My Egg Freezing Experience

Thinking of egg freezing? Hear from our 28 year old patient and staff member, Sorcha, who kindly shared her experience with us.

"A hot topic. A quick Google search will tell a tale of many women trying to figure out the question of kids vs careers and if freezing your eggs is the answer to having both. I admit, I hadn’t given it much thought, I naively assumed it would be no issue and I would think about it in five years time', a general consensus also reached by my close friends.

To be honest, I wasn’t even sure if that was the path I wanted. I spent a lot of time around kids my whole life, I was a babysitter, I worked as a camp counsellor and I adored it but still something in me had doubts.  That Google search did one good thing and for the first time in my adult life, I felt less alone in my indecisiveness.

I also think I was quite naïve about babies and how they come to be, not in the act of creating them, but more in how hard it can be to actually get pregnant.

So there I was, 28 years old and with a stroke of luck, working in a fertility clinic (let me tell you, the very definition of ‘you end up where you are meant to be’), surrounded by incredibly courageous people going through their own fertility journeys, I made the decision to get the blood test that would tell me a little about my own fertility. Anti-Mullerian hormone, also known as AMH, can be measured by a blood test. AMH is released from the total pool of eggs left in the ovaries and this can be detected in a blood test.

Nervous doesn’t begin to cover it, I had a pit in my stomach, like I knew it wouldn’t be good. Your gut is never wrong. There it was in very clear black and white, my AMH (anti-mullerian hormone) indicated a very low ovarian reserve. No eggs to put in anyone’s baskets. The panic set in, and the feeling of hopelessness and confusion was overwhelming.

‘Why was this happening? What does it mean? Can I never have biological children?’

The questions were endless with the general theme of what can I do and what will I do. After the initial shock, I decided I wanted to book in with one of the doctors and get a better idea of my options. I met with Dr Alex. He was so incredibly kind to me, he treated me as if I was his sister and was clear and realistic with me. He told me this was not a result we sit on, it was one we act on. He went over all my odds and what options I had available to me, and recommended I try an egg freezing cycle, knowing that I wouldn’t get many eggs so potentially would have to do multiple cycles in order to increase my chances of having a positive outcome. By the end of that appointment, I felt confident that I was going to move forward and that I was taking my own future into my hands. Despite the sadness of it all, I felt quite empowered to be doing something about it.

I got my prescription, collected my bucket of meds, Googled things I shouldn’t have, asked many, many questions to the lovely nurses and waited for my period to next appear to get things kick-started. Two weeks later, my period arrived, while I was away of course, but I contacted the clinic and they booked me in for my scan for as soon as I was back to get this cycle underway. I’d never had a transvaginal ultrasound before and I was apprehensive as expected. The nurses made me feel right at ease, they explained the process and chatted to me all through the scan to ease my nerves. Bloods were taken at this appointment to check the hormones were all at the right levels to proceed. Unfortunately, I got a call later that day to let me know that my bloods came back and I wasn’t ready to start. This felt like another blow. I had been all hyped up to start but I think that’s what this experience is truly like, a roller-coaster of emotions.

Thankfully, we got started on the next plan, onto the OCP for two weeks and then rescan, take more bloods and try again. Flashforward and I was having serious déjà vu, my blood results did not come back as hoped. I sat down with the doctor again and he was very honest with me, my body just may not be responding the way we want it to and that if I wanted to take a chance, we could start the hormone injections and rescan at the end of the week with about 70% chance of cancelling this cycle. I decided to give it ago, I was so ready mentally to start but had very low expectations. It was a really hard week, I felt very much like my body was not my own with the internal scan, the bloods draw and then all the injections. It was very surreal but in a weird way, I felt like I was in control of the situation, I was actively doing something about it. Friday eventually came along and I was ready to hear that I still had no follicles and it was going to be cancelled. To my utter surprise, it had worked, things were happening! Over the next week, they watched me like a hawk and I finally made it to trigger time.

I was so anxious to take my trigger, I was out for a meal for my sister’s birthday dinner, and I made sure to leave with plenty of time to spare to sit at my kitchen table with like an hour to wait, a bit like how I am in airports waiting for flights! I just did not want to mess this up, it had felt like forever getting to this point. I felt so bloated and heavy (and some family members may say moody). I was ready for this to be over.

I barely slept the night before my egg collection. All the ‘what ifs’ were flying about in my head on repeat. I just wanted to have some good news so desperately, but it was out of my hands at this point, I had done all I could. I had the first slot of the day so was up super early with my mom to bring me. You need someone to collect you as you are undergoing what’s called ‘conscious sedation’ so you are unable to drive after. I was a bag of nerves on the inside but outside I was trying to stay calm, and cool as a cucumber. The lovely nurses got me all settled in, I got into my blue gown and socks and the doctor came in to go over the consent forms and ask the most important question, what music I wanted on. Taylor Swift, obviously.

The whole procedure was a bit of a blur, I remember thinking that I didn’t want to feel anything but it is only conscious sedation, not the full anaesthetic so I was aware I may feel some things. I felt fairly nauseous when I was back in recovery and had to be given something to help that. Thankfully my mom was there to bring me home and I went straight to sleep. To be honest I think I slept most of the day, a combination of the medication and all the nerves meant I was exhausted. Even though I had left my phone beside me, I still managed to miss 3 calls from the lab (sorry lovely embryologists!). I rang them back and I was given the news (good news in my case) of how many gorgeous eggs were safely tucked away in one of the big tanks. The rest of my recovery was a bit rough, it really took a lot out of me and I think the emotions all came to the surface over everything that had happened over the last few months, it really was A LOT.

Overall, would I do it all again? Yes, 100%. This whole experience has shown me how strong I am, how I can take control over my own fertility and allowed myself the option to have options down the line."

We want to extend a huge thanks to Sorcha for sharing her egg-freezing journey with us.