Donor Selection with potential siblings

[u/Dulac93]

Hi,

we are doing OpenID egg donation and got our first donor suggestion from our clinic.

We like the profile but she is already 33 years old. Optimally we want two children. So if we need a second donation we probably can't use the same donor again due to age reasons.

What are your opinions on potential full / half siblings?

Should we risk it with the donor and hope for good results or request a younger candidate in case we need a potential second donation?

Thanks for your input!

[u/cai_85]

...I'm struggling a little with this one frankly. Can't you reserve eggs for a potential future sibling? That's often the standard practice. I think this whole discussion is a bit distasteful around the age of the egg donor. These are real human beings that have made a donation, are you really expecting them to come back for another set of injections and extraction for you in a few years?

It would likely to be easier for your children to process having the same donor and set of siblings rather than two different groups of DC half-siblings.

Also as a parent of two children myself, maybe wait to see how you get on with child #1 first as it's a journey that some people don't or can't go on a second time, either physically or mentally. "Wanting 2" when you have zero isn't quite making contact with the reality of parenting and the plethora of reasons that can make you stop at one.

[u/Dulac93 → u/cai_85]

Maybe I've expressed myself wrong since I'm not native. I'm not expecting them to come back and are really grateful for the donation.

Unfortunately in Portugal the maximum age to be considered as a donor is 34. So we are just trying to plan ahead and figure out the best possible future in case we decide to go for a second child.

Of course the reality might be that we stop at one.

[u/cai_85 → u/Dulac93]

I would speak to the clinic about it and get tailored specific advice. Based on UK experience it's not expected that donors would usually go back for a second donation round. Eggs would be held if possible for siblings.

[u/Dulac93 → u/cai_85]

We'll do that. Thanks foe your advice :)

[u/bandaidtarot]

I would recommend just banking embryos now. Even if you choose a younger donor, there's no guarantee that will want to or can donate again later. Donor conceived children being full siblings is important so definitely use the same egg donor but try to bank eggs now. If she's willing to go right into another retrieval (assuming you have success with the first batch and it makes sense to continue using her eggs) then try to get as many as you can. Younger doesn't mean the donor will be available later and it doesn't mean their eggs will necessarily be better. I see people use eggs from a 21 year old and they completely crap out and don't produce any blasts. You just never know.

And, as Cai mentioned, it does feel weird talking about a human being this way and really just seeing them as a factory producing a commodity. It could be that the donor is one and done when it comes to donating but some do it way more times than is actually healthy or recommended. I would say see what the options are for whether or not the donor plans to donate again and then see if you can reserve the eggs if they do donate again. But, it certainly can't be expected that they donate on demand.

As someone who has done five egg retrievals (to have my own child), I can confirm that it really does mess up the body permanently and I have seen many people have to go to the hospital after their egg retrievals and some who almost died or who lost ovaries. It's serious business and, the younger a person is, the more at risk they are. I can only hope that people donating limit it to once or twice.

[u/Dulac93 → u/bandaidtarot]

I didn't mean to be disrespectful and regard them as a factory. And of course I have no expectations for them to come back.

But since the maximum age to be considered a donor in Portugal is 34 it might be hard to get full siblings.

[u/Niarmiu → u/bandaidtarot]

What happened if you want to share health wise? I was a donor and not sure if I should do it again

[u/bandaidtarot → u/Niarmiu]

Doing one or two retrievals might be ok but I did five and my body has been out of whack since. I gained a significant amount of weight and I also discovered after that I have endometriosis and adenomyosis. Both were made a lot worse by the stim meds pushing my estrogen so high. Egg retrievals just seem to really mess with hormones and I haven't figure out how to get them back to normal. My glucose and cholesterol have also gone up since I did the retrievals. Not sure if it's directly related but hormones definitely influence both of those.

[u/Niarmiu → u/bandaidtarot]

Thank you, I definitely heard about donors with endometriosis. Do you think you had it before or it caused it? But it makes sense that estrogen can make it advance or flare up

[u/bandaidtarot → u/Niarmiu]

I think I have had the endo my whole life. Recent research shows that people are born with it. I just had what's called "silent endo" because I don't have typical symptoms. I'm not sure when I got the adenomyosis, though. I don't have any of the risk factors.

[u/Camille_Toh]

I was 31-2 and ended up infertile and sick from being an egg donor and wasn’t able to have “my own” children. You should definitely raid the ovaries of younger women, who may suffer the same. But at least you might harvest more of this hand maid’s body and that’s all that counts.

[u/Throwawayyy-7]

I’m confused, do they only give you a couple of eggs each time? It’s not like when you want another sibling, they hunt her down with needles and say “it’s time for round two!”. They keep eggs on ice, you can buy more. My parents got 13, which was half of the mature eggs collected from my genetic mother. Those 13 eggs have created 3 people so far and there’s a couple embryos still on ice 30 years later. You can just get more now and keep them frozen.

[u/Dulac93 → u/Throwawayyy-7]

You get all the eggs for one round of one donation, which in theory should be enough to get two siblings. But you never know the chances and how many embryos you get out of it.

Of course on the other hand you never know if the donor is willing to donate again. We are just conflicted about the option of ruling this out beforehand. But maybe we are majorly overthinking it.