# My heads in a bit of a pickle



## loopylulu888 (Jul 6, 2013)

_Abit about me first just to give you an idea - I'm 24 , hubby is 27 and we had our little boy J in Jube 2014 following an ICSI cycle - eternally grateful for him but I'm getting that gut pulling jealousy of pregnancy announcements again ! I want another baby !!

My issue is , atm , with me being a SAHM we are surviving of 1 income and we would struggle to save the £3500 needed for another cycle , should I go back to work the situation would be the and as childcare costs would eat my wages ! So I'd much rather stay at home.

While stalking our clinics website I came across the "egg sharing" heading and read up on it - I could recieve treatment for £1100 if we egg share which is an achievable amount to save over this next year - I want J to have a sibling close in age which is why I don't just wait until he's in school before trying again .

My pickle is that in not sure how I would feel , if I'd went through the whole IVF procedure again and got a negative with the donar getting a positive - I know it sounds silly but I can't shift the feeling of losing my eggs that could have been my baby. Obviously I'd be happy that the lady fell pregnant and happy that I have helped but these feeling are lying deep down - do you think I'm not ready for egg sharing or are these feelings normal ? _


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## KDJay (Sep 21, 2015)

Hey loppy - that is a totally normal feeling and something the counsellor will go through with you at the clinic  - when I had my counselling session the question about negative for us and positive for the recipient was the only thing I didn't feel totally 100% with then but I had my counselling session at my initial consultation and by time time all the screening comes back etc./waiting etc I had naturally come to terms with this in my own mind. In the end I had binding issues with my half of my eggs and I would have liked to have known if the other half of my eggs had the same problem but my eggs went into the egg bank as my recipient pulled out. If my recipient had a positive I would have seen this as good news that my eggs were good. Everyone is different and you need to take your time to come to a decision that's right for you and counselling during the process may help this. As with everything there are waits along the way so it gives you plenty of time to change your stance on things and evolve with your thinking , I know my thinking about it all has evolved so much in the relative short period I have been on this journey x x x


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## goldbunny (Mar 26, 2012)

or it could succeed, you could get one or two beautiful siblings out of it And make another families dream come true. in your shoes i'd egg share no question. you could egg share two cycles for less than one straight ivf. time is on your side. and if getting a sibling quickly is the issue then the cheaper option is a no brainer. if you get enough eggs to share them, you wouldn't be putting them all back anyway so it would still be a dice roll as to whether the right egg went back. but if it failed, where would you be? saving up again? how many goes could you manage before egg share felt right? if you might end up doing it anyway might as well start now and hope for the best. good luck x


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## Puggle (Mar 3, 2016)

Hi Loopy,

Just thought I'd share my experience. I've egg shared twice and both my recipients are pregnant and I am not (and I have never been pregnant).

I asked myself before going ahead with the treatment what would I would feel in this situation, and I thought I would simply feel grateful that the eggsharing scheme had given me a chance I otherwise couldn't afford, and happy that an infertile woman got her dream baby. Now I'm here however, its a little different. I don't feel any gratitude, only grief. There are some good aspects, in terms of future treatment at least I have an indication that the implantation is unlikely to be egg or embryo factor, so I think we are going to explore immunes next.

I try to think of having donated those eggs as just like donating any other bodily tissue like blood or bone marrow, and remain emotionally detatched from it. If I didn't do that, or if I thought of those pregnancies as 'my babies', I would go mad. On the surface I'm not bothered either way that my recipients are pregnant, but deep down there is a grain of resentment. I wonder what kind of people they are, would I like them, are the grateful, will they tell their child its donor conceived.

On balance I do think egg sharing is a good thing, but it hasnt given me the warm feelings I thought it might. My advice if you go ahead with it it to shop around carefully for your clinic to get the best 'deal'. Some give you a free consultation, others don't, some give you entirely free IVF, others get you to pay a reduced cost. They also vary in the exact number of eggs they expect you to donate, what they do in the event of odd numbers of eggs collected and what they do in the event of not enough eggs collected, so do your homework! Good Luck!


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## nevertoolate (Jul 15, 2015)

Hi
The rules have changed for aspects of egg sharing.
In the past if not many were collected, you could have in the past chose to give the recipient all of the eggs on that round and go for another round yourself.
Now that is not possible and you would keep all of those eggs yourself so the chance of the recipient being pregnant and you not having a positive is reduced now.


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## KDJay (Sep 21, 2015)

Dreaming - I think it must depend where you egg share as they all have different terms, I recently egg shared and I was allowed to donate all if I hadn't had enough and then my next cycle would have been a keep all cycle and it would be for free but different places have different rules xxx


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## Puggle (Mar 3, 2016)

I just did my egg share last month and if there were not enough eggs (less than 8 ) I could have donated all and have a free cycle... But I know other clinic offer different rules. X


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