Coffee Break: Emilie Handbag

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black leather handbag with triangular flap and buckles

I love the look of this crossbody from French brand Le Tanneur.

It looks like a great size for daily use, and the triangular flap, as well as the contrasting leathers, really makes it look luxe. The T-shaped buckles are a signature of theirs.

The pictured bag is not on sale, but they do have a bunch of nice things in their winter sale, including a fabulous large tote and this fun orangey yellow crossbody. If you're looking for a simple backpack or briefcase, there are a lot to choose from in the men's sale.

The pictured bag is $660. It comes in 10 other colors, as well as a smaller size.

Sales of note for 2/14/25 (Happy Valentine's Day!):

  • Nordstrom – Winter Sale, up to 60% off! 7850 new markdowns for women
  • Ann Taylor – Up to 40% off your full-price purchase — and extra 60% off sale
  • Banana Republic Factory – 50% off everything + 15% off (readers love their suiting as well as their silky shirts like this one)
  • Boden – 15% off new season styles
  • Eloquii – 300+ styles $25 and up
  • J.Crew – 40% of your purchase – prices as marked
  • J.Crew Factory – 50% off entire site and storewide + extra 50% off clearance
  • Rothy's – Final Few: Up to 40% off last-chance styles
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – Flash sale ending soon – markdowns starting from $15, extra 70% off all other markdowns (final sale)

143 Comments

  1. Randomly: does anyone know why Meta’s stock keeps going up up up? I bought some long ago and have been selling it off because I’ve been uncomfortable with the company’s policies — last summer I sold a lot around $215 per share. Today, $698. Why???

    1. Because their profits are up and beating expectations. Most investors, particularly institutional investors, do not care about a company’s political stance. They care about making money.

        1. Meta is a publicly-traded company and all of this information is available from its filings. About 99% of its total revenue is from advertising.

          1. How do you block the ads? Half the “content” they stick in your feed is ads.

          2. I always go to my feed (which is only people/pages/groups I actively follow). It looks like the link is https://www.facebook.com/?filter=all&sk=h_chr ?

            If I just browse what appears when I scroll, it’s a bunch of AI generated inspirational photography and comics with no punch lines. If they’re ads, I don’t know what they are ads for.

    2. Just wanted to say, thank you for this. I don’t own Meta stock but I have sold my Tesla stock, deleted my Amazon app and am not on FB. I am so sick of how the Big Three either bought this election or are syncophants to the King that I just cannot give them any of my business or indirect revenue in any way. Instagram is going to be the next to go.

  2. Looking to splurge on new sunglasses as a reward for some incredibly tough work travel that is now ending. Willing to pay up to $500 or more if they are really cute but obviously open to less. I have a sort of big head, so I usually avoid the smaller styles.

    Any all-time favorite sunnies?

    1. These are not luxury but I love my Warby Parkers. They are a good size – big but not laughable. Mine are prescription and I’ve been using the same pair for 10+ years. Super sturdy. They are a classic brown/tortoiseshell, but WP has all kinds of if you want something more in the moment.

      1. I’ve got opposite problem and have a small head. I’m a fan of WP because they make some styles in different widths to fit different head sizes.

      2. Same. My WPs are progressive lenses so def old lady land, but at least I can have cool frames around my bifocals. :)

    2. My favorites are in Anne et Valentin frames. Full disclosure: I pick out frames I like at my optician and order two pair – one with normal sunglasses lenses and another with my prescription in sunglasses lens. I got what I consider to be a classic shaped frame, have had the scrip lens replaced twice with newer scrips, cannot remember how long ago I bought them as it has been a while, and the frames still please me and are in good condition.

      1. I bought these frames at an optical shop in France and I’m a total convert! They are so stylish, light and comfortable and I have a high index prescription.

