Happy New Year, welcome 2018 and blissful happiness xox

Gosh, what an crazy and amazing year 2017 was… we can’t believe that we’ve welcomed in the New Year with our precious boy Owen.

To go to sleep last night and wake up in a New Year without it being tinged with sadness as our dreams have come true is surreal.   Most years we’ve welcomed the year in with hope and sadness except for the year that we had Liam and this year with Owen.

There’s always some sadness with loved ones not here, for me my Mum and Scout xox  I wish my Mum could see our little family but I know wherever she is, she’ll be so happy for us.  I know most of you grieve for someone at Christmas and New Year, huge hugs and love to you.. it’s a time for spending time with loved ones and when some are missing it’s hard xox

We have so much to be grateful for but as you all know we’ve spent many years wanting a family and then a sibling for Liam.  We’ve had a lot of speed humps in our life together, Shane trying to find his daughter, my lying, cheating ex husband including three years of property settlement with a huge emotional and financial toll all because he continued to lie about our financial situation and his stupid solicitor failed to read the facts I kept sending them and so much more, infertility diagnosis/early menopause and years of IVF, breast cancer diagnosis with massive treatment and huge complications, our search for our egg donor angels, miscarriages, the loss of our 11 embryo’s, Mum’s breast and lung cancer and dementia and sadly her decline and passing… and much much more…

We feel complete and whilst I’d love to have another baby and to be a surrogate for someone else, we just can’t put my body through another pregnancy and I can’t put my three boys through it.. and I need to be here for them too xox

We are blessed and grateful for what we have xox

We couldn’t have done this without our friends and family and their love and support, especially through the tough times, you’ve been amazing and we love and thank you xoxox

Sorry that we’ve not been in touch as much and spent as much time recently but we’ll make up for it this year xox

When I started Egg Donor Angels in 2008 I had a dream to help others along this journey as we’d just started it and I’d realised were few resources available but were so needed.  Many years later Egg Donor Angels has grown so much with many Facebook support groups with people from all over the world and hundreds of babies born from local and overseas donations.  My payment and joy is knowing that I’ve provided a support network for those on the journey and when I get an email, message, text message, phone call saying that they have achieved their dream, it’s all worth it xox

All the people in my groups also make them the amazing space that they are, they provide wonderful support and friendship to others along the journey and to my fabulous admins Katherine, Natalie, Lauren and Christine, thank you, I love you and couldn’t have gotten through this pregnancy without your love, help and support xox

I wish I could wave that magic wand and help everyone to achieve their dream xox

We hope that 2018 will be the year for many of you and your family in achieving your dreams and if there’s anything we can do to help, please let us know.

An update on Owen;, our little tiger has moved to bay 4, the last bay before being able to go home, yayyy.  He’s gaining weight and feeding well.  He just needs to take a bottle and/or breast feed at every feed and consistently gain weight to go home.  We’re now doing 3 trips a day to the Penrith/Nepean NICU, 7am, 1pm and 7pm so we’re a bit off the grid till he comes home, hopefully soon 🙂 xox

So Happy New Year to all our family and friends, may 2018 be a wonderful year for you and your loved ones, lots of love Dianne, Shane, Liam and Owen xoxox

Transfer done, now the 2ww xox

It’s our last full day in Cape Town and whilst we are looking forward to going home there is a tinge of sadness to leave this beautiful city and the friends we have made along our journey xox

Our egg donor gave us some wonderful eggs and we ended up with 2 fabulous quality embryo’s to transfer and 6 in the freezer 🙂

Transfer was Monday and all went wonderfully and we are now in the 2ww nervously…  each step is so very hard, its the decision to use an egg donor or for us to do another cycle after our last miscarriage and negative, it’s the process of seeing if your egg donor is suitable then the cycle begins and are they responding and well and will you get good quality embryo’s that give you the best possible chance xox

Its the egg collection and how many fertilise, then how are they going at each stage and how many embryo’s you have and what quality they are…

Then of course once you’ve done the transfer it’s the waiting, listening to your body and each twinge and symptom brings about “could we be pregnant?”…  the hormones play with your body and your mind as does the emotions of the whole journey…  your hopeful and you want this so badly but you also know there’s always that risk/chance its not going to be successful….it’s a numbers game… you do everything you can to ensure the best possible outcome, acupuncture, Chinese herbs, endo scratch, hysteroscopy, vitamins, supplements and so the list goes on..

