My body is trolling me. It ACTS like it can make a baby, but it super can’t. Stupid clear signs of ovulation when I know I have garbage eggs. (I also have super great AMH for my age. On paper, IVF should have worked for me.)
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OMG, y’all, the Boy just told me yesterday that he doesn’t really want to stop after all. At some point over the last two years, he stopped just humoring me and started actually wanting us to have a baby. He wants to look into embryo adoption.
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Wow! That’s a big about face. But treatment definitely clarifies stuff for people I think! I feel like I would be excited but a little overwhelmed. How are you feeling about it?
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Same, I think! Thinking about starting over feels like a fresh decision to add a baby, if you know what I mean, so I am thinking about the $$ and the sleep and all that and also about what it would be like to raise a baby who wasn’t genetically related to my family… and also feeling really excited that we might actually go forward and it might actually work this time.
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Paging @frogger if she wants to share thoughts! (I can also delete if you would prefer Frogger LMK)
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‘Sup, I did donor embryo, which is slightly different but sometimes used interchangeably with embryo adoption. Regardless, my daughter is 100% not genetically mine and I’ve spent the last 3 years in the donor embryo/embryo donation/embryo adoption world. AMA.
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Thank you! I didn’t know there was a difference or which one CCRM does!
What do I probably not know I don’t know?
Also interested in topics like cost and what you told friends and family. I think it sounds odd to people who aren’t in the infertility game am wondering about getting buy in from the extended family. I also have older children that would need an explanation at some point.
Hopefully this covers both of those questions, and a bit on costs. Costs vary a lot, and are also dependent on fertility insurance coverage and whether the clinic takes insurance.
There are kind of fuzzy definitions, and sometimes people fight a lot about terminology, but I like to break it down into three basic types:
Embryo adoption (EA) uses existing embryos from other families’ fertility treatments. Typically not done/facilitated by the clinics themselves, but rather through a few select programs such as Nightlight or NEDC involving homestudies and other steps closer to traditional adoption (often with a highly religious bent with all the attendant restrictions on acceptable recipients) or individual families matching privately through sites like Miracles Waiting or on EA/ED Facebook groups.
Donor and recipient families will have all kinds of match preferences based on their specific circumstances–some may prefer a certain religion, others not care; some may prefer a straight married couple, others open to single women or lesbian/gay couples; some may prefer the recipient to not have children already, others prefer they do, others don’t care either way. Most donors and recipients prefer at least a semi-open relationship.
Very often, you would receive all remaining embryos from that family for as many chances/children as that gives you–could be 1, could be 10. Involves a legal process to transfer the “property” from one family to another, and embryo transfer is typically done where the embryos are housed, since moving them can be risky, and will have varying medical costs. Typically the medical costs are on a per-embryo basis and fairly cheap (for fertility treatment).
Wait times vary, but may be short if a donor picks you quickly. There is no guarantee of being picked and many more recipients than donors.
Embryo donation (ED) also uses embryos from other families’ fertility treatment, though the family would opt to donate to the clinic where they were created/are housed. The clinic facilitates the matching of embryos with recipients without input from the creating family. Transfer would also take place through that clinic. Some clinics have an embryo donation program and others don’t. Wait times can vary considerably from reasonably short (Shady Grove, Donor Nexus) to many years (CNY Fertility) and costs also vary based on the fees from that clinic.
No special legal process by the recipient, generally no specific recipient considerations (in the US) other than medical, selection may be large or small, and typically you would get 1-2 embryos per match. For more children, you would usually start the process over, and embryos may end up split across different families–possibly. The donation is typically anonymous, and information from the donors can be limited.
The other consideration with embryo adoption and donation is that they are remaining embryos after a donor’s family is complete, so the quality can be variable. Some clinics will provide multiple tries for a package cost, or a money back “guarantee”. If a la carte, this tends to be the cheapest option, though clinic non-medical service fees for the program can approach the homestudy/legal fees of embryo adoption.