  3. I have Goodr sunglasses that are phenomenal as sunglasses, especially for driving into the sun. But I otherwise wear progressives. I have Rx progressives and progressive reader sunnies from Foster Grant that are only meh in bright sun and no longer good enough as readers. What should I get for progressive readers for strong sun? Is there an Rx item type I need to look at? The Goodrs are excellent for driving but not if I’m at a restaurant outside and need to read a menu or know what to tip.

    1. I have had luck with polarized progressive sunglasses from Costa and Maui Jim. They are not cheap and are not generally covered by vision insurance, but they are very very good. For something less expensive you could try Warby Parker.

  4. I need something like yesterday’s straw man art sale caper to get me through a CLE. Pls someone help!

  5. what are your worst “asked someone out” stories?

    i don’t know why i was thinking about this the other day. one guy in college i remember asking out several times, at several points over the years… i just could not take a hint apparently.

    1. Not an ask out story, but I have an awkward college break up story. I was in a situationship with a guy and decided I was done. While we were lying on his bed making out. So I suddenly sat up, rambled on about being friends for a few minutes and then peaced out. I had to clarify the break up the next weekend when he swung by my dorm to see if I wanted to hang out.

      1. I am so awkward with my situationship partner. He is the one person who makes me a mumbling, inarticulate, insecure mess. I am totally good if we are meeting up, but if I just run into him – and I do – I feel like such a dork. He is genuinely “cool” by any measure and I think I really feel that when we are out in the wild.

    2. You just brought back memories of me flirting hardcore with this guy in my class in college who I later found out was gay. I could not take the hint.

      1. This also happened to me! I was flirting with the guy and then he told me he wanted to be a Catholic priest…he came out about 10 years later.

      2. If it makes you feel better, I have wondered if my husband is gay. You flirted – I married the guy!

        1. I am acquaintances (he’s in my broader social circle) with a gay man who tricked a woman into marrying him and having his kids. I hate him more than any other person because it’s so scummy to basically steal another humans life and chance at happiness. Such a selfish dirt bag and so covertly misogynistic.

          1. Me too! The mom was a close friend and her kids are great but boy did he cause heartache and chaos.

    3. At one point in college I went on a date with a guy…thought it went well but then it was spring break and then he was completely ignoring me and I was like wtf (we did an activity together). Turned out that he’d gotten his high school ex pregnant over Christmas and at spring break they’d gotten together and decided to get married and keep the baby! So…

    4. Not asked out. But my worst first date was fresh out of grad school. I didn’t want a guy to drive me after having security fears jammed down my throat. So I was driving us to a restaurant. I started drinking a Diet Coke I had left in my console and totally forgot he was there. And then I produced like the biggest burp of my life. He just stared at me. I seriously want to crawl in a hole looking back. Like what the heck was wrong with me?! (I didn’t get a second date. 😆)

      1. I just want to say this is 100% something that would happen to me and it’s kind of hilarious.

    5. I did first contact with a guy on a dating app once. We went out, it was abundantly clear he was gay, then he admitted his mom just wanted him to get married. “To a woman,” he added. Then we went to his apartment so I could give him my opinion on what drapery color would go with his new sofa. He was balding and talked about shaving his head and I said I would do it for him if he wanted.

      Months later I made first contact with a different guy. He responded “are you still going to shave my head?”

      Same guy. Different profile.

      I really think I missed an opportunity to make a new bestie, but he was very determined to find a woman to marry!

    6. in law school i was a very inexperienced, young 23 and somehow fixated on a 45-year-old fellow student. i was so awkward around him. asked him out once, then worried (from his reaction) that i had been unclear, so asked him out again and no, he just wasn’t interested. gah.

    7. I have a degree in computer science. The dating motto amongst the other women in the program was “the odds are good, but the goods are odd.”