I know many of you reading this will relate either doing your own IVF with your own eggs and doing IVF using an egg donor…  it’s a roller coaster of emotions and whilst you try to “not stress” and “not think about it too much” and “relax” you know your mind is there in that place xox

I will do a future post about Cape Town, what to see and do as it is a beautiful city and the people are lovely xox

We have done some further sightseeing, we did Kirstenbosch gardens, Moyo restaurant for Mother’s Day, Simons Town, Bree Street and the famous Mount Nelson Hotel High Tea.  Every day we have done a lovely walk along the bay and have had a great time with Liam playing in the playgrounds.  We found a great children’s playground along the waterfront that’s fenced and gated with a track for him to ride his tricycle around and a swing, slide and climbing stuff.. he’s loved playing and riding his trike and it’s been wonderful having this family time…  Liam’s made many friends, he just loves to people watch and he’s so friendly smiling and chatting to the locals…

We got to catch up with some friends we’ve made here previously and that was lovely, though not enough time and we hope that when we bring Liam back when he’s older we will have more time to spend with them.

I’m nervous to write anymore about our chances of success or if I think we are successful, I plan to do a home pregnancy test probably around day 8 or 9 just before bloods and even just writing that makes my heart skip a beat…

To those that are thinking of going overseas, don’t be afraid of doing this, so many are going and are successful, it’s not as scary as you think, most clinics are as good as Australia/the USA, are reasonably priced and the success rates are very good…  and I’m happy to chat to you about it …

I’ve been wearing my Mum’s heart locket here with a photo of her and Dad in it so she’s with us and my lucky elephant from a good friend… and of course all the hope and good wishes from our friends xoxox

Fingers and toes crossed we are pregnant with a sibling for Liam… chat soon, love from us xoxox

After holding our breath for almost 9 months, here he is finally, our Egg Donor Angel conceived little boy is here xox

Hey everyone, sorry it’s taken me so long to post our news and updates 🙁 Life has been a wee bit hectic lately and several times I’ve tried to do this post and thanks to my computer crashing have lost what I had written….  but I’m back and ready to make this happen lol.. xox

So, let me introduce Liam James Heron, our little miracle boy xox, born Friday 26th February at 8.57am at Nepean Hospital weighing 2.93 kilos and measuring 47.5cm.. he’s now 5.44kg and 59.5cm.. and growing lol. Thanks to the awesome and divine team at the University of Sydney Nepean clinic, that’s Maree, Sarah and yes you too Tracy, you all made our pregnancy and the birth so much more special and we can’t wait to go again and have you looking after us.. after that we hope to catch up and stay friends xox

So after a crazy plus year, losing Mum, dealing with settling her affairs and a family member causing major issues and conflict, dealing with our clinic not freezing our embryo’s properly and losing all 11 of them, trying another donor cycle with the devastation of it not working, making the decision to go to South Africa for our egg donor angel and then to find that our donor didn’t respond well and we had one little good quality embryo but it’s ok, that embie was Liam and we are soooo happy he’s here.

We can’t believe he is and whilst every parent has those “first” moments and “wow” moments, ours are just huge and overwhelming..

The pregnancy was good considering my history, I remember my first appointment with Maree, it was hours going through my history lol and then chatting heaps to Tracy about my passion with Egg Donor Angels and just infertility etc.  And our first appointment with Sarah this year where we spoke to her about going back to South Africa for a sibling for Liam in November.. she was amazing and said “I understand why” and supported us.. as crazy as it seems..

