Open or closed, open or closed?

So we haven't heard a peep from that family we wrote to. I suspect we won't. Which is okay. We present a strange situation, and it might not have been the right fit for them.

Because I'm deep in the throes of Project GASP! (Get A Sibling Pronto!), I'm exploring all of our options. In my first post about embryo donation, I went on and on about how I thought embryo adoption was the way to go, how I didn't want to treat an embryo like a piece of property (despite the fact that I am not in favor of granting them full people status for other legal reasons), and so on. Then I really started looking into it.

There are two ways (that I've found) to arrange for an open adoption of embryos. (1) Find someone through private means who is willing to donate their embryos to you and who is willing to maintain an open relationship -- a friend of a friend, posting a personal ad somewhere, etc. -- or (2) use an agency.

There are a slew of agencies who process open adoptions of embryos. And none of them feels like a good fit for us. Some of them limit the age of the woman and the combined ages of the couple (if the woman has a partner). We skim under the wire on this one. Some of them require that a married couple have been married a certain number of years. Again, we just barely qualify. Some of them don't allow single people to adopt embryos (code for "straight couples only, please). Uh-uh, no way, not the agency for me. And, with all due respect to my religious friends out there, some of them are just incredibly religious or promote themselves as a "Christian" agency. That's just not a good fit for us.

And then there are the agency fees, oh my! I was perfectly comfortable paying our adoption agency their fee, because I really felt like they earned it. They held our hands, wiped our tears, acknowledged our grief, counseled us, introduced us to many other couples in similar situations, invited us to monthly group educational/counseling sessions, provided us with an enormous amount of educational materials and resources on all aspects of open and transracial adoption, provide birthmoms with enormous amounts of counseling (whether they end up placing their child with adoptive parents or not), continue to keep us apprised of relevant open adoption news, and provide us all with lifelong counseling surrounding adoption issues. These folks rock.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not begrudging the embryo adoption agencies their fee. They are also businesses who need to pay their employees, they screen both the donating bio parents and the potential recipients, they provide varying amounts of education and counseling services, and some of them even provide legal documents. I know they're providing a valuable service to many people. But for the Mister and me, most of that is unnecessary. We already had so much counseling about maintaining an open adoption relationship, that paying them to do the same thing makes no sense. We don't need legal forms drawn up because I would prefer to use a local lawyer I trust (who happens to specialize in ART legal issues). What we'd basically be left with is the match-making service. Which is valuable, but I have a hard time believing it would be $8K worth of valuable to us. For someone who hadn't been through the full gamut of experiences we've been through, sure, it's totally worth it. Absolutely. Blessings and luck to all. But I don't see it for us.

Which leads me back to fertility clinics. Some (but by no means all) offer embryo donation programs. From what I can tell, most of those programs are on a closed-relationship basis -- probably because they don't want to get involved in the potential legal/relationship issues that could arise in an open situation. I spoke with one such clinic this week. This clinic is out of state, but highly recommended by a single friend whose daughter was conceived using donor gametes. The program coordinator asked me to tell her my sad story, which I did. Married late, unspecified infertility, Clomid, IUIs, IVFs, miracle pregnancy, miscarriage at 11 weeks, last-minute transracial adoption, the whole ball o' wax. Oh, and we want a non-Caucasian baby this time, by the way. "You're perfect for us," she said. "You've been through a lot, you really understand the options, you're already raising a child who is not genetically related to you ... We probably wouldn't accept someone who wanted a child of another race unless they were already in a situation like yours, because that would be kind of weird. But in your situation, it makes perfect sense."

Gulp.

I asked her about the closed-donation situation. She was very firm about there being no wiggle room on this, and brought up issues I'd not thought of before. Things I should have thought of -- many of these embryos are from donor egg cycles (because if you're getting an IVF with your own eggs, there are often problems with gamete quality already, and it's statistically less likely you'll have embryos to freeze), the donors want to give a gift to other potential parents and give the embryos a chance at life, but because by the time they get to a DE cycle they've already been through the infertility wringer in every way, they often don't want to deal with the big emotions and issues that can arise in an open donation situation -- they just want the long nightmare to be over. I don't know that I agree with this argument necessarily, although I'm sure it's true for some people. And I've read posts in ART forums recently by donor moms who are agonizing over their relationship with the recipient family and really wrestling with their grief at the knowledge that they have genetic children whom they're not raising. Coming from the open adoption world, I can't help but wish all of these wonderful donors had had the opportunity for serious counseling before they made the decision to move forward. While they're not carrying these babies in their wombs before placing them with another family, there are certainly going to be loss issues. It would be strange if someone didn't have some grief to deal with. But, while open adoptions are HARD sometimes, I do think openness is best for the child. Does this change in a donor embryo situation? Maybe. I don't know. I really have to think about it.

So I asked more questions about the process and the costs and told her I'd be in touch if we decide to go forward. It's a lot to ponder.

Comments

[Rachel]

I'm sure you've thought about this, but what about using the online community to at least throw your name out there as someone looking for donor embryos? I read a blog of a woman who is giving her embryos to a blog reader (Sticky Feet Part Deux) and several other where it has been discussed. It would of course be much harder to find a non-white embryo in the online community, but still possible. I'd suggest something like writing a brief intro and asking your readers to post it at the bottom of their next post with a link back to you. You never know what might happen.

[Calliope]

When I was involved with the donor egg program of my clinic in the northeast there were MANY forms about how the clinic will not link up donor and recipient. Codes were used instead of names and appointments were carefully scheduled so that no "I think that's my donor" moment would happen in the lobby.

I know that part of me would want to know about the family that was raising a child from my eggs, but I was going through infertility hell and realized that if someone had a viable pregnancy and I didn't that I might go a bit bananas. (which was how I really realized that I was no where near ready, emotionally, to be a donor).

That being said- I have heard that some clinics are doing a version of open embryo adoption where records are released when the child is 18. Maybe you could ask this clinic if they would have any donors willing to meet you half way??

either way- Your Project GASP is on!! yay!!

[Maru]

I had no idea there was such a thing as open embryo adoption. When we were doing IVF they told us about donating our embryos. Never thought it would be an adoption...