[renni1010]

Well, since there aren't too many of us in each monthly group I thought I'd start a buddy group of our own...would be nice to buddy with older ladies facing the same challenges as an older pregnant person.

I hope ladies over 35 will join so we can chat about age related pg issues.

Right now what is on my mind is the amnio. I've gotten past deciding about all of the screenings and decided to just go with the amnio only to get the final result.

Still can't believe I am pg at 41 after giving up all hope!! All that money spent on FT and nothing, nada, zilch, zero; then to get pg after being "done".

[bunniswife]

Hi and thanks for this. Although I am not pregnant and will not be getting pregnant again, I was pregnant with my twins at age thirty seven. It's very true that older ladies face issues during pregnancy that younger women don't usually have to worry about. For me, it was one pregnancy that ended in miscarriage due to a chromosome disorder and the heart defect my son Calvin was born with and later died from. Those two things themselves convinced me that I was not willing to take the chance at anything going wrong again. As well, I found that pregnancy was harder on my body this last time around, even though I was thirty four when my first daughter was born. Older women are more likely to suffer from gestational diabetes, chromosome disorders, more difficulty getting pregnant and a higher rate of miscarriage.

[AMF728]

Originally Posted by bunniswife

Hi and thanks for this. Although I am not pregnant and will not be getting pregnant again, I was pregnant with my twins at age thirty seven. It's very true that older ladies face issues during pregnancy that younger women don't usually have to worry about. For me, it was one pregnancy that ended in miscarriage due to a chromosome disorder and the heart defect my son Calvin was born with and later died from. Those two things themselves convinced me that I was not willing to take the chance at anything going wrong again. As well, I found that pregnancy was harder on my body this last time around, even though I was thirty four when my first daughter was born. Older women are more likely to suffer from gestational diabetes, chromosome disorders, more difficulty getting pregnant and a higher rate of miscarriage.

Oh, great. Just what I need... MORE WORRY!! (kidding)

It was tough feeling that my reproductive life was over before I wanted it to be, but thank god, it seems like maybe it's not. If these two make it, I will be good and ready for my reproductive life to be over. But I'll be OLD by the time they're born (which means, of course, that I'm already old - older than anyone else on here I've seen).

[Kay]

I am not pregnant right now... but hope to be in Sept or October with a FET. I have a beautiful 9 mo girl who I delivered at the age of 41. I must say this pregnancy was the BEST of all my pregnancies. I had two other children in my 20's, but had much less energy and complained more of aches and pains. I gained more weight with my earlier pregnancies and had a much harder time getting rid of the weight. All of my pregnancies I had PIH and expect to have it again.
Let's hear it for AMA ladies ! I would love to join this group and cheer everyone else on until I get PG again soon! I am always glad to know I am not the only one who is experiencing this miracle later in life.
Kay

[Sparkly]

Hi ladies!

Who's getting/had CVS testing?

[amybeth]

Hi! Oh the dreaded term "AMA"! The only thing it did for me that was good was it got me extra ultrasounds that my insurance company would pay for!!!

Congratulations to everyone in this group, regardless of whether you are trying to get pregnant, currently pregnant, or have new little ones like me! We've all overcome the concern of being "old" and are working to make our dreams come true!

I had complications with my pregnancy, but no one is completely sure if it was related to me being 36 or if it was related to IVF or if it was just meant to be that way! I had placenta previa which started out as complete previa and ended as marginal previa. I've read that previa is more common in women over 35 and also in women who conceive through IVF.

I also have fibroids, of which one grew to over 10cms and another to over 5cms. I've been told that if I ever want to get pregnant again (which I'd love to!) I will have to have the fibroids removed because they haven't really shrunk. I've had those however since 2002, but they did get a lot bigger much faster than normal as a result of the stims.

Regarding the amnio, I refused to do it. Frankly, it scared me half to death and the only way I would have done it is if I absolutely had to in order to check the baby's lung development if I had to deliver early. I did do the NT Scan and the bloodwork to check for Downs and Trisomy 13 & 18, but DH and I had talked about it before and said that we would continue with the pregnancy regardless of the results so the main reason for doing the NT Scan was so that we could see the little one on the ultrasound! Happily our results were great and there was no need to do an amnio throughout the pregnancy.

