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Hi,
I have tried IVF 2 times with my own eggs, once with my sisters, and still BFN. Nothing left to use. None frozen. Now looking at Autonomous Egg Donor, but Split Egg Donor. I'm 41 and seems to be my last option. Thinking of the split because it's a little cheaper. My thoughts are, do we tell people, family, the child it self? I am kinda torn. If we tell family, we must tell the children. But is it unfair to tell them when you know they will never find the blood mother? Not sure how to take this road. Women out there that have been in the same situation, how did you handle it? Thoughts?
I have tried IVF 2 times with my own eggs, once with my sisters, and still BFN. Nothing left to use. None frozen. Now looking at Autonomous Egg Donor, but Split Egg Donor. I'm 41 and seems to be my last option. Thinking of the split because it's a little cheaper. My thoughts are, do we tell people, family, the child it self? I am kinda torn. If we tell family, we must tell the children. But is it unfair to tell them when you know they will never find the blood mother? Not sure how to take this road. Women out there that have been in the same situation, how did you handle it? Thoughts?
First, I'd like to say thank you ladies, for all your posts. I have been searching the web for a forum, exactly such as this one. Being new here, I have to say, I'm glad to see that I am not alone in being mid-40, and wanting to have a child. I know and have been told by doctors, prime pregnancy age is early 30's. I was not in the right place, in my 30's to have a child. Life got busy, the career.... next thing I knew, 15 years went by. So here I am, 44yrs old, wanting to have a child. Is that even thinkable at my age? Even possible? So many risks to weigh, assisted or not assisted, not to mention the costs, and, the reality of having a sucessful pregnancy at 44 yrs of age. Not good odds. Which lead me to this forum. Donor eggs. I don't have the quantity or quality of eggs for a sucessful IFV. I don't think I will even go through the IFV motions, with my own eggs. The odds are just not that good, at my age. Thought that was the end of it, until I learned a bit about donor eggs. And, that women in their 40's were having babies with donor eggs! I'm in Canada, and in a province where the fertility program cuts off at age 43, but, in Calgary and Toronto their cut off is 45 for IVF. Does anyone know that if you use an egg donor, it doesn't matter what your age is, when using a fertility clinic? And most importantly, in Canada, how do you ever find an egg donor?
If anyone, anywhere could let me know, or provide a link to a Canadian program, I would appreciate that. And, I welcome and and all feedback from you ladies. I'm glad to have found this forum, and you all.
If anyone, anywhere could let me know, or provide a link to a Canadian program, I would appreciate that. And, I welcome and and all feedback from you ladies. I'm glad to have found this forum, and you all.
Leatha - just reading your story again makes my heart warm (or is heartwarming :-)). Makes me kind of wish we had met our donor.
Robyn - I know one thing - that when the re transferred the embryo in me, that baby became mine - even more so than my husband's or the donor's. I guess I felt like that because I would be the one carrying & birthing him/her. My husband told me once that the baby would probably end up w/my traits despite everything - I'm not sure that was a compliment - LOL but I got the message. Leatha's right, finding/picking the donor's the hardest part. We were fortunate to use the donor pool at my re's office.
I wish you the best! - jen
Robyn - I know one thing - that when the re transferred the embryo in me, that baby became mine - even more so than my husband's or the donor's. I guess I felt like that because I would be the one carrying & birthing him/her. My husband told me once that the baby would probably end up w/my traits despite everything - I'm not sure that was a compliment - LOL but I got the message. Leatha's right, finding/picking the donor's the hardest part. We were fortunate to use the donor pool at my re's office.
I wish you the best! - jen
hi there,
Thanks so much for your frankness. I might know of a few people. 1 is my cousin and other is a dear friend of mine. I am not sure about either one of them, but at lease I have a few options. My husband and I have a phone appt tomorrow morning with a donor company here in the Chicago area. So will see then.
I will let ya know for sure what happens.
Thank you
Thanks so much for your frankness. I might know of a few people. 1 is my cousin and other is a dear friend of mine. I am not sure about either one of them, but at lease I have a few options. My husband and I have a phone appt tomorrow morning with a donor company here in the Chicago area. So will see then.
I will let ya know for sure what happens.
