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I already had a son from a previous relationship, his father & I had split when I met the love of my life. I was 39 when we got married & had always wanted children together. It never occurred to us that we would have a struggle to get the family we so desperately wanted, but after two years without success my GP referred us to an IVF clinic which was quite a blow in itself, my body wasn’t working as it should The fertility specialist ran some tests & told me that I was a prime candidate for IVF.

We started on our journey & had a great number of eggs retrieved for someone of “my age.” Our first ever embryo transfer was succesful & we were finally pregnant. Our joy however was shortlived as we miscarried just before 3 months, just as we were getting ready to share our news with family & friends. We had 5 frozen embryos left so again we thought “piece of cake” we did it once before. While we were getting ready for our next transfer, we fell pregnant naturally, oh the joy, there’s nothing wrong with me after all. Unfortunately that pregnancy only made it to 7 weeks before we miscarried again. It then took us around two years to get through the five remaining embryos we had all without success. Another IVF cycle saw us retrieve only about half of what we got the first cycle & all were unsuccessful. Now it started to take it’s toll on us & our dream was slipping away.
Next we were told our only chance of having a family was to use an egg donor. This was such a foreign concept to us & we walked away from that appointment thinking that our family was further away than ever.

A friend offered for about a year to be our egg donor but we weren’t able to get our head’s around the whole idea of it. Finally we gave in & took her up on her offer. Cut a long story short, I don’t think she was emotionally ready for the process herself as she made the whole experience horrible from start to finish with her constant complaining & insentivity to our feelings. As much as we wanted a baby, I was kind of relieved that our journey with her was unsuccessful, I don’t think she would have been able to detach herself emotionally from what would have been “our baby.” My niece then offered to donate for us but unfortunately she was ruled out due to health reasons. We were back at square one with our dream slipping further away.
Now we had to put ourselves out there & try to find a donor that isn’t a friend or family member. I joined some forums & placed ads for a donor on various websites, then we waited, all the while wondering if we were ever going to be able to hold our own baby in our arms. Hearing news of other friends & family being pregnant came with mixed feelings, of course we were delighted for them but heartbroken & wondering if it was ever going to be our turn.

We had a few nibbles on our ads, some legitimate, some from scammers asking for money, some that sounded really promising & then would change their mind for whatever reason. Our hearts breaking all over again with each rejection. I really was starting to believe that it was never going to be our turn, but I was not going to give up until I made my wonderful hubby a dad. He’s not one to say much but I could see his heart breaking more & more everyday.

Finally the most amazing angel found us through our ad on a website, we met, clicked & our journey to parenthood began.

Within 4 months of meeting our donor I was pregnant, now we just had to make it to the end & we would finally be able to hold our baby. We had a few scares throughout but all was fine & at 36 weeks our little man couldn’t wait any longer to meet us! Our 8 year struggle for a baby of our own was finally over, he was/is perfect in every way & looks just like his daddy ♡ Hubby thanked me for not giving up as he had lost hope long ago.

A few months later we decided that due to my age if we were going to try again we should do it sooner rather than later. Could we be so lucky again? We contacted our donor who we had now become close friends with & amazingly seeing as she had quite a rough time (pain wise) the first time around she agreed to go through another cycle with us. We are now 2 days away from being induced & meeting our next little man, our family will be complete & we are over the moon & still pinching ourselves that it is real.
I wanted to share our story to give others struggling hope & to encourage them to keep an open mind on all the options that are available out there to help their dreams of having a family come true, also to raise awareness about egg donation, something many people don’t even think about unless they know someone going through it. Don’t even start me on the kindness & selfless generosity of our egg donor, it still amazes me to this day that a complete stranger chose us out of all the people out there struggling to help make our dreams a reality, we will forever be indebted to her. How do you thank someone for the gift of a lifetime, of life in fact, not once but twice? I’m in awe of these wonderful angels that walk this earth among us.

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Posted by Kath, 4th April 2015