      As such, I went on some weird dates. A highlight includes the guy who was sweet but super sheltered. Comes out on the third date that his dad “had a vision from Joseph Smith” and thought that he was a prophet of another restoration. This poor boy had spent a couple years of his life living in the mountains with his family waiting for doomsday. Never came, so they were kinda reintegrating with society. Boy still believed his dad was some sort of prophet. I felt really bad for the guy, but I am not dealing with that baggage.

  6. Can anyone explain the national report card about 8th and 4th graders in reading and math? With all the money, with all the programs, how can these students not read or do basic math? I personally have long thought it’s poverty, with parents not understanding the importance of reading, plus struggles with life’s necessities making it hard to learn. But…still? Hooowww?

    (As a wild and snarky aside, since a vast proportion of American kids aren’t learning anything, why not stop school at 8th grade for most kids and send them into the trades and save the taxpayers billions? Kids with college interest could go to high school of course.)

    1. Why not? Because having an educated populace is – shocker – good for everyone. Otherwise we end up electing fascists because of egg prices.

      1. Trade school is an education with a skill attached. I sat next to a teenager from Finland on an airplane once and he was already tracked to go into a trade and was beginning to form his HS education around it. I think it’s a great idea, even if college is the goal, to have people learning trades.

        1. Do you think most 13 year olds are fully educated enough to both function in society and to decide whether to stop further education in hopes that they can make it in the trades?

          Your example is a high school student planning to go into a trade rather than college, not an 8th grader skipping four years of even basic math, English, and history to build houses or read electrical diagrams.

        2. I will follow up to say that I don’t think learning a trade is the same as obtaining a fundamental baseline understanding of how society and our government works, where things went off the rails in history and how they have actually worked, life skills like basic algebra, logic and reasoning, important scientific information, and fundamentals of communication, including how to evaluate information.

          And if education can stop at 8th grade, how many underprivileged students would be forced to stop there due to family pressures or financial inability to continue further?

          History has been through that before and it didn’t result in a place where people could find their own level and flourish. It doesn’t just a result in situation where the mechanic who could fix diesels from age 3 was no longer pressured to finish high school, it means his kid sister who dreamed of being a civil rights attorney has to leave school at 14 to work at the hair salon because her parents couldn’t afford anything further, and she never gets a chance to chase her dream.

          1. Okay, but I know a lot of people who didn’t learn any of those things in school and also didn’t learn a trade. I honestly think that learning some kind of hands on skill can help with academics when they aren’t going well; it’s a concrete lesson that things exist outside you that matter and that learning can help you deal with obstacles and achieve goals. So learning some kind of non-academic skill might help school go better (no need to stop all academics to learn one).

          2. If you truly didn’t learn basic algebra in school, that is not evidence that it should not be bothered with at all. Rather, that’s a sign of our failure as a society to fully fund and support robust public education.

      2. That’s true, which is why people are getting concerned about what even well funded public schools are doing.

    2. Because the trades require literacy. The skills deficit shown in these tests means these kids will struggle to pass the written portion of a driving test or fill out an online job application. We keep kids in school in the hope we can help them get to the level where they can hold down any kind of job.

      1. See, this doesn’t match what I know of schools and teachers. No 10th grade biology teacher is going to stay after to help Johnny with basic reading comprehension – the job’s too big by that point.

        1. It’s a range – we have Johnny who has bad reading comprehension, which is going to hinder his career regardless of whether he needs to file briefs or parse manufacturers install guidance for a furnace. We send Jack to the same school, who is bored with reading exercises, and Jack’s parents expect him to learn some biology and other basic knowledge from the school system. Teachers have to serve all kids in that spectrum which is tough.

      2. I do wonder if we’ll continue to gatekeep roles that don’t strictly require literacy with tests and applications that do. Text to speech has come a long way.

    3. In our district, they can’t read or do math because they aren’t being taught. Long division and fractions, both of which were taught in second grade in my Title 1 elementary school back in the day, are taught in fourth grade “advanced” classes and regular fifth grade classes. Algebra 1 is the equivalent of the pre-algebra course I took, and most of what I learned in algebra 2 isn’t covered until precalculus. Middle and high school teachers are forbidden to have the entire class read and discuss the same book, except for IB and AP courses. My daughter’s tenth-grade honors English class wrote no essays other than the state writing assessment. It’s madness.

