My egg donation became a nightmare

My experience with egg donation and what you need to know before deciding to donate your eggs.

My story begins about six months ago when I decided I wanted to donate my eggs. I had heard about it a couple of times on TV and on social media. It resonated so much with me… Having the power of helping people to have a baby, how amazing would that be.

One of my College professors had announced that her wife was pregnant. Because they are two women, they used a sperm donor. She talked a little bit more about her wife, her baby, and the stars I could see in her eyes. I had the power to give this to someone.

I did some research about the procedure; I discovered the medication that had to be injected to “grow” the eggs. I watch videos of other donors’ experiences. All positive, everyone was talking about their success story, nobody talks about the failures.

So, I applied at a couple different agencies. You must fill out an initial application, if you are a good candidate you have to fill out your profile. This profile consists of a ton of photos of you at different ages and lots of recent ones as well (so much so that I had to organize a DIY photoshoot). I had to give them literally every detail about myself as a person and as a body (I mean about your health and health history as well as your siblings’, parents’ and grandparents’).

One of those agencies got back to me and wanted to discuss with me. I had an initial call with one of the “managers” and she explained the whole process to me. Honestly, I did not learn anything new on that call, she was just repeating what I had learnt about egg donation on the Internet. I had a second call with another “manager,” and we discussed more about how this whole process works and how they usually work with their donors. After lots of back-and-forth emails, I did an initial blood draw to evaluate my hormones to once again determine if I would be a good candidate. About a week later, the results came back normal, and we were going to proceed to the next step…more tests. I was flown to the NYC clinic for more blood draws, and it would also be an opportunity for me to meet with the doctor and ask any question I might have. I did not ask much…maybe I should have.

A few weeks later, the results came back normal once again. There was only one step left to determine if I could donate my eggs, the psychological evaluation.

I had never been to a psychologist before, but my guess is: it is just like a fist-time therapy session. They asked a bunch of questions about me and my family for about an hour. How is your family? What about your childhood? How many friends do you have? Have you experienced trauma? And then some more questions specific to the egg donation. Why do you want to do it? If a child was to be born from your egg donation, would you consider them YOUR child?

When that consultation was over, they did not tell me “Okay, you are good to go” or anything like that. They just said thank you and that they would send their full evaluation or report to the agency.

I never got to lay eyes on that report. Maybe it was the first red flag. (For all I know, I might not have even passed that evaluation.)

But we moved forward and next thing I knew, the doctor sent the schedule with all of the medication I had to take, all of the appointment I had to attend and the date of the procedure was set.

I was really happy, this was finally happening. It had been six months since that whole process had started, tens of emails a bunch of phone calls and appointments. I would actually donate my eggs and help out a family in need of some DNA to make a baby. How amazing is that?

My flight to New York was booked for the following week and I also got the booking information for the hotel I would be staying in. Usually, when agreeing to be an egg donor, you should get all of your transportation, accommodation and food paid for by the agency or the intended parents. So you don’t have to worry about paying all of those. Unfortunately, I wasn’t so “lucky”.

First stop when getting off from the plane was to meet with my doctor for the initial physical exam, blood draw and have a nurse show you how to inject the medication.

Before deciding to become a donor, you have to make sure you are comfortable around needles. Not only do you have to get multiple blood draws, but you also have to inject yourself with the medication daily.

Another good thing to know, is that during the cycle, the doctor will have to monitor the growth of your eggs/follicles through an internal ultrasound. Yes, it is as uncomfortable as it sounds… but nobody ever said that egg donation was easy.

After that first visit, I was good to get to my hotel room… and I was so exhausted. I did my first injections as early as I was allowed, and I believe I was in bed by 7p.m.

The second day I went for a long walk close to my hotel and found a grocery store to get enough food for the next couple of days and spent the rest of the day in front of the TV. The rest of that first week was a lot like those two days: walks around the block, doctors’ appointments and watching TV or YouTube.

By the beginning of the second week, I started to feel sick: at first it was just a little bit of dizziness/ headache, but not long after I started a fever, nausea and non-stop vomiting. I could not keep anything down. Not even water. I got dehydrated very fast. The symptoms were so severe I literally thought I would die alone in that hotel room. I had never been in such an anxious state.

I did inform my doctor and my agency of what was wrong, and I was told by both to “wait it out” until my appointment the next day.

After another sleepless night, I finally saw my doctor. He did a couple of tests to conclude that my problems were not coming from the egg donation cycle or the medication it was E. Coli. Of course, we had to stop everything as my condition was too serious to continue. The doctor called the agency to tell them the donation was off, it would be dangerous to continue.

My agent had other plans for me. Basically, since I could not perform my end of the contract (from a cause other than the donation cycle itself), I was in beech of the contract. I spent what feels like an hour on the phone with my agency: debating the fact that I was not responsible for my illness. That it was outrageous that they were making me PAY for everything now that the cycle was cancelled, and how could I, a young woman, reason a rich white man.

I was panicking with fear. Crying. I had two choices: continue in that state (consenting to a procedure and potentially risking my life); or stop, pay for everything so I could get back home.

I literally felt like a hostage.

I was alone and far from home, nobody with me to protect me from them.

So I did pay to be able to get back home.

The plane ride was no fun. I was still sick and crammed on a tiny seat… people around me were right to be uncomfortable and disgusted.

But a least I got home. My family came to get me from the airport and took me to the hospital. I immediately felt a lot safer, but devastated. I felt abused, my trust violated and my bank account drained.

The worst part of this whole horrible experience is that I will never get to donate my eggs. No family will ever be able to conceive a child thanks to me. I will never make the gift of life. We need more egg donors, I wished so badly to be one, but after going through all of this… I failed.

I did nothing wrong, but I got caught up with the wrong people who took advantage of me and my desire to help. Right now, I can’t say the name on the agency I dealt with, I am too scared of retaliation. I don’t want other girls to be preyed on by them so if there is one thing you should be taking away from my experience is that these people’s goal is to make a profit from young women’s bodies, and they should never interfere with someone’s medical treatment. My doctor told me to stop, and the agency was pressuring me to continue and threatening me by forcing me to pay if I “chose” to stop. This kind of behaviour or practices are extremely problematic and dangerous.

Stay safe.