So you might ask why when we have our little boy.. well we are older parents and we won’t be around for as long as some parents for Liam, our families aren’t big and aren’t getting any younger lol like all of us.. we have amazing friends whose children are going to be like family to Liam and of course my beautiful and amazing cousin’s children will be fabulous cousins to him and guide him along his paths as well.. but we both always wanted more than one but we also want Liam to have a little brother or sister that he has by his side for the rest of his and their lives.. when we aren’t there xox

So we go back to Cape Town in November to go again.  Our donor has done another cycle for us… we were discussing doing another one with the donor agency and with the IVF clinic when they contacted us and said that the recipients had pulled out of a cycle with her and would we like to use Shane’s frozen sample/sperm and do the cycle.. we knew we wanted to go again so we thought oh well lets do it now.. so we have 1 fabulous embie, 2 really good ones and 2 not so good in the freezer waiting for us and we feel confident that we will have another successful pregnancy from this.

So my pregnancy, I loved being pregnant even with the high blood pressure scares, the terrible reflux (I already have awful re-flux from chemo but this made it much much worse if possible lol), the swelling and the pain in all my scars and my side from the breast cancer etc. .. but it was all worth it, even the last month where it was hard to sleep and do anything lol…….

So our wonderful team booked us in for a C section on the 26th and as that day rolled around we felt nervous but also surreal that it was real and happening.. I felt sad that he was not going to be safe and warm in my belly but sooo excited to meet him as well.. everything went well, Tracy looked after Shane wonderfully and me prior to delivery and then Liam and she was the first one other than the gorgeous Sarah that delivered him to hold him… and check him out.. it was a weird feeling not being able to feel or move my lower half, gosh I’ve always had empathy for invalids but I can sort of relate to it for a short time anyway.

We all got to cuddle him and have skin to skin time in recovery and then in our room and then Marleen (Shane’s dads partner) and Shane’s Mum came to the hospital and got to meet him as well.  As I didn’t know if I would be able to breast feed, the midwives suggested we do a “line feed” for him.. basically using a syringe and a line and feeding him through the tube/line on my nipple.. it worked well and Shane and I managed to prepare and to it on our own and I even did it on my own own lol several times.. it was nice to know that I had that considering everything.. that was done on the breast that didn’t have the cancer in it but had a reduction as it was dare I say cheaper to have it reduced and get a smaller implant than get a larger implant in the cancerous breast.. our government doesn’t consider breast reconstruction after breast cancer necessary, apparently it’s elective.. but that’s another story and passion of mine to change xox

The hospital was great, Liam had some jaundice and had treatment, the worst part of it was the little eye mask he had to wear and he hated it.. but it was necessary.. we went home on the Monday night, Shane had to work that day.. and as we packed up and got into the car with Liam loaded up we had to stop and take a breath.. oh my we both said, he’s real and he’s hear and oh they are letting us out of here to look after him.. yikes.. lol.. but it was fine…

We went back a few days later for a check up and I asked them how to check to see if I had any breast milk, we hand expressed and as some milk came out we all cried for joy… so I am able to do a mix of bottle and breastfeeding to him.. which is great as I get that contact with closeness with him but Shane also gets to bottle feed him and have that closeness as well… we get the best of both worlds.. I’m so pleased as he would have gotten the colostrom as he was on my breast quite a bit with the line feeding and he’s getting nutrients from both options.. win win I say 🙂 xox

And yes I am exhausted, tired, sleep deprived and as I wander up the hallway at all hours of the night in my routine, put my pillows up, get the bib, get my feeding pillow, go the kitchen, prepare and heat up the bottle.. all I can say is oh wow he’s here..  Some nights I manage to unpack the dishwasher, sterilise his bottles and fill them with kettle/boiled water.. some nights, I post and comment on Egg Donor Angels Facebook groups and some nights I fall asleep holding the bottle feeding him.. and just cuddling him..

