My experience with IVF

clskier · #1 Jan 21, '10, 10:35 am

First off, this is not a thread about what is right and wrong. I KNOW what I did was wrong. I have since prayed about it, gone to confession, and been absolved. What I want to do with this thread is bring up a couple of things for anyone of the mind set I was in to think about. That being said:

My wife and I have a very strong desire to have more children. After many miscarraiges, our doctor (we had already been seeing a reproductive endocrinologist due to the miscarriages) said our last hope was IVF. We had already told him this was off the table due to our religious beliefs. He respected that decision, but IVF is his bread and butter. So we discussed a plan in which we would not fertilize any more eggs than he thought prudent to implant (i.e. we would not freeze any babys or worse). So after much thought, prayer, and tears, we decided to proceed. At this point I was sick about entering into sin with so much pre-meditated thought beforehand. This was not just a slip up, this was full out willful disobedience to the Church and God!

So by now I'm trying to convince myself what we are doing is OK since we are not creating any extra children, and the first alarm goes off when we are signing the paperwork. We had to sign a form that specified what we wanted in the event that we both died in the three days between when they fertilize the eggs and implant them. As unlikely as that situation is, there it was on paper in black and white....only two choices....either destroy the child or donate to science. That was almost a deal breaker. I just couldn't get past that. Even though the odds were one in a million, how could I sign that paper. In the end, I told myself if this was a natural pregnancy, the child would be in my wife, and pass with her.

The second alarm went off when I had to supply my part of the process. I'm a man and I would be lieing if I said I had never fallen to this sin before, but this was different. As I was carrying the beaker to the nurse, I was just thinking that this was part of a new life about to be created....in a lab. It just felt wrong.

Alarm number three was when we got the call later that day that two eggs had accepted my sperm. There were two babies of ours in that lab, and we were not there with them.

Three days later the babies were implanted in my wife. Seeing the nurse carrying a syringe, knowing our babies were in there; more alarms.

Well, the procedure did not take, the babies died, and there are two new souls in heaven. I now know better than ever why this is a sin, even if we were not creating any additional children. If you are of the mind set that IVF can be acceptable to Catholics, please think about these points long and hard.

**1ke** · #2 Jan 21, '10, 10:41 am

God bless you for sharing your story.

kristie_m · #3 Jan 21, '10, 11:17 am

Thank you....this is not a perspective that is often seen. God Bless you for sharing it!

baltobetsy · #4 Jan 21, '10, 11:28 am

Thank you so much for sharing this story. It's a part of the process that many simply refuse to acknowledge.

It may have been quite a mercy to you that the Lord called these little souls to Himself when He did. How heartbreaking would it have been for you to look into your child's eyes every day and be reminded of your sin.

May God bless you richly.

Betsy

clskier · #5 Jan 21, '10, 11:54 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by baltobetsy

It may have been quite a mercy to you that the Lord called these little souls to Himself when He did. How heartbreaking would it have been for you to look into your child's eyes every day and be reminded of your sin.

Not sure how you meant this, but I would gladly be reminded of my sins every minute of every day if it meant I could look into my child's eyes!

Lutheranteach · #6 Jan 21, '10, 12:42 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by clskier

Not sure how you meant this, but I would gladly be reminded of my sins every minute of every day if it meant I could look into my child's eyes!

I had questions on that myself....

Rence · #7 Jan 21, '10, 1:02 pm

I'm very sorry that the procedure didn't work for you and your wife, especially after all you had been though about it. I'm quite certain that had those two babies lived you would have loved them just as much as any other child you would have conceived the natural way. And looking in their eyes, you would have found them just as precious.

Thank you for sharing your story.

anneline · #8 Jan 21, '10, 2:03 pm

Thank you for sharing your story! God bless you and your wife!

petesgottheseat · #9 Jan 21, '10, 4:39 pm

Thank you for sharing your story. I know all too well what it's like wanting a baby so bad to resort to something that we know is wrong yet still going ahead and doing it anyway. It's heartbreaking.

vera dicere · #10 Jan 21, '10, 6:16 pm

Have you considered embryo adoption?

It would avoid the many sins and alarm bells you discussed and would actually save embryos who are destined to be destoryed or studied.

Rence · #11 Jan 21, '10, 6:28 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by vera dicere

Have you considered embryo adoption?

It would avoid the many sins and alarm bells you discussed and would actually save embryos who are destined to be destoryed or studied.

But isn't that forbidden by the Vatican? I thought it was......

SophiaLector · #12 Jan 22, '10, 12:38 pm

God bless you for sharing your story and my sincere condolences on the passing of your children. I have a good friend (non-Catholic) who's been through this and the outcome is just horrific. I think that doctors who perform IVF as their "bread and butter" also have an obligation to let prospective patients know that the mortality rate is shockingly high. There are some people who have been unsuccessfully trying IVF for years. The number of babies lost shadows the rates of abortion in many cases.

