Sarah Bonham

Review of Fairfax EggBank

Everyone has a different reason as to why they are...

Everyone has a different reason as to why they are in need of an egg donor. For me, I had very few eggs, my FSH levels were low, my estrogen was low, etc. It was completely devastating for me to hear this. I was finally married to an amazing man and we wanted to start our family. It never dawned on me to ask my OBGYN to check if I was not still able to have children, nor did they ever ask what my future desire was to have babies. I wish they did; I wish that it was part of the annual to ask. I wish that our bodies caught up to how we live our lives now. There are a lot of wishes I went through such an emotional roller coaster; it took me months before I was able to get myself to see a fertility specialist. She is the reason why we chose Fairfax EggBank. I was quite adamant about the features that I wanted the donor to have. Since I wasn t able to provide the egg, I wanted our baby to be as much of me as possible. However, I found it very difficult to find Chinese donors let alone all the other features I was hoping for. I searched everywhere and came to another realization that there are no standards for egg donation banks to follow. The testing, questionnaires, background checks, etc. was all over the place, including the pricing. After much consideration, we decided that frozen egg donation made the most sense for us and decided to go with the recommendation of my OBGYN; I trusted her already and respect her in every way possible, so why would I not trust her recommendation to use Fairfax.

JeanMarie Ruane was my coordinator and she was amazing. She seamlessly helped us make a very difficult decision. I gave her my lists of wants and she was very open and honest to me about my requirements. She was very thoughtful and genuine; she never pushed us to make a decision, but gave us enough information to make the right decision. We had been looking for the right donor for some time and when she narrowed down on our wants, she sent me donors that I should look at to help me in my search.

Although she didn t meet all of our physical requirements she actually was more of a match to my personality than I ever expected, which is why we selected her.

JeanMarie and I spoke on the phone (talking to her was like getting on a call with a friend) about the process and she got all the necessary paperwork for us to sign and notarize. Once that was completed, the frozen eggs went out immediately! The frozen eggs arrived in perfect condition. Of the 6 received, 5 made the 'defrost'. All 5 eggs were fertilized with A gradings. 1 was A+ and that was the one we chose to implant. Even Dr. Han who handled the creation of our blastocysts said our little one was the most perfect she's ever seen. Apparently she doesn't say this often.

We now have a beautiful, healthy, and happy baby girl. And what s most important to remember is that this little baby is in your belly for 40 weeks. So the DNA maybe from a donor, but everything else is from the mother.

I read in an article that the donor egg is like the outlines in a coloring book, but we are the crayons that fill in what s in between the lines. I found that to be so helpful in accepting and understanding that our little one is ME. Thank you JeanMarie and Fairfax for making our family possible.