Cat out of the bag

Ahem ... well we have found an egg donor angel. Actually she found us.

Yep that’s the big secret, and it feels like we’ve hit the jackpot in so many ways.

I didn’t want to say anything too soon, for fear of the same outcome as last time.

So, here’s how it works in Oz. The waiting lists at clinics are more than 2 years long, so you are encouraged to find your own donor – family, friends being the first ports of call. If that fails a lot of people will advertise – put themselves ‘out there’. Alternatively you can go overseas and pay for an anonymous donor.

Payment for donor eggs is illegal here, so there are no commercial operators with young donors on the books. Since this is a purely altruistic gift, women that want payment will go to the US.

Soooo, when our friend initially offered to be our donor, I started trawling the internet and eventually came upon a members-only forum specifically for donor’s and recipients. I thought this would be a great thing for us if we started cycling. Yaaawwwn.

The forum also runs a section for it’s members to write a story about themselves, an ad. if you like. Any women considering donating can go there and see if they either connect or are touched by someone’s story. Why not? I thought and so Mr S. and I sat down and wrote our story together.

A few days after our ‘last ever’ cycle [that failed], we were lucky enough to be contacted by an amazing woman. She had read our story and followed my posts and felt she connected with us. She had read a story about egg donation while waiting in her doctors' reception with her son, and had decided to look into it. Like many women, she had no idea until that point that IF couples needed donor eggs.

This was some weeks ago. Since then we have spent a lot of time on messenger getting to know each other. We've swapped fli.ckr accounts, and learnt about each others lives.

Thoughtout this time several other women contacted me to offer to be our donor (far out!), not really knowing what to do I thanked them all, but let them know we had received a serious offer. Each one of them told me to contact them back if it didn’t work out. Can you even believe this?

This weekend Mr. S. and I flew interstate and we all met. Our donor, her partner and son. I’m going to think of a special name for them soon.

So here we are in the IF version of internet dating.

Was it nerve-wracking? Yes. Several times I got paranoid we were going to be cancelled at the last minute (for no good reason). How to explain how it felt to make my initial phone call to work out a meeting place, and hearing her voice for the first time. Walking towards them to meet for the first time and wondering if we would get on.

And yet, who could predict that we would meet people that not only wanted to do this for us, but that we liked and got along with really well. We’re blown away – is it possible for me to say that they’re people like us and list the reasons why – without sounding like an egotist? Because of course I’m talking about all our good points!!!

We have sat down and talked through all the scenarios we could think of. Everything that will come up in the mandatory counselling sessions we will do.

Now all I have to do is make it happen. We’re hoping we will be cycling with a view to a December transfer.

Here’s something you maybe curious about (I know I would be), do we look alike? Actually we’re almost exactly the same height and build and close to same complexion – she’s has slightly lighter hair.

I still can’t believe it’s happened.

But it’s made me think about all the different emotions I’ve felt on this IF ride. How that over the years I’ve come to believe that all the horrible things that happened to us was purely Random Bad Luck. So maybe now we’re experiencing what it feels like to have Random Good Luck?

I know this is only the start of another journey and that there are no guarantees, but far out, this is an amazing place to be.