Egg Retrieval Day

Today is the big day to find out how many eggs were retrieved from our donor and we just received an email from our nurse.  She told us that we received 14 eggs but only 10 were mature.  They are inseminating the mature eggs today with my frozen sperm and the other 4 immature eggs were discarded.  

We will be getting daily updates on our embryos up until it's time to transfer!!

It's about that time!

So we're just one week away from transfer!!  I've been waiting to update the blog when we had some dates set in stone for the egg retrieval/insemination and for the transfer and we (finally) got confirmation today so here we go.......

I'm going to write this in chronological order so it doesn't get confusing.  If you remember, we decided to split the number of eggs (and the cost) with another random couple.  Since the fertility clinic now had to deal with two carriers (or surrogates), they had to wait for the menstrual cycle of our carrier and the other couples carrier to fully complete before they started taking their hormones. This led to a bit of a delay but only by a couple of weeks.  

On Sept 4th, our carrier started taking estrogen injections to "trick" her body into thinking it was pregnant so it would build a thick uterine lining for the embryos to attach to when it came time to transfer.  She's been giving herself these injections every three days and will continue to up until the day of transfer.

On Sept 14th, our egg donor starting taking her hormones to get her ovaries to produce as many follicles (that will end up being eggs) as they possibly can before retrieval day.  

Sept 17th our carrier went to her local clinic in Wisconsin to check her uterine lining and to make sure everything looked healthy.  There was some concern over a cyst that was found on one of her ovaries but the doctor wasn't worried so luckily there was no hang up with all that.  

Yesterday (the 23rd) we received an email from our nurse saying that currently there are 34 eggs (17 for each couple) and they all look healthy.  Keep in mind that even though we're getting 17 eggs, not all of them will be viable for transfer so we might only end up having 12 or 13 eggs to really use.  

Today our clinic told us that our egg donor will "trigger" this evening; apparently they give the donor some type of final injection to mature the eggs.  Since she will trigger tonight, she will come back in on Wednesday to have her eggs removed.  

On the 25th, the egg donor will have her eggs removed by using a hollow needle that will go up and thru her vaginal wall toward her ovaries.  Once the needle is near the eggs, a suction device will suck up all the eggs that have accumulated over the last week and a half.  Almost right away, they will inject my sperm into the eggs.  They have my swimmers frozen at the clinic so I don't have to make a trip to the clinic on Wednesday for this.  

After the eggs are fertilized, they will sit in a petri dish anywhere from 3 to 5 days.  Since we'll likely have quite a few eggs, they'll transfer the eggs on the 5th day.  If we didn't have many eggs to start with and if they didn't look like they were doing too well, they'd want to transfer the eggs into the uterus sooner but hopefully this won't be the case.  On the 5th day, the top two eggs that look the healthiest and most viable will be transferred to our carrier.  The rest of the eggs we will freeze in case we want to add any brothers or sisters down the road.  I'm really pushing for more kids but Chris wants to be done at one or two.....so likely we'll have more kids.  :-)

Our carrier (along with her husband) will fly into DC on the 29th and the transfer will happen on Monday, the 30th.  The transfer process takes less than 5 minutes and then she will be on bed rest for 24 hours at their hotel.  Then the next day they fly back to Wisconsin.  

I'm not too sure how long they wait to do the pregnancy blood test or the pee test but once they do, I will of course shoot out another post.  Keep in mind though that only one or maybe neither of the eggs that are transferred will make it.  I think it's like a 74% chance that one will make it and 63% that both will make it; so our chances are good but it's still not a guarantee.  

I won't do that whole thing where we wait until after the first trimester to tell y'all (that whole jinx thing)......as soon as I know, y'all will know.

Thanks for reading!

An egg-citing update about our donor!

We got the confirmation we were waiting for......the email that said "congrats! you've successfully matched with the egg donor"; which really just means "thanks guys, your check cleared".  As promised, I'm going to describe our egg donor in as much detail as I can so you can get create your own visual on what she looks like.  Actually, Chris and I are kind of creating our own visual on what she looks like too since all we have to go by is her baby pics.  We took a gamble....we're just hoping it pays off.  

