Natasha from London hopes to inspire you this Mothering Sunday with her own fertility journey.
“Today is the most precious day for me, my first Mother’s Day! For the last 11 years, Mother’s Day has been painful for me, because I couldn’t conceive a child of my own. We consulted Drs, who told me I was young and that I had plenty of time. I can’t tell you how quickly my 30th birthday came around and how often our families and friends kept asking when we were going to have a baby. It was just awful; we didn’t want to discuss our private life with anybody else!
Tests showed that everything was normal with my husband, but my tests revealed I had premature ovarian failure. I was totally devastated, my body had completely failed me, I wasn’t ovulating monthly, and so had no hope of becoming pregnant.
My whole world just collapsed around me. All I had ever dreamed of was being a mother. It was a very harsh reality to face and learn this basic human function would never be mine. I became withdrawn avoiding friends and family because I was just so depressed.
It took 6 months to get my head around this bombshell news and only after what felt like grief for the child I would never have, did I pluck up the courage to start searching on the internet to see if there was any solution to this devastating problem.
I could have kicked myself; I had spent so long feeling sorry for myself that I hadn’t realised that I could conceive with an Afro Caribbean donor egg. I called Barbados Fertility Centre (BFC) and spoke with Dionne Holmes, IVF Donor/Recipient Coordinator. That phone call changed my life! Dionne was the friend that I could confide in. I cried, all the years of heartache and the previous 6 months all came out in that phone call. Dionne reassured me there was hope for me and that BFC could and would help me.
Dionne explained the IVF donor egg programme at BFC, which involved retrieving eggs from the anonymous donor, fertilizing her eggs in their laboratory with my husband’s sperm, creating an embryo and then placing the embryo back into my womb.
As soon as my husband got in from work, I literally leapt in to his arms and cried tears of joy, we finally had a plan and we couldn’t wait to get started.
BFC got to work matching me with a donor based on my skin tone, eye colour and also level of education. They arranged counseling to understand the implications of using a donor egg. The whole team at BFC was so welcoming and friendly, for the first time in years, we were not alone in this nightmare and we had something that I hadn’t felt in a very long time – hope.
Just two short months later and we were in Barbados for the painless procedure, but the 14-day wait to take the pregnancy test was painful – my heart would explode at the thought of being pregnant and then my heart would sink at the thought of the procedure not working. But, after the longest 14 days of my life – finally it was POSITIVE!
In January, our beautiful baby girl arrived and we cannot thank BFC enough. But there is one person who I have never met and never will, one person who I thank from the bottom of my heart, the donor. This lady gave me the most selfless and precious gift, the gift of donating her eggs to give me the chance of being a mother – whoever you are, you made my life complete and I will always be eternally grateful to you.”
Natasha, London