      1. Any English class after 4th or 5th grade (let alone a high school honors one!!) that doesnt gave kids writing essays is educational malpractice

      2. Anecdotally, I just checked my second grader’s homework on fractions this evening. I’m not sure that everything you’re saying is accurate. Then again, I do live in a place where public school teachers make a darn good living and property taxes are high. I bring this up because I think people are committed to thinking public education can never work. It works pretty well when the community values it and it’s well funded.

    4. All the money?! Programs? As a parent of an 8th and 6th grader, I know not of this money or the programs of which you speak. 8th and 4th graders missed at least 6 months of education in 3rd and Pre-K during covid. My kids fully missed multiple months in 3rd and 1st, then were hybrid in 4th and 2nd, and finally had outbreaks that shut the school down in 5th and 3rd. These are kids whose young educational years were rocked by covid. At the same time, societal supports for parents were non-existent.

      1. + 1 – not sure what money you think is being thrown at this.

        People on this board love to bemoan the failures of public education and then routinely send their kids to private schools which spend at least 2x more per student to achieve results AND ALSO can turn away kids who have disabilities, chaotic family situations, etc.

    5. Someone here recommended “Sold a Story” on counterproductive instruction.

      The teachers I know personally say that there is a lot of top down micromanagement preventing them from focusing on literacy instruction. They can’t just drop everything they’re supposed to be teaching and do remedial instruction. Especially if the school accepts a lot of donations with strings attached (e.g. computers and then requires hours of computer use each day).

      Teacher education varies a lot too.

    6. In my kids’ school district, it’s because the money doesn’t go where it would help with instruction. The two things that would really help are better teachers and smaller class sizes. They want to run out the good teachers, replace them with cheaper new ones, and make the class sizes huge. The money flows to the endless parade of contractors and seminars for purchase.

      1. I’m in California, so YMMV, but in my district, there really isn’t a huge flow of contractors and seminars for purchase. Over 90% of our district’s budget goes to teacher salaries. It is true that it is cheaper to have newer teachers and larger class sizes. That’s just math. But I don’t see a huge outflow to third party services.

        1. Small class sizes and experienced teachers are the low-hanging fruit of improving student outcomes. Smaller class sizes are the main thing private schools offer.

          1. Smaller classes, experienced teachers with more autonomy, and more differentiation (even if it’s via admissions).

          2. Totally agree. My kids have done public and private in California. The huge advantage for private is small class size and the ability of the school to kick out (or not accept) difficult students. The teacher quality and experience is actually higher in public school, but they are teaching classes of 32+ students, where 10% of the kids have special needs, another 10% have chaotic family lives, and 10% may be food-insecure. If you could prune those kids out of a classroom just like a private school, you’d see massively different outcomes. But that also would erode the entire point of public school – which is that EVERY CHILD deserves an education.

          3. Every child deserves an education, but there need to be alternatives to the classroom. It’s an environment that causes issues rather than alleviating them for a lot of kids who need to be more active and learning a broader variety of skills.

            I was the perfect classroom student who was very academically inclined and very low energy even in kindergarten. The educational environment that made me happy and thrive was practically cruel to some of my classmates who were not meant to sit still that long! And I was miserable when creative teachers tried to make class fun and active and play based. Competing access needs are real and the classroom can not be all things to all children.

        2. Our CA school district doesn’t spend anywhere close to 90% of their budget on teacher salaries and they can barely manage spending half of their funding on student-facing operations (and needed an outside contractor to redo their budget to comply with state mandates). It’s very, very poorly run.

          1. What size district are you? We are a smaller district – total budget is only like $110 million/year, which is nothing compared to Oakland or SF – so maybe that’s the difference.

