Dear Valerie,
I am so sorry to hear of your ectopic pregnancy and loss, sadly I am not medically trained so cannot give you specific advice on your query but will do my best to help.
For many women including myself, it can take a few months for periods and cycles to get back into a rhythm that is more usual for us so it may just be a little more time that is needed.
Trying to conceive again can be a challenging time for couples especially after experiencing loss. I will do my best to help.
While generally it is possible to conceive after an ectopic pregnancy, the amount of time it takes varies from couple to couple. Factors include age, general health, reproductive health and how often you have sex, among other things.
I wish I could give more precise information, but as I do not have access to your and your partner’s medical records, it is difficult for me to provide specific details. Generally, we and many healthcare professionals advise keeping a healthy balanced diet, maintaining a healthy weight and abstaining from alcohol and smoking.
Importantly, help is available if conceiving naturally has not yet been successful after some time trying - and the EPT advises that women under 35 should seek medical advice following 12 months trying to conceive and those over 35 should seek advice after 6 months.
The chances of a further ectopic after a first in UK is 10%. So that’s 90% chance of the embryo being in right place next time.
While generally it is possible to conceive after an ectopic pregnancy, the amount of time it takes varies from couple to couple. Factors include age, general health, reproductive health and how often you have sex, among other things. It may be comforting to know that 65% of women are successfully pregnant within 18 months of experiencing an ectopic pregnancy and some studies suggest this rises to around 85% after two years.
I do not think it will matter whether you are ovulating from your tubeless side as generally, when a person has only one fallopian tube and both ovaries, they are still able to get pregnant from an egg at the opposite ovary as an egg from one ovary can travel down the tube on the other side. The fallopian tubes are not attached to the ovaries and, at the point of ovulation, some very delicate structures called the fimbriae begin to move gently creating a slight vacuum to suck the egg toward the end of the tube it is nearest to (like lots of little fingers waving and drawing the egg towards it). So, if you have only one tube then there is only one set of receptors working and one set of fimbriae creating a vacuum and so the egg is much more likely to find its way to that tube, whichever ovary it is produced from. Conservative estimates suggest that an egg produced on the tubeless side manages to descend the remaining tube around 15 to 20% of the time.
For the best chance of success, guidance from the UK’s National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) advises that having sex around the time when the woman ovulates causes stress and is not recommended. We here at the EPT and the NHS suggest having intercourse 2/3 times between days 10-20 of their cycle when trying to conceive.
Sending much love,
Karen x
The Ectopic Pregnancy Trust
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