Choosing the egg donor

Two women are crucial in the gestational surrogacy - the carrier and the egg donor. Choosing an egg donor is just as important as choosing the carrier because it determines half of the baby's genetic make-up. There are a few options to find an egg donor

• on your own
• from fertility clinic or agency
• from egg banks

Each has pros and cons. The biggest advantage of finding an egg donor on your own could be cost savings and a known donor. Some have their relatives or friends donating their eggs. Disadvantages include adding another legal matter and defining the role of the donor in child's life. One could also find a donor from classifieds.

Donors from fertility clinic and agencies are often anonymous. Some may offer semi-known in which donors knows the recipient/intended parents’ first names and the state in which they live. The donor and recipient/intended parents might exchange emails and photos; however, no specific personal information is provided about the donor or the recipient/intended parents. The major difference between clinic and agency is the pools of donors to choose. Fertility clinics usually have a smaller pool limited to a local area.

Egg banks is another option. The main advantage is that eggs are already retrieved, lower costs and time savings. However, eggs are frozen so fresh embryo transfer won't be an option. Some studies have found frozen eggs are just as good as fresh ones with IVF success rates. Frozen or fresh, the most important part is the quality of the eggs which depends on many factors of the egg donor.

Another issue is proven donor - Proven donors are women that have gone through the egg donation process before and helped a family have a healthy baby. Using a proven donor can be reassuring for intended parents because the donor has already completed the process once before and truly understands what is involved, responded well to the medication and had healthy eggs that contributed to a live birth. Using a proven donor over a first-time donor does not necessarily guarantee success, but it does offer some advantages. Some agencies charge additional fee for a proven donor.

After our research, we weren't sure about a known donor and decided to choose an anonymous donor from the clinic, mainly for convenience. All we needed to do was to review profiles and choose one and the clinic did all the medical and psychological screening plus the legal part. Since we opted for fresh embryo transfer, we had to wait until "S" was medically and psychologically cleared.

Choosing an egg donor was relatively easy for us. We indicated our preferences and were given donor profiles one by one to review. The profile included physical characteristics, donor and her family's medical history, psychological and genetic assessment and personality. It also included photos from childhood.  

Since DH and I don't have any same physical trait, we weren't too concerned about the color of skin, eyes or hair. Our main criteria were health, height and BMI. When we received a profile, we reviewed it separately and gave it an up or down vote. Surprisingly, our votes were all in agreement. It didn't take long until we finally found one which we really liked. To us, choosing the egg donor is probably the least stressful part of surrogacy. It was fun and exciting because it provides some cues to the genetic make-up of our kids.

Below is one hilarious blog post about comparison of straight and same-sex couple trying to have a baby.

Things are more fun for straight people

One of which relates to choosing an egg donor -

"Straight people are stuck with the qualities of their partner. I get to choose between a woman who is getting her PhD and speaks several languages, a woman going to medical school who qualified for the Olympic trials and a woman who has her masters degree in an interesting field and is cool with her eggs going to gay parents."

Hopefully, we have done a good job to give our kids half of the best DNA.