Lisa J Lafave

The Fertility Coach

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Snowflakes

Embryo Donation/Adoption

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So what do you do with those extra embryos? Inquiring minds want to know! There are several options. You can store them for later use. You can donate them anonymously or to a known recipient. Or you can donate them to science and leave them with the doctor or clinic, to do with, as they will.

I have been lucky enough to be able to donate my embryos to a known recipient. We are still in the process of taking care of the legal aspect of the donation/adoption.

This embryo donation process is more involved than I ever would have thought. We are putting the final touches on the contracts between me and the embryo recipient, as well as creating an amendment between me and the egg donor, in order to give the embryos to the embryo recipient. There is a lot to consider. Much more than one would anticipate, at first blush.

In retrospect, I am so grateful that I had four gorgeous embryos, and only four embryos, after the insemination of sperm into egg and the five day wait, while they divided in the petri dish. It was the perfect amount, not too many, not too few. It allowed me the opportunity to breathe and know I had two more waiting, if the first two didn’t take! It also allowed me to fantasize about using them myself, at a later date. Finally, it will prevent me from having to go through this process of speaking with lawyers and trying to donate the embryos more than once. Trust me once through this shoot is enough for me. For heaven sakes, what would I have done if I had 17 gorgeous embryos? And what would it have been like trying to donate a few less than gorgeous embryos?

I have found an embryo donation secret group on Facebook and it has been very illuminating to discover how much angst is involved in the embryo donation process. Much to my surprise, it has been a veritable emotional roller coaster for me. It has been good to see that others have been through much the same. Essentially by reading others’ posts I got the support I needed. I learned that having difficulty letting go of the “snowflakes” is just part of the process.

Thankfully, I am now on the better side of that roller coaster. It was rough there for awhile. So good to know my feelings about the embryo donation/adoption have smoothed out and I am completely secure in the fact that I am doing the right thing! So good to have arrived at this spot again.

Intended parents of children through surrogacy, just remember that embryo donation may be part of your future too!

Lisa J Lafave, PhD, MBA, ACC
The Surrogacy Coach at Surrogacy Rocks
CEO & Founder of Coaching Rocks
A Single Mom By Choice of Surrogacy Twin Boys
Written in my Little Brick in University Hts, Ohio

Leap Into Action!

Hold on to Your Hats

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Not so fast, that was just the retainer that I signed the other day!

These embryo donation / adoption agreements are boiler plated and sound a bit crazy given our particular circumstances. We want an open agreement and these have a gag rule, in which, if you talk openly to the newspapers, etc., you can be sued. Yikes!

Doesn’t make sense to me to be sued just telling your story, to whomever! Fortunately, my recipient and I are on the same page.

We are in the process of hammering out the details. Within a week or two everything will be signed sealed and delivered.

I am feeling so much better now about giving my snowflakes away. So glad peace and tranquility has arrived.

Lisa J Lafave, PhD, MBA, ACC
The Surrogacy Coach from Surrogacy Rocks
CEO & Founder of Coaching Rocks, LLC
A Single Mom By Choice Raising Surrogacy Twin Boys
Written at Lake Morey Resort in New Hampshire

The Embryo Donation is a Done Deal!

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In this very litigious world even handing over a few snowflakes must be attended by a few lawyers!

I have employed Tom Pinkerton and Michelle Keeyes at the Reproductive Law Center to oversee the contracts between me and my recipient regarding the donation and adoption of my remaining two embryos. My recipient has retained Steve Klein of Falletta and Klein.

I have signed on the dotted line and my egg donor has provided her John Hancock, enabling me to donate my embryos, thus giving them a chance at life. I am truly so grateful to my recipient for being ready to take the next step and attempt to help these embryos become babies.

It feels good knowing where the embryos are going and being allowed to hear the story as it plays out. I love that I already know, like, and trust my recipient. I am all for open donation and adoption of embryos and other genetic material.

My recipient and I began this conversation more than a year ago. I feel so fortunate to have made her acquaintance. We literally met in Target. First laid eyes on one another at Boston Market. What if we had gone to a different Restaraunts that night? What then?

I surely do hope they stick. I am secretly hoping she has twins. She is hoping to do the transfer the weekend of Labor Day. It is the same weekend she conceived with her son, who is now 4, soon to be five. So it’s meaningful to her. I hope she gets her way!

I’ll keep you posted.

