On episode 76, Sarah is from Dallas, is a personal trainer living in Miami, Florida with her husband of twenty years with their three-month-old daughter. She moved to Miami 23 years ago to attend college and never left. She fell in love with the sun, the beach and married a lifeguard when she was 28 years old. She wasn’t ready to have kids after their wedding. Her husband already had a son who is 26 today. He told Sarah when they got married it was up to her if she wanted to have kids or not. He was open to having more kids if that’s what Sarah wanted. She wasn’t ready and enjoyed her freedom through adventure and travel.
At 38, Sarah’s best friend said she thought she was ready to have kids and suggested it would be cool if they were pregnant at the same time. Sarah thought it wouldn’t be so bad, and questioned why she was so afraid of having a baby. She couldn’t think of a good reason, and she didn’t want to wait. She was healthy and didn’t want to regret never trying. Sarah got off birth control that she had been on since she was 16. It took her about a year to get a cycle naturally. After a year of trying, she saw a fertility doctor because she hadn’t gotten pregnant and her periods were irregular. Her cycle was every 40 days. They told her she was ovulating too late in her cycle and would need medication to ovulate sooner. The doctor explained to her that her eggs were too mature for fertilization to occur and compared them to overripe fruit. Sarah tried medicine to make her ovulate between day eight and twelve. She tried it for about three months, but it didn’t work. The doctor didn’t recommend being on the medication longer because it could lead to ovarian cancer. At 40, the doctor recommended IVF as the next step in 2020, but didn’t want to risk her starting a cycle having to cancel. The doctor recommended hitting pause until restrictions were lifted.
Sarah decided to see a nutritionist to see what she could do on her own in 2020. The nutritionist ran a Dutch test to tested her levels of estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. The results showed she was low on progesterone and testosterone. The nutritionist gave her supplements to help regulate those. Next, Sarah saw an acupuncturist weekly because she read it’s supposed to help with fertility. She told Sarah she would get her pregnant in six months. Sarah also did Reiki to balance her energy. In 2021, within six months, as her acupuncturist promised, Sarah was pregnant. She was thrilled and excited. At 10 weeks, the doctor couldn’t find a heartbeat during the scan. She left the office crushed. The next cycle, she was pregnant again. At the 10-week scan, she heard a perfect heartbeat. At 13-weeks, the blood test showed abnormalities with a third chromosome, trisomy 13. It was incompatible for life, so she had a D&N.
Am I ok with donor eggs?… I think this is my best chance.
At 41, she gave her body a 4-month break and had her first egg retrieval. She had ten eggs, all ten fertilized, but none of them made it to be an embryo. She couldn’t believe it. She expected at least 3-4 embryos. Sarah was crushed. She bought an IVF financing bundle that included two egg retrievals. Her insurance didn’t cover anything, so she was looking for a deal. In 2022, she got five eggs for her second egg retrieval and all fertilized. Again, none of them made it to an embryo. Sarah thought she couldn’t keep doing the same thing over again. It wasn’t working and wanted to know her options. The doctor suggested using donor eggs. She wasn’t sure she was ok with it. She knew her baby wasn’t going to have her DNA but would have her husband’s. More importantly, she had a higher chance of success using the eggs from a younger woman. She really wanted a baby, so she decided she was okay with it.
I have to do it. There is something in me, this is what I really want. I want a baby.
Sarah started looking for donors. The doctor recommended two egg banks, one in Dallas and the other in Virginia. Sarah went with the one in Virginia. Sarah wanted the donor to have blue eyes and be caucasian. It took her six months to find the right donor. She found a donor that was very similar to her who was also into fitness and adventure. She thought they could be sisters. Sarah put a hold for her eggs right away. There was a $100 hold and she had to decide within 72 hours if she wanted the eggs or not. They were $18,000. She had taken out two loans to finance the rounds of IVF with her own eggs, and she didn’t think she would be approved for another loan. She borrowed the money from her stepmom to pay for the frozen eggs. The six eggs were fertilized with her husband’s sperm and four of them turned into embryos by day four. On day five, she was ready for the transfer. The embryologist selected the best one to transfer but didn’t recommend testing the embryos.
The transfer was really easy. The doctors came in and took one look at her husband’s long hard and told him to put on a hair net. Sarah laughed at him for looking like a cafeteria lady. She heard Tom Petty blaring in the embryo lab and thought they had to be fun people. The doctor told her they found that the embryos produce better when they’re surrounded by music, and that’s why they always have music in their office. She liked knowing the cells were multiplying surrounded by good energy. Sarah watched the doctor put her embryo inside on the ultrasound screen. The embryologist wanted to make sure the embryo wasn’t still in the catheter, but it was. The doctor had to repeat the transfer. The doctor suggested it was a good sign the embryo was so sticky because that meant it would implant inside her. Her friend suggested she sleep on the couch, so she could be on her back for 72 hours. That’s what she did. Sarah really stayed mellow for the first two days. On day seven, she started taking home pregnancy tests, and they were positive. She got the call from the nurse who told her she had a good HGC level. The numbers kept doubling every few days. At her first ultrasound, the technician told her the heartbeat was the most beautiful sound in the whole world.
