The business of having a baby.

Nobody likes to talk about it because it makes us feel uncomfortable.  We want everything to be warm and fuzzy.  We don’t want what we are doing to feel or appear cold, impersonal, and sterile. And last but not least we certainly don’t want this to look like we are buying a car or a house.  Because for us it’s so much more than a transfer of property.  It’s the beginning of life.

I know for me, it was just something so reverent and holy with deep meaning.

Many patients adore their Reproductive Endocrinoloigsts and it’s safe to say some even worship the ground they walk on.   But the reality is the  infertility industry in the United States has grown to a multi-billion dollar business. And some even go as far as to say that human eggs are the main commodity.  Let’s face it no matter how to slice it everyone in the industry gets a piece of the pie.

The fertility clinic and your reproductive specialist receives the  largest slice because they provide the services and procedures that help women like you and I get pregnant in the first place. 

Then the egg donor or a gestationa carrier receives her slice of the pie because she’s donating her eggs or renting out her womb and they need to be compensated for their time and trouble.   Next are the egg donor or surrogacy  agencies who help us search and make that perfect match — and to add to the mix the psychologists who help us navigate through the whole process as we sort through our feelings along the way. 

Of course we can’t forget our lawyers, without them we’d be wading through pages upon pages of contracts filled with big words and legal speak that leaves the majority of us with a big headache.  We can’t forget the pharmacutical companies who provide both ourselves and our egg donors with very tools of the trade (drugs) that our mixologist (RE) uses to create amazing eggs and those fabulous triple patterned utereses that we all covet. 

Where are we without our massage therapists, acupunturists, and vitamin companies who keep us relaxed and healthy before transfer?  And how can we forget companies like EPT, Clear Blue Easy, Answer, and Fact Plus who aid us in our obession with the ceremonial peeing on a stick?

I am sure I have left out someone or some company along the way but you get the idea — we are writing checks or forking over our credit card to many along the way which brings me to the point — this is a business and because the infertility industry is the livlihood of many (especially to those of us who are trying so valiently to have a baby) it’s important that we as consumers have the ability to compartmentalize the process.  Because if we didn’t — frankly we’d go crazy.

So how do we get to a place so we can  feel “good” about all of “this”?

How do we as women who are exchanging or giving up our genetics for the genetics of another get over feeling weird or uncomfortable?

Never in million years did I ever think I’d have to pay someone (let alone a stranger) for her time and trouble so I could receive some eggs to have my child.  And while I am certainly glad I did (my child is one of the best things that have ever happened to me) getting from there to where I am today took some time and great thought.

I think the truth is — you really don’t get over it.  It’s kind of like grief