Over the years I have treated many cases of infertility. These cases were the most challenging. Case#1: 25 year old female LS. LS was told
Over the years I have treated many cases of infertility. These cases were the most challenging.
Case#1:
25 year old female LS. LS was told by her doctors that she would not get pregnant. LS did not want to believe them and took matters into her own hands. Researching acupuncture LS reached out to us.
After doing a full intake we found out that as a child she was overweight. As an overcompensation LS became a fitness addict. LS had 0% body fat and increased muscle mass. As a result there was an imbalance of her female hormones. LS had not had a period in four years.
After two years of acupuncture and herbs she gave birth to a baby boy. This was the most challenging case by far to date.
Case#2:
37 year old female IP. IP had just ended her first cycle of IVF unsuccessfully. She had heard that acupuncture can help boost the success rate of IVF. We began treatment while she was attending her reproductive endocrinologist. frequent testing showed that her hormones were normalizing. I remember her saying “my LH (lutenizing hormone) is at a good level and all I’m doing is the acupuncture.”
Over a period of seven months I suddenly lost track of IP. I called and called. I thought I had done something to hurt the patienI. IP called three months later out of the blue to thank me. she had gotten pregnant. IP told me that the institution where she was doing the IVF treatment had done a pregnancy test and it came back positive. they further told her it was ectopic and needed to be aborted. Wisely she saw her gynecologist. He confirmed that everything was normal and that she should break from further treatments. She now has a baby girl.
Case#3:
36 year old female YB. after one successful pregnancy YB wanted to have another child. unfortunate she had suffered multiple miscarriages.
The significance of this case is that even though she had a successful pregnancy in past the she was diagnosed with infertility. After eight months of treatment she got pregnant.
In the eighth month of her pregnancy YB lost her mother. Although her mother was terminally ill it was hard blow. in the end she gave birth to a baby boy.
Case#4:
36 year old female TT. TT was on her eighth cycle of IVF. She had one successful pregnancy with IVF and was trying to get pregnant a second time. Three of the cycles were freshly harvested eggs and four were frozen.
TT was very excited about the prospects of trying acupuncture but was disheartened after so many failures. I mentioned that every attempt was a different scenario including the current cycle with acupuncture. I referred to the “German study.” This case stated that women who received acupuncture before and after embryo transfer had a higher success rate of implantation than those women who did not. I also explained that we would treat twice a week for two months until TT went for the transfer procedure. I also encouraged TT to do what the German study suggested and go before and after transfer and she did.
The most significant thing we worked on was not to have any expectation. Although; we did everything by the book including acupuncture, TT could not spend time thinking about whether or not she would get pregnant. expectations often create scenarios that do not come to fruition and one can not spend time thinking about the future if one is not there yet. We can only treat and take it one day at a time. The worst case scenario was that the ivf would fail. We set up post IVF treatment protocols. TT could continue getting acupuncture until she got pregnant. She was fine with that case but she did not want to pursue IVF any longer.
TT had a baby boy.