Our Trip to Tennessee

This past week we headed down to Knoxville, Tennessee for our extensive consult with Dr. Keenan.  It was a quick flight; we flew in on Wednesday, had our consult at 10:30am on Thursday and then flew out Thursday evening.  It was a somewhat exhausting trip as we had connecting flights through Chicago on the way down and back therefore much of our time was spent sitting at the airport.  Now, onto the part that everyone really wants to hear about, the extensive consult with Dr. Keenan. 

The first person we met with was Kelly, she is the IVF Nurse Coordinator and will be our contact as we move forward through the entire process.  The next person we met with was Dr. Keenan we spoke with him about our previous infertility treatments as well as our medical history.   Following our meeting with Dr. Keenan Sara had a couple procedures done and was subsequently medically cleared! 

We then met with Clydene the Patient Coordinator to discuss the matching process.  We originally said we would be open to adopting embryos in either an anonymous or open agreement situation but we realized that we need to choose one or the other as the matching process is different depending on which we choose.  Therefore, we are taking some time and discussing both options to ensure that we are comfortable with the final decision as this is a very big decision.  Among other things one major difference between the two would be whether or not the child(ren) would be able to contact/locate their genetic parents when they turn 18.  If we move forward with anonymous they wouldn’t be able to do this.  Therefore we have a lot to think about and a big decision that needs to be made before we can move forward.

Once we’ve decided which way we are going to proceed we will then begin the matching process.  If we choose anonymous we would review multiple profiles and ultimately choose the embryos for ourselves.  If we were to move forward with an open agreement Clydene would complete the matching process based on the level of communication we have said we are comfortable with as with an open agreement there would be some level of communication between us and the donors.  We would discuss the specifics of the agreement once we’ve been matched with a donor couple and then the legal agreement would be completed.  Another decision we have to make is whether we would be open to adopting embryos where an egg or sperm donor was used.  The pool of available embryos is larger if we are ok with the fact that an egg or sperm donor was used.  Therefore we have a few decisions to make.  We hope to make our decision this weekend so we can start the matching process next week. 

We met with three other individuals while we were there.  Carol, the embryologist, explained the three different stages that the embryos are frozen at as this is something we’ll need to know and understand as we go through the matching processes.  Gary, the practice manager, came in and spoke to use about the costs involved as we move forward through the process, the fun stuff :)  Chris, the new media coordinator, came in to ask us if we would feel comfortable sharing our story with him and NEDC.  We, of course, said absolutely as we want to let the secret of embryo donation and adoption out.  The one consistent comment we hear from everyone we share our story with has been they had no idea that this process was even an option.  Many people compare it to something they would see in a sci-fi movie because it is still so new.  This is one of the reasons why we are willing to share our story; we want people to know that there are additional options available to them. 

While it was a somewhat exhausting trip we learned a lot more about the process, have a few additional decisions we need to make before the matching process to begin and are hopeful that we’ll be headed back to Tennessee before the end of the year for the transfer!  Now that we move forward we will update the blog as decisions are made so everyone knows where we are at in the process.  As always thanks for all your love and continued support!

xoxox
Ryan & Sara