Things That Make You Think

In the past week I've read two things that stopped me in my tracks about in vitro fertilization (IVF). As you probably know, this is the we got Reagan and Nolan.





The first thing I saw was: World's first IVF baby marks 30th birthday



I knew IVF was a new procedure in the medical world, but to see it in print really made me think about it. This technique was developed in my lifetime. Anyone having trouble conceiving before 1978 did not have the option that allowed us to be blessed with Reagan and Nolan and our 2 totsicles (frozen embryos.) I'm sure in another 30 years there will be some new breakthrough that wasn't available to me that will make IVF seem barbaric. So, thank you to Drs. Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe for developing the procedure that allowed my children to be.



Secondly, I was reading about the Jolie-Pitt twins, you know, looking for contact info so I can arrange a play date and we can discuss the ins and outs of raising boy/girl twins. I found this to be very intersting, " The chance of having fraternal twins at Angelina’s age (33) naturally is under 1 percent; with in vitro, the chances are 25 percent. Says Dr. Arthur Wisot of L.A.’s Reproductive Medical Group." I'm not sure how they came up with that percentage. Anyone familiar with IVF knows that it is a crapshoot. I mean you can transfer 1 embryo or 3 or 4 depending on your doctors recommendation. Even after that, the embryo can split and you could have multiples that way. But anyone that is doing IVF is well aware and (most) are welcoming to the fact that you could have multiples. Many of us only had 1 shot at making this work so it really can be time to put all your eggs in one basket (pun intended.) Also, I have male twin cousins that were born when their mom was close to 40. They are a year older than me, so they fall in that "less than 1%" catergory. Amazing!

At any rate, we did well with the odds given.

Finally, a friend forwarded me this quote by Albert Einstein "Not everything that can be counted counts. Not everything that counts can be counted."