Sarah had a great pregnancy at 43. Sarah didn’t have any complications. It was the anxiety and the nervousness of something going wrong that she struggled with. She felt like she had the fear put in her: She wasn’t supposed to sleep on her back after 16 weeks, don’t sleep on the right side, only the left. She worried about what she ate and always questioned herself what she was allowed to eat. She constantly worried she might be doing something wrong. Her OB gave her permission to listen to her body and do what felt good. He told her she could work out as long as it felt good. She had been referring to dr. google which she knew wasn’t a good idea. At 10-weeks, she heard a great heartbeat but knew from her past, she wasn’t out of the woods yet. At 13-weeks there was a huge relief her bloodwork came back that the baby didn’t have any abnormalities. Later she was the most anxious during the anatomy scan at 20 weeks. They looked at the baby for about an hour and took 100 photos. The technician doing the scan made light of the situation which calmed her. She loved peanut butter. She had peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, peanut butter and banana sandwiches, and peanut butter shakes. She just craved peanut butter.
Sarah’s friend recommended her OB she saw for her care. He was just 15 minutes from her house. It is a team of four doctors that rotate and the one who is on-call would delivery her baby. After she started going to the practice, the more good things she heard from others about the doctors. At every appointment, they took turns to make sure she saw all of the doctors.
She found out the gender at 13-week when she had the NIPT test. She really wanted a girl. Her husband also wanted a girl because he already has a son. She was told it takes 7-10 days to get the email with the results. She had been checking her emails religiously waiting for that email in her inbox. At 6 am one morning, she woke up to see the email that said FEMALE. She woke her husband up to give him the results. He had the brightest, ear to ear grin after she told him.
She took a prenatal yoga class which she enjoyed being around other women that were pregnant. At the beginning of each class, the instructed asked what was going on in each of their bodies. She liked hearing from other women, but the class was a little slow for her. She also took a newborn basics class which was a 6-hour class on a Saturday. It was led by a Swedish nanny who taught what the different cries mean. She had a baby shower at week 30, so she put the nursery together after that. She had the drawers labeled with the different sizes of baby clothes. She felt prepared.
At week 30, the baby was breach. They could try to manually turn her, but the doctor didn’t recommend it because her umbilical cord was wrapped from her neck around her shoulder, kind of like a seatbelt. They wanted to watch her and suggested it might turn into a c-section. The acupuncturist suggested certain points that could manually turn her. Sarah declined. The doctor also suggested trying to turn the baby in the ER and then if something happens, he could do a c-section. Sarah declined that also. She would rather just have the c-section and not have the added stress. After week 30, she was going every two weeks, and then every week. Her baby stayed in the breech position, so her c-section was scheduled at 39 weeks.
At 39-weeks, there were six doctors in the OR for her scheduled c-section. They were all joking and playing music, so it was a happy environment. Sarah felt nothing from the waist down as she laid on the table with her husband by her side. The medication made her nausea the whole time. They gave her a tiny straw to throw up in. By the time they took the straw, she would need it again. It was non-stop throwing up through the whole surgery. Then, she finally heard her cry. She was so glad she was ok and felt relieved. Her daughter was brought over to breastfeed while her husband was right there to share the beautiful moment. She latched immediately even thought there wasn’t anything there yet. The c-section was only 20 minutes. It was wonderful.
The rest of the day, she threw up. Her stomach was sore because it’s an abdominal surgery. She said it felt like someone punched her in the gut. Sarah healed quickly afterwards. The next day she started gaining strength back and wanted to walk the halls of the hospital. She was released two days later. She was happy to go home to her comforts. Within two weeks, Sarah was jogging even though she wasn’t supposed to be. The doctor told her she could walk. She power walked, then thought she could light job which just led to jogging. She felt good.
At her six-week follow-up appointment, she asked if she could start weight training again and swimming and bike riding. He said she could do all of those things with modifications and wanted her to listen to her body. She started to feel like herself again. She really needed it. Exercise and being outside made her feel good.
Sarah started breastfeeding. Her daughter had lost weight in the beginning, so the doctor recommended she supplement with an ounce of formula after she breastfed. She found it alleviated stress and pressure from solely breastfeeding. She wasn’t sure how much milk her daughter was getting with breastfeeding and the formula gave her reassurance. It was also a time where her husband could help.
The first four days Sarah was home was very overwhelmed. It felt like panic-attacks and very chaotic. There were so many people that wanted to come over to congratulate her, but it was too much. After four days of having visitors, she had to put an end to it. She needed two weeks to just be alone at home with her baby and her husband to figure it out. Everyone understood. She had a friend that is a lactation consultant that she kept on-call for the first week to answer any and all questions. She also had another lactation consultant with her insurance that she was able to zoom chat for help. Her husband took off work three weeks. It was a lot of TV time because she was breastfeeding all the time. She describes it as peaceful and wonderful.
Rate, Review, & Follow on Apple Podcasts
“Your podcast gives me so much hope!” If that sounds like you, please consider rating and reviewing my show! This helps me support more women— just like you — have a better TTC experience to pregnancy in your 40’s. Click here, scroll to the bottom, tap to rate with five stars, and select “Write a Review.” Then be sure to let me know what you loved most about this episode!
Resources:
Over 40 Fabulous and Pregnant on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/over40fabulousandpregnant/
Sarah on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Sarahhkouri/
The pregnancy Deck: https://thepregnancydeck.com/
Leave a Reply