Thank you
I understand what you mean by worrying the donor coming back and making trouble, or of you losing your child. But I think that is one of the worries that we really don't have to worry about. I really don't think that they are intersted in YOUR child, because legally the child would be yours and your husbands. I am from Canada and part of the process that we had to go through was that we as a couple had to meet with a social worker and discuss everything that egg donation entails...and then the egg donor had to do the same thing with a social worker...so risk assessments are done and you can verbilize your concerns. Once you actually start to talk about your worries they really just seem to disapate and not be important any more.
To me the most difficult and stressful part of the whole procedure was actually finding a donor. Then once I met her, first through email and then we met for dinner...we were so happy with our choice and she felt happy that she is donating to us so we can create a family. I really don't think that women who donate their eggs have ulterior motives later on in life....that is just our worry....for instance my donor has her own family she is not interested in "taking" mine away from me. I think that she is curious and would like some pictures every now and then but she does not want to be part of the family so to speak.
I know it is a lot to take in and I personally needed to go through a grieving period about not being able to use my own eggs, but it doesn't matter anymore. I am going to have a baby and I am so thrilled, regardless of whose eggs they are. I look at this pregnancy and all pregnacies as "gifts from God" and these little beings are placed in our care to raise.....using your own DNA is not a precussor to being a good parent.
Let us know how you make out.
To me the most difficult and stressful part of the whole procedure was actually finding a donor. Then once I met her, first through email and then we met for dinner...we were so happy with our choice and she felt happy that she is donating to us so we can create a family. I really don't think that women who donate their eggs have ulterior motives later on in life....that is just our worry....for instance my donor has her own family she is not interested in "taking" mine away from me. I think that she is curious and would like some pictures every now and then but she does not want to be part of the family so to speak.
I know it is a lot to take in and I personally needed to go through a grieving period about not being able to use my own eggs, but it doesn't matter anymore. I am going to have a baby and I am so thrilled, regardless of whose eggs they are. I look at this pregnancy and all pregnacies as "gifts from God" and these little beings are placed in our care to raise.....using your own DNA is not a precussor to being a good parent.
Let us know how you make out.
Thank you so much for all of your candidness. My personality is all the type that would love to meet the donor, but in the end I am not sure if she would want to come back later and make life difficult. That might not be the case, but I guess with this situation it might be different. I am goign to make a call to have a phone consultation today regarding this. I think this is the best thing for us since we do not have extra funds to keep trying IVF with my own older eggs. It has been really interesting though. I have a friend who wants me to try again and I have said to her. I know it is not right. I did everything right and stil did not take. Also, the doctor advised us that donor eggs are 60-70% will take. I think those are really great odds from 25-30 with my own before my first IVF cycle.
Any other advice is wonderful and I truly thank all of these women here.
Any other advice is wonderful and I truly thank all of these women here.
Hello, I just wanted to add that I am now 4 weeks pregnant using donor eggs. I had tried for four years to get pregnant and then after the second failed IVF turned to donor eggs and here I am blissfully pregnant. It is an emotional decision to use someone else chromosomes but as 40smama said it doesn't matter in the end, you have a baby which is the result that we are all aiming for. And as mentioned above there are alot of legalities to go through we saw a lawyer and signed many many consent forms which included freezing of the eggs and everything else under the sun. I have a different situation where I met my donor which was a very positive experience for me, most don't know or ever meet there donors as most parties want to remain anonymous but we opted for meeting and she is a wonderful friend to us now.
If you have any more questions feel free to post here or pm me.
If you have any more questions feel free to post here or pm me.
Of course you can! Since it's a little after 4:00 a.m. and my baby just went to sleep - sigh - I'll be glad to answer it.
We knew very little about the whole retrieval/IVF process while we were ttc - even when we were in the middle of the donor cycle - things like embryo transfer (which day was it, the quality of the embryo, etc) so after the retrieval, we didn't worry at all about how the embryos were - we just waited until our daily phone call from the embryologist who updated us on how things were going (or growing).
On the transfer day, we went into the room and the nurse said she would give me the Valium after we decided how many embryos to transfer - i was like, HUH?? I had no idea about any of this! The embryologist came in then and asked us how many children did we want to have. I wanted twins but thought there would be little chance of that. He then showed us pics of the two top embryos & he said they were perfect.