Ok so she's a white girl (we briefly talked about a black egg donor since most mixed kids are gorgeous but we figured having two dads would already be enough to explain as he/she/they got older) born to an Italian mom and German dad.  We're hoping she doesn't have a feisty temper and a fresh mouth; I won't name names but we already have one of those in our house.  She's 22, 5'06" and currently weighs 125 pounds.  Over half of the donors were immediately eliminated since we gave a weight cut-off to any potential donor.....I'm not going to post what that weight is because I'm sure we'll look like a couple of dicks.  I'll just say we were pretty picky.  

She has a small body frame, born with blonde hair but it's now a light brown color and has blue-green eyes.  She's not married and doesn't have any kids of her own but plans to down the road.  In college, she played field hockey and was a competitive cheerleader.  Right now, she's working on getting her masters in social work.  I can't believe this is actually a question on her questionnaire but she's only had 2 partners in the last five years, I find this pretty remarkable for being 22 actually.  I hope this characteristic IS inherited in our kids from her......I won't give my number of partners by the time I reached 22 since I have family reading this but I will say there is a number 2 in it.  Hahaha....jk.  Maybe. 

If I see you out and you want to see her pics, ask me and I'll show you.  Or shoot me a text and I'll send you a screen shot of her two pics.  

So right now our carrier is taking more meds to trick her body into thinking it's pregnant and the egg donor is taking meds to get her ovaries into overdrive so we can get the most eggs out of her as we can.  This all takes 4-6 weeks in total.  Our nurse from the fertility clinic said that we'd be transferring the fertilized embryos to our carrier mid-September.  More waiting but at least I feel we're making some real progress.  I'll update the next post when it comes time to transfer

Thanks for reading.  

To say that these last couple of months have been frustrating would be a major understatement.  I really thought that we'd be transferring the fertilized embryos to our carrier about this time (if not sooner) but the medical screenings our carrier had to go thru were a bit more time consuming than we had anticipated.  Even then I was hopeful that if we picked our egg donor as recent as last week, we could still transfer by the end of July but that was a pipe dream also.  This whole process is basically a series of "hurry up and wait" steps that has really tested my patience but this blog ends on a good note so let me jump back a bit to share how we got where are are today.  

One of the mandatory requirements for the fertility clinic is a group meeting with a social worker.  Chris and I already had our couples meeting with her back in February but our carrier and her husband had to do one also and then we had had to do a group session with all four of us.  This was scheduled for the beginning of June so we had to quickly make travel arrangements for them.  As the intended parents, we are responsible for all flight and hotel costs in addition to food and other expenses that are incurred during their trip.  So back on June 6th, we were all set to meet and even though we left in what I thought was ample time to make our appointment on time, thanks to the notoriously horrific DC traffic, we were about 30 minutes late.  The carrier and her husband did their couples session right before our group session so everyone was awaiting our arrival.  

We ran into the waiting room, quickly introduced ourselves to the carrier and her husband and we were ushered into the social workers office.  Since we literally only had about 20 seconds to size each other up in the waiting room, the entire hour of the session basically consisted of eight eyes shooting across the room stealing glances and making first impressions.  Both the carrier and her husband were extremely nice people and where the she was pretty timid and shy, her husband was a bit more outgoing.  Also, our carrier is tiny.  I mean really petite; probably 5'2 and 110 pounds.  I couldn't quite picture her carrying twins but Chris swears that it shouldn't be an issue.  Anyway, I'm sure all of us were quite nervous initially but as the session went on, we all seemed to open up a bit more.  During the meeting, the social worker basically went over what we all expect out of each other in regards to visitation both during and after the pregnancy.  We decided that it would be best to fly out to Wisconsin for the first ultrasound, one other time when she's about 6 or 7 months along and of course at the delivery.  After the baby/babies are born, we will send both birthday and Christmas cards with pictures of the child(ren) but no face to face interaction.

After the therapy session, we went to grab a late afternoon snack and a drink just to chat and talk about what we expect from this whole process.  It was nice to just talk without a third party analyzing and writing down notes as the conversation is taking place.  No real deal breakers came up but she prefers a mid-wife while Chris prefers her to see a ob/gyn so we compromised by agreeing for her to see a mid-wife that is employed in a physician group where an actual MD signs off on any treatment plan.  That and confirming that we're ok with the delivery taking place in Wisconsin made for a productive afternoon.  This was important to us because it was at this point where things broke down with the other couple she was initially going to carry for.  We all left the meeting feeling pretty good about the conversation we just had and pretty confident that our attorneys wouldn't hit any road blocks that would stop the entire process.  

