And Now for Something Completely Different - PART III

If you're just now diving into this, you may want to read Parts I and II. Or maybe just II, or maybe just I. You will likely be confused no matter what. 

I am lucky in that I have had both experiences. The infertility, IVF, difficult path, and the easy-peasy, “oops, how did I get pregnant?” – path. Both have made me more grounded, humble, and with a better understanding and more empathy for others no matter how they got to the motherhood destination. This has also led me to where we are now. Donating our unused embryos to another family was not something we originally anticipated we would do. But after this whole experience, destroying the unused embryos was not something we could ethically do either. I also think about those who want to be a mother, or are a mother, who desperately want to carry her own child and cannot. I think of these women and think of how donating our embryos may help. So again, another decision made more objectively. Not how it would affect us, but how it would help someone else. So we did it – chose a family who cannot get pregnant on their own, already has two adopted children and wants more, and wants to have the experience of carrying her own child. This is another process that typically takes a lot of time and decision-making, but something that just came easily to us. Now this woman is pregnant with one healthy baby on her 3^rd try with our (her) embryos.

I am sure our egg donor did not think much of donating her eggs, or at least as much as we thought of it. Heck, it may have even been about the money for her since she was paid a decent amount, but the impact it had on us obviously is our entire world. Thinking that our embryos are the same to someone else is a surreal feeling. To us, it is just something we did, but if this woman has a healthy child from this gesture, it will be a much bigger part of her world. This is very difficult for me to even articulate well. The impact it has on our children is also much bigger – the boys will have a full sibling in an entirely different family, and our daughter will have a half-sibling just like her brothers. What an incredible world this has become – for better or for worse. But for these things to even be possible is beyond comprehension.

After reading through my personal journals, I thought it best to sum it up like this. For myself, or for my children to read someday, this was a good outlet and way to do it. And if by chance you stumbled upon this because you googled anything relating to IVF, infertility, egg donation, embryo donation, or something totally unrelated…welcome. Hopefully if you are here looking for comfort or answers to guide you through your journey, you find this helpful. Or at the very least, entertaining.

BAM! I don’t write often, but when I do, it’s a lot.