How Being an Egg Donor Impacted my Kids
Becoming an egg donor was something I decided to do after I already had my two children. I decided that being a known egg donor was the best option for me, because I really wanted to have an open relationship with my kids about the process and didn’t want to be anything other than an open donor. This was a personal decision that I made based on my beliefs. I was very lucky to be very involved with the couples that I matched with and so were my kids.
My daughter seemed to understand the process better than my son did. She was able to understand how I was able to help infertile families, whereas my son thought the babies were somehow new family members to us. He knew the babies were not siblings, but also kind of where siblings from a genetics perspective, so he questioned if the parents would now have a tie to our family. My daughter understood the embryos were created and that was the only part I was involved in, whereas my son questioned how the new family involvement would be moving forward.
As the years have gone by, my kids ask every now and again about the babies, but they don’t seem to think about them too much. I am really glad that I got to experience this process with them, and we really have become friends with the families that I have helped with egg donation. We don’t feel like the babies are mine, but we do have a special connection that makes the whole process a wonderful experience.