I may change my mind about amnios when and if we get pregnant again. I'm 37 now and it looks like I'll have surgery to remove the fibroids later this year (Oct/Nov timeframe). My OB wants me to wait 18-24 months to deliver after the surgery, so I'd have to wait about a year after surgery before trying, meaning I'd be 38 then and 39 when I'd deliver (providing all goes well). I do have one frozen embryo which was frozen with my 36 year old eggs, so if we don't conceive naturally, we'd try the FET first.

Anyway, enough of my rambling.

[kblythe]

Hello to the mature mammas! I'm not pregnant, but I gave birth last year at the age of 41. Since I was pregnant with a donor embryo (from a 26 year old egg donor, no less), I didn't worry about amnio. But I faced a few hurdles because of my AMA. I had gestational diabetes, which ended up being a blessing in disguise. I was way healthier following the diagnosis. Like Kay, I LOVED being pregnant. And I have this great, mellow baby. I think he just picks up on my vibe of how happy I am to have him. I think we older moms just have such awesome perspective.

Anyhoo, I'll try to check in on this thread to see how you are doing. But feel free to pm me if you have any older mom/pregnancy questions.

Congrats!!!!

Kathryn.

[socaintexas]

Hi ladies. I'm 38 years old and 17 weeks pregnant with twins. I am due on my 39th birthday, but with twins they will probably come earlier. We do not have children, so this is a first for us. We opted not to do the genetic screenings or the NT scan, and are not going to do an amnio or CVS. We did go in for a level 2 ultrasound at 15 weeks 6 days and everything looked good. We go back in around 21 weeks to double check. We are just praying for healthy babies and know that God will bless us with what he feels we need. So far so good in my pregnancy, but I worry every day. I am glad this thread got started, as I feel it can be very supportive and informative.

[bunniswife]

Wow, I just reread my post from last night. I did not intend to come off sounding negative or scary. The fact is that we DO face alot of things younger women don't have to worry about. HOWEVER there is something to be said about having had babies later in life. First of all, I was absolutely ready to have them. I had done all of my partying when I was younger and by the time I got down to having children, I was willing to sacrifice everything to be a good mother. Motherhood didn't clash with my social life, it was what I truly wanted. Also, because of our AMA, most of us are more settled in life. My hubby makes good money so I was able to be a stay at home mommy to our girls. Older women also have better nutrition, better healthcare and are less likely to do things that are harmful to our bodies and to our babies. In fact, if I didn't already have two babies with problems and hadn't already lost five others in the process of trying to get pregnant, I would definitely go for it again and I applaud all of you who are choosing to give it another go. Hugs to all...

[lovingwife]

At 35, I was considered AMA when I delivered my first baby in January. I had a scare with abnormal quad screen results and was sent for a level II u/s. My chances of having a baby with trisomy 18 were 1/90 according to the quad screen but after the level II the odds went up to 1/900. The doctor was confident that the baby was healthy and did not feel that an amnio was necessary. We hope to get pregnant again in the near future and I'm torn as to whether I would do the early screening again. I feel with the age factor, any of those tests are going to come back with an increased risk for something. I was happy to get the level II and find out my baby looked healthy, but went through a week of hell waiting for the u/s.

Congratulations to all the mature moms and moms to be!

[MrsM]

This is my first pregnancy, and I am 39. We had been TTC since 2006, and my OB/GYN kept saying everything looked fine, and keep trying. I pushed to get referred to a specialist, and thankfully I did.

My RE found 3 fibroids at our first consultation. All of my bloodwork came back excellent for my age, and DH was totally fine too. He did the HSG which found no problems, then he did a lap in January which determined I had endometriosis. He removed that, and one of the fibroids that was "blocking" things. As you can see in my signature, I got pregnant on the second round of IUI with injectables. The first time around, I started ovulating before I was ready, so the second round he was more aggressive using the BCP and Lupron, and added Menopur to the stims. While I did have a mild case of OHSS, and was in a lot of pain for a couple days, it was worth it!

I am 6 weeks 5 days, and we go for our 2nd u/s on Wednesday. I pray everything is progressing normally. Other than sore BBs, some mild cramping early on, I have really felt great. (Although I am crying at the drop of a hat!) Of course I worry about AMA, and the rate of miscarriage, etc, but we want a child so badly. Believe me, I wish I was 10 years younger, but life just didn't work out that way for me!!