We then had 10 minutes to decide what to do. Both re docs came in and explained the risks of multiple birth/pregnancies and highly encouraged a single embryo transfer. Both embryologist and drs said it wouldn't increase my chances of getting pregnant if we transferred one or two - my mind couldn't wrap around that concept - still can't. They also gave us an 85% chance of getting pregnant.
My husband who's a pharmacist felt strongly we should go for a single transfer after hearing all of the scary stats. I just wanted a baby and decided to trust the professionals and that's what happened. I was so scared during the entire tww that this poor lil' embryo wouldn't take but here he is!!
The legality of the donor eggs - from what I understand, you don't buy or purchase the eggs but rather reimburse the donor for her time, discomfort, etc. When starting the donor cycle, you sign tons of paperwork - everything from permission slips to papers outlining what to do w/leftover embryos in case of divorce or death of a spouse - issues I never even thought of.
You decide pretty much then what to do w/the leftover embryos or at least state your intention of either disposal, donating them to science, donating them to another couple or freezing them. We opted for freezing them. We're still undecided of what to do at this point w/them - I kind of wish for another baby but gosh, one's a handful so I dunno.
Hope this helps - jen
We knew very little about the whole retrieval/IVF process while we were ttc - even when we were in the middle of the donor cycle - things like embryo transfer (which day was it, the quality of the embryo, etc) so after the retrieval, we didn't worry at all about how the embryos were - we just waited until our daily phone call from the embryologist who updated us on how things were going (or growing).
On the transfer day, we went into the room and the nurse said she would give me the Valium after we decided how many embryos to transfer - i was like, HUH?? I had no idea about any of this! The embryologist came in then and asked us how many children did we want to have. I wanted twins but thought there would be little chance of that. He then showed us pics of the two top embryos & he said they were perfect.
We then had 10 minutes to decide what to do. Both re docs came in and explained the risks of multiple birth/pregnancies and highly encouraged a single embryo transfer. Both embryologist and drs said it wouldn't increase my chances of getting pregnant if we transferred one or two - my mind couldn't wrap around that concept - still can't. They also gave us an 85% chance of getting pregnant.
My husband who's a pharmacist felt strongly we should go for a single transfer after hearing all of the scary stats. I just wanted a baby and decided to trust the professionals and that's what happened. I was so scared during the entire tww that this poor lil' embryo wouldn't take but here he is!!
The legality of the donor eggs - from what I understand, you don't buy or purchase the eggs but rather reimburse the donor for her time, discomfort, etc. When starting the donor cycle, you sign tons of paperwork - everything from permission slips to papers outlining what to do w/leftover embryos in case of divorce or death of a spouse - issues I never even thought of.
You decide pretty much then what to do w/the leftover embryos or at least state your intention of either disposal, donating them to science, donating them to another couple or freezing them. We opted for freezing them. We're still undecided of what to do at this point w/them - I kind of wish for another baby but gosh, one's a handful so I dunno.
Hope this helps - jen
congrats!!!! on your baby boy. Can I ask you what the short story version of the long story is? About the legality of donor eggs? What is your take on that?
Thanks
Thanks
Hi - I'm 40smama - the one Yvette mentioned. There's an excellent fertility clinic in your area - www.advancedfertility.com/ - I checked out that website many, many times during our fertility attempts to get info on all IVF options - they seem to have a very good record w/donor egg IVFs. Go to cdc.gov and you can check it out.
I had my tubes tied when I was 30. I remarried and we thought we had plenty of time and waited until I was 43 to get serious about trying to get pregnant. We visited an re who gave us our options which was either IVF w/my own eggs or IVF w/donor ones. We tried w/mine- the cycle got cancelled one day prior to retrieval. I was devastated!
I didn't want to go through another disappointment like that so we went for donor eggs - we picked out the donor right away but the wait was about 4 months. The donor was 21. There was 31 eggs retrieved, 26 fertilized, & we transferred ONE embryo - long story there. We have 11 embryos frozen and like Yvette, I'm not sure what we're going to do about that.
We got pregnant on the first try (thank God), had a great pregnancy and delivered last April - healthy, active, baby boy who's the light of our lives. I could care less about whose DNA he has - he's healthy, beautiful and so sweet and that's all I care about.
If you have any questions, please feel free to pm me - good luck to you - jen
I had my tubes tied when I was 30. I remarried and we thought we had plenty of time and waited until I was 43 to get serious about trying to get pregnant. We visited an re who gave us our options which was either IVF w/my own eggs or IVF w/donor ones. We tried w/mine- the cycle got cancelled one day prior to retrieval. I was devastated!
