Future Egg Donation

When my phone rang today and the caller ID read that it was egg donor agency, I quickly picked up the phone. I anticipated good news about the couple I just donated to, or with my new couple that wanted me after this donation. My agency told me that the couple looking to use me after my 3rd cycle, had found someone else a couple of weeks ago. I guess they could not wait for me to finish off this last cycle. I am disappointed that it didn't work out, but I am fairly confident that another couple will pick me. Hopefully soon! 

-Your Egg Donor-

Follistim Pen is MIA?

What today looks like: 

Lupron: 5 IU

Menopur: Day 2, 150UI (1cc mixed with 2 vials)

Follistim: Day 2, 300IU

I feel like my vagina has taken a beating with all these daily pelvic exams and a pap smear today. Sorry, were those details too intimate for you to read? Welcome to my blog. I'm open and want to share everything I have been going through so that other prospective donors can understand the whole process. Three years ago when I tried doing research on this topic, there wasn't a whole lot of detailed donor experiences. Yeah, there were handfuls of YouTube "how to" videos on injections and medications... but I really just wanted to know what the donor was going through on a daily basis.

Anyways, last night I had a falling out with my follistim pen. Meaning, it was MIA from the box it was delivered from. I began freaking out, because I did not know how I was going to inject myself with Follistim! This medication is pretty much what feeds your ovarian follicles, so it's pretty important not to miss a dose. Luckily, I remembered that my sister-in-law was currently undergoing fertility treatments for herself and was using the follistim pen.

I am pretty secretive about egg donation (hence, the name of this blog), so I was extremely nervous about having to break the news to her for the first time. I didn't know how she was going to react, especially when she is having such a difficult time having her own babies. All worked out well, thanks to her sharing her pen. However, I did NOT like having to spill the beans about my egg donation secrets.

I called the on-call nurse at the clinic last night to tell them they needed to send me a new Follistim pen ASAP. They said would send me one immediately. It never arrived today, so I had to call my sister-in-law to loan her follistim pen again to me.

More on adventures of egg donation tomorrow! 

Day 1: Repronex/Follistim

Where I'm at:

Lupron AM - Day 12

Follistim PM - Day 1

Repronex PM- Day 1

No Birth Control

Tonight, I began Follistim and Repronex (i.e. Menopure). The doctor ordered me to take 10 units of Lupron in the morning, 250 units of Follistim, and one vial of Repronex in the evening. In addition, I was instructed to combine Repronex and Follistim into one vial and inject it

into... my... rear...

I about died when I read the instructions from the nurse via email. I died a second time when I saw the needle!

I cheated on the needle part though... At least for tonight. I took one of my smaller needle overstock from my last cycle, and replaced the needle. I guess that was a bad idea because I ended up with a small bubble on my butt that looked something like this woman's bump on her stomach:

I asked my husband to shoot me in the butt, but I freaked out, and shot myself. It takes a lot of talent to inject yourself in the rear... Just sayin'... I feel a lot better inflicting the pain rather than having someone inflict pain on me. Weird, I know...

Tomorrow, I will have to allow my husband to have some face time with my rear tomorrow (aka: needle in the bum).

We are aiming to retrieve by the second week of December. I am not excited to feel the "water-balloon" feeling in my stomach right before the aspiration. I am also not excited to work with this clinic in ______. They are not as friendly as my last clinic... and the doctor has zero bedside manners. I am told, however, that this doctor is one of the best in their state. In contrast to some of my not-so-excited feelings, I am, however, very excited to see how many eggs they will retrieve this time, and if my recipients will get pregnant like my first couple did!

This cycle, they are doing many things different than the first (see above), to see if they can increase my egg count.

Off topic, I talked with my agency director and asked if anyone had been looking at me lately to do another cycle. One family had been looking at me because of my ethnicity, but still no word about a future cycle. I asked my agency to please send a portfolio out to New York. My husband and I are dying to visit such an exciting place for our next cycle!

Until next time!