Happily married, secure, mature (or so we thought), next logical step - baby! Well it didn't quite happen like that.
My
usual lady doctor referred me to a fertility specialist, who
immediately diagnosed that it was completely impossible for me to
conceive without the help of an egg donor. This was an absolute shocker
and devastation. I needed time to understand. I had never even heard of
egg donation, now it was suddenly my only way forward. I tried to find
the silver lining and that was it was completely possible to conceive
this way. There were no further problems or complications. My uterus was
in order and my partner's sperm confirmed good. His experience of all
of this is one for another account. After a dummy run of checking my
cycle, it was confirmed that we could proceed with my next cycle.
I
was referred to baby2mom to help with the selection of an egg donor.
The process was so new to me, I did not know what to consider in an egg
donor and that such a concept as an egg donation agent actually existed.
I think I just wanted to be a mom, so really my criteria was to find a
donor who was able to proceed as soon as possible. It really did not
matter if she was physically different to me. I needed to be a mommy and
if I did not become this soon, I would start sinking without the
prospect to climb back to normality. So, I paid little attention to who
she really was, just the urgency.
So our first cycle started, I
kept thinking of this egg donor. I could not actually even begin to
imagine her. It so happened, that the egg donor did not have any
childhood pictures, so I really imagined this woman who had the heart of
gold. I was stunned at the thought that an ordinary person would go out
of her way to help me heal, to make a difference in my small life. Why
would she do that? Who am I to her? So I ate properly, prepared my body
for the transfer, prayed for my donor and for the tiny pieces of human
tissue that would contribute to life, or hopefully so. Unfortunately my
first pregnancy test yielded a negative and I was not only in a state of
shock, I started to break, on an emotional level. It could not be as I
had done everything so right. How can this happen? I was so prepared for
this moment, even playing, 'this is my moment, my perfect moment' en
route the pregnancy test. It was a learning. Life is divine in its own
time. I needed to avail myself. My saving grace was the lining up of
another donor.
I was to learn and grow spiritually even more
than anticipated. A further negative result. Twice it did not work. I
began to disbelieve. I have always only seen this happen to other woman.
It was starting to look like something (great) that only happens to
normal woman. I felt that my punishment was so great and yet it was
something about which I was so focused. My life could not proceed
without this.
Yet each time my hope was vested in the plan, a
new egg donation cycle. My theory was that it had to work at some point
in time. I learnt that even with perfect circumstances, sometimes the
result would be negative. Each time, my criteria for an egg donor was
really to proceed as quickly as possible.
Then it happened, a
pregnancy. I was in complete shock. I am pregnant. After the news, I
could not wipe the smile off my face. This moment had eventually
arrived. It was not the exact moment I had anticipated (as this would
really have been with the first IVF or even before that first trip to
the fertility specialist), but it was the greatest moment and greatest
joy known. You know joy when you know the same level of pain.
As
I look over at this bundle of joy cuddled in my arms, I imagine this
soul out there who gave me a tiny piece of her, and yet she changed my
world. I don't know where she is and if she has donated again and I have
not asked Jenny more of her, except that I am now whole and able to
carry on again. My egg donor has blessed me and for that I will forever
be grateful to her for changing my life forever, for making me mommy.