ICI questions

[foodislove]

Hello friends!

I haven't posted in ages so I should probably do a re-intro. I had a baby boy with donor sperm via IUI. Took me 6 tries and a boatload of fertility meds but it finally happened! On my last try before I would've given up DS is 2 now, I am 34 and my DW turns 34 in May. We are Hoosiers.

The time has come for my wife to hop on the saddle as we hope for a bio kid from each of us. She wants to do one at-home insemination, to see if it would work and save some money. I'm okay with giving it a shot but I have no idea what to do. I tried searching the interwebz but the only info I found was from forums from 2009 and it was just a bunch of ladies asking each other questions without ever providing answers themselves so... not very helpful.

I was hoping for some responses from folks who have tried at-home ICI with frozen sperm (whether the results were fruitful or not).

1) When did you perform the ICI (prior to ovulation? Right after the LH surge? Did you use OPKs?)

2) When did you collect the sperm from your bank or doctor?

3) How did you thaw it out?

4) Did you use a cervical cap or speculum/syringe/catheter combo?

5) And finally, did it result in pregnancy?

Not sure who all has tried ICI on this forum but if it doesn't work for us we're just going to go to our RE and do monitored/medicated IUIs. Hoping to get her pregnant this year while we still bear the callouses from raising a toddler. Cannot imagine going through the toddler stage again after enjoying the relative independence of an older kid for a couple years!

Any responses are appreciated!

[kona]

We tried ICI with a known donor but not with frozen sperm. We read this book and found it very helpful, The Ultimate Guide to Pregnancy for Lesbians.

It was awhile ago but I'm pretty sure we did insemination after ovulation. We used OPKs and temping.

We used a cervical cap.

We were not successful after about 4 tries. We ended up moving and that's why we stopped trying, we would have continued otherwise.

[amacbaby]

I don't frequent this board often but I thought I would chime in. We got my wife pregnant doing insemination at home after four tries (well, we got + on the first try but ended up in miscarriage). I am currently pregnant, we tried 4 tries at home, pregnant on the 4th but then miscarriage so we went to the doctor and did an IUI the next cycle and I'm currently 33 weeks. We did ICI/IUI at home (wouldn't recommend IUI at home to people that aren't comfortable/with a medical background though due to risk of infection). So we used sperm from a bank that allows shipping to home with a doctors note. We tracked our cycles closely for a few months prior to trying. We used BBT and OPK's and kept track of secondary signs like cervical mucous. We timed the inseminations after a positive OPK but hopefully right before ovulation (once your temp rises, you already ovulated). With my wife we did back to back inseminations at around 22 and 34 hours or so after a positive OPK. With me we tried both double inseminations and single and actually got pregnant when we just did one at around 24 hours. I read just about every research article on the right timing and honestly, there is not a ton of great research (like with a lot of people) and it seems to also depend on just your body. When we did the insemination, we thawed it (there are usually directions that come with the best way to thaw at home), pulled it up into a catheter on a syringe and inseminated (but that was with IUI). If I were doing ICI I would probably do the cervical cap method or just insert with a syringe slowly right near the OS.

Hopefully it works quickly for you guys!