42 and pre-sleeve

[carrieann70 14]

Hey everyone! I will be sleeved in 9 days (woo hoo!) and I'm 42 years old. I had a healthy baby boy at the ripe old age of 40 and my husband and I would really like to have another. Needless to say, while 120 pounds overweight conceiving and caring for another child is just not in the cards. My fervent hope is that I can lose at least 100 pounds by October and then start trying to get pregnant toward the end of 2013. If this works, I'll be 43 when I conceive and possibly 44 by the time I give birth - and weigh a good 70 pounds less than I did when I concieved my first child.

Here is my question for the forum - I'm reading lots of happy sleevers that are getting pregnant. Is anyone out there in their early forties, sleeved, and pregnant or given birth? Am I setting myself and potential baby up for a double whammy of complications between wls and being "older" for pregnancy? Just curious if anyone else is in my same boat.

Thanks all! Congrats to all the soon-to-be parents out there - having a son was the best thing I ever did. Hopefully being sleeved will rank up there in the top 2!!

[FishingNurse 1,210]

I'm just about 30 and pregnant. I'm not quite in your shoes but I wish you all the luck! You sound like a sensible sleever, and a good parent. Keep us posted!

[iggychic 1,405]

I wasn't sleeved when pregnant but wanted to just share some "reality" with you on being over 40 and pregnant. First...I got naturally pregnant at 42 and 45. I had the first baby as a preemie (eclampsia) and only lost the second because of an accident not under my control. She would have been fine if I hadn't been hurt badly.

I then went into fertility treatments because the clock was ticking. I found that I could get pregnant but not hold onto the pregnancy and after losing six more gave up on it. That said, remember I had two healthy ones up until the age 45. I would advise that prior to trying you go in and see a good AR specialist. Mine was a nurse (she's a dear friend of mine) and she put me on some medication that made my period timing spot on so that when we were ready we would be a leg up on that. Those can take a couple of months to work so it's nice to start early. You could do this while losing weight. The other thing we did early was to start monitoring hormone levels. That's another valuable thing to do in advance. Make sure your thyroid is all good, estrogen, etc. That way if you do get pregnant you can start on any necessary hormone therapy right away verses waiting til there are signs of trouble (which is common over 40 and much much more so each and every year past that).

I don't know how you feel about a pregnancy with a special needs child so I'll just share my choices. They're a fact of life after forty and increase significantly again each year after that. At 45 I was something like a 70% chance of Down's syndrome so with each pregnancy we had genetic testing early on in the pregnancy (and then while they were embryo's). The risks are very low and you then have a chance to either "fix" an issue if possible or to prepare yourself for your future path, either with or without continuing the pregnancy. We wouldn't have continued one ourselves, but for those who do, knowing in advance what you need to do is very valuable!

Pregnancy after 40 is harder to achieve successfully...that's just a fact of life, but it is possible for many women. I wish you the best at achieving your dream!