I’m trying to stay on top of Egg Donor Angels but some days are just filled with Liam and stuff.. though we have been out and about quite a bit, we got to catch up with one of my gorgeous donors from my site in the city, so Liam had his first train ride, we’ve been shopping and to lunch and dinner with friends, we’ve had lots of visitors including my self adopted Dad, friends and another wonderful donor from here as well to name a few.. we’ve been on a car club run in the XY and I’ve started walking with him and Scoutie the dog.. oh and I’ve joined the local new parents group.. and yep already mentioned Egg Donor Angels lol…

So now I’m going to put up lots of photos as I know you all want to see them and I hope to do more posts and especially on our next stage of our journey, the next little one.. yayyyy we can’t wait.. as nervous as we are.. and know we will be holding our breath again for the whole pregnancy.. it’s all worth it..

And maybe I’ll write a book about this whole journey and for awareness.. I’m thinking the title along the lines of “holding our breath waiting for our miracle egg donor baby” or something similar but definitely with “holding our breath”.. as the whole pregnancy, we just couldn’t get too excited as we knew we had to get to the end and see him before we could..

Oh and the name.. well we hadn’t really decided on any, it only took us 3 weeks to finally decide lol.. I think we just couldn’t make that decicsion till we met him and till we knew he was here safe and sound.. and then we were looking at an African name that meant “long awaited” but it wasn’t correct.. and then any African names we looked at were too hard to pronounce for us Aussies.. so we both liked Liam and James so that was it.. though if it’s a boy for the next one, and I keep saying it is, I actually already have a name, not one that we had for Liam, one I have chosen after he was named.. it’s a name from a TV series from my childhood and I always loved it.. just only thought of it recently.. if it’s a girl the next one well.. I had some names picked out years ago but sadly I’ve forgotten them.. but I’m sure 3 weeks after he/she is born we’ll decide lol again..

Thanks for all your support, love and just everything, to those still on the journey let me know what we can do to help you achieve this, to those that have helped us, thank you so much, we love you all xoxox

Dianne, Shane, Liam, Scout the dog, Sooty the Cat and the chickens xoxox

P1080097 DiJohnston 12 Week scan P1090640  1000026_10153988205200439_6876232834275836390_n 10390011_10153988205250439_5943993377731606619_n 10450733_10153988717185439_7671569568361952996_n 12742817_10153988717115439_3156649835865778701_nShane cutting Liams umbilical cord 260316 Liam getting ready to leave hospital birth 290216 Liam and Daddy asleep 010316 (5) smallerLiam with Nan 080316 (1)Liam with Shane and Nan 080316 (5) 12791129_10153988205075439_790118422995894123_n
Mummy & Daddy leaving hospital with Liam 290216 (3)

 

Family photo Liam b&w 240316 to use smallerFamily Photo Liam stone room 240316 (9) to use smallerP1090195Scan 121015 baby boo cropped
12419139_948069125291035_557585815668142147_o 12916787_948069881957626_6179199695371595050_o Liams first trip into city to meet Kasey 050416 (4)12961229_948069721957642_799306810022201735_o 12967482_948069168624364_5400541969713071139_o

Liam tonka trucks 240316 (5) to use smaller

Liam tonka trucks 240316 (2) to use smaller

So it’s been a while……sorry :(

Gosh I’m sorry it’s been a while since I have written anything, I hoped to do it regularly but a wee thing called breast cancer just got in my way.. plus all the usual day to day stuff 🙂 I hope to get back into it more soon…

Thank you to everyone for all your support and patience, I have tried where possible to approve ads really quickly and reply really quickly but there have been days where I have just been too sick to do it 🙁 and it’s also been very difficult to do it from a hospital bed.