Due to demand, some clinics will only do embryo donation for patients who had already been seeing them for fertility treatment, and may or may not advertise that they have a program without being asked.
Donor embryos (DE/DDE) are different because they are created by clinics from egg and sperm donors for the purposes of family building for patients. Clinics create “batches” of embryos that may go to a few different recipients. Recipients can select the profile after it is made, or rarely select the specific egg and sperm prior to fertilization. Transfer is done at the creating clinic. Costs vary, but this tends to be the most expensive of the three options on a per-embryo basis and many use multiple try packages.
In the US, recipient age and health/medical characteristics are the only criteria. Internationally, it is cheaper, but more common that the recipients must be straight and married. Some clinics have the option of a money back guarantee, with increased medical stipulations for the recipient.
Wait time is usually much less than the first two options unless the recipient is chosen quickly (EA) or the clinic is hopping with embryos (ED). Embryos are also usually guaranteed to be of a higher quality due to the fact that they are made from younger donors with no infertility history, and the “best” embryos weren’t already used by the creating family.
Recipients typically get 1-2 embryos at a time and would have to start again to have more children, with genetic siblings possibly available or possibly not. Finding genetic siblings is typically harder than with open relationship EA, but easier than a closed relationship ED because egg and sperm donors are usually identified by a number or code that can be used to look for other recipients.
The OG DE clinic in the US is California Conceptions, though there are now additional options such as Shared Beginnings, DIRM, and I think Shady Grove. Abroad, Spain and Czech Republic are DE options that are cheaper than US clinics even with travel costs.
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This is useful, thanks! What CCRM does is definitely ED. They don’t let you do genetic testing on the embryos because then they would have to discard I’d any were abnormal, and of course people donate to avoid discarding.
Doc thinks we would have success with an egg donor but cost is a factor and the Boy doesn’t care about his genetics, and points out that his sperm is technically our only known problem, so why not take it out of the equation?
I’m trying not to get too excited because the cost might be prohibitive (doc called it “expensive” and/or wait times could be too long for our family. I do have insurance for IVF but not sure what would be covered with ED.
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Okay, Part II.
I’ve told some people and not told others (I also didn’t share a lot about fertility treatment with most people, anonymous internet excepted, so that’s my baseline). The only person who truly needs to know, and recommended early on, is the child in question so that there is not a surprise for them later in their life. You can expand the circles of knowledge on an as needed basis if you prefer, and eventually as you move from being the one to share the information to the child having more responsibility for interacting with friends/teachers/doctors, you leave the telling decision up to them.
Every family situation is different and there are certainly some different meanings that people place on their process (for some it’s a “save the frozen babies” mentality, which I side-eye a bit since there really are more people wanting an embryo than donating one, and most frozen embryos in the alarmist statistics are not made available by the parents for sundry reasons, up to and including they are still going to use them). Overall, if you are confident and comfortable in your decision, and others’ opinions won’t change that, then I’ve found that people are generally accepting, even if in time, and eventually excited. Of course, not always, but usually the people who matter.
For me, explaining that it was my chosen option to build my family and deciding when to share further with people interested (not nosey) was how I approached it. Sometimes I shared reasons, sometimes not. Mine was having a limited amount of money to spend and not wanting to take the risk of IVF, having fertility issues and not having to worry about what a partner wants, and wanting to move ahead quickly with the highest chance of success.
Friends of mine also did donor embryos and also bypassed IVF and both of their genetics even though only one had the known issue because they decided it was both their genes or none. It takes the sting out of “they look so much like you!” when it’s neither person’s genes. Also, people will still tell you how much they look like you. Even if they know. Especially if they don’t.
For explaining to the non-genetic child there are a lot of good books specifically about embryo donation. For me and my daughter there’s like one, Our Story, that has a single mom double donor embryo option and I should get around to buying, but there are others that are close. There’s also Mommies, Daddies, Donors, Surrogates for help with wording and explaining to others, including families and friends and current and future children. For explaining to your older children, there’s What Makes a Baby that explains having a baby as needing egg, sperm, and uterus, in no assumed combination.
