# Known donors



## trueginger (Oct 17, 2006)

Hello ladies,
I have had 3 unsuccessful bites of the IVF cherry now and I am giving up with my own crappy eggs and considering the use of a donor.  I have several friends and relatives who would consider donating an egg to me (no sisters unfortunately) but I wondered how the procedure works for this.  Do they allow you to do that or do you have to donate to the clinic?  Do you need conselling before you start?  Has anyone else done this with a known donor and what did it feel like?  All these questions but I am sure you lot have had all these thoughts and more.  Please let me know what I am potentially letting myself in for! All thought welcome...
Sarah


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## JennyJJ (Oct 10, 2008)

Hi,

I have recently been a known donor so will try and answer at least some of your questions...
You don't have to donate to the clinic and it is perfectly ok for you to have your own donor and means that you can start as soon as you like once tests are done and everyone is good to go. As the donor I had to have counselling. The recipients didn't but the service is there if you want it. I can't really answer about how you as the recipient will feel but I do know that my friend felt a bit helpless up until ET as she was not doing any of the injections and I think it made the process seem even longer for her. But hey there are def pros to no daily injections!! HTH

Jenny x


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## hobbesy (Nov 22, 2006)

I was a known donor last year, my friend/recipient is also on ff so she may pop by and find your post too. Each clinic is different, but we both had to do a counselling session to ensure we'd thought everything through. There was no problem with me donating just to my friend, but there is also the option of donating to the clinic to put you at the top of their list if you wanted an anonymous donor (but I'm very much in favour of known if you have the option) I obviously can only answer for myself how it feels, but its not been weird in any way. I think with egg donation particularly there is an advantage to the fact that is the recipient's body that grows and nourishes the baby (babies in our case!) so perhaps makes it easier afterwards. But, I certainly don't see the babies as mine in any way if that was your concern. More that I just got to play a special part in my close friend having a baby. 

We both had blogs documenting everything so feel free to have a read through. The link to mine is in my signature (i think) and you can find DrownedGirl's from there

Feel free to pm me with any questions

Keri -x-


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## drownedgirl (Nov 12, 2006)

Hi! Yes, I'm here too.

Obviously now we actually have De twins, I'm feeling the benefits of it being a known donor.. no worries that I'll be unable to explain things honestly to the babies later on or that they might be distressed at not being able to find the donor.

Having a friend alongside through the whole process is great too, though seeing someone undergoing ET etc is pretty harrowing (and Hobbesy had OHSS too)  I think she was hit pretty hard by the initial BFN after all she'd gone through, as well. It's not nice to see someone suffer on your behalf!

Of course now we have our twins, it was all worthwhile.

I don't have any weird feelings or doubts or sadness that we didn't have the babies I miscarried. I couldn't be happier than i am with these ones. They feel totally mine, even at the same time as I can see bits of Hobbesy in them. 

I guess if you are ready for donor eggs, in your heart, then you are past the time for sadness or regret.


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## drownedgirl (Nov 12, 2006)

PS I think not using a sister has its advantages! Relationships with a sister can be fraught.  

You don't need any genetic link to feel a baby is yours, once you've grown it and given birth.

xx


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