Anyone use your own egg for kid 1 and donor egg for second kid?

[Anonymous]

I am wondering how folks feel about using own egg for the first kid and a donor for the second. Same sex couple, so sperm for both is donated—they would be genetic half siblings.

I worry that this will feel hard to the kid down the road—e.g. the kids will share the mystery about their sperm donor but kid 2 will have the added mystery of an egg sober and the knowledge that s/he has no genetic tie to anyone in our family (besides sibling). I’d love to hear from others about this. I’m the person who posted about the egg donor timeline earlier today and I’d still love to know that as well From choosing a donor to FET, what the timeline if you’re using frozen eggs and frozen sperm.

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

We decided against it. I got pregnant right away with my daughter at 35, then started TTC #2 when my daughter was 10 months old. Found out I was completely infertile when my daughter was a year old due to low ovarian reserve (AMH of .30). Despite my low AMH (which was my only low number) I tried for 4 years to get pregnant with #2 and zero pregnancies resulted. Researched donor egg extensively since egg quality/quantity appeared to be my only problem. After thinking about it for a long time we decided not to go forward with it, and to just be happy with one child. What it came down to is that I did not feel comfortable having one bio child and one child genetically unrelated to me, but genetically related to my husband. I'm trying to make peace with having an only. Our life is great, no stress, and my only is very happy and has never asked for a sibling. I personally would consider adoption over DE, it just seemed simpler.

[Anonymous]

yes, we did. I tried for a couple of years to make peace with an only, but i couldn't. at 42, we went the DE route. my daughter is 2, so i can't tell you how it was telling her that genetically she's not mine. and it's painful for me to even type that because she is mine.

she and my other child look very much alike. (my son looks like me, but also like his father.) i don't think she looks like me, but i think we look similar. she has my eye color and a smaller nose. I looked for a donor with similar features.

we did shared risk DE at SG, not frozen.

[Anonymous]

I did - just got a BFP on a HPT from the transfer last week. My 4yo knows that my eggs are broken and we borrowed an egg from a nice woman, so it definitely won't be a secret. We did pick someone who looks very much like me, so it shouldn't be something that is noticeable to people who don't otherwise know. We have additional embryos, and I wouldn't mind having 3, but husband isn't up for that (currently, anyway). I'm sure there will come a time when the child will feel some disappointment at not being my genetic child (probably as a moody teen), but I'll only ever feel incredibly lucky and lots of love. I talked to a counselor that specializes in donor issues, and she said that most DE children take issue with it being kept a secret from them and then also want to know of siblings. They tend not to have issues viewing their birth parents as their actual parents or feel the same sense of loss that adopted children do, since they were never "given up." We also have a lot of health history for the donor and know her name (and skyped with her briefly), so the child could contact her later if desired.

There are counselors that specialize in donor issues. The person I talked to was in New England, I think, and did phone consults.

[Anonymous]

My sister did. She has 3 older kids then had twins many years later DE. Everyone in family knows but it’s not like they advertise it outside of family (but not deep dark secret either!) Donor chosen to look like my sister (actually one of donor’s photos of when she was about 6/7 looked totally like me and she was in dress I’m sure I owned!-and my sister and I look similar. Anyway: kids are definitely bonded as siblings and there’s always ‘oh she looks just like X at that age.’ Sister has zero regrets