The Donor Conception Network has a lot of other good resources and book options, including talking about your path.
Finally, I don’t have any basis for comparison in that I don’t have genetic children (I do consider myself her “biological mom” since my body grew her, and the census and her birth certificate agree). However, I really cannot imagine that it’s possible to love her more than I do, and given the option to make her genetically mine, I wouldn’t, because then she wouldn’t be the same.
I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say I’m glad that the pregnancy losses and other issues happened, but I am glad that the baby I have is her, and since I’ve made connections with egg donor, sperm donor, and full sibling families, I love that I see her face in their children and that they will be able to share something special too. TBH, I’m also glad she’s spared some of the issues in my own genetics, even though it didn’t stop me from TTC with my eggs when I started.
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Thank you for sharing your story! I think I was worried about what my mom would think, especially because she is the money in this operation, but she’s on board! AND my insurance lists donor services as being included with their infertility coverage, so that’s good.
I don’t think CCRM does DE but I haven’t talked to the coordinator yet.
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Another thought I had–I have qualms about using an anonymous donor when the potential child never consented to not have contact with their donors/genetic parents. I mean, seems like the benefits outweigh the cost? But curious what your thoughts are.
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I don’t have the first hand experience that others do but my thought on this would be that kids don’t get to make a lot of choices about their being brought into the world. They don’t consent to be conceived or born and we have to make choices about how to manage things before they can tell us (for example we call my kiddo a son and use he/him pronouns and we will let him know we did our best guess and he’s welcome to let us know if we got it wrong, and we also consented to several medical treatments and have him in a daycare that I have no idea if he likes because he can’t tell us.
Kids might hate where they live or that they have one parent (or 2 or 4!) we just have to do the best we can with the information available to us at the time. I’ll be interested to hear what others think as I’m sure there are things I’m not thinking about and will learn from others.
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Yeah, three aspects, I guess:
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Like @nickybecky1 said, no one consents to the family they are born into or to being born at all. I think having children is inherently selfish and for ourselves, not for them, which doesn’t mean it’s bad or we shouldn’t. There were some situations I wouldn’t want to bring a child into, so didn’t for a while, but the fact that she’s donor-conceived will just be the low-hanging fruit of things she can yell at me for. “You’re not my real mom!” maybe. She will get to make a lot of decisions about her life as she grows. For now, I make most of them. We often try to undo whatever we don’t like about how we were raised when we have children, so she can make those choices when it’s her turn. Some people do decide that pursuing donors of any kind isn’t for them, and that’s fine too and good for them to know their boundaries. Others change their mind and use donors, or choose known/open donors, also fine.
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Donor-conceived children, and the adults they become, have varying levels of desire for their genetic information/relationships. Some are upset about it, often because they were not told the truth from the start or it was seen as something shameful, though not always, and the people most likely to talk about being donor-conceived on the internet are, like many things, the people most upset about it. Others are indifferent, or even prefer their life as it is and have no interest in anything beyond the most basic information. A friend of mine is a donor-conceived adult from a time when no information at all was shared with recipient families, and she has no interest in the donor or looking for other information. I’m cultivating relationships with my daughter’s half and full sibling families now so that the option is there for her when she’s older, but she may or may not be interested.
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In the era of personal genomics and direct to consumer testing, genetic anonymity is not what it used to be and neither donors nor recipients should now enter into these processes with any true expectation of it. I’m not planning to make use of any of these services on her behalf, but if she chooses to as an adult and opts to find relatives, then she may discover the donors’ families. I am planning to spend a good amount of time making sure she knows what types of outcomes she may find and whether the answers would be satisfactory, as well as making sure she knows that I’ll support her in her choices 100% and that her wanting to look has no reflection on our relationship or her opinion of my parenting.
