You asked for it, and here it is. In this solo episode, Dr. Sasha Hakman walks through her own two IVF cycles in full detail — the exact medications, doses, trigger decisions, lab outcomes, and the reasoning behind every choice she made. As a reproductive endocrinologist who has navigated IVF both as a clinician and a patient, she brings a level of transparency you rarely get from a doctor. From a purely elective embryo freeze at 32 to a second retrieval at 37, this episode breaks down what actually goes into building a family through IVF — and helps you understand your own protocol along the way.
In this episode, we cover:
Why Dr. Sasha chose to freeze embryos at 32 — before she was ready to have children — and the reasoning behind creating embryos vs. freezing eggs
Her diagnosis of Non-Classical Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (NCAH), what it is, and how it contributed to her ovulatory dysfunction
Her baseline fertility stats: AMH of 4 ng/mL and 30+ follicles — even while on continuous birth control pills
Cycle 1 at age 32: antagonist protocol, 275 units of Gonal-F + 75 units of Menopur, and why she chose a combination Lupron + low-dose hCG trigger The OHSS she developed after her first retrieval — how bad it got, and how she managed it at home
Why she got 26 eggs but only 11 were mature — and why she was so disappointed with that outcome
Cycle 2 at age 37: what changed in her protocol, and what the data from cycle 1 taught her
Final embryo outcome: 6 blastocysts, 3 euploid (1 male, 2 female), 3 aneuploid
ICSI — why she chose it even without a male factor diagnosis, and the case for doing it even when sperm looks great
Assisted hatching — what it is, why she opted in, and the small but real risk of monozygotic twinning
PGT-A genetic testing — how it works and why she would never transfer an aneuploid embryo
Delayed vs. immediate egg stripping — an inside look at embryology lab practices most patients never hear about
What she did NOT add to her protocol — no growth hormone, no embryo glue — and why she kept it evidence-based and simple
The future of IVF: personalized genetic protocols that could one day predict how your ovaries will respond before your first injection
Pregnancy update: 23 weeks, scheduled for a fetal echo, and feeling every bit of the third trimester
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Instagram: @sashahakmanmd @tryingpod
YouTube: @sashahakmanmd
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