What drives me

This is one question I get asked fairly regularly and one the recipient couple asked me immediately. There are a few answers to this question so I'll bullet point it all to make it look cool ;)

• We had it easy in terms of conception. At the time for both babies it felt like it was taking forever but realistically, it didn't. Apparently, there is normally a 25% (ish) chance of conception per month and only 65% of couples will have conceived in the first six months*

• I have a couple of friends with fertility issues who have either been through IVF or might have to at some stage in the future. I can't even imagine having to go down that road. 

• Faith. Sounds a bit cheesy but having faith in something much bigger than myself really is a driving force. I believe in Jesus but I know for some its not as simple as that. From that belief it follows on to the old adage (and bible verse- Luke 6:31) of "Do to others as you would like them to do to you." I would hope that if we were in the situation that we needed an egg donor, someone would put up their hands and say 'I will'. This is a huge driving force for me in many aspects of my life. Looking at it from this perspective it seems such an easy decision and in some ways it was. 

Have you ever had the innate urge to do something for someone? Or even just a driving force behind the thought "I have to do that". That's how it feels for me. 

I've been talking to many people about this process lately (I'm such an open book sometimes. It has its good points and bad points) and one of the biggest comments I get is one about generosity. 

Yes, its a generous thing to do. But I just want to make this clear- just because I'm doing this, it doesn't mean I think i'm more generous than anyone else. Everyone has their giftings. This perhaps is just one of my gifts. 

Hope that makes sense :)

xJ

*Fertility associates http://www.fertilityassociates.co.nz/understanding-your-fertility.aspx

Meeting the parents (well, potential parents-to-be)

I barely slept last night I was so nervous. Poor Mr3 picked up on that and for the first time since starting kindy (1 month) he didn't want to go. Of course, 5 mins later it was another story thank God!

It was so lovely having hubby with me- I find its so much easier to do scary things like this when you have the solid backup of someone you love. He had to be there anyway, but I still appreciated it. 

We spoke to the counselor for all of 5 minutes before she brought the couple in. All she asked of hubby was 'Do you consent?' and 'Do you have any questions?'. 
They walked in and we immediately remembered seeing them at the clinic walking past the waiting room. She walks in and said 'Oh I thought it must have been you when we walked past'! I suppose we were the only couple in there with a wriggly child in our lap! 

Their first question was a biggie- Why are you doing this. 
It stumped me at first as I wasn't expecting it. My answer is pretty simple though. 
If I dont then who will? I have written a post 'what drives me' but haven't popped it up yet. 

We talked about various things- they asked about family histories of illnesses etc which I thankfully dont have a lot of and also things like family trends. My family has a long history of being quite musical so they were keen to know about things like that. [My mother plays piano, her mother plays piano, her mother played piano, her mother played piano... and so on!] 

One thing that I keep thinking about is that they wanted to talk about any 'restrictions' I wanted to put on donating. That struck me as strange. I do understand many people prefer to donate within certain boundaries but my logic was always that everyone should be given the opportunity to be parents. I didn't put any restrictions on who I wanted to donate to and so I wouldn't put any restrictions or requests onto the donation itself. [NB. the example the counselor used was 'if X & Y moved to Timbuktu, how would you feel about that?' My response was 'Well if they want to move, its none of my business!] 
Some also want regular updates if a child eventuates from the process- photos, letters etc. Again, if the couple wanted to do that (for closures sake or whatever other reason) I would be open to it, but I certainly wouldn't request that they send me any updates! I personally feel that once the embryo is implanted into her, then its really none of my business.  

Having Mr11months with us was a nice ice breaker too as he grinned, and toddled (he's nearly walking) and generally looked pretty cute while doing naughty things so it was helpful to have him there. We had taken a photo on hubby's phone of our 3 year old in case they were curious and showed that around (tongue poking out. silly!) 

It was a very strange meeting in the sense of being guided to talk about certain topics by the counselor but also feeling quite comfortable with these new people. The nurse had talked about matching people who would normally get along in a social situation and boy, she had got that right. 

We came out of it with a great feeling of peace and purpose. The recipient couple were overwhelmed, but that's understandable. 

So the next step, as I've said before, is weaning and then we go from there. Normally 2-3 months after weaning will be the cycle. 

xJ

Meeting date looming

The title says it all. Today is friday. We are meeting the recipient couple on monday. 

I feel nervous and I dont know what to expect. We will be taking Mr-nearly-1 with us too and I hope that's ok for the couple. I go between thinking it will be nice for them to meet one of our kids and then at the same time not wanting to rub in the fact that they have had such a hard time having a baby. 
Its silly really. 

