Since my last post where I noted that 10 embryos were created, only 5 embryos developed enough during the blastocyst stage to be viable for freezing and PGT-A testing.

Out of those 5, only 3 came back normal, which--considering the high transplant success rate these days--I am told is a good number to work with initially.

Of the 5 healthy embryos, 2 are female and 1 is male.

I'll ultimately be thrilled to have a child of any sex, but will have the male...

Exciting news to report!

I received word today from my IVF center that they were able to create 10 embryos from my sperm and my donor's egg

I had 11 today eggs to work with, so that was a great creation success rate.

They are going to let the embryos grow for 3-5 days before they freeze them and ship off for PGT-A testing (checking for chromosomal, etc., abnormalities and also will identity the sex of each embryo).

Probably won't have...

My donor started taking her medications (September 17th) in preparation for egg retrieval in a couple of weeks, so things are moving forward as planned! I'll receive daily updates during the work week from this point onward until the retrieval occurs, so I have something else to look forward to in the short term. I'm also keeping my surrogacy agency in the know so that I don't slide back too much on the wait list for a surrogate (due to COVID, many agencies have a 6-8 month waitlist for surrogate...

After going through a grueling process of tests (blood work, physical, etc.) and sperm freezes, I was finally granted access to my IVF's egg donor database.

Based on the program that I am a part of, there weren't too many donors available at the time. But the donor profiles that were available were quality. I knew instantly what donor was for me.

Here's to keeping the fingers crossed that the donor produces enough eggs (I'm in a shared donor program) for this go...

When deciding on a surrogacy agency, first and foremost for me was reputation and quality of care, to include information on how an agency screened potential surrogates and the care that the agency took with surrogates and intended parents. Any agency with a poor reputation in those areas (and I spent considerable periods of time researching each agency I considered) was immediately crossed off of my list.

After these things, the next biggest issue was cost. With surrogacy agency...