Our attorneys contacted us several days after the meeting with the social worker to go over the contract that all parties would need to sign before going forward.  Basically the contract covers the money due to the carrier, her medical responsibilities during the pregnancy and life decisions for the carrier and the embryos in several "what if" scenarios.  This was a non-event really since we already talked this out so the contract was agreed to and signed in a matter of days.  This is also where I started to lose my patience with the fertility clinic.  

Chris and I were both anxious to get started on looking thru the online egg donor database so we could start making some decisions on who our baby mama would be.  The clinic initially told us that we would gain access after our social worker signed off on our chart.  Then we were told that we couldn't gain access until they received confirmation that legal was complete.  And then once our attorneys sent them a signed copy of our contract, we were told that we couldn't have access to the database until our carrier finished her mock EEP cycle (more on than in the next paragraph).  I completely understood the rationale why they made sure all these steps were complete but the bait-and-switch really wore me down to where our agent had to take over communication with the clinic because I wasn't at a place where I could have a calm conversation with them anymore.  

Now that legal was complete, our carrier had to have several procedures and testing to go through to clear the final hurdle before we got the medical clearance to proceed with the transfer and more importantly to gain access to the egg donor database.  All carriers have to go thru a mock EEP cycle to test the uterine lining to make sure it's thick and viable enough for implantation of the embryos.  This is where we hit another small hurdle in our time frame.  Since our carrier has her period at the beginning of each month, we had to wait for her July menses cycle to complete before she could begin her mock cycle where she has to give herself estrogen shots.  This takes about two weeks of self-administered shots every three days followed by an ultrasound to check her uterus.  

We were notified just last week that her mock cycle got the medical thumbs up so now (finally) our complete medical chart was ready to be reviewed by our fertility doctor.  She apparently reviewed our chart, gave it the ok, and provided us access last week but the email from the staff member that deals with the egg donor database (and our access code) was hanging out in my spam folder, which I found out about this morning.  As of just earlier today, we have full access to the donor database and we were given our access code to pick out our donor.  Luckily a couple of weeks ago I was able to convince one of the nurses to give us access to the database with a temporary code so we actually had already made a decision on our egg donor but now we could actually choose her.  You read that right, we have our baby mama!!  Now is when the real fun begins and hopefully things will move at a much faster pace.  We picked our egg donor today but it's not official until we get confirmation (and when our check clears.....ugh) and that should all happen in the next couple of days.  Once we get the confirmation email, I'll describe the egg donor we picked out and go into detail of the next steps.  

Thanks for reading!!

We found our surrogate!!

I can't believe it's been almost two months since my last post!  I've been meaning to update over the last couple of weeks but as soon as I think I'm at a good point, something else seems to come up to add.  Ok, so last time I left off where we were leaving the clinic and waiting for us to get matched with a surrogate/carrier so that'll probably be a good place to pick up.  

In less than two weeks after our clinic meeting, our agency found a potential carrier for us.  I was actually quite surprised that it happened so quickly and I later found out why she was available so soon but I'll touch on that later.  I'll briefly explain how the whole "matching" process works.  When we first signed on with our agency, they had us fill out a quite lengthy questionnaire that touched on basically every topic you can think of like personal family background, education, health history and also a couple of pictures of us.  All the potential surrogates (or gestational carriers; GC for short.  Remember this because I'll be using this abbreviation here on out) have to fill out the same type of application that we did.  The surrogate agent reviews both applications and takes every couples' individual circumstances/preferences into consideration when trying to match a GC like proximity, willing to carry multiples (ie twins, which we're hoping for), diet, and religion but for gay couples, there are a few more hurdles to leap through.  The GC has to first of all be willing to carry for a gay couple and live in a gay friendly state (I'll go in to detail why this is important later).