I didn't want to go through another disappointment like that so we went for donor eggs - we picked out the donor right away but the wait was about 4 months. The donor was 21. There was 31 eggs retrieved, 26 fertilized, & we transferred ONE embryo - long story there. We have 11 embryos frozen and like Yvette, I'm not sure what we're going to do about that.
We got pregnant on the first try (thank God), had a great pregnancy and delivered last April - healthy, active, baby boy who's the light of our lives. I could care less about whose DNA he has - he's healthy, beautiful and so sweet and that's all I care about.
If you have any questions, please feel free to pm me - good luck to you - jen
I also know of someone else who's used donor eggs. She's on this forum 40smama. She had her baby last april.
As far as costs....if we hadn't found our donor from an egg donor agency it would have just been $12,655, but since we used an agency we paid the clinic $9255.00 I do have insurance which pays for IVF, but of course the donor expenses aren't covered by insurance plan. The insurance covered the transfer, however. They could be covered by your Flexible saving account if you had one, however.
Since we found our donor thru an ED agency we had to pay them around $7400.00. It was for the donor fee, agency fee, attorney fee and insurance for the donor if there was a problem.
So in total about $16655.00. I was so relieved it worked the first attempt, but as you can see our donor had a good response and we probably would have been successful in subsequent attempts if the first time didn't work.
Another lady just got pregnant and she used donor eggs..I'm not sure if she's the other poster's cycle buddy. Her hcg is very high and I'm sure she's got twins.
Our infertility clinic has a waiting list for donors, that's why we went to an outside agency to find a donor. The donor agency was here in Phoenix, AZ too.
You know I just was getting to a point that miscarriage after miscarriage I couldn't take it anymore. I was tired of the emotional roller coaster with each prenancy and/or month TTC. This really gave us a good shot. I was 41 when we decided to use an egg donor. It did take us longer than normal time from the time we decided to use the egg donor to the time they did the retrieval, but we ran into a couple of donors who changed their minds and the third go pregnant on us during the fertility testing. But I think if you don't run into any problems you could probably do it an about 4 months.
Best wishes to you! And feel free to PM me.
Good luck to you.
As far as costs....if we hadn't found our donor from an egg donor agency it would have just been $12,655, but since we used an agency we paid the clinic $9255.00 I do have insurance which pays for IVF, but of course the donor expenses aren't covered by insurance plan. The insurance covered the transfer, however. They could be covered by your Flexible saving account if you had one, however.
Since we found our donor thru an ED agency we had to pay them around $7400.00. It was for the donor fee, agency fee, attorney fee and insurance for the donor if there was a problem.
So in total about $16655.00. I was so relieved it worked the first attempt, but as you can see our donor had a good response and we probably would have been successful in subsequent attempts if the first time didn't work.
Another lady just got pregnant and she used donor eggs..I'm not sure if she's the other poster's cycle buddy. Her hcg is very high and I'm sure she's got twins.
Our infertility clinic has a waiting list for donors, that's why we went to an outside agency to find a donor. The donor agency was here in Phoenix, AZ too.
You know I just was getting to a point that miscarriage after miscarriage I couldn't take it anymore. I was tired of the emotional roller coaster with each prenancy and/or month TTC. This really gave us a good shot. I was 41 when we decided to use an egg donor. It did take us longer than normal time from the time we decided to use the egg donor to the time they did the retrieval, but we ran into a couple of donors who changed their minds and the third go pregnant on us during the fertility testing. But I think if you don't run into any problems you could probably do it an about 4 months.
Best wishes to you! And feel free to PM me.
Good luck to you.
OMG.. that is amazing. I am 40 1/2 and we are going to do the donor thing, but was wondering about the costs involved. WE are in the chicagoland area and have many options here, but want to make the right decisions. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
I used donor eggs due to advanced maternal age (42) and I am almost 18 weeks pregnant. I worked the first time. They got 50 eggs from our ED and they transferred two embryos. I'm pregnant with one. And they froze 21 embryos. I'm not sure what we're going to do about that.
I used donor eggs last year. Taylor is 6 months old now and the joy of my life. Donor was 21 years old and I got pregnant with my first IVF attempt.
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