Lisa J Lafave, PhD, MBA, ACC
The Surrogacy Coach at Surrogacy Rocks
CEO & Founder of Coaching Rocks, LLC
A Single Mom By Choice Raising Surrogacy Twin Boys
Written in My Little Brick in University Heights, Ohio

Heart and Head are Not on the Same Page!

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I figured it out! The snowflakes cause distress because my heart and head are not on the same page. What makes sense intuitively and cerebrally, just doesn’t feel good to my heart yet.

But it’s coming. I went out and bought a piano for Jarvie and Giles today. It’s a Baldwin and has rich tones. It looks brand new but it’s used so it’s a pretty good value. Between the piano and the lessons for two it will be a bundle! Now imagine if I were paying for three or four or more. On the one hand more fun, but more labor intensive and many more dollars! So here is the reality of having 2 versus 3 or 4 children. In my current situation 2 is far more practical.

We are also going on vacation. We were supposed to first stay with my sister North Shore of Boston and then with my brother near Hanover, Vermont. Now if I had 4 kids would we really get an invitation? I think not. Moreover, the plans had to be altered because there will be a memorial service the weekend we were expected to be there. So we are staying at a Resort on Lake Fairlee and then moving onto a place on the beach in Rockport, MA. The places are small. If I had four kids the accommodations would have to be entirely different, as would the car we would rent.

These are just a few sobering thoughts, which help pull my heart out of the clouds and bring it back down to earth, where it belongs. You see I can be a soldier. And my snowflakes will be just fine. They will be given an opportunity to thaw out and have life. They will be afforded the right environment to make their journey and see if they can go from snowflakes to stickies. Stickies are embryos that implant or stick to the uterine wall and then grow and develop until it is their time to be born.

My egg donor is all for the donation. This is a very good thing too, because it can’t go forward without her written approval. This was all stipulated in my original contract with her.

Enough for now. More details later, as the story unfolds.

Lisa J Lafave, PhD, MBA, ACC
The Surrogacy Coach from Surrogacy Rocks
CEO & Founder of Coaching Rocks, LLC
A Single Mom By Choice Raising Surrogacy Twin Boys
Written in My Little Brick in University Heights, Ohio

Snowflakes

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By now, you all know that the fact that my embryos have been frozen all this time causes me some grief! I came across a term that is used in the embryo adoption / embryo donation world that somehow softens the blow. From this moment forward, my embryos are going to be thought of as my darling little snowflakes!

I am making arrangements to adopt out or donate my snowflakes to a friend, who so very much wants another child or two for her brood. She has been trying aggressively, cycle after cycle, and nothing has given rise to a little one that would stick. So now she enters the world of embryo adoption. She will be the one, who is adopting my darling little snowflakes.

I trust her implicitly. None of the following questions have anything to do with her integrity. Nonetheless, as I move forward in donating my snowflakes I have to be in awe of what I am giving up.

Interestingly here, my coaching role helps me in my journey. Through coaching I have been trained to ask opposing powerful questions. I have been taught to ask, “What do I give up, if I accept this?” As well as, “What do I get, if I accept this?”

In this case, by donating my snowflakes, I understand I have more love and resources to share with the wonderful boys that I already have. And I do love Jarvie and Giles so very much! I would never want to do anything to compromise their lives or life style, only enrich it.

Conversely, if I were to keep the snowflakes and have them thawed specifically for the purpose of growing my own family, I would have the joy of knowing and loving the babies that might actually come to life. I would also get the opportunity to watch all of my children grow and interact over the course of our lives. I would savor watching the them of them! But I would also have one sad friend!

This is the first time that I have ever been in touch with any feelings associated with changing my mind or even with understanding how others at the brink of giving a child or embryo away, could ever change their mind. In this very moment it all makes sense to me. Someone could very sanely change their mind and no longer be able to walk away. I truly never understood this before this exact moment. This is a complete revelation to me.

Now feeling more rational and less emotional, I know I do not have the wearwithal to have more children. Nonetheless, somehow giving them away causes me so much pain. I never knew it would. It is such a surprise. I always thought it would just bring relief that they would no longer be suspended in that nearly everlasting freeze. Alas, it causes pain as well. I will just have to learn to bravely soldier on. Who knew?

I suspect with time, the pain will ease and I will get used to the choice I have made.

Lisa J Lafave, PhD, MBA, ACC
The Surrogacy Coach from Surrogacy Matters
CEO & Founder of Coaching Rocks, LLC
A Single Mom By Choice Raising Surrogacy Twin Boys
Written in My Little Brick in University Heights, Ohio