We are Catholic. We have to stand for life.

I hope you are considering a regular adoption and I hope your home is full of children soon!

Quote:

Originally Posted by vera dicere

Have you considered embryo adoption?

It would avoid the many sins and alarm bells you discussed and would actually save embryos who are destined to be destoryed or studied.

I have another friend who is involved in embryo adoption -- she just had a transfer today, actually. While it seems like a better option than traditional IVF, I can tell you the mortality rate is just as high, if not higher, and the "alarm bells" are just as loud. The children are Fed-Ex'ed to the clinic; artificial hormones, steroids and antibiotics are administered to the mother; the children are thawed; and an incision is made in the mother's womb where the babies will be implanted by a doctor. And, in the case of my dear friend, the babies typically do not make it. She and her husband adopted 8 embryo babies and so far 6 have died. These last two are their only remaining hope. They plan to adopt should this transfer not suceed (they are not Catholic).

I know people who have suffered with infertility and miscarriage but I know very few who have lost 6 or 8 babies naturally. And I can think of no case where someone adopted a child only to have them die within days of that adoption. When a couple adopts a living child they get that child. And they support adoption -- not abortion or IVF -- in the process.

In a perfect scenario, IVF would be outlawed and these abandoned embryos -- CHILDREN -- would be adopted and carried to term by parents who love them. But unfortunately adopting embryos is still neither unitive nor, in many cases procreative, and it supports the very thing that made these children orphans in the first place.

That doesn't mean that I don't love and support my friend or her children. I hope they live and thrive and make their parents the happiest people on earth. And I have no answer for what should be done with the remaining orphaned embryos. That's beyond my pay grade.

SophiaLector · #13 Jan 22, '10, 12:40 pm

No, the Church has not made a ruling on embryo adoption yet. But a verdict is forthcoming and the general feel is that it will be deemed morally wrong.

vera dicere · #14 Jan 22, '10, 3:33 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rence

But isn't that forbidden by the Vatican? I thought it was......

Someone already made comment that a verdict was pending. But I'd be very surprised if they said it was morally wrong.

The reality is either the embryo is adopted by a loving set of parents or the embryo is destoryed or used in research which is murder.

Yes, the chances of an embryo implanting in the adopting mother's uterus are low but at least its given a natural chance at life. Mind you, people who have adopted embryos, tend to be functionally normally reproductively and have higher rates of success.

Seatuck · #15 Jan 22, '10, 3:56 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by vera dicere

Someone already made comment that a verdict was pending. But I'd be very surprised if they said it was morally wrong.

The reality is either the embryo is adopted by a loving set of parents or the embryo is destoryed or used in research which is murder.

Yes, the chances of an embryo implanting in the adopting mother's uterus are low but at least its given a natural chance at life. Mind you, people who have adopted embryos, tend to be functionally normally reproductively and have higher rates of success.

From Dignitas Personae

Quote:

19. With regard to the large number of frozen embryos already in existence the question
becomes: what to do with them? Some of those who pose this question do not grasp its ethical
nature, motivated as they are by laws in some countries that require cryopreservation centers to
empty their storage tanks periodically. Others, however, are aware that a grave injustice has
been perpetrated and wonder how best to respond to the duty of resolving it.
Proposals to use these embryos for research or for the treatment of disease are obviously
unacceptable because they treat the embryos as mere “biological material” and result in their
destruction. The proposal to thaw such embryos without reactivating them and use them for
research, as if they were normal cadavers, is also unacceptable.37
The proposal that these embryos could be put at the disposal of infertile couples as a
treatment for infertility is not ethically acceptable for the same reasons which make artificial
heterologous procreation illicit as well as any form of surrogate motherhood;38 this practice
would also lead to other problems of a medical, psychological and legal nature.
It has also been proposed, solely in order to allow human beings to be born who are
otherwise condemned to destruction, that there could be a form of “prenatal adoption”. This
proposal, praiseworthy with regard to the intention of respecting and defending human life,
presents however various problems not dissimilar to those mentioned above.
All things considered, it needs to be recognized that the thousands of abandoned
embryos represent a situation of injustice which in fact cannot be resolved. Therefore John
Paul II made an “appeal to the conscience of the world’s scientific authorities and in particular
to doctors, that the production of human embryos be halted, taking into account that there
seems to be no morally licit solution regarding the human destiny of the thousands and
thousands of ‘frozen’ embryos which are and remain the subjects of essential rights and should
therefore be protected by law as human persons”.39

The magesterium seems to be leaning toward not allowing it. But we shall see.