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I’m part of the known donor community. You see mixed feelings from both kids and parents about the amount they want to know about the donor or other kids. Some of the parents cultivated friendships and the halves are growing up informed but like cousins. Some of the kids have asked a lot of questions. Two have asked to do the genetic tests. They used different companies and got the same results. The donor has no plans to do one, but looked at results and verified the relationships are pretty accurate. If any of his siblings do the test, the truth will come out fast.
Using a donor was absolutely the right choice for me. I think that using donors in ivf is wonderful too
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Known vs anonymous donor feels like a huge decision… but it also feels like one that we will probably make (if we get that far) because of structural factors and timelines rather than a coherent position. Is that awful?
I wish the donor coordinator would call me already! I’ve been waiting a day and a half to even hear from my nurse.
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Hello, I am back to not being pregnant again. Today I heard from my doctor and she said that once my situation resolves with this new miscarriage, I should come in to get a general blood panel, a thyroid panel, and to check for clotting disorders. She also wants to make sure I have a filled prescription on hand for progesterone so that I can use it during the TWW each month to support any possible pregnancy. So once I’m done bleeding, I will make the appointment.
I think I’ll spend some time later today organizing my fertility supplies.
Crunchy Stuff
I know I need to strain my tinctures (vitex, motherwort, black cohosh).
I also need to mix a new batch of my smoothie mix. For a while, I was doing detox greens (chlorella, spirulina, barley grass) in it, but I honestly feel like I’m properly detoxified since I barely drink anymore, use a Berkey filter, and have mostly cut plastic and chemical products out of my life. And I switched my NAC, ALA, and vitamin C to pills because I was having trouble getting to the smoothie every day so my intake was inconsistent. I’m way more consistent with supplement pills. So that leaves for the smoothie mix just plant-based protein (I use a hemp-heart-based one), maca, fenugreek, ashwagandha, and cinnamon. Which are the tasty ones, so maybe I won’t drag my feet about drinking it quite so much.
Lastly, I think I will make a pitcher of my iced “fertili-tea”: decaf green tea, red clover, red raspberry leaf, and nettle. I added a few drops of bergamot oil to the blend when I made it, so there’s a very slight earl grey vibe to it too. I like it very lightly sweetened with a tiny bit of maple syrup. I try to drink it during the first half of my cycle.
Food
I’m turning over in my mind the whole “full-fat dairy” thing. I’ve been, for the most part, avoiding dairy while I work on my sinuses, with the exception of sometimes a teaspoon or so of cheese sprinkled on a salad. Last night I had a bowl of real ice cream for the first time in months, as a balm for my soul, and it was . . . fine? I mean, it was delicious, but it wasn’t like a passionate, engulfing feeling of reunion.
I feel like the advice to eat plant-based protein and the advice to eat full-fat dairy somewhat contradict each other since, before mostly dropping dairy, I was depending on it as a vegetarian (though obviously not vegan) protein source. We eat lots of nuts and beans and lentils and tempeh and tofu, and some Beyond meats (and, to a lesser degree, other faux meats), as our plant-based protein. We avoid seitan because it disagrees with Swan. We also eat organic, pasture-raised eggs and wild-caught seafood, usually having eggs almost every day and seafood 1–3 times per week (shrimp, salmon, and cod). So we’ve got the protein covered.
But if full-fat dairy is really so good for fertility, maybe I should add some yogurt back in? And keep doing a little ice cream? I just . . . I’m afraid of further irritating my sinuses. I’m weighing it back and forth—if I have to choose between fertility and sinuses, fertility wins, I guess?
I already eat absurdly healthily, aside from a slight chocolate bar dependence, so I’m not really concerned about changing my diet at all. The dairy is just the one thing that’s on my mind that I keep getting stuck on.
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Sorry you’re back in this thread 
Do you want comments on either of the spoilers topics?
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Sure! Any feedback always welcome!
I’m sorry to hear that, @wooljaguar. I have no helpful advice but am sending you good vibes.
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