The agent sent me an email saying that she felt like she found us a perfect match and I instantly got kinda nervous/excited.  She had some updates to put on the potential GC's profile but she said that she would send it to us in a matter of days.  That Friday (two weeks to the day after our clinic appointment) she emailed us a very detailed bio about this potential GC.  Included in the email was a brief personal bio, several pages of open-ended questions with her answers along with several pictures of her, her husband and their kids.  While finding a carrier is pretty important, we weren't as nervous about it as we were about choosing the egg donor.  So we both read and looked over her profile/pics and basically just said "I guess everything looks ok".  We weren't really too sure what to look for in a GC and we felt completely clueless so I called the agent and asked "Are there questions we should be asking?  Something to focus on in the bio?".    She just told us if the GC looked good to us on paper then we'd proceed with a group phone call to get a better feel.  In all honesty, it was kinda anti-climatic.  

Coincidentally, that same weekend the agent was hosting a GC get-together type thing in Chicago; kind of like a support group where GC's get together and talk/share about their experiences.  Teresa (our then-potential GC) was there also so the agent shared our profile with her.  She was also interested to move forward and by the end of that weekend, we had a potential match!!  It felt like it all happened too easily so I was still cautious going forward because we still had to have that group phone call.  I was quite relieved knowing that the agent would be on the phone call too because I felt that this could get very awkward very fast.  That next Wednesday was the group call.  We all took turns telling a little about ourselves, why Chris and I wanted to start a family and why Teresa wanted to be a carrier.  Out of privacy, I'm not going to share why she wants to be a GC but I'll say it's very important to her to help couples have a family that otherwise wouldn't be able to.  There were some definite awkward pauses, some talking over one another, and some nervous laughter in there but overall, I felt the phone call went rather well.  Moments after our half-hour phone call, I get a text from our agent telling us to talk things over about how we feel about Teresa going forward and to get back to her.  She seemed like a lovely person so there was little hesitation on our part so just 10 minutes after her text, I texted back saying that we really liked her and that we're good to go on our end.  Apparently Teresa had the same reply back to our agent so now it was official, we were matched!!

Remember that I said earlier that finding a gay-friendly state was important?  Well here's why.  Some states flat out prohibit surrogacy of any type, surprisingly New York is one of them.  Other states prohibit surrogacy involving gay couples while some prohibit surrogates carrying for any non-related family member.  However, in most states the same-sex second parent issue is where it gets really tricky.  I'll use our case as an example.  I'd be the on the birth certificate since I'll be the biological father but we'd have to go through a second-parent adoption process to add Chris's name to it which can take anywhere up to a year to do; that's assuming we live in a state that allows same-sex parent adoption which Virginia does not.  Luckily Teresa lives in Wisconsin where the laws are more relaxed.  In short, prior to birth, our attorney in WI (also located for us by our agent) will draw up a petition to file to the state court to add Chris's name to the certificate without having to go through the adoption process.  This is filed with the court the day of or the day following the birth of the baby/babies and typically within just 5 days, I'll be able to leave WI with both of our names on the child/children's birth certificate(s).  This is a HUGE deal and a major relief.  Some couples choose a GC closer to home for the convenience of it and choose to fight the adoption process but we decided this little concession was worth a headache down the road.  

Teresa and I have texted and have had several hour-long phone calls to get to know one another better and to create a bond.  I honestly felt like this would be forced and awkward but I am very pleased to say that we both have very similar (lack of) religious beliefs, same political views and similar views on other topics so the conversations have been free flowing and easy.  Oh right, the reason why she was available so soon.  She was initially matched earlier this year to another couple but that couple wanted her to give birth in their home state which she didn't feel comfortable doing.  Now the next step is for her and her husband to fly in to DC to visit our fertility clinic and meet our doctor.  At this meeting, they'll take some blood samples from both of them and do a mock transfer; basically sticking a narrow tube thru her cervix to make sure that there will be an easy pathway to transfer the embryos.  Teresa and her husband also have to meet with the social worker that Chris and I met with a few months ago for a couples session, then all four of us meet with the same social worker for a group meeting later that day.  That should be interesting.  All this is scheduled for June 6th and 7th.  Assuming all goes well at this two-day trip to the clinic, we'll then get access to the egg donor pool and that's when the real fun begins!!

So unless something dramatic happens in the next couple of weeks, I more than likely won't post again until after the first week of June when we get to meet Teresa and visit the clinic again.  

