Egg donation can take a toll on a recipient’s mental, physical and emotional health. In addition to ingesting medications and undergoing the implantation procedure, recipients must prepare themselves for possible failure of the process or becoming pregnant. Below are some tips to help you prepare for egg donation if you're considering this procedure.
Make Yourself Healthy
A healthy body is more likely to become pregnant after the implantation procedure. A healthy body does not need to struggle to find nutrients or operate normally. Maintaining a healthy weight, eating nutritious foods, and abstaining from cigarettes, alcohol and drugs will put your body in the best position to become pregnant. Do not engage in excessive exercise or severely restrict your caloric intake, as both of these will place stress on your body.
Follow Physician’s Orders
The medications and other instructions your physician has given you are the results of previous experience. Following your doctor’s orders, including getting enough rest and eating properly, are essential to the procedure being successful. Do not think that you know your body, or what it needs to do to prepare and heal after the procedure, better than your physician.
Make All Legal Preparations
The clinic or specialist you are using for the egg donation should have provided legal forms to all involved parties stating the terms of the procedure, ownership rights to the eggs and future responsibility for a child. Make sure that all parties have completed these documents, understand their contents, and that you have copies of them for your records.
Prepare Yourself Mentally
The egg donation procedure is mentally taxing for all involved parties. Most likely prior to starting the egg donation procedure, you have tried other methods to become pregnant and undergone several tests and rounds of medicines. Unfortunately, while egg donation to treat infertility has been proven a successful method, there is still no guarantee that you will become pregnant.
Additionally, you must prepare yourself to dedicate time and energy to your recovery, and to being pregnant should the procedure be a success. Pregnancy is not easy on a body, either, and while you may be ecstatic that you are pregnant, you still must anticipate your body changing during the upcoming 9 months.
Prepare Yourself Emotionally
You must also prepare yourself emotionally for all possible outcomes of the procedure. Hopefully, the procedure will be successful and you will become pregnant shortly afterwards. It is possible, though, that your body will reject the fertilized egg and you will need to undergo the procedure again from the beginning, starting with picking a new donor. You may also choose to try another method to start your family, such as adoption. The important thing in preparing yourself emotionally is to ready yourself for success and failure, to prevent from becoming overwhelmed with sadness should you not become pregnant.
You may want to consider speaking with a therapist about your emotions during this stressful time. Therapy and counseling are wonderful for alleviating stress and gaining new or additional perspectives on what you are going through.