    7. I don’t necessarily agree with stopping school at 8th grade, but I do wish there was a way that kids could leave school at 16 with a high school diploma if they aren’t interested in attending college or trade school right away. There is a huge population of students at my kids’ school who are just marking time until they are 18.

      1. Post-secondary enrollment programs were really popular where I grew up (I think that is what they called them), where 16 year olds would start attending community college but keep getting credit towards high school graduation.

        1. We allegedly have dual community college enrollment but it’s basically a scam. Nobody who is interested in a selective four-year college or university can take more than a couple of classes.

          1. It’s an interesting idea if there could be some sort of two year college prep school program for students who are interested in a selective four year college or university. Maybe that’s what some programs for advance learners end up being?

    8. 1) Special education services are critical but extremely expensive. The general education budget for a single student in California is about $9000. For a student receiving special education services, it’s $26,000. You can’t talk about “all the money” without understanding where it actually goes. And incidentally, I don’t even think that $26,000 is necessarily enough for the services that are required – just noting that SPED services are profoundly expensive.
      2) Teachers are being paid incrementally more (though still not enough) which means that class sizes are larger.
      3) Covid broke the relationship between families and schools. Attendance declined massively even after kids came back to campus.
      4) Screens have broken the attention span of our kids and basically stopped them from reading for pleasure, at all, which is demolishing their ability to learn in school.
      5) A systematic conservative attack on public schools has eroded the trust that parents have in the school system, which means that when school leaders discipline students or set expectations, they get zero support from parents. Alternatively, parents today don’t know how to discipline. Pick your preferred explanation.
      6) It’s still about poverty. Socio-economic status has a massive impact on educational outcomes.
      7) Covid. I don’t think it’s possible to underestimate the impact of school closures, and I say that as a dyed in the wool Democrat and liberal.
      8) Finally, there frankly just isn’t enough money. It is expensive to educate children, full stop. We spend a lot of money on it, but it’s not enough – as evidenced by the fact that even at higher teacher pay, we still see massive teacher shortages.

      1. There is zero discipline in our county public schools. Teachers are unable to maintain discipline in the classroom because administration and parents don’t support them. Mainstreaming, refusal to track, and a total refusal to expel disruptive students or to send them to the alternative school are hugely problematic.

      2. A lot of teachers accept pay cuts to go private; it’s not all about pay. To me it seems like we need to spend more money on everything else children need so they’re coming from better situations at home and are in a better place to focus on learning. They also need to be working towards their own goals and futures and not just force fed someone else’s priorities, because that’s not how learning works. There has to be at least some buy in and engagement, or it doesn’t stick.

        I always thought of the library as an actual educational environment and the typical day at school as an ordeal of chaos vs. discipline where 80% of time was wasted as if it were just set on fire in just trying to get kids to calm down. I assume the difference was that kids go to the library with the intention of learning, and they go to school because they’re just made to.

        Now there seem to be much better schools out there, that kids actually want to attend, but they’re also the schools that everyone was trying to get their kids into.

    9. yeah I don’t get it. Our local public school district (normal nice suburb in a MCOL area) spends over $15,500 per student and has fewer than 40% of students at grade level. They have huge facilities for sports and music/theater, computer and robotics labs, iPads for every student, and complain constantly that they need more funding.

      My kids’ private school spends less than $8,500 per student. There is no technology (just chalkboards with actual chalk), no A/C, no sports facilities or labs of any kind. And over 90% of students are at or above grade level (even though the school does admit children with disabilities, including conditions like Down syndrome).

      We selected my kids’ school for religious reasons so there are certain features that make it easier for our school to cultivate high achievement – 95% of students live with their two married parents, for instance, even though there is wider economic diversity than at the public school.

      But I don’t understand why the public school, with 83% more funding per student than my kids’ school and fewer economically disadvantaged students, can’t get even HALF as many kids at grade level as we do.

