The Chicken or the Egg Freezing?

These are the reactions from women when I tell them I’m freezing my eggs:

“Congratulations!”

“Good for you! Are you excited?”

“You should be really proud.”

“Oh shit. Should I be freezing my eggs, too?”

These are the reactions from men when I tell them:

“Oh! How old are you?”

“I thought you were supposed to be really old to have to do that. But you look pretty young.”

But to be honest, it’s been hard to know how I should feel or react.

When I first had a Zoom with my doctor to discuss egg freezing, and he talked about the importance of getting as many good eggs as possible, all I could think about were chickens. We weren’t so different.

Their eggs were being taken and refrigerated and sold in supermarkets. Mine were being frozen and kept in a storage facility in New Jersey.

As my doctor went on about how the actual procedure would work - after two weeks of injecting myself with hormones, I would go under anesthesia and they would retrieve the eggs - I froze with fear. I’ve had a lot of horrible experiences with anesthesia throughout my eye surgeries. Often times, they wouldn’t give me enough, and I’d need to go through the surgery in excruciating pain, while still needing to lie completely still since they were operating on my eye.

I continued to ask more questions about the procedure when he stopped me.

“Don’t worry. You can trust us,” he said over Zoom.

Just hearing those words from a doctor made me tear up. Realizing how little trust I have in all doctors, because of my many awful past experiences.

I nodded, unable to speak without crying, and he told me to get scheduled to move forward.

There is something very strange about going through a medical procedure of my own free will. I am so used to being forced into surgery and making panicked medical decisions, backed up against a wall, that there is something that feels almost wrong about choosing to do this to myself.

This month I finally got great news from all my doctors — my eyes are looking healthy, my MS is stable, and yet this is how I’m deciding to spend this period of long awaited health? With more doctors?

I meant to this do last year, but my most recent surgery got in the way and I wasn’t able to. So, a part of me also knew that I had to act now while I could.

I went ahead and scheduled all the necessary appointments and ultrasounds and bloodwork, because despite my fear and trauma around a new medical procedure, I think a part of me still wanted to do this. Whenever I’m undecided, but I see myself going through the motions of making the option possible, that is how I know I’ve decided. As if my body has decided for me before my mind can catch up. I follow where my feet take me, and it just so happened that they were taking me to the NYU fertility center.

A lot of the decisions around this hinges on my future self. Do I want kids? Do I not? Either way, it felt like a safe option. Like getting a refundable ticket for a trip in case I changed my mind.

The problem is, my future often feels very unclear to me. It’s so hard for me to see too far ahead, and now, for once, I felt able to make that decision. What I would actually do in the future, I still wasn’t sure, but they were baby steps in some direction.

And that’s been a noticeable change in me lately. For a long time, I felt paralyzed with fear, and the idea of making the wrong move. But now, I feel more confident in making a decision, seeing what happens and being ready to learn from it.

Last week, I started my injections. I was terrified to do it on my own, so my friend Eve came over to help me. We sat at my kitchen table, drinking La Croixs and watching the same tutorial videos on Youtube over and over again, trying to tune out the awful royalty-free music playing each time we played the video.

I wondered if the woman in the video for CVS pharmacy was a real nurse, or a paid actor. When people asked her what she was in recently, would she send them the Follistim tutorial link?

After learning how to properly mix the medication, and insert it into the syringe, I injected myself with the first one. By the second one, my hands were so sweaty from nerves, I needed to have Eve do it because I couldn’t press down on the syringe.

When we were finally done, I felt a wave of relief. I had to do this every night, I remembered with a panic, but at least it was over and I felt so grateful to have a friend there with me to help.

I cleaned up the syringes and medications after Eve left, and jumped in the shower. I had to get ready for a date.

Pregaming by injecting myself with hormones is now by far the strangest thing I’ve ever done before a date.

When I go in for regular monitoring once the injections start, I’m struck by all the other women there, too. Two long lines of hallways are filled with women on their phones, disassociating. It feels both terrifying, to see this almost factory-like operation, and also comforting, to see so many other people also going through this.

Sometimes, there are couples there together, or the lone guy in a sea of women sitting there by himself. I passed by a very cute guy the other morning, and had to remember he most definitely was not single if he was at a fertility center at 8am.

All I will say is that going to yoga to meet women is a dumb tactic when everyone should just hang out at fertility clinics early in the morning.

It’s now been over a week, and my stomach is all black and blue from the injections each night. I’ve also been much more emotional, which I knew would happen, but still doesn’t make it any less weird. One day, I’ll find myself walking to Trader Joe’s and think, “Does anyone even care about me?!” and then the next day I’ll be completely fine and can’t remember what I was crying about.

I’ve also been trying to move slowly, and not make as many plans. To let myself rest more and to eat healthier. In a way, I was already on a health kick when spring started, so this just feels like a more extreme version of that.

When I left the doctor today, I was told that the egg retrieval procedure will likely be on Monday or Tuesday. While I’ve been trying to embrace this experience as best I can, I’ll be very relieved once it’s over.

I thought because of all my experience dealing with medications and appointments for my health conditions, this would be easy. But it’s been a lot to handle and keep track of. I’m both grateful to be able to do this at all, and also very happy for it to be done.

A few blocks over, in Midtown, I passed this on the street:

For some reason, I was really nervous to write about this experience. Even though I already write pretty intimately on here about my health, this felt different, even more private, and I was avoiding this newsletter. But I’m trying not to let the literature, or the chickens, or the egg freezing discourage me, and simply move forward the best I can.

Love,

Julia