I'll post once we've had the meeting. I just hope it goes well! 

-J

"Have you finished with your family?"

The above question is what I get asked quite a lot when I talk to friends/family/random strangers I meet on the street (just kidding) about my egg donation journey. 

Its not that I feel 100% finished (NB the clinic does not require that you have completely finished either) but that I am completely at peace with the idea of just having 2 children. 

Right now it would not be possible for us to have another child anyway. Hubby still has 1 more year to go in his degree and we have already had a child in the middle of his study (luckily over the summer break). Out current rental is brilliant and cheap but there just would not be enough room for another child so realistically we would have to move. 

For us to have another child I would also have to be at peace with the idea of having another boy. I know it sounds silly but the thought of having 3 boys scares me a bit. In my heart right now I would love a girl but I would hate to feel any kind of disappointment at the joyous occasion of having a child. 

We have previously talked about perhaps fostering children, but I think that's a conversation for a few years time. 

At this point in my life I dont think I've ever felt happier, despite the lack of sleep and the assertive 3 year old. Kids are pretty amazing and I really hope I can help this couple we have been matched with to realise their dream of having a baby. 

xJ

Sinking in...

All of this is starting to sink in and feel very real. Not that its a bad thing necessarily, but it does feel a lot more scary than it did a few months ago. 

Today I received more paper work now that we've been matched with a recipient. We've also set a date for the 2nd counselling appointment (required) and at this appointment we will be meeting the matched couple. 

I had always been open to meeting the recipient couple but to be honest was more comfortable with the idea of being anonymous. In saying this though, I can understand how important it may be for a recipient to meet the person donating genetic material! 

So, some of the paper work I got today was: 
Bloods screening forms for me and hubby (HIV, Hepatitis B,C, Syphilis)
A second health and lifestyle declaration form (gotta cover all their bases)
A consent form and a hard copy of the recipient's profile. 
The egg stimulation plan 
Oh, and a form for getting my GP to do high vaginal and Chlamydia swabs... nice... 

All of this needs to happen 1 month before my cycle commences... Still not sure when thats going to be, but they said that the recipient is not in a hurry and perhaps April/May might suit them better.  

The egg stimulation plan is quite interesting. I gave it to hubby to read- he really hadn't thought about how involved it would be and did see why I was so keen to do it before he started university again. 

It goes something like this:

Day 1: Phone clinic (first day of period), collect injection pack from clinic
Day 2: Commence daily Gonal F injection (300iu) every evening. To grow your eggs
Day 6: Commence daily Cetrotide injection every morning. To stop you ovulating. (first to happen at the clinic)
Day 8: Vaginal scan to count and measure the follicles in your ovaries. Blood test. 
Day 9 (onwards): Vaginal scan every 2-3 days at the clinic until your follicles measure 17-18mm
Trigger injection: Buserelin (at clinic)
Egg collection: 36 hours after the trigger injection. 

(Note at the bottom: please wear nana knickers and not a g string)

!!!

Phew

Not getting cold feet (have this deep desire to go through with it all) but feeling a little overwhelmed and a bit nervous. 

xJ

Matchy matchy

So much for sleeping on a decision. I thought about it all for a good couple of hours and emailed the clinic straight back with a big YES. 

This couple had been through a whopping amount of IVF cycles with no success. It just astounds me and amazes me that someone can go through that, but still be stronger for it (in their profile, they said that it has only made their relationship closer).

I had an email back from the clinic and they had to pass my profile on to the couple and wait to see what they said. I had kind of assumed they had already done that, so that was quite nerve-wracking to think that so soon they would be looking at the stuff I had written about myself. 

Got a phone call just now to say that the couple had accepted my profile and they would like to meet both me and hubby!! 

Feeling very nervous about it all, but excited too.

xJ 

Matched!!

I had a phone call from the clinic today. They asked whether I would consider a recipient! I told them about weaning- we have decided to let it be a bit more natural (which is good. I was just a bit impatient I think), but the nurse said the people she has in mind are not in a hurry. 

Not even 10 minutes later, I got the email from them with the information. 

I thought it had been strange to write about myself in this way, but it felt even stranger looking at someone else's details like this and thinking that these might be the people I donate my eggs to. 

Hubby was home (he has finished university for the year) and we read through it together. They sound wonderful and we felt a number of different connections- one of their favourite places to holiday was where we went on our honeymoon. 
We both immediately felt like it was a resounding yes (we were told, its absolutely fine if you have reservations or feel like there is no connection), but we will sleep on it overnight and email them back. 

