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By Noemy Chavez
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Body art by Allan Kukral
Photo by Brian J. Morowczynski
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Amanda Burrell just got a photo of the baby she helped bring into the world. “He’s
beautiful,” she says. “I think he has my nose. It’s amazing
and it’s really exciting.”
Burrell donated the egg that helped create this baby, since his parents were unable
to conceive on their own.
In many ways, she is typical of college women who are recruited for egg donation:
She’s between the ages of 20 and 30, she’s proportionate in her height
and weight and she does not smoke or drink. She’s also in a stable relationship,
which is considered necessary for emotional support, and does not have a history
of substance abuse.
But each woman’s choice to become an egg donor is a far more personal matter.
Burrell, 23, was motivated by a desire to help an infertile couple start a family.
Like many other women, she easily found a company that was interested in her eggs
but not in her as a person.
“The companies didn’t want to know what my dreams were, what my passions
or talents were; they just wanted to know my hair and eye color,” says Burrell.
So she contacted the women’s coalition at her college, which introduced
her to a couple that was looking for a donor. By pursuing this route she was able
to sit and speak with the potential parents and decide whether or not they were
right for each other.
This was the beginning of a process that turned out to be as emotional as it was
physical.
“In the midst of going to the appointments with the doctor, making sure
that you don’t have a certain genetic thing that’s going to screw
up the way you mix with the dad, you also have to see a psychologist,” she
says. “They wanted to make sure I was sane and that I was in the right state
of mind to be making a decision like that.”
Since a woman seems to be more fertile during the morning, the 10 to 12 required
doctor visits were at early hours. Burrell was put on birth control to regulate
her system so that the doctors could manipulate it.
She also had to give herself a series of 40 injections in her stomach, which had
to be administered at the same hour every day. The shots are designed to synchronize
the donor’s reproductive cycle with that of the birth mother. “The
injections aren’t so bad,” says Burrell. “If you were a diabetic,
it’s that same kind of needle. You still have to stick them in your stomach,
which sucks. And I didn’t want just anyone poking at my belly fat, so I
decided I’d do them myself.”
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Photo by Stacie Freudenberg
Women who become egg donors find the process an emotional journey. It requires 10 to 12 doctor visits at early hours of the morning, and a series of 40 injections. |
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Burrell didn’t expect this process to take as much of a toll on her emotions,
or that the effects of all the drugs would linger. The hormones made her feel
sick to her stomach and exhausted.
“When you screw around with your body that much, I knew it would be a little
weird,” she says. “I was super moody.”
This isn’t uncommon. Burrell was warned by a Chicago fertility clinic that
side effects vary, but most women report some combination of emotional and physical
reactions.
After months of preparation, the egg retrieval procedure was remarkably quick.
Burrell was sedated and a needle was passed through the top of her vagina under
ultrasound guidance to get to the ovary and the follicles. Since the eggs are
microscopic and cannot be seen on ultrasound, the physician used a transvaginal
probe to see them.
“It’s cool,” says Burrell. “It’s got this little
thing on the end of it that opens up all your little egg capsules and sucks the
egg out. It’s the tiniest of needles.”
The entire procedure took only 20 minutes, but again, the side effects lingered.
“Afterwards I was just really bloated,” she says. “I looked
like I was pregnant for two days and I didn’t go to work right away. I thought,
‘Oh no! I grew!’”
Serious side effects are rare. According to the Center for Human Reproduction,
there is less than a 5 percent chance that during the extraction process the needle
may puncture surrounding tissue or organs and cause injury, bleeding or infection.
There also is less than a 5 percent chance of ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome,
in which the ovaries become enlarged and fluid collects in the pelvis. The procedure
does not seem to have any long-term effects on a donor’s fertility, her
body weight or her risk of disease.
In the end, Burrell was paid $5,000, which may not sound like much for all that
she went through. But for her, it was not about the money. It was about helping
to bring a baby into the world.
April Smith, a 22-year-old college student who is in the beginning stages of egg
donation, shares the same motivation.
“I thought to myself, ‘What if I couldn’t have kids?’”
says Smith. “I’m just giving away an egg — something I get rid
of every month. It’s no big deal.”
Stories like Burrell’s convinced her the appointments, shots and emotional
toll can have a happy ending.
“I think about [the baby] a lot,” Burrell says. “I’m sure
I’ll think about him my whole life because it was a really cool experience.
It’s one of the best stories I’ll ever have.
“There is a little person out there who I helped make, and I’m really
proud of that.” 
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