It’s been a crazy 2 1/2 years, since my diagnosis, I have had a mastectomy, FEC90 chemo x 4 sessions every 3 weeks and that was crap (nausea, vomiting, exhaustion, mouth ulcers, lack of appetite, hair loss and much much more), I was admitted for a week plus to hospital for low white blood cell count and infections after this first chemo, then I had to have a port put in as my veins collapsed in my arm and they couldn’t get a vein for the chemo, I then had another chemo taxol weekly for 12 weeks and that too was crap 🙂 (absolute exhaustion to the point I couldn’t walk or move, I lost my toe nails and my finger nails went extremely brittle, I lost feeling in my toes and fingers and it’s still as bad today which potentially no fix in site.. and again much much more), then I did radiation every weekday for over 4 weeks and that gave me a lovely tan, well actually really really bad sunburn with blisters… I also started a therapy called Herceptin through the port for a year as I was HER positive, I then had my reconstruction and 5 weeks later was rushed to hospital with massive infections and pain and subsequently had to have the implant removed.. then about 4 weeks later the wounds opened up and I had two lovely holes in my side where I could see inside myself :)… so my specialist got me to have them dressed daily for weeks, then sent me to Prince of Wales hospital daily for hyperbaric oxygen treatment to see if that would heal them, that was fun from Faulconbridge in the Blue Mountains on the morning train to Central railway station then by bus to Randwick and back home again in the afternoon… when that wasn’t working after 12 weeks, they did a CT scan to find that I had Osteoradionecrosis, a rare condition where the radiation and infections had caused the tissue and skin and some of my ribs to die… so they I had to have a lat dorsi where they took skin, muscle and tissue from my lower back and pulled it through to my front to give that area circulation and skin to heal…. but wait there’s more 🙂 so then once that was healed I had the expander put in, another surgery, and then they inflated it slowly to stretch the skin out and then finally about 7 weeks ago I had the implant put in… so we are on the home stretch, yay!!

Sorry a boring lot of detail and I am sure I have forgotten lots of extra treatment and stuff…. but that’s the quick snapshot 🙂 of course there were weekly/daily specialist appointments, lots of pain and exhaustion and so much more…

So the great news for me is that my egg donor angel did another cycle whilst I was still going through treatment and we have 11 snow babies on ice waiting for us.  I have just had full scans and yes am cancer free, yayyyyy, we are full steam ahead on doing a cycle and a transfer.

This Tuesday I have a d+c to clear my uterus of all those nasty chemo drugs and other chemicals… then my body will heal whilst we go away to Melbourne to visit family and once we return we will do our first transfer, sometime around the end of September.

It’s been a long, exhausting and emotional journey for us and I hope that our dreams will now become reality and this Christmas I can celebrate knowing that the next one, we will have our own family.

So what about you?? I have had lots of wonderful news whilst going through all of this of babies being born through couples meeting their egg donor angels through here and lots of couples and egg donor angels currently going through the process.  Some sad news where the cycles haven’t worked or the couples have decided to not continue looking 🙁

I am soooooo very excited, every week this site is growing and more and more wonderful egg donor angels are placing ads or contacting couples offering to help, when I started there were so many of us looking and not many angels…. but now we are getting the word out there about egg donation, infertility we are getting many more successes., thank you to everyone for this and please keep spreading the word xox

I was in Springwood at my local shops the other day and typical me, found any opportunity to talk about egg donation and Egg Donor Angels and infertility, that I was chatting to a shop assistant and she said if she had know years ago after having her children, she would have donated her eggs…

But the most important message I had for her was to be aware of her daughters fertility and as they get into their thirties to get themselves checked out and if they aren’t ready yet or haven’t found the right one yet, freeze their eggs…

When we are young, we are told “don’t get pregnant”, “go on the pill”.

