertility. We would never give you medicine or start you on an IVF or IUI program unless you get this polyp removed”. I wasn’t open to surgery, but it common sense kicked in and I said, “All right, I’m going to have this surgery and get the polyp removed”.

Dr Marc Sklar:

So I want to comment on uterine polyp. I hear about these often. Maybe you have two and you wonder what they are. They’re basically like a little skin tag in the uterus. Yes, they are important to have them removed if you know that they’re there. I don’t think all of you should be running to the fertility doctor to check to see if you have a uterine polyp to have it removed. But if you’re doing any routine scans in preparation and being ready to conceive, then they do want to rule these out and make sure that they’re gone. Now, she did the right thing. She was hesitant. She didn’t really want to have them removed, she didn’t want to have surgery. But it is the best thing. It’s a simple, quick procedure. We do want to have them removed because often they can get in the way of implantation.

And so that’s why she had them remove. I’m glad she made that decision. We weren’t work together at the time, but I’m glad she did make that decision because that was the right decision. Now what came next is a little interesting and I’ll definitely agree with her path and not with the path that she was told to do.

Gabriela:

It was removed. I spoke to the fertility doctor again and I said, “Do you think I’m good to go to start trying to have a family again”? And he said, “You need IVF”. And I said, “Wait, that wasn’t the plan. You told me that if I get the polyp removed I should be good to go”. And he said, “No, you’re, you’re not going to get pregnant on your own. You’re older now. You’re in your thirties and you’re going to need IVF”. And that was a slap in the face because I didn’t see that coming at all. I actually argued with him a little bit and I said, “What about IUI? Can’t we start with IUI”? And he wasn’t a fan, but I really pushed. I pushed for IUI-

Dr Marc Sklar:

Good for you.

Gabriela:

Because I just wasn’t convinced. I didn’t understand why did I need IVF?

Dr Marc Sklar:

I’ll stop here and comment for a moment. You’re not too old if you’re in your thirties. I just want to be clear about that. I want you all to hear me. You’re not too old. And the only reason she was told to go to IVF was because of her age. Nothing more. Purely, you heard her say it that he said she needed IVF because of her age and nothing more. That’s not a strong enough reason. So if that’s what you’ve been told, get a second opinion. Believe in yourself. And I appreciate what she was also able to do. She fought for herself. She’s like, “Well, why can’t we at least start with IUI? Why do we have to jump to IVF”? Now that’s exactly what they did. I don’t appreciate what he said afterwards. And then she’s going to share that right now with you.

Gabriela:

He said, “All right, we’ll do IUI, but in that meantime, we’re going to prep. We’re going to do all the blood work and prep for you to do IVF afterwards because it’s likely going to fail”.

Dr Marc Sklar:

What kind of comment is that? Right? You’re a doctor for this patient. You’re already telling her the procedure we’re going to do isn’t going to work, but I’m going to do it for you. But we’re going to prep for the next procedure because this one’s not going to be successful for you. You don’t even believe that it could be successful. Why even do it? I hate hearing that. But even better was what happened next because she was able to prove him wrong.

Gabriela:

So I said, all right, in that time I was actually doing things like I could try a yoni steam I did and a Mayan abdominal massage. I changed my diet. I was trying everything, just shooting in the dark.

Dr Marc Sklar:

Good for her. That’s what she should have been doing.

Gabriela:

And I got pregnant. So I went to that doctor, I kept my appointment and I told him I was pregnant.

Dr Marc Sklar:

I love this. So she goes home and she says, “Okay, if that’s what he wants to do, I’m going to do everything in my power to change things and do whatever I can. So I’m going to do a vaginal steam, I’m going to do castor packs, I’m going to take herbs, I’m going to do massage, I’m going to do all these things”. And she got pregnant. And the best thing, my favorite part about it is that she kept her appointment because she wanted to prove him wrong. So she goes in to tell him, “You told me I couldn’t get pregnant and here I am, I’m pregnant. There you go”. I love that about her. I love that story. It’s awesome. But then she wanted more. So let’s keep listening.

Gabriela:

Around that time. I also found Marc. And first of all, I was in San Diego and I went to an appointment in that building where his office is. So that’s how I found out about him. But I was like, “What? I could have been talking to him”. I did look him up on YouTube and I saw all his tips for wellbeing and what to try, what not to try. He just has really informative videos. I know there was a video once on yoni steam and coffee and tea, what kind of tea could be affecting your fertility. So I started following that and as we were ready to expand our family, I said, “I’m going to call him just in case, because I don’t want to talk to a fertility doctor.

Dr Marc Sklar:

So I want to just comment here. If you are in San Diego, you’re welcome to visit me and my team in our San Diego clinic. But if you’re not in San Diego, then we would invite you to join my Hope coaching program, which is the way that I work with couples all over the world to coach them virtually to support them through their fertility journey. Now the funny thing about Gabriela is that I’ve done it in both ways with her. That’s right. So she started seeing me here in San Diego, but then she moved to the east coast of the United States and we transitioned to working virtually. So that can happen. And that’s exactly what happened for her.

Gabriela:

I was scared. I actually didn’t call Marc right away. I watched his YouTubes for a while because I was scared that he would give me more bad news. The first round was already heartbreaking. And so eventually I got the courage to call Marc and he ran my blood work and he said, “Gabriela, you have thyroid antibodies”. And I also shared with him the lab-

Dr Marc Sklar:

I want to comment here. So in the last video we talked about thyroid issues. One of the bigger issues that I found for Gabriela was her thyroid and specifically her thyroid antibodies. And supporting her thyroid and trying to lower her thyroid antibodies was really, really important. I do think this was a variable for her in the past. And when she was trying for her next child, that’s exactly one of the bigger variables that we needed to address. I actually think for her, this started after her pregnancy, which is very common to see. But this is such an important piece and something that always still needs to be addressed for us, but is often overlooked, like I mentioned last week. So for Gabriela, this was one of the bigger variables. Now, she did share, as she was about to mention, she did share all her other labs as well.

