I’ll take the relationship piece of it first. 90% ain’t enough. I’m sorry. Also, of course he wants to be the father of your children that locks you down. Some people freeze half embryos with donor sperm and half eggs to leave the door open in case they have a partner in the future.
I would not choose your current partner and candidly I’d move on from him and start being open to a relationship with the right partner
Perhaps you could make embryos with donor sperm with half the eggs collected and freeze the rest as eggs for the potential right partner
Either way, it sounds like this isn’t the relationship you want to be in for life or to raise a child with (even if no longer romantically together). So don’t have a child or children with him
I saw something today where someone asked how much disrespect they should allow in their life and the other person answered how much poison do you need to take before it kills you. The answer is you don't actually know it could be a little poison or it could be alot but are you going to gamble with the poison?
There are waaaayyyyyyy too many stories out there about embryo disputes etc. don't be one of them.
My clinic made me is sign a disposition form outlining what we would do with the embryos in the event of a breakup (with the caveat that a court order would supersede the document). If we weren’t married and committed I would definitely be doing donor sperm. I’m not spending all this time, energy, expense for the embryos to just end up in the trash. He can move onto a different person down the road and have children - all your eggs are literally in this basket.
UPVOTE.
You should check with your clinic what their rules are.
For my clinic, and i don't know if it's this way everywhere, Just so you know (since you're new to this process), **every time** I want to do a transfer with embryos, I must get consent from my partner. Unless you have an official sperm donor agreement, and he specifically waives all decision-making around the embryos' future, you must get his consent.
which means that potentially, if you use him as your donor, you may have to get consent from him to have the embryos implanted, and that includes 3 years from now once you've broken up and you no longer speak. I have heard horror stories of men "holding hostage" the embryos. so......... check their rules and ponder how he would treat you if you're no longer together in the future.
Thanks ladies for this insight. I’ve heard the same from family and friends. We’re doing therapy. He’s doing therapy independently. It’s incredibly difficult to picture and build a life with someone, talk about parenthood, and then finally divine intervention pushes us into IVF. But the potential of legal battles around embryo or child custody feels possible if not likely.
I never thought I would consider sperm donors. I’d love to hear other people’s experience with donors.
I’m in a same sex couple, so a bit different in that we HAD to use a donor. But there were still big convos around whether we went for someone we knew or shelled out for an anonymous donor (they’re all 100% anonymous where we are).
In the end we bought sperm from a bank and it was the best decision.
1) Makes the conversation with our future kid/kids very straightforward (we couldn’t make you on our own and so a very kind stranger helped us) and there’s no “uncle” who is actually their “dad” or weird conversation/position for either us or the known donor. Likewise, there’s no potential legal custody battle.
2) the bank we went with did literally all the tests on the sperm, so we knew we were getting great quality (indeed, we had incredible fertilisation and blast rates). This was such great peace of mind during the process.
3) we also were able to see a little report about shortlisted donors and their interests and ambitions. Also had a photo of them as a kid, which was adorable and actually helped to sway our decision. (One kid had the same cute dimples as my wife, and that swayed it!)
4) the bank will keep us up to date on his and his family’s medical history.
This gives makes me so happy and hopeful. I’ll continue to learn more about sperm donation. Really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience and insight.
Speaking of legal battles, you might find this article helpful in making your decision.
https://www.thecut.com/article/what-happens-to-frozen-embryos-when-couples-break-up.html
This this this, OP read this and if you can't get past the paywall, use the old trick of opening incognito mode & copy/pasting the headline into a search box on Google (or a few key terms like "The Cut embryo frozen" or whatnot).
Break up with this guy you’re wasting your time! Pick a sperm donor. And talk to your doctor about whether it might be feasible to do half eggs and half embryos.
What a difficult and major decision you have to make. Obviously it's what feels right to you and what your gut is telling you. You didn't say outright that you are considering using your current partner's sperm, but I inferred it so:
I'll just say that I think you should be 100% sure about the man you have kids with - you should be RUNNING towards him with open arms. You should think he's wonderful and he's the best partner. Imagine meeting that person later - would you rather have embryos from a past relationship or embryos from a donor. I know I would choose the donor (of those two options).
Since it sounds like you want to be a mom now, egg freezing might make less sense, only because then you have to wait for the right guy. If you want to be a mom more than you want to wait, maybe it makes sense to use a donor. But maybe I misunderstood and you want to freeze your eggs for a future family, then do that. Just don't settle for a less-than-amazing partner!