At school, we learn the basics of reproduction but no one teaches you about infertility and its conditions and how age affects it and how our fertility starts to decline after 35…. I am not saying all young women should get pregnant or have babies earlier, everyone is different and each person needs to do this when they are ready… but I want every girl/woman to totally understand how it all works, the issues and even the simple thing of how ovulation works…

Well that’s it from me…I would love to hear how you are going..

xoxox

Here’s to a new cycle………

This week we start a new cycle, exciting but nerve-wracking as well! Thank goodness I am feeling much better, the nasty flu has gone yay…
I have been seeing my wonderful TCM and Accupuncturist Kathryn Taylor since the miscarriage. Both of us are quietly confident that this one will be the one.. fingers, toes and just about everything crossed it is…
What truly amazes me again is just how many people have been through IVF. Every time I talk to someone about it, they have done IVF, know someone etc… How outstanding that the current Govt changed the rebates for IVF almost 2 years ago. How is it possible that they can think its not necessary and the Doctors and clinics are not reducing their fees, so the only ones that are hurting are the couples going through IVF. They have made it out of reach financially for lots of couples. They were also quite sneaky in changing the rebates for donors. If you use a donor, you only get a tiny rebate, prior to the changes your donor made the claim and got the full rebate same as the person doing an egg retrieval cycle. We paid almost $10,000 for our donor cycle and only got back $1,480, yep that’s right! If you do a cycle on your own, it’s approximately $7,500 and you get around $3,000 to $4,000 back….. I even rang Medicare and questioned the description on the web site for that claim and she checked with the assessors and they confirmed that it was right. No reason as to why. Not sure why we are discriminated against for doing a donor cycle. However I do plan to write to the Health Care complaints Commission about it and put in a formal complaint about it.

There are so many unjust causes I wish I had money to fight for them including Child Support Agency and IVF recipients.

Anway off my soapbox now.. time to take the doggie for a walk, now it’s cooled down here…

Take care and baby dust to those of you that are dreaming the dream and thank you to those whom support us going through the journey.

xox

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Where do I start…..

Hi everyone,

Sorry it’s been a while, it’s been a rather hectic few months.  We renovated a house, were going through the process of starting our Egg Donor Cycle, had work commitments, went away for a well-earned break (I worked throughout the holiday but still relaxed!) and had the usual day-to-day stuff going on.. you all know how it is 🙂

So where are we at?…. well we did our first cycle with our Egg Donor, yay.. we ended up with 6 snow babies, we had 2 transferred and have 4 still on ice.  That was about 8 weeks ago… the day after we came home from the cycle I came down really sick with the flu and for the next 6+ weeks, couldn’t do anything but get out of bed to do work for my clients and then go back to bed to rest.  During that we found out that we were pregnant, we were so excited and as you do when you are an IVF’er, were a bit nervous, then got excited and started to plan.. sadly a few weeks later I miscarried the baby, my HCG hormone levels started to drop and within days I miscarried.  It’s an awful thing and my heart goes out to every couple that have gone through this, apparently 1 in 3 women have a miscarriage, some don’t sadly know, they just have a really really bad period.  For over a week I battle the bad flu as well as the extreme pain of the miscarriage and in between dealt with the sadness of it all.

But the one thing that keeps us IVF’ers going is the plan, what’s next… as hard as it is.  So my plan is to have a period in about 2 weeks and then start a new cycle and fingers crossed, lots of hope and prayers, this one will stick and we can tell the world that we are going to be a family.

An update on my website as well, I have removed this cost for the time being. I have spent thousands of my own money creating this site and paying for advertising for previous ads but at the moment going through our own journey and with work commitments, I have decided to remove the charge to advertise on this site for the moment… Good Luck with your search for your Egg Donor Angel and we will keep you updated on our journey…

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Update

Ok, so I have been a bit slack, I am just not very good at “blogging” and we have been away for our holiday.