Thanks for reading!!

I have to do what?!

Finally some good news.....we've officially found our clinic!!  It's the Maryland clinic I mentioned in the last post and since it's America's largest fertility clinic, they have an extensive donor pool of fresh and frozen donor eggs which will make the decision process all that more intense going through all the profiles but it will also make us feel we picked the best of whats out there.  Ok fair warning, from here on out parts of this blog will be crass, crude and somewhat awkward for me to write about and maybe even for you to read......you've been warned! :-)

A major step in starting this whole thing is the screening process for the intended parents.  The MD clinic said that before they could schedule an appointment for my semen analysis that I would have to get screened for HIV, Hep C, Hep A and some other diseases.  Knowing that the longer I waited to get my blood drawn, the more anxiety I would have over the blood-letting so as soon as I got the email order, I went and had it done that same afternoon.  My hands were slick with sweat but I somehow managed to get to the lab.  At intake, I told the lady that I tend to pass out and that I didn't want a student doing it which she obliged but I could tell she was already annoyed.  When my name was finally called, I grabbed my juice box (I've learned to carry juice with me because it helps when I come to after I pass out) and went on back.  The phlebotomist was trying to keep a convo going to keep my mind busy but it wasn't helping because I could tell I wasn't feeling all too well after that needle was stabbed in my arm.  She called for help and a younger lady came in, put my feet up and put wet rags on my neck and face.  I started shaking, my legs and arms were feeling tingly and numb but I didn't pass out!!  They had me stay there a bit to wait for color to come back to my face so after 15 minutes (and with a slightly wet shirt) I was able to leave.  

Anyone who has ever taken this type of blood test knows how awful the waiting process is for the results!  Even tho I knew I was good to go, I still had that anxiety-ridden feelings of "what if?".  I finally got the results back and of course it was negative so on to the next step.  Oh btw, Chris had to do the same test even tho he won't be giving sperm; apparently it's a requirement altho I still don't get why.  Anyway, the clinic had my blood results so they called and scheduled our initial visit and sperm analysis for this past Friday.  Side note, this clinic is on it.  When you decide to use this clinic, they assign you a team that helps you along the entire process.  They are very quick in responding to emails and phone calls and they also give you an itinerary and a checklist so you know what you need to do and what they need to do along the way to make this whole process go as smooth as possible.  

Ok so two days ago we drove up to northern Virginia to meet with the doctor that will do the procedure when the time comes.  Unbeknownst to me, they needed a urine sample and more blood work!!  I was not prepared for this at all.  I easily gave the urine sample (it was a long car ride and I had already downed a bottle of water) but the blood work was going to be an issue.  Apparently the FDA requires additional blood screening to the blood work that I had already done.  The staff decided to wait to take my blood until after the consult with the doc since my anxiety level was sky high.  This physician was very informative, kind and just easy to talk to; I think we're really going to like her.  Now it was time for my blood draw.  I told them that sitting up in a chair wasn't a good idea so they took me to an exam room and laid me on an examination bed with stirrups.  After the lady politely asked me to remove my feet from the stirrups, she began the blood-letting.  It wasn't that bad but she still had me wait a bit to get color back again and for the shaking to stop before I could get up.  Keep in mind, I knew that I was going to have to give a sperm sample in about an hour and at this point, I was definitely not feeling in the mood.  

We left to go for the hour drive up to Maryland to their main clinic office.  This place was super fancy and a little intimidating.  I checked in and could barely make eye contact with the front desk lady because we both knew what I was there for.  Oh right, let me give you some of the rules they gave me before I gave them my sample.  I couldn't ejaculate for 3-5 days before the appointment (I opted for 3 days, 5 was pushing it), couldn't use lube or any other aid, and no one could be in there with me.  I was ok with the last part since I tend to do this on my own anyway.  So they called my name and this young lady took me back to the masturbation rooms.  Let me paint a picture for you.  This room was super small, the size of a bathroom really, with an oversized leather barcalounger crammed in there.  On the seat of the chair was a small stack of paper towels for which I can only assume was there to soak up any ass sweat that may occur while masturbating....needless to say, I opted not to sit.  Next to the chair was a magazine holder and on the wall was a small ten inch tv and a tiny sink below it.  The girl that took me to my room had me sign some paper work but before she left she apologetically said that they didn't have any gay porn.  So of course only to make it even more awkward, I replied with "oh no worries, it's been 3 days so it won't be an issue".  She politely laughed but then quickly shut the door.  