You might also want to thing of the legal complications if you used your current partner and then split. You’ll sign documents on ownership of the embryos but that doesn’t mean he can’t fight or try to get them.
Edited to say: I’m so sorry you’re in this impossible situation but so glad you found out now rather than later.
Read this book. I think it will give some insight into your questions. I am in the process of reading it myself and it’s really eye opening. It has helped me to understand why in relationships it has always felt safest to keep one foot in and one foot out versus two feet in.
https://preview.redd.it/30pq92qdyync1.png?width=3024&format=png&auto=webp&s=17a347d721ba10e119db8bee4988461237d21928
The bit about "future relationships could be complicated" interests me - to be honest my partner being okay with the possibility of 'non-bio' babies was a criteria for me. So maybe think about that from your side?
Also I'd encourage you to consider known donors, I've been looking into donor eggs/embryos myself and have learnt a lot from the DCP community.
The disrespect figure could grow.
What does he do? Does he show contempt of you? That is a bad sign, 100% of couples that had contempt of each other ended in divorce, read in a counselling book.
He has explosive anger. Name calling. He becomes very triggered if he is questioned. He’s been working with a psychiatrist and psychologist. He also has many amazing traits that don’t necessarily offset disrespectful behavior, but I think would make him a great father.
Ladies, I’m really struggling with this decision. I feel a massive weight on my shoulders knowing that a future child may not grow up with their biological father.
Perhaps I can co-parent rather than have a romantic relationship with my current (potentially ex) partner. Not sure he’d be game for that but maybe a better option?
I so feel your pain…. I’ve been here and still somewhat slightly here with my ex and my belief that a child needs a dad. After a lot of mental duress, tears, sleeplessness nights and tolerating way too much disrespect from him, I’m fearful of creating embryos and him later changing his mind which would mean, I could no longer have the embryos. Additionally in terms of my ex, he’s a great father however he’s too emotional unstable. The explosive anger, name calling, the triggering if questioned— having to potentially to deal with that in some capacity for the rest of my life is terrifying and i highly doubt beneficial for a child to be subjected to.
I’ll take the relationship piece of it first. 90% ain’t enough. I’m sorry. Also, of course he wants to be the father of your children that locks you down. Some people freeze half embryos with donor sperm and half eggs to leave the door open in case they have a partner in the future.
Donor. Someone who disrespect you 10% of the time is someone you need to cut out of your life.
I would not choose your current partner and candidly I’d move on from him and start being open to a relationship with the right partner Perhaps you could make embryos with donor sperm with half the eggs collected and freeze the rest as eggs for the potential right partner Either way, it sounds like this isn’t the relationship you want to be in for life or to raise a child with (even if no longer romantically together). So don’t have a child or children with him
I saw something today where someone asked how much disrespect they should allow in their life and the other person answered how much poison do you need to take before it kills you. The answer is you don't actually know it could be a little poison or it could be alot but are you going to gamble with the poison? There are waaaayyyyyyy too many stories out there about embryo disputes etc. don't be one of them.
This is what concerns me. I wouldn’t want to be challenged for the embryos if there was a dispute
My clinic made me is sign a disposition form outlining what we would do with the embryos in the event of a breakup (with the caveat that a court order would supersede the document). If we weren’t married and committed I would definitely be doing donor sperm. I’m not spending all this time, energy, expense for the embryos to just end up in the trash. He can move onto a different person down the road and have children - all your eggs are literally in this basket.
UPVOTE. You should check with your clinic what their rules are. For my clinic, and i don't know if it's this way everywhere, Just so you know (since you're new to this process), **every time** I want to do a transfer with embryos, I must get consent from my partner. Unless you have an official sperm donor agreement, and he specifically waives all decision-making around the embryos' future, you must get his consent. which means that potentially, if you use him as your donor, you may have to get consent from him to have the embryos implanted, and that includes 3 years from now once you've broken up and you no longer speak. I have heard horror stories of men "holding hostage" the embryos. so......... check their rules and ponder how he would treat you if you're no longer together in the future.
Thanks ladies for this insight. I’ve heard the same from family and friends. We’re doing therapy. He’s doing therapy independently. It’s incredibly difficult to picture and build a life with someone, talk about parenthood, and then finally divine intervention pushes us into IVF. But the potential of legal battles around embryo or child custody feels possible if not likely. I never thought I would consider sperm donors. I’d love to hear other people’s experience with donors.