[Sparkly]

I don't feel old but my docs keep saying differently!

I'm healthy (bloated & constipated as all get out). I'm finally ready to be a Mom, altho saying that scares me!

Anyhow, we all here & thank god, right? We went through a lot to get here, so let's keep it positive in here, we need the support.

I just want to be at week 14 already & have a clear scan/CVS/NT. I'm glad I'm going Wed, hopefully I can get a decisive due date & find out my cyst is not a cyst at all.

[HallieL]

Hey ladies!
I'm 36 now and was 35 when I got pregnant. Don't feel old, but all the risks are still there. We opted for sequential screening and all came back okay . Unless our baby was going to be harmed, we wouldn't abort anyways. I think next time around, we will opt for the amino, we had to go to a specialist for the screening and it was long draw out process. Amino is one time 5 minutes with the level 2 u/s. Yes there is recovery time, but there is less than 1% of a chance to have a misscarriage.

I agree with that we are much more prepared for this. I will be able to stay at home as well. And I was able to finish all of my schooling through my docorate degree without having to choose between family/school which i'm not sure how some ladies did it in my program. Lots of divorces throughout the program.

My hubby and I started to clean out the house this weekend for getting the baby's room ready and I commented that we are so old and domestic that this is what excites me now. I was one of those girls that thought I would never get tired of going out on the town. I still enjoy going out but love to getting to sleep early.

Hubby and I are both in a good place financially/emotionally/physically and the new middle age is at least 65 anyways. We want to have another one soon after this one so we will start trying as soon as we can. Want it to happen naturally but if it doesn't than we will do iui again.

I'm a reading buff and of course need to be knowledgable on everything that comes my way so parenting books galore and research on what to buy the baby. Sometimes I wish I could be in lala land because we got offered a used crib/glider which are both unsafe so i had to refuse. If I didn't know all that I know I would have just taken them and be done with it, but this little girl is too important to us for me to take her saftey lightly and saftey comes before finances all the time.

We are also going to bank our baby's cord and feel really good about this decision. If we don't use it we will donate it.

Okay, think that is all for now, enjoy your monday ladies

[tracys16]

I too am pregnant with my first at a AMA. I did go through the IPS (NT Scan etc), everything came back good. I can't say that I have had much trouble yet...knock on wood that it stays that way. It took us a long time to get pregnant, but now I'm enjoying it as much as you can I guess. I do have my times that I worry and get upset over stupid stuff...but thank goodness my DH is very understanding about it. I think this group is a great idea as it allows us to talk about stuff that won't affect all those young ones. Not that I feel like I'm that old...but there are different things that we face.

[EvaR]

I am also pregnant with my first at an AMA. My baby is due 10/24 and I will be 39 in Dec. We opted to only do the non-invasive tests this time...i.e NT scan, AFP, Quad Screening and Anatomy Scan. We had decided that if something were wrong we wouldn't abort either unless it was life threatening. Thank goodness all my tests came out ok.

We are looking to start trying again 6 months after this baby is born. I know it will be hard with two little ones, but this is what we have been waiting for and we will take what God gives us. It will probably be another IUI, since I don't seem to ovulate on my own and the next time around, we may opt for the amnio since I will be 40+ when I deliver....

I am excited about being a mommy, but at the same time I am scared to death, as well. DH laughs at me and says that you would think I had never been around children before with how neurotic and anxious I am about getting things done before the baby comes. I know the baby doesn't sleep in the crib for awhile, but I want the baby's room done before the arrival. I want the house child-proofed as well, even though I know we have time for this. I also worry about other things too, like how we are going to take care of the jellybean, etc. We are financially secure and ready to have this baby, so I don't know why I get like this sometimes. Maybe it's because I just can't believe this is finally happening to me and pray that everything turns out ok. After having had a recent m/c, I worry all the time that something is going to happen.

DH and I have been done with the going out and partying, etc. for awhile. Don't get me wrong, we like getting together with friends, going to dinner and socializing, but not like we did when we were in our 20's early 30's. DH and I have also taken time to enjoy ourselves by going on vacations, etc. as a couple, but we are now looking forward to expanding our family and doing things with our children.

I'm glad that someone started this thread because it is easier talking with other ladies who are in the same age bracket. Things are definitely different when you conceive later in life.