    10. A huge chunk of this is COVID shutdowns. Kids who are now in 4th grade missed out on critical instruction, particularly in reading. Also, I can only speak for my NYC 4th grader, but, on top of that, she had to deal with an “intuitive reading” curriculum and didn’t learn phonics based reading skills until 2nd grade. We are a literate family. She’s been read to every day of her life since birth and loved reading, but actually learning to read was a struggle. Spelling is still a huge struggle. And once you’re in 4th grade, school can’t help you catch up (up to 4th grade you are learning to read, 4th grade on you’re reading to learn…) Everyone I know in our well ranked school has either struggled with this, hired tutors to help, or had very very hands on parents basically doing their own teaching from the get go.

      I agree with the comment about religious school doing better. At least in our area, they didn’t shut down or shut down way less and they never bought into BS reading curricula for reading and math (vs. our public school where my daughter was scolded for ‘stacking’ numbers to do addition instead of picturing those numbers on a number line…)

      If I didn’t experience all this myself I would have said it was impossible that any child I have would struggle with something this basic, but live and learn. I have a younger kid who didn’t have to go thru pre-k and kindergarten during Covid shutdowns and he’s reading leaps and bounds better (helps that the school also revamped their curriculum to actually teach kids to read). I think math is similar, particularly for 8th grade where they missed out on core foundational blocks due to Covid.

  7. T/W: Infertility

    Just starting the IVF journey and had the initial consult yesterday. The doctor said that the National American Board Academy of People Who Monitor This wont let them transfer more than one embryo at a time. I thought it was normal to do more than one? (We’d really love twins.) I don’t know what to google to search this myself. Thanks.

    1. Maybe it’s because of selective abortion to reduce the number of embryos that “take”. Probably. I don’t know for sure.

      1. No. It’s because twin pregnancies have a higher rate of maternal and fetal complications. Singleton pregnancies are materially safer for all involved.

        1. Exactly this. Transferring multiple embryos used to be standard practice, but with increases in success with one embryo transfer and singleton pregnancies being generally safer, that’s no longer the standard approach. I did IVF last year at a big research hospital (non-religious) and that’s where I learned this. Good luck!

        2. This. I understand the desire to have twin children, but it’s not really something you should wish for. It’s dangerous to both mother and babies.

    2. American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) guidelines are to transfer no more than one embryo for patients under 35 and to consider only one for patients 35-37. They are deliberately trying to avoid twins since the risk of complications is higher than singleton pregnancies.

    3. are you going through a hospital or doctor associated with a hospital? are you sure the hospital isn’t secretly Catholic?

          1. No. JH in Baltimore. But perhaps that one and mine are governed by the same entity?

          2. Stuck in mod, so let me try again. I went through M G H in 2010 and 2011, and, at that time, only they would transfer only one. Incidentally, that baby is turning 14 next month

          3. No, I don’t think so. We discussed implanting multiples at MGH and ultimately could not (another post is in moderation explaining) bc of my uterus. This was as recent as the last couple years. But they were just awful on several other fronts, so I wondered if you got weird information from them.

      1. IVF mom here: this is not a secret Catholic thing. It really is the best evidence-based practice for most patients to do a single embryo transfer; most REs will consider a double transfer only after previous failed transfers, and not with PGT-tested embryos.

      2. It’s not a catholic thing it’s a health thing. I have a long comment in mod but there are good reasons to do one at a time.

    4. I can’t speak to what’s allowable or not, though this is the first I’ve heard of such a regulation.

      However, no it’s not “normal”. It’s situational. In my case we couldn’t ever transfer two. Per conversations with my doctor, I had a deformed uterus that was surgically repaired, but was not perfect post surgery. Twins, either spontaneous or from two embryos, would have resulted in having to terminate one of them because it was extremely risky for me to carry two babies.