Now the pressure was on!  I knew this staff was professional but I felt like I was on a timer and they were just waiting for me to hurry along.  Again, not really the mindset I needed to do what I needed to do.  I wasn't remotely turned on at this point so I tried to look at some pics/videos via my phone but my room was in the middle of the building so the reception/signal was terrible.  I went ahead and decided to pop in a (straight) porn called Construction C*nt on the tv just to see if it would help.  Surprisingly it worked!  Altho after three days I'm sure watching two dogs going at it would do the trick.  Anyway, I tried to mentally remove the girl and her bouncing boobies from the scene but ended up just fast forwarding to the "final shot" which ultimately did it for me.  So I pulled my pants up, washed up and rang the bell for her to come back.  I can't even describe how awkward I felt at that very moment.  You know that initial feeling you get right after sex when you're with someone you probably shouldn't be with and you say to yourself "oh god, why did I just do that?"?  Yep, something like that.  So of course I made this moment worse by saying "so is this as awkward for you as it is for me right now?" but, with a giggle, she said it wasn't awkward and that she does this all day long.  Thankfully it was over and I went back to the main waiting area.  As I walked in the waiting room, I felt like the other people were all just staring at me quietly thinking "oh we know what you just did" but gratefully the nurse quickly came to take us to the main meeting room to meet with her, the donor coordinator and our personal assistant that will guide us along the way.  

We went over the next steps in the fertilization process, payment and embryo transfer options, and looked over some potential egg donors.  This meeting didn't last more than an hour so we were back on the road home in no time.  

So that's where we are now.  They have my semen which they will freeze so I will never have to do that again.  Now we just wait for our surrogate agency to find us a carrier which will hopefully happen in the next couple of weeks.  Once we find a carrier, then we can really start looking at potential donors.  Technically we can look at egg donors now but the timing might be off so we'll just wait until we find a carrier so we won't be disappointed if eggs that we want now won't be available in the next month or so when we're ready to transfer.  

Once the agency finds some potential carriers for us, I'll be back here to blog about it.  It may take up to a month but if anything major happens before then, I'll be back here to share with all of y'all!!  

On to the next.....

Needless to say our last visit to a fertility clinic didn't go so well so I had to start all over again.  In all honesty, I was extremely discouraged and completely let down after that initial consult.  I didn't know if other clinics were going to lure us in with all their smoke and mirrors just to build us up for another disappointment.  Word to the wise, read the online reviews of any potential clinic you're thinking about using.  I went off the advice of a couple that used this clinic for their transfer (when I say transfer, I mean when the fertilized eggs are transferred to the surrogates uterus) and their website made them look completely legit.  In a weird way, I'm glad this happened actually because it taught me a lesson in all this; research, research, research!  I can't say for sure that I wouldn't have visited this DC clinic but I think my expectations would have been a bit more tempered.  Oh and one more thing, I found out that most reputable clinics do a free initial consultation.  I mention this because just this week we received a bill for $500 from the DC clinic!  Now I'm all for paying physicians what they're due (because that's what pays our bills) but to me that amount is extreme for barely a 10 minute chat with a physician and a disastrous meeting with their coordinator.  I'm not adding this to the tally on the right yet because I'm fighting this; we'll probably end up having to pay it but not before the physician and I have a talk.  Side note, I'm not mentioning any of the clinics names out of complete fear of potentially getting sued.  

So I called Jesse (the lady that will be coordinating most of the process and more importantly, finding our carrier/surrogate) and told her that we're moving on to another clinic.  She told me of this clinic based out of Maryland that might be a bit more pricey but they have great transfer success rates and come highly recommended.  I did some snooping online and found that not only do they have great reviews but also have a unique donor option that I'll go into here in just a bit.  I called the MD clinic and spoke with their donor coordinator; not only was she extremely nice but she was also very knowledgeable.  We agreed to set up a phone call with one of their physicians, which just took place this past Tuesday, to go over the basics like our timeline on when we want to transfer, our medical and personal history, and the expectations that the clinic has of us.  After the phone call was over, I felt a sense of relief and renewed excitement about this whole process.  

