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Intended Parents

When to Move on to Donor Eggs

Deciding when to move on to donor eggs for surrogacy and IVF is a deeply personal and often challenging decision for intended parents.

Whether you’ve experienced multiple failed IVF cycles or you’re dealing with other medical challenges, using donor eggs can still give you the opportunity to experience parenthood.

Learn more about how to find an egg donor

This article explains why someone may consider using donor eggs, things to consider when making this decision and the benefits of using donor eggs.

When to Consider Donor Eggs

There are various reasons for individuals or intended parents to learn when to use donor eggs.

Some of the most common reasons include:

Egg quantity and quality are directly impacted by age. As a woman gets older, it becomes harder to conceive. For women over the age of 40, the success rate of pregnancy increases, miscarriages and birth defects drop dramatically.

Although multiple IVF cycles are typically needed to conceive, repeated IVF failure can be caused by embryo quality, age of the eggs, autoimmune disorders, chromosomal issues, lifestyle and more.

Whether it’s a diminished ovarian reserve or premature ovarian failure, both of these circumstances can impact the quantity and quality of your eggs.

Whether you or your family has a history of a genetic disorder, this is a situation of knowing when to use donor eggs to prevent any chance of passing on that genetic disorder to your child.

Emotional Considerations

The choice is ultimately yours to make but there are some emotional aspects when considering using donor eggs.

IVF with donor eggs can be a whirlwind of a journey and you need to be prepared to deal with a variety of emotions such as:

  • Grief
  • Anxiety
  • Hope
  • Relief
  • And more

No matter how long your journey to becoming a parent has been, there have likely been ups and downs and another emotional consideration to take into account is your lack of genetic connection to your child.

It may be hard to address it initially, especially if you’ve exhausted different forms of assisted reproductive technology (ART).

A good way to know when to use a donor egg when it comes to the emotional aspects is the love you feel for your child that hasn’t yet been born.

As a parent, the love and support you give to your child as they grow into the person they will become helps form a bond that goes much further than shared DNA.

Financial Considerations

The emotions discussed above may be a sign for you about when to consider using donor eggs. But it could go beyond situations like that and repeated IVF failure.

A primary example of a situation like that is cost. Cost is a common concern for those looking to grow their family. According to The American Pregnancy Association, the average cost of donor eggs ranges from $12,000-$20,000.

It’s not out of the ordinary for multiple IVF cycles to be needed in order to achieve a pregnancy and that can become costly.

You may have to look for an alternative if you were not prepared for the additional cost of cycles.      

Contact us online to learn more about surrogacy costs with donor eggs.

 

Benefits of Using Donor Eggs

Beyond the obvious benefit of using donor eggs to help grow your family, some of the other benefits include:

Using an egg donor can come with higher success rates because of the extensive screening used to identify the best egg donors. This can prevent issues such as passing on a genetic disorder that you, or your partner, and the egg donor share.

Beyond being cost prohibitive, you can obtain unlimited donor eggs. This gives you flexibility in planning out a potential pregnancy vs. IVF with your own eggs where quality and quantity decrease with age.

What are the disadvantages of using donor eggs?

The potential disadvantages of using donor eggs include the lack of a genetic connection to the intended mother, conversations with your child about how they were conceived and delays caused by dropped donor cycles.

Get the Support You Deserve

If you don’t know when to use donor eggs and you have been having trouble conceiving, talk to your fertility specialist.

Be prepared with questions you can ask them about your egg quality so you know when to use a donor egg. Here are some examples of questions you can ask:

Fill out our online contact form to get connected to reputable fertility clinics near you that can help vet any potential egg donor to make sure they meet the necessary requirements.

Male and Female couple smiling with surrogate mother
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