    5. I did IVF some years ago, so I may be forgetting some other factors, but there are a number of reasons for this, including:
      1) Single embryo transfers are successful significantly more often than double embryo transfers;
      2) An embryo splitting into identical twins is more likely in an IVF pregnancy. With two embryos, you now have a higher chance of high-order multiples, which is obviously very risky; and
      2) Even twin pregnancies without additional splitting are higher risk than pregnancy with one baby.

    6. Twins have a higher rate of resulting in stillbirths, profoundly premature, unhealthy or disabled babies, loss of a uterus, basically every maternal pregnancy complication, and other major consequences. The standard is to target one healthy baby at a time.

      If you have had multiple transfers fail, or if you are very old, they may consider transferring multiples. But otherwise, medical ethics dictate against raising the risk of multiples pregnancies.

    7. It’s a safety thing and has been the standard for a while. Twins are not safe for mom or babies.

    8. My IVF clinic’s policy was to transfer one embryo at a time, with rare exceptions. I never understood why clinics transferred more than one embryo at a time. Is it because the parents wanted twins/multiples?

      1. Or because they wanted to increase their odds of having at least one embryo implant

        1. But it doesn’t increase the odds of pregnancy, just the odds of a multiples pregnancy, for most women.

    9. This is absolutely the correct standard. Multiples pregnancies are higher risk for baby and mom. Like: higher risk of stillbirth, of profound birth defects, of loss of a uterus for mom, of every pregnancy complication.

      There are certain circumstances where they will eventually transfer two, like if you transfer 3+ times with no implantation, or if you are very old. But medical ethics dictate against increasing the risk of multiple pregnancies. One baby at a time is safer for everyone.

      Sorry if this shows up twice—first attempt at this got eaten.

    10. It’s no longer considered a best practice to transfer multiple embryos if the embryos have been genetically tested. Twin pregnancies (and higher-order multiples) carry higher risks for the mother and the babies, so that is why it is not recommended.

      Source: did IVF. Am now a happy mom. :)

      Follow @jennakahn_md and @lucky.sekhon on IG for more info about IVF

    11. I had the same question when I started my journey years ago. I ended up being offered the option to implant 2 at once toward the end of this journey, and I decided to do just one. I’ll explain.

      An IVF pregnancy is already high risk by definition. A twin pregnancy is also high risk. Adding more risk factors increases the dangers for both you and baby.

      If one embryo doesn’t take, it can take the other embryo with it. Miscarriage of one embryo often leads to a miscarriage of the other. If the miscarriage does not complete on its own then “products of conception” have to be removed via a D&C and they likely are removing the other embryo too in order to save your life.

      Due to my age (40) and a number of other factors, I was eventually offered the option of transferring 2 embryos at once. They were the only 2 I had left, so I didn’t want to risk them. I’m currently pg with one and the other is still on ice.

    12. OP, the relevant professional organization is ASRM. The guidance you’re being told is correct.

      1. Also, I do not blame you for wanting twins. I also wanted twins after such a long infertility road! But the risks are much higher for both you and the babies, including a pregnancy that results in permanent loss of fertility and/or no living babies. Sounds like there are at least two of us with long comments to that effect in mod.

    13. Yup im in Canada (so presumably a different board) and was told the same – because of the risk of complications with twins. All the best with your IVF journey!

    14. A friend is currently pregnant after her first embryo transfer. Her care team would only transfer one. I was surprised but was she was advised this is the current standard of care.

    15. Absent multiple miscarriages or other conditions, in this day and age no reputable doctor should implant two on a first go around. It used to be more common to implant two bc the success rates used to be much lower. A twin pregnancy is high risk. The goal is not to set you up with a high risk pregnancy (i say this as a mom of healthy twins)

    16. No. It’s ASRM. Twins are risky and reduce your chance of one healthy baby. There’s so much info on IVF out there! Start learning.