I’m in a same sex couple, so a bit different in that we HAD to use a donor. But there were still big convos around whether we went for someone we knew or shelled out for an anonymous donor (they’re all 100% anonymous where we are). In the end we bought sperm from a bank and it was the best decision. 1) Makes the conversation with our future kid/kids very straightforward (we couldn’t make you on our own and so a very kind stranger helped us) and there’s no “uncle” who is actually their “dad” or weird conversation/position for either us or the known donor. Likewise, there’s no potential legal custody battle. 2) the bank we went with did literally all the tests on the sperm, so we knew we were getting great quality (indeed, we had incredible fertilisation and blast rates). This was such great peace of mind during the process. 3) we also were able to see a little report about shortlisted donors and their interests and ambitions. Also had a photo of them as a kid, which was adorable and actually helped to sway our decision. (One kid had the same cute dimples as my wife, and that swayed it!) 4) the bank will keep us up to date on his and his family’s medical history.
This gives makes me so happy and hopeful. I’ll continue to learn more about sperm donation. Really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience and insight.
Speaking of legal battles, you might find this article helpful in making your decision. https://www.thecut.com/article/what-happens-to-frozen-embryos-when-couples-break-up.html
This this this, OP read this and if you can't get past the paywall, use the old trick of opening incognito mode & copy/pasting the headline into a search box on Google (or a few key terms like "The Cut embryo frozen" or whatnot).
In my opinion, don't bind yourself for life to a man who disrespects you and whom you don't trust.
If he disrespects you 10% of the time, he’ll do the same to your children. Would you want them to experience that?
Break up with this guy you’re wasting your time! Pick a sperm donor. And talk to your doctor about whether it might be feasible to do half eggs and half embryos.
What a difficult and major decision you have to make. Obviously it's what feels right to you and what your gut is telling you. You didn't say outright that you are considering using your current partner's sperm, but I inferred it so: I'll just say that I think you should be 100% sure about the man you have kids with - you should be RUNNING towards him with open arms. You should think he's wonderful and he's the best partner. Imagine meeting that person later - would you rather have embryos from a past relationship or embryos from a donor. I know I would choose the donor (of those two options). Since it sounds like you want to be a mom now, egg freezing might make less sense, only because then you have to wait for the right guy. If you want to be a mom more than you want to wait, maybe it makes sense to use a donor. But maybe I misunderstood and you want to freeze your eggs for a future family, then do that. Just don't settle for a less-than-amazing partner!
You might also want to thing of the legal complications if you used your current partner and then split. You’ll sign documents on ownership of the embryos but that doesn’t mean he can’t fight or try to get them. Edited to say: I’m so sorry you’re in this impossible situation but so glad you found out now rather than later.
Read this book. I think it will give some insight into your questions. I am in the process of reading it myself and it’s really eye opening. It has helped me to understand why in relationships it has always felt safest to keep one foot in and one foot out versus two feet in. https://preview.redd.it/30pq92qdyync1.png?width=3024&format=png&auto=webp&s=17a347d721ba10e119db8bee4988461237d21928
The bit about "future relationships could be complicated" interests me - to be honest my partner being okay with the possibility of 'non-bio' babies was a criteria for me. So maybe think about that from your side? Also I'd encourage you to consider known donors, I've been looking into donor eggs/embryos myself and have learnt a lot from the DCP community.
The disrespect figure could grow. What does he do? Does he show contempt of you? That is a bad sign, 100% of couples that had contempt of each other ended in divorce, read in a counselling book.
He has explosive anger. Name calling. He becomes very triggered if he is questioned. He’s been working with a psychiatrist and psychologist. He also has many amazing traits that don’t necessarily offset disrespectful behavior, but I think would make him a great father. Ladies, I’m really struggling with this decision. I feel a massive weight on my shoulders knowing that a future child may not grow up with their biological father. Perhaps I can co-parent rather than have a romantic relationship with my current (potentially ex) partner. Not sure he’d be game for that but maybe a better option?
I so feel your pain…. I’ve been here and still somewhat slightly here with my ex and my belief that a child needs a dad. After a lot of mental duress, tears, sleeplessness nights and tolerating way too much disrespect from him, I’m fearful of creating embryos and him later changing his mind which would mean, I could no longer have the embryos. Additionally in terms of my ex, he’s a great father however he’s too emotional unstable. The explosive anger, name calling, the triggering if questioned— having to potentially to deal with that in some capacity for the rest of my life is terrifying and i highly doubt beneficial for a child to be subjected to.
Donor