During the phone call, the physician gave me the password to access their donor pool.  I'm not going to lie, this is a mixed bag of feelings.  While the thought of finding the egg donor to what will be our future child/children is thrilling and makes this whole thing feel so real, it also fills you with a sense of anxiety because you immediately wonder what kind of women are out there donating their eggs.  While I know that these clinics won't let a crack whore off the streets to come in and donate her eggs (there is a very rigorous screening process), it makes me wonder if these girls are the "top shelf" of DNA that we would want.  After perusing through their quite lengthy list of potential donors, I found that there are just a few diamonds in the rough.....most of them just seem rough.  What really surprised me is that these donors only have baby pictures and maybe a couple of pics of them as a child.  I called the coordinator to ask about adult pictures of these donors and I was told that due to facial recognition software out there now, most donors do not want their current pics online.  I guess I get it but it would be nice to help narrow the search.  She did say that once we pick a potential donor we could then get a picture of her or maybe even meet her in person.  I'm not so sure how I feel about meeting her but I'll cross that topic if and when it comes up.  Anyway, all I did initially was look thru the pics and tried to determine who was the cutest/most attractive baby.  Can you imagine what an asshole I felt like after a while when I realized I was judging babies?!  Here I am thinking "oh god no", "too risky on what they look like now", or "mmm....maybe" about these little girls that I've never met.  Let's be real, not every baby is cute or adorable but when you criticize and scrutinize baby after baby after baby, it doesn't take long before you feel like a real dick.  

Here's a quick breakdown of the cost for this clinic.  If any couple wanted exclusive use of a particular donors' eggs, then for $55K the eggs are theirs and that donor is out of the loop for any other couple to use.  Ever.  Obviously this is for couples that don't want half-sisters or half-brothers running around.  This fee also includes up to six transfers and if after six transfers nothing happens, you get a full refund.  If you want to gamble by only attempting one transfer but still want your own eggs and no sharing, then its $29K.  However, if a couple is willing to share donor eggs with one other couple, then it's $39K for up to six transfers or just $18K for the one time deal.  Or if a couple is willing to share the eggs with two other couples, then the cost is $31K and $14K in each scenario.  On average the clinic can get around 30 eggs from a donor so I assume y'all can do the math on how that would break down on splitting the eggs.  I think we'll be opting for the "shared risk" option of up to six cycles because the clinic will also freeze any fertilized eggs of ours that aren't transferred at that time for us to use if we choose to add to our family down the road.  I'm still not sure if we'll be splitting the eggs with one other couple or two; I can say, with complete certainty, that we will not be choosing the $55K option.  

Ok - back to the list.  From the list I found my top two potential donors!!  Exciting right?!?!  Yeah, I thought so too.  I called the coordinator yesterday (due to the snow storm we didn't have power Wednesday nor most of Thursday) telling her this fantastic news but she quickly told me to slow my roll.  She said that we still have a few steps to take before we can pick out any donor and that while it's great that I have a couple picked out, they may not be available when we're ready.  Apparently before we can choose a donor, we have to go up to the clinic for the (free) initial consult, I have to give a sperm sample to make sure I'm not shooting blanks and get my blood tested to check for any diseases.  I'm hoping we can get up to the clinic on the 22nd of this month but Chris's work schedule really limits the days we can go.  Apparently they need him there to sign some documents to make sure he's aware of this whole process and they need to witness his signature.  If he can't go in the next two weeks, I can still go on my own for them to poke and prod me so they can do all the initial testing they need done and for me to sign my paperwork.  He can realistically sign the papers any time before the transfer but I'd rather him be there so he doesn't feel left out of any part of this process.  

So that's where we are now.  We found a new clinic that I hope won't be a disaster like the first and hopefully we'll be able to make a day trip to MD in the next couple of weeks.  There's quite a bit of work and time consumed in the beginning stages of this but I've been told that once we find a carrier and the donor, things just take off from there.  We were hoping for a May transfer but in reality, I think it'll more likely be June or July.  I'll keep y'all posted!