One step closer!

xJ

Waiting...

Not a lot has been happening on the donor front here as we really have to wait until my littlest boy is weaned from breastfeeding. So in other words, life goes on.

I had a phone call from the clinic yesterday touching base about that. No pressure, of course, but I feel more than ready to take the next steps... except with regards to weaning.

Littlest person is nearly 10 months and is still having 2 feeds a day, plus some comfort sucking/food at night (really need to get onto tackling that so we can all have a bit more sleep!)

I'm much more ready to stop breastfeeding at this point now though than with my first. I think partially as I had so many issues with latching/blocked ducts/the dreaded mastitis with my first boy so it felt so triumphant to go until 15/16 months. With this one, I feel much less connected in terms of feeding (does that even make sense?) so I'm quite keen to stop sooner rather than later. (in other terms, I'm a wee bit over it) 

Hubby and I had our first argument about this yesterday though. He thinks I'm rushing it to even think about weaning in the next couple of months. 

Part of my thinking was to do the donation in the university holidays which would mean less stress for hubby, but perhaps that was wishful thinking. 

Still right on board to do this, but might have to think about timing a bit more seriously over the next month as the clinic will be due to call me again then. 

x J

Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork

Until my newest boy is weaned from breastfeeding, there isn't a lot to do in terms of the donation. He is nearly 8 months old and full of beans. I breastfed my first until 15 months (he weaned himself) so I expect this one will be similar. 

They need me to have stopped breastfeeding due to the fertility hormones they will give me before the actual procedure (they dont want them to be transferred to bubba in my milk) so we have a wee bit of a wait until that happens and I can donate. 

In the mean time, I was given a bit of paperwork to fill out- most specifically, one titled: 'Oocyte Donor Non-identifying information'.

This is 4 pages of questions to provide the recipient and (if any) future children with information about myself but anonymously. This information is the only information which will be disclosed about me without contacting me first, before my donation. 

I found this to be really hard to write even though it did offer some leading questions. I mean, what do you say about your own personality? 

"How would you describe your personality/temperament?" 

"How do you get on with people?"

"Please describe what sort of child you were (eg, interests, activities, sports, personality)"

"Do you have any thoughts or feelings you would like to pass on about what it means to you to be identifiable and the possibility of contact in the future with any children born"

Oh man. It kind of feels like a delicate balance between being brutally honest and at the same time talking yourself up. 

"Well, sometimes I'm a bit of a smart ass and sometimes I have a bad temper (like my 3 year old) but I'm awesome... really" 

The other questions were much easier... height, weight, medical history, mother & father's height and ages. Boring stuff like that. Much easier. Facts. I can do facts. 

I feel like it took me a good solid week to fill out that form. One form. 4 pages. 1 week. That's a lot of mulling over what to say. Probably far too much mulling! 

The other two forms I'm sending in with the big huge scary one are a Reproductive questionnaire and a Health & Lifestyle declaration form. Both were pretty straight forward; the first asking questions about my menstrual cycle, fertility, pregnancies etc. The other asking about drugs, tattoos, STDs, prostitution etc. I have tattoos but none in the past few years (since before my first pregnancy) so that doesn't count :)

Now I need to get around sending it all in... and then we'll go from there. One more step on my way!

xJ

Meeting the experts

One morning last week I bundled myself and the 6 month old into the car, leaving hubby and Mr3 at home. Hubby is on holiday from university so as always it was much easier to not take the toddler with me. 

I get there with plenty of time to spare, find a carpark and mutter a quick prayer under my breath. 
The place is impressive; 2 levels of a high rise and everything you'd expect in private practice: a showroom-perfect waiting room, current magazines, fabulous art work on the walls and expensive trimmings. I picked a couch slightly out of the way as the wee one needed feeding and I wanted to be discreet. 
I have no issues breastfeeding in public as such but I felt very aware that I was in a fertility specialists clinic and didn't want to flaunt that I had a baby. Silly, I know given that its a baby friendly place but that's just how I felt. 

10 minutes later and a happy baby fed (great timing), the doctor comes and we trot off to her room. Baby is very taken with her and seems to think everything she says is hilarious.

We talk briefly about my reasons for donating and she starts to ask me questions: weight, height, age of parents, age of living grandparents, age at death of deceased grandparents, heath issues in my family... etc etc etc
She shows me a big list of diseases and asks if any of my relatives have had any of them. Nothing looks familiar though dad does have asthma and a mild heart condition but it doesn't sound like that's a big thing. 

