Correction

We are moving straight to donor eggs.

No "one more try" with my own eggs.

It was a hard decision to make in that there is still a chance, slim as it may be, that I could squeeze a gentic offspring out of my tired and scarred ovaries.

And yet, it was an easy choice to make - once I let it sink in that I would no longer have to try to squeeze a genetic offspring out of my tired and scarred ovaries.

There can be such tremendous relief in letting go and giving up.

This doesn't mean that I'm not still grieving. Or that I don't have tearful or angry moments. I am. And I do. But that's nothing new. I've been grieving and angry and tearful for nearly five years. Not consecutively, thank goodness. But enough.

The difference is that now grief and anger and tears are softened by waves of relief. And glimpses of hope. And a hint of what life could be like without constant failure hanging over my head.

But I admit that I'm still struggling to feel any real confidence that this will lead to an actual, living child in the end. That still seems a bit risky of an idea to get too attached to. Though I think that is a pretty normal response. I'm guessing I won't feel confident until, I don't know, the first birthday?

There were a million small steps that led up to this decision. But if I had to point to one thing that got me over the hump, it would have to be the beautiful description of pregnancy below. I don't know who is the original author. It's one of those things that have been shared and reposted a million times on blogs and forums. I'm not even sure where exactly I came across this description for the first time. I just know that it healed my heart a tiny (huge) bit and helped me to feel immense gratitude that I live in a day and age where this is even possible:

Many believe the uterus is simply an incubator. Nothing could be further from the truth. The most important aspect of all pregnancies- including egg donation pregnancies- is that as the fetus grows, every cell in the developing body is built out of the pregnant mother’s body. Tissue from her uterine lining will contribute to the formation of the placenta, which will link her and her child. The fetus will use her body’s protein, then she will replace it. The fetus uses her sugars, calcium, nitrates, and fluids, and she will replace them. So, if you think of your dream child as your dream house, the genes provide merely a basic blueprint, the biological mother takes care of all the materials and construction, from the foundation right on up to the light fixtures. So, although her husband’s aunt Sara or the donor’s grandfather may have genetically programmed the shape of the new baby’s earlobe, the earlobe itself is the pregnant woman’s “flesh and blood.” That means the earlobe, along with the baby herself, grew from the recipient’s body. That is why she is the child’s biological mother. That is why this child is her biological child.