parents

Letting the balloons go

With two beautiful children of her own and ovaries that were still capable of producing healthy eggs, Kylie Ladd made the most generous donation of all.  She writes

By Kylie Ladd

“Flat on my back, I am searched like customs. The ultrasound technician anoints my stomach with blue unguent, then urges me to relax as she carefully probes my lower abdomen. We both hold our breath as we gaze toward the monitor. The grey mist parts, and she smiles as she starts to count. “Six, seven, eight… and I think that’s one at the back too. Nine. Nine follicles! Oh, well done!” she says, as if I am personally responsible for this rich haul of human fruit. My fertility swells resplendent on the screen, ovaries blossoming like wildflowers.

It’s day twelve of the hormone shots, four months into my attempt to become an egg donor. First had come the questionnaires and the counselling, the blood tests and the examinations. Once that was complete I was started on the pill, so that my cycle could be brought into line with that of my recipient. A month later a nasal spray was added, then, in another fortnight, a two-week course of injections. In between I trekked in and out of the inner-city fertility clinic for regular ultrasounds to measure the precious cache gathering in my belly, and to determine the retrieval date: Too early and there wouldn’t be any mature eggs, too late and they may have already been released or started to deteriorate. Today the technician is satisfied that mine are ripe for harvest. Pick-up is scheduled for two days hence.

Why was I doing this? At the most basic level, because I could. Our own children had taken a while to conceive; my husband’s cousin battled infertility for over a decade before giving up after she miscarried twins at six months; a number of friends had been through IVF with varying success. I knew the ache of empty arms, the hunger that made Rachel, Jacob’s wife, demand of God, “Give me children or I will die.” My husband and I had been lucky. I had a bad case of endometriosis, but it was diagnosed and then treated. The drugs had done their thing and in due course a son and then a daughter had arrived, whole, vibrant, impossibly perfect. Now though I had no more need of my eggs. Month after month the supply ebbed away, the clock ran down. It seemed such a waste. I’d given blood since my teens, was on the organ donor registry. Why not offer these also?

Egg donors are hard to find, and under Australian law cannot be paid for their services. Though already in my mid-thirties, and with my eggs thus at the outer limits of their viability I was quickly snapped up.  Detailed investigations ensued: my current health, my medical history, my genetic makeup. Then followed two mandatory counselling sessions, the first to discuss ethical and moral issues around egg donation, the second (after an obligatory month’s thinking time) to complete the legal consent forms. My partner, I was told, would need to accompany me to the latter appointment, as given that we were married my eggs were deemed to be joint property, and he would also need to sign them away.

Afterwards I was given a small esky full of drugs, taught how to inject myself by practising on a sadly pocked resuscitation doll, and informed about the recipient couple. They sounded just like my husband and I- similar ages, heights, colouring and educational level. As donor and recipient are matched to be as alike as possible we even shared many of the same interests. The only difference was that after five years of trying they had no children. I did, and I had eggs that had worked before. Every time that I prepared an injection in the weeks that followed I reminded myself of those facts… I swear the shots didn’t hurt at all.

Pick-up took place early one morning in a small operating theatre at the rear of the clinic. By now my ovaries were palpably distended; tender, but not painful. Lying on the table, subdued with nerves and a twilight anaesthetic I found myself stroking them in small comforting sweeps, the way I’d once caressed the bumps of my babies. A nurse at my head noted my movements and stopped chatting with an orderly. “They’re like two big bunches of balloons, aren’t they?” she asked. Then she paused before adding “Your recipient is right outside, you know. She couldn’t bear to wait by the phone to hear how things went.”  I never met her, but as the surgeon prepared to retrieve my fecund cargo via a needle inserted through the wall of my vagina I imagined I did, handing her first one balloon, and then another, until the whole bunch leapt and jostled in her hands.

Ten ova were collected that day, then fertilized immediately with the recipient husband’s sperm. Of the ten, six developed over the next forty-eight hours into healthy looking embryos. Two were then transferred to the recipient, while the remaining four were frozen for use in later cycles.

And that’s where my part ends. I was given the option of being informed of any “live births” resulting from my donation, and my husband and I discussed the issue during counselling. In the end, though, I knew that if all six embryos had amounted to nothing I would feel disappointed, maybe even that I’d wasted my time. Conversely, if any had taken I also knew that I would wonder about the child. Did he or she look like me? Was he healthy? Was she loved? There would be no answer to any of these questions, and thus, it seemed, no point asking them. It makes me happy to think that I gave someone a shot, some hope, and maybe, just maybe, a baby of their own. But I don’t need to know any more. My balloons have flown. I hope they are soaring.”