What I Was Doing When I Got Pregnant at Almost 44

I had a full set of fertility tests while on holiday in Goa, including Anti-Müllerian Hormone (AMH), the marker most commonly used to assess ovarian reserve.

I received the full picture. I was in Goa at the time — sitting in a cafe, I processed the meaning of the results, and cried.

My AMH read 2.2 pmol/L (or 0.31 ng/mL in the scale used by some clinics). Depending on who is reading it, this sits at the lower end of what is considered normal for a woman of 43 — and well below what many clinics like to see before proceeding with own-egg IVF.

I did not know yet what those numbers would mean for the road ahead. But the results were in, and the clock felt very loud. Holding out for Mr Right — a highly risky strategy — clearly wasn't working. I needed a new plan. I paid for a consultation with a clinic in Spain. Then despite the many red flags, moved forward and paid the deposit.

In June, I started taking DHEA (dehydroepiandrosterone) and omega 3.

DHEA is a hormone precursor that has been the subject of significant research in the context of poor ovarian response and low AMH. It is not a magic solution, and the evidence base is still developing — but it is one of the more studied supplements in this area, and I decided, after reading as much as I could, that it was worth trying.

The doctor at my first clinic, in Spain, suggested 75mg. That's a high dose, and wasn't suggested on the basis of any pre-testing. Around 10 weeks later, I stopped it because my skin was so greasy — worse than teenage acne — and my voice was developing a low tone.

I freaked out and realised I needed to hire a qualified nutritionist to understand exactly what I needed. Not simply what a book, or another woman, recommended.

At this point I was beginning to take active ownership of what I could actually influence — and that shift in orientation mattered as much as anything I was physically doing.

My first IVF cycle.

My protocol included 225 units of Pergoveris. I primed with birth control. I went to Spain and paid a well-established clinic 8,500 euros for a "Day 5 package with PGT-A." For medication, travel, accommodation and a few extras, I spent in total around 11,000 euros.

The cycle did not result in a pregnancy. The constant disorganisation, lack of patient care, and absence of empathy made this a traumatic experience. Worse, the doctor casually mentioned I use donor eggs, as if he was talking about the weather. I was shocked. There was nowhere to go with this confusion and grief. Once your cycle is over, clinics are typically no longer interested in supporting you.

IVF is physically demanding at any age. At 43, with low AMH, and flying abroad alone for treatment, it is also emotionally demanding in ways that are hard to fully prepare for — the combination of hope, medication, waiting, and uncertainty. I didn't have a strong support network.

After the Spain IVF cycle, I hired a BICA-accredited therapist.

BICA is the British Infertility Counselling Association — their members are trained specifically in fertility-related emotional support, which is a different discipline from general counselling. They understand the clinical context, the grief, what it means to have a cycle fail or to be told your odds are not good.

Hiring that therapist was critical in helping me heal and re-focus on my goal. The experience of a failed IVF cycle is not something you simply move on from. It needed to be properly addressed before I could approach the next phase from a grounded place.

My second IVF cycle, this time in Greece. Another difficult experience.

My protocol included 300 units of Meriofert and priming with low-dose Human Growth Hormone. I felt terrible and complained several times to my doctor but was dismissed. The cycle was a disaster. I had only one mature egg and it never fertilised. If I had done a scan before I left the UK, we might have chosen to cancel the cycle.

My body had been through a lot and I felt broken physically and mentally. Some weeks after the cycle I realised hair had fallen out around my temples. I had lower abdominal cramping that continued for around 8 weeks after the cycle.

Shortly after the cycle, I flew to India to recover. I needed to be somewhere warm, restorative, and familiar.

Rest as a deliberate, intentional act is underrated in the fertility conversation. We talk a great deal about doing — supplements, protocols, cycles, interventions. We talk much less about the value of stopping, for a period, and letting the body settle. This was that period for me.

December was when things shifted most significantly, and it is the month I find hardest to summarise neatly — because several things changed.

Following my own research, I started taking Low Dose Naltrexone (LDN) that I purchased in Athens. LDN is a medication with a growing body of interest in the context of autoimmune conditions and, more recently, fertility. The evidence base is still relatively early. I was not taking it under medical guidance.

Beyond the medication, December was also about returning to something more fundamental. I was in India, eating vegetable-rich food, getting morning sunshine every day, swimming in the sea, walking barefoot. These things sound almost simple set next to the clinical complexity of IVF. I include them because they were significant in both my recovery and my preparation for more IVF cycles.

I also worked deliberately on my mindset. I had spent months inside a framework that positioned my body as failing, as unlikely, as past it. I wanted to find my way back to a different relationship with it — one that assumed capability rather than deficit. I read Paul McKenna's Power Manifesting and did the exercises it outlines.

I also wrote a little mantra to help change my very negative mindset about my ability to become pregnant. It made it much easier to be around children and to experience all the new life surrounding me as a positive feeling. Previously I'd run out of shops or crossed the road to avoid small children and pregnant women. My outlook brightened.

By January, I had made a decision: I was going back to Greece, to a clinic called Embryolab, and I committed to undertaking three more IVF cycles. This was not a decision made in desperation — it came from a place of having done a significant amount of physical and emotional work over the preceding months.

Having a clear plan, and a doctor I trusted, mattered more than I had anticipated. The sense of direction was itself stabilising.

The healthy eating continued. I reduced toxins such as sugar, except for in fruit, and kept up my protein levels. I walked, swam, hit the yoga mat, worked on my mindset.

In February, I had a chance encounter with a man who offered to be a sperm donor.

I want to be careful about how I describe this, because every woman's circumstances are different and the decisions around donor conception are deeply personal. I got to know him and somehow it felt right to try.

Not everyone will have this experience — most women pursuing solo fertility treatment use anonymous or identity-release donors through licensed sperm banks, which is a well-supported and well-documented route. If you are considering your options around donors, the Donor Conception Network (dcnetwork.org) offers excellent independent guidance.

In March, using a natural ovulation cycle, I made a first attempt at pregnancy with this known donor.

After two IVF cycles and everything that had gone into them — the protocols, the medications, the monitoring, the waiting — the simplicity of it felt almost disorienting. I worked with a local gynaecologist to be clear about my ovulation window. The scans and consults under his care were the first feeling of empathy and support I experienced from a medical expert.

Sitting in Goa again — the same stretch of coastline where, a year earlier, I had cried reading my AMH results — I took a pregnancy test. It was a cheap one from a local pharmacy but there was no doubt: it was positive.

This was on my first attempt at pregnancy, ever, aged almost 44, after two doctors said my only chance of a baby was via a donor egg.

The pregnancy was uncomplicated in medical terms — though anxiety, given everything I had been through, was a challenge. I do not think that is unusual for women who have had difficult treatment histories. The physical ease of the pregnancy did not automatically translate into emotional ease.

On December 23rd, 2025, my daughter arrived by emergency caesarean section at 39 weeks and six days.