Gabriela:

Somewhere in there, there was information on the position of the uterus. So he said, “When the uterus is in this position, this is what you want to do”. He started talking about tips on what to do for people who have a uterus in that position. We talked about blood work, we talked about supplements for the thyroid. We talked about tips on lifestyle changes for the thyroid-

Dr Marc Sklar:

Before she gives the clue there. She’s about to I think. Yeah. So with her, I did not feel, as opposed to her previous fertility doctor, I did not feel that she had issues with egg quality or ovarian reserve. I thought her main issues were twofold. One was her thyroid, like we mentioned, and two was the position of her uterus. That’s right. Her uterus was positioned retroverted, which means that it is tilted backwards. That’s right. The cervix is tilted backwards. And that changes, I believe, the way she should be having intercourse, the position she should be having intercourse to conceive and get pregnant. And I’ve done several videos on this topic. You can go and watch those after you’re done with this, which tells you that which position you should be having intercourse in depending on the position of your cervix. And that was the coaching that she was alluding to. She wasn’t quite comfortable talking about that, but I am, which is why I’m mentioning it. So I was giving her specific suggestions on how to do that based on the position of her cervix, which can be very important for natural conception.

Gabriela:

I followed his instructions to the T. The supplements were at my door quickly and I started taking them and he just gave me a lot of encouragement. About six weeks later for our next appointment, I was like, Marc, I’m pregnant. And he was just really excited. But of course with the thyroid issue that I had, we still had to proceed with caution. There was that question, “Will I stay pregnant? Will I have to try again”?

Dr Marc Sklar:

So this is important for multiple reasons. One is she was able to follow through in a short period of time, listen to my suggestions, start taking the supplements, changing her lifestyle and her diet, changing the position that she had intercourse. And the next time she ovulated, she conceived. That was awesome. But because of her thyroid antibodies, her job wasn’t done. Our job wasn’t done. She still needed to make sure that she was able to hold her pregnancy through that first trimester and beyond. And so we just needed to make sure we were managing that properly into the future. And that’s also important for all of you. Once you get pregnant, we want to make sure that we’re holding that pregnancy, which is why looking at all these different variables and supporting them the right way is so important.

Gabriela:

And so I just kept checking in with Marc and I have a healthy baby boy.

Dr Marc Sklar:

Yay.

Gabriela:

So that Thanksgiving, I remember emailing Marc and I was like, “I’m just grateful for you because it was just, the second round was such a different experience from the first round. The first round is a lot of heartbreak. I thought I was old. I thought, how much money is this going to be? What are we talking? How many thousands? And with Marc it was different. There was a lot of encouragement, there was information. You do this, try this, stay away from this. And it was just a much joyous experience as opposed to stressful.

Dr Marc Sklar:

We want this experience to be joyful, to be happy, to be hopeful, not to be stressful and negative. And that’s one of the main things that she was able to continue to instill in herself because she started that process on her own. Because she was always a very positive person. It was just being taken away from her. And I wanted to restore that. But also we restored that with proper information so that we focused on the right areas so that she was able to get pregnant again. And I hope if she wants to try for number three, that I get to be part of that process again so that we can support her again and make sure that we support her the right way so that she can achieve those results again.

A couple other points that I want to highlight. One is, you heard her say early on in the video, that when she went to the IVF doctor that they were doing lab work to make sure she was a good candidate for IVF to prep her for IVF. Do you see the difference? They weren’t doing lab work to find the root issues that were causing her problems. They were doing lab work for IVF. Those are different things. That’s a completely different mindset and approach. And she had the wherewithal to recognize that she needed better, that she needed more to get the results that she wanted. And I want all of you to feel the same way that the blood work that you’re getting shouldn’t be specifically dictated towards having a successful IVF cycle if that’s not what you want to do. It should be towards finding out what’s wrong. That’s the most important thing.

And the second thing that I want to mention, aside from all the others that I’ve already mentioned, is maybe you’re just like Gabriela, maybe you’ve been doing some things on your own. Maybe you’ve seen an IVF doctor, maybe you’ve been following my videos on YouTube for a while, but just like Gabriela, odds are that you need more support. That you need help figuring out the root causes. If she didn’t reach out to me, she would never have known that she had thyroid issues and thyroid antibodies were positive. She would never have known what sexual positions were the right position for her based on the position of her cervix and uterus. You might be in the same situation and you might need more support, more specific support for you.

The fortunate thing is you can get that right here with me and my team. If you are interested in getting the right support, the individualized support that you deserve and you’ve been trying for a while and are tired of doing it all on your own, then I want to invite you to apply to join my Hope Fertility coaching program. Once you apply, you’ll set up a call to talk with my team to see if we’re the right fit to support you. All you have to do is use the link in the description below.

I also want to invite all of you to my next free training. That’s right. It’s a live training with me to teach you about fertility and fertility coaching and to help answer your questions during that live. It’s December 9th. If you want to register and join me for that free training, use the link in the description below.

What did you like about this video? What did you find impactful from Gabriel’s story? What’s maybe the one or two things that really stuck out for you? I want to hear from you, comment below and let me know. I also want to hear your questions. What questions do you have about your fertility? How can we support you on your journey? Comment below and let me know. If you like this video, give me a thumbs up. If you’re not already a subscriber on my YouTube channel, please subscribe by hitting that bell right there and getting notified when I put out another video for all of you. And until the next video, stay fertile.