    17. It is sooooo risky to have twins, you need to listen to your doctor. It’s not routine anymore because IVF has gotten much better. Do not put yourself and/or your future children at risk just because you think it would be convenient or cute to have twins.

    18. Counterpoint. Everyone I know who did IVF 10-15 years ago implanted two to have twins (and it’s a LOT of people). They are all fine and thriving and didn’t have complicated pregnancies either. If it’s something you want to do, I’d see if another clinic is a better match.

  8. Does anyone have experience with the “CareerOneStop Interest Assessment”? My middle schooler just took it and the 15 pages listing 240 careers he might be interested in is a bit too much to be useful. Apparently the data and formula for matching interests to careers came from the DOL (O*NET).

    1. I wish I had ever been given a list of 240 potential careers. I feel like the only one I ever got back was “lawyer”. I’d try breaking that list down into groups of 20 and ticking off the ones that are immediate no’s and then make a new list. Is there any reason he needs to decide something now?

      1. I did a similar test in my home country (also department of labor directed). Somehow lots of us got back Puppeteer as potential career, lol!

  9. What is some good scar covering make up for the face I can find in a drugstore? Need it for a meeting tomorrow so I don’t have time to ship. I have a (relatively small) surgical scar that is slow to heal from a surgery 2 weeks ago. Would like to cover it as much as possible.

    1. Maybe a silicone filler like elf power grip primer and a concealer? Depends on contours of scar.

      But: you had surgery. It’s fine. People will understand.

  10. Interested in getting away for spring break with our kids. We’re looking at Cancun. Travel time is such a limiting factor for us, as almost any destination will require multiple fights. Is three or four nights worth the hassle and expense? (This is the question I ask nearly every time.) We really can’t extend it much longer than that due to other commitments.

    1. I would think it’s worth it if you can fly straight from your airport to Cancun, and then stay somewhere that’s no more than a 30 minute ride from the airport.

      1. Do you have a big time change adjustment? May be worth it if you get more time there, or can ease back into reality.

    2. I would not go to Cancun unless on a nonstop flight. Caribbean islands deserve a connection. Not Cancun.

  11. Is there a book like Expecting Better for IVF? Because if not, I’m kind of thinking of writing one. I’ve never published a book before.

    1. I don’t think the evidence base is deep or stable enough around IVF to support a book like this, sadly!

      1. There is not a strong evidence base around anything related to pregnancy. An Emily Oster-type book looks at the existing evidence and the quality of the evidence to make informed decisions.

    2. There isn’t. And I have actually written to Emily Oster to write this book! I don’t know if she will, but you should. IVF is a complex and confusing process. The last embryo we had was a mosaic and I had to do extensive research on genetic testing of embryos and what it means to have a mosaic embryo. It was not easy to find that information, especially because I don’t have a medical background. Turns out genetic testing of embryos is an area where the technology has advanced faster than the medical field. No one knows what the results of a genetic test actually mean. The results are probably meaningless, and an arbitrary test like that is maybe only worth it if you had 10 embryos to choose from, not the three I had. Wish I had known that before we paid $5000 for genetic testing. My fertility journey is thankfully over, but I would have appreciated a book that explained the implications of these types of decisions.

    3. I mean, do you have any kind of qualifications to do so?

      For the rest of you looking, read the blog Remembryo.

    4. there’s two that come close: Concievabilities and It Starts with the Egg. I would start with ISWTE.

  12. We just got an email that someone from my company was on the plane that crashed in DC yesterday. So incredibly heart-breaking.

    1. It is. The flight crew was from my city. I used to live near DCA. It is so sad.

    2. The whole situation is so tragic. I know that every plane crash is a tragedy, but this one hits extra terribly for me because I keep picturing all those young skaters and their families and can’t imagine that it was just all over in a snap. There was a crash in NY in the late 90s filled with HS kids on a senior trip to Paris and I still think of it sometimes and this feels similar. All those poor people and their families. I’m sorry for your colleague.

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