For many of us, simply having sex with someone we love to produce a child is a great idea. But life being what it is today, women like us, busy with goals and options, have many more choices than we used to. We can delay child-bearing a few more years, generally into our 30s, sometimes into our early 40s. But when things don't go as easily as we would like, and we see the many options to motherhood available to us, how do we choose?
Our Sponsor:
Posted October 21, 2011 at 12:35 PM
Q: More IUIs? IVF? embryo donation? adoption?
Choice Chat
This was a recent topic of discussion started on the Choice Moms discussion board.
A 42-year-old woman with a boyfriend who didn't want children learned that her fertility was quickly waning, when she went to check her FSH level. So she proceeded to do IVF with donor sperm. But she didn't respond as well to the costly IVF treatments, so after one chemical pregnancy she tried IUI. Six cycles later, she is still not pregnant, and has broken up with the boyfriend. Her quandary: IVF has been a costly heartbreak. Should she try donor egg, or might her body reject that too? Should she consider adoption? Making these decisions, alone, is difficult -- as we all know -- so she has turned to the Choice Mom community for advice.
One woman recommended embryo donation, which she is in the process of trying. (You can read more about this great option in our Choice Moms E-Guide to Embryo Donation, and I've started conversation with one embryo donation agency about a specialization within the Choice Mom community -- single women giving remaining embryos to other single women!)
Another woman who is pursuing domestic adoption recommended it, as a less emotionally trying option (not without its frustrations and disappointments, but better odds of becoming a mother).
On our Choice Moms Over Age 40 discussion board, a 43-year-old woman recently reported that she is 10 weeks pregnant, using her own eggs and donor sperm in IUI. "I say all of this to give all of you hope. And also, I frankly believe in miracles and that some things just cannot be rationally and logically explained. I am just about in tears thinking about all that I have gone through to get to this stage. Two pregnancy losses, a divorce, my beautiful miracle daughter, a chemical pregnancy, a miscarriage and now THIS. This perfect little 10.5 week MIRACLE."
And on our Choice Mom Ning board, where women can converse with faces, privacy, and geographical localization, another Choice Mom has reported an open relationship with embryo donors. We're waiting to get an update!
What method to motherhood do you prefer, or did you choose? Have you changed your plans along the way? Do you have any advice for women stuck in the difficult quandary of deciding between the options? I'd also love to hear from women who have used surrogates or gestational carriers.
-- Mikki
Reader Comments
Post a Comment
We ask you enter a valid email to reduce spam. This email will not show. But please remember this is a public page. If you do NOT want your comment to be approved for public viewing, indicate that in the comment and the administrator will be the only one to read it.
NOTE that we just learned of a bug involving yahoo addresses. They are apparently filtered by Google forwarding usually as spam. So if you have a yahoo email and you post a comment for approval, it might take longer for me to discover it for approval. We're working on solving this issue.
Comment Etiquette: Please do not post spam. Please keep the comments on-topic. Please do not post unrelated questions. Anything mean-spirited or off topic will not be approved.
Posted October 23, 2011 at 11:50 AM by Kath
I had numerous IUI, IVF cycles. In the end I went to a different clinic who told me - your own eggs 5% chance of a baby, donor eggs 65% chance. I went with the donor eggs (and donor sperm as before). The fresh cycle failed but the frozen cycle worked. Was attempt 23 for me. Now I have a gorgeous 4 1/2 year old daughter who is my child in every way. She just has 3 people who helped bring her into the world instead of the usual 2.