IVF: The Gift of Life
At the age of 18 I tragically lost my ovaries to a rare cancer (dysgerminoma). However, all was not lost as I was one of the first women in the UK to have a slice of ovarian tissue frozen, for hopeful future use. Words by Jenny Johnson. Issue 11 Archive.
Being young and somewhat naive, I assumed that following this, I would be able to have my own genetic children with the aid of IVF when the time came. In my early 20’s, I grew curious as to the condition of my frozen tissue, and what would happen when the time came for me to want to start a family.
On seeing my Consultant I unfortunately found out that it was unlikely I would be able to use my frozen tissue in the next 10 years, as technology had not advanced enough. My only option to have a baby would be to use an egg donor.
I married at 26, in 2002, and shortly afterwards visited the hospital again with my husband to ask to be put on the waiting list for future treatment. However, after the visit a close friend confirmed that she would like to directly donate her eggs to us, which we were thrilled about. After preparing excitedly for this treatment, my friend changed her mind at the last minute, and we were very upset and disappointed. Of course I understood her reasons for doing so, but it meant that we were now in the position that I never intended to be in; desperate and at the bottom of the waiting list for an egg donor.
We now had 2 options; either wait on the list for up to 2 years plus, (which I was not prepared to do) or do something about it ourselves! We found out we could join various advertising campaigns, to boost recruitment of egg donors through our IVF unit.
We decided to join a radio advertising campaign, which although costly, was worth the chance. Unfortunately, it was not very successful. Undeterred, I put an anonymous advert in a magazine at work. Then out of the blue, 8 depressing months after the initial blow, we got the letter to say we had a donor! IVF treatment followed 3 months later, but devastatingly it failed. Unfortunately, as we had no embryos spare for another go, it meant we were back to square one. In order to cope with the devastation, I threw myself into trying to recruit our next donor, even though affording another £4,000 treatment would mean re-mortgaging the house.
We joined another radio campaign, which was more successful and I also made my own appeal posters. After 6 months hard work, we amazingly had another donor, and another chance to fulfil our dream. Unfortunately, the pregnancy test was again negative.
This time though, we were lucky enough to get 3 embryos to freeze, which we will be trying again with this coming year. If it wasn’t for the generosity and kindness of women who decide to donate their eggs, we would not even have the chance to try and have a family.
If you think you would like to consider donating your eggs then please contact your GP or local Fertility Unit for information. For now, our plight continues, until hopefully one day we will get a positive outcome, and the miracle of a healthy baby.