We discuss the actual procedure. Its very straight forward and the actual harvesting takes around 10 mins. 
I'll talk about that in more detail at a later stage. 
She said they normally at this point do an internal ultrasound to just have a look at my ovaries, but we decided to do this at another appointment closer to the time. 

I then go and speak to the nurse who is the one I initially contacted. She, I think, is trying to get a sense from me as to how serious I am about this and whether I am comfortable with the process. She is lovely and really puts me at ease. 

My last appointment is with the counselor. Part of the whole process is meeting with the counselor twice- once now and the other time later on but with your partner. She said part of her job is to get a better sense of my personality as they not only try to match a donor on their physical attributes but also on personality a little. 

The only part of the morning I feel a little uncomfortable with is one time with the counselor. I tend to talk a little too much about everything really and have a real tendency of repeating myself. Apparently most recipients want to meet their donors first. Not 100% sure how I feel about that as at this point. Some donors receive updates on how their donations (is that even the right word? children doesn't feel quite right) are getting on and I'm not sure how I feel about that either. I kept saying "well, its not like they are my children" and I got a terse "well, you've made that very clear" in response. 
I suppose I just wanted to make that distinction as perhaps some people feel like its hard to separate themselves. Its for this reason I don't think I could be a surrogate. I think I would feel far too connected to the child itself and I think I would find it very hard to give them up after birth. 

I leave the clinic feeling even more determined to go through with this, but strangely not particularly emotional about it either. 

xJ

Second steps

Email sent... and the reply received. I open it with a little trepidation and inside contains some quite detailed information that I need to know to donate. 

As it turns out, there is a LOT of information about the process, requirements and obligations. Nothing too scary though so far. I'm not nervous about the actual procedure but I am nervous as to how I'll feel if its not successful. 

The next step, after a phone call from one of the nurses, was a round of bloods. When I say 'a round' I really mean it. The phlebotomist took 7 vials of blood. Eek!

Amongst other things, they tested for Hep C, HIV, The Cystic Fybrosis gene, and my AMH level (Anti-Müllerian Hormone). 

The AMH level is an interesting one as this hormone is a good indicator of how many eggs you have left in your ovaries. A week later and my result came back slightly below average but thankfully this does not rule me out from donating. 

Along with the forms for the blood work, came a folder with forms like an expense form (donors are not paid, but expenses are reimbursed), reproductive health questionnaire  a health and lifestyle declaration and of course, a donor profile. To be honest, I haven't really looked much at the rest of the forms and information, just in case I end up not being a good candidate. 

It sounds a bit strange re-reading that but I really dont want to get my hopes up lest it doesn't come to fruition. 

The next step is to meet with one of the specialists, a nurse and counsellor. Its all booked in and I know where to go, but I'm still nervous. 

xJ

Beginnings

The thought started years ago, reading the little ads in the paper and magazines 

"We are a couple desperate to start our family. After years of failed tries, we are seeking  an egg donor. If you are aged between 21 and 37 years old, have completed your family and are considering donating your eggs, please call...."

Sometimes I would read them and feel nothing. Other times it would tug at my heart and make me long to start my family so that I can eventually help another family do the same. 

Before having children, despite reading these things on and off I had never considered the fact that so many people have problems conceiving. In fact, I thought it would be really easy- I mean, you hear of teenagers getting pregnant after a one night stand, so it can't be that hard... right?

My desire to have a family came on suddenly. We had always intended on having children and talked about starting after 3 or 4 years of marriage. 4 years came and suddenly I HAD to start trying. The instinct was there and in full force. Hubby wasn't so certain, but I don't think many people are at first!

My first boy took around 8 months to conceive, which I believe is near average. It hadn't occurred to me that it would take more than 2 months, naive as that seems, so every time my period arrived it was heartbreaking. We were naturally elated when it happened and 9 months later came our first son. 

Our second boy took around a year to conceive. We had intended on an 18 months gap between them (so tidy) but ended up with a 2 1/2 year gap. 

I started to remember those feelings of everything not happening straight away and then read more of the ads in the magazines

"After suffering several miscarriages, we need an egg donor to make our family complete. If you are interested in being our donor, please contact...."

I kept having this feeling that I should be doing something about it. So I sent off a little email to a local Fertility Specialist

"I would like some information about becoming an egg donor. I have been thinking about it for a number of years and I recently had my second child recently who I breastfeed full time at the moment. I am a non smoker with no health issues. 

If someone could please get back to me with some information at some point, that would be great."

A feeling of relief came over me as I sent it, and I waited eagerly for a reply...