First, congrats!! I didn't realize your history. That's great!

From your post below, it sounds like you bought the DHEA from www.dhea.com. Is that correct? If not, what is the name of the pharmacy you used?

Just from reading your history and knowing what others have said about dhea, I wonder if dhea is better for those who do conceive but have losses vs. others (like me) who don't usually get that far. Do you have any idea about the history of women who have been successful w/dhea? Just throwing out ideas .

Thanks!

i took dhea for more than a year. i never did the 75mg because of all the talk of hair loss, etc. i did 50mg daily for few months, and then tapered down to 25mg/day. ten or eleven months later, my hair got really oily and started falling out. at the same time, i had my dhea-s level checked, and it came back at 312. i am someone with a somewhat similar history to tracey's - one chemical pregnancy from IVF and four natural pregnancy losses. the four natural pregnancies all occurred before the dhea (and ART), and the chemical came the month i started it, from my first non-cancelled IVF. since then i haven't been pregnant once, despite 10 ivf atempts, several IUIs and a whole lot of natural cycles with a whole lot of progesterone support.

so, like we always say re. dhea, my opinion is, it just doesn't work for everyone.

i've been off of it about 8 months now. my hair loss stopped right after i quit it. of course these posts makes me feel tempted to try it again. but i think i'd probably be smarter to accept that it won't help me.

but you never know . . . .

crayo

I got pregnant after I took DHEA for 4 months. That was an IVF cycle, however, it turned out to be an ectopic pregnancy with very high Beta. Before taking DHEA, I did 2 IVF cycles, all with very poor quality embryos with 3 to 4 cells. When I started taking it, I really see dramatic improvement of my embryos. Just 2 months into taking it, I already got my embryos to 8 cells.

However, I do have some hair loss, therefore, I reduced my DHEA from 75 mg to 25 mg. It did not work for me. Then I took it at 50 mg for a while and now it is up to 75 mg per day. I have done about 10 IVF cycles with DHEA. What I found is that when my DHEA-S level is between 450 to 650, and my testosterone level is around 110 to 130 (very high level), I got the best embryos, in terms of numbers and quality. My last cycle was in May, I got 7 embryos with 4 of them having 8 cells. I now just freeze all my embryos until I can do gestational surrogacy.

My RE suggested I add estrace on CD21 two months ago. That turns out to be a great disaster. It affects the DHEA-S level and it dropped it to only 250 while I was taking 50 mg. Also, we had to cancelled that cycle because the follicles did not grow at all with stimulation. Therefore, I now up it to 75 mg. I have been taking DHEA for 20 months now. The biggest side effects for me is hair loss. However, my friend who also takes that amount for about the same length of time, she has no problem with her hair at all and she also had great improvement in her embryos. She was pregnant and then miscarriage.

Besides DHEA, you still need to have a right protocol to go with it. The EPP protocol not just affected my DHEA-S level, but it just jumps my FSH to 21!!! My highest FSH was 14.7 before taking DHEA. After that, my FSH was around 6 to 9. I checked all my blood every month and therefore I can see how these things affect me inside.

HTH

Frisbe

Just wanted to say hi! Haven't seen you in a while.
Hope things are going well in your pursuit of gestational surrogacy (that is what I am now doing), and that you will have success soon!

Good luck.
xoxoe

The first time I took it was after 6 chemicals, an ectopic and a blighted ovum. I got it from the pharmacy used by CHR in NYC. I started at 25mg 3x/day. I was on that dose for almost 3 months when I got pg w/ the twin gestation (b.o. and Trisomy 11). I had never seen a baby or hb up to that point. That was in Sept 05 when I had just turned 43. In Jan I had another ectopic so I got on the donor list. I started TTC when my DE DD was 6 months and started DHEA again but this time got it from DHEA .com. I started at 25mg 2x/day and dropped to 25mg/day after a few weeks. Both times the only side effects I had were oily skin and acne. My acne was large and painful but no hair loss etc.
I think more research needs to be done so AMA women can determine who it is right for. I think it can be huge for some women as far as success. The CHR site feels it helps with anuploid sp? eggs which us older women have. I also put my DH on supplements...can't remember if I did before I moved on to donor.
Bottom line... something made the difference for me. I added Dexamethasone and did low stims (vs high stims)with the DHEA this last time around so I can't say for sure what did the trick. I know I had some endo so maybe the successful pg did the trick. I can't help but think the DHEA helped since I got farther than I ever did the first time I took it.
Sorry for babbling but I wish I could know for sure so I could potentially help others in the same boat.
Good luck!

Tracey