Had a great time, we relaxed, stayed in lots of free campsites, over half the trip was done free camping.  Some of the rest stops we camped in were just great, one of our favs was about 24kms out of Longreach.  There were dirt tracks behind the main rest stop area that you could park in, light a campfire and look at the stars – it was just wonderful, oh and we had mobile phone reception, not that we really had time or used it that much 🙂

We got all the way to Darwin, through outback QLD and up the main highway, stopping at some of our favourite places, Mataranka, Daly Waters and Litchfield.  We swam lots and the warm weather was wonderful.  At Litchfield, Wangi Falls were closed due to the high rainfall and the late wet season but we found a couple of new places to swim, one was Walker Creek – WOW.  We bushwalked about 3kms to get to it, it was a plunge pool at the bottom of small cascading waterfalls and we swam with fish and water dragons etc.  It was just wonderful.

We have been back a couple of weeks but it’s been rather hectic, catching up with stuff which we are still doing but getting there.

The most exciting news is that we have started our donor cycle – Yay!  I am calmly excited if that’s possible 🙂  The trip away gave me some time to truly think and reflect and let go of my demons and regrets, so now I am ready for this journey and the next phase of our wonderful life together. 

I love Shane very much and so glad that we are doing this together, he is a wonderful person.  I love my donor and can’t wait to also share this exciting journey with her xox

Will keep you all updated, thanks for your support, thoughts and wishes xox

hhhhhmmmm still thinking :-)

Yep still thinking about it….. though after last nights run where my feet were so cold I couldn’t feel them for the first 10 minutes, all I can think about is warm weather.  Of course it appears I have Raynauds syndrome which doesn’t help, in the past two years my fingers and toes are quite often frozen and go white with no circulation…

Speaking of the run, now I am not normally an gadget person personally, I love them for businesses but not necessarily for myself…. but on my HTC desire I have loaded Runkeeper and tried it for the first time last night and it’s awesome.  I don’t plan to share with the world my details on it but it’s just great for my goal setting.  I think I understand some of the hype about “apps”.  So then after I woke up when Shane got home last night, well this morning, I lay awake with my brain going 100mph thinking about work and then what apps I could develop for businesses and in terms of my favourite topic infertility.

So what to do about our holiday… another issue is that my cycles have been so erratic, well nothing for almost a year that I feel I need to use the pill to give me a couple of good cycles before we get a little embie to try to attach itself. They need nice snug uterus linings to attach to 🙂 sorry if too much detail!  I need to send my ultrasound report to my Dr and see what she says, once reading that she might suggest to wait a cycle or two for this reason.

So another wet miserable day in Sydney, but again the fires on and I have work to do.  If it was a nice sunny day I would feel guilty for being indoors so it’s probably a good thing.

Well I need to go and collect firewood, finish these presentations, do some filing, ring my Mum, do some housework and later do my dog walk, run and workout…

Thanks for listening xo

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Getting closer…

Hey,

This week has been a great week, we are getting much closer to our dream, thank you our egg donor angel, we love you but not just for this gift but because you are the person you are no matter what happens xox 

I have been busy with work, trying to get people to attend the Cystic Fibrosis Australia and Bipolar Education Foundation Gala event on 25th June, it’s always hard to get people to help charities especially when they are inundated with requests on a daily/weekly basis.  Such wonderful causes and they don’t get as much attention and support as they deserve and compared to other well-known charities.  And working on 65 Roses Day for PGPR and Cystic Fibrosis Australia is always a wonderful experience, this is my third year working on this campaign and I just love helping this wonderful cause.  Did you know that there are only 40 people over 40 years of age alive with Cystic Fibrosis?  The average life expectancy is 37 years of age which has increased significantly over the past 10 years thanks to donations, awareness, research and the dedication of the people who live with Cystic Fibrosis whether it is the person, the family, the friends or the people who work towards the goal of finding a cure.

But in-between this and other projects, I decided it was time to send out my press release to the media for the egg donor angels website.  Today it went to over 1500 national print, magazine, TV and Radio media and I hope that this helps get the word out there that there is a need for not only awareness for infertility and egg, embryo and sperm donation but also a shortage of people for this.

I came up with the concept of the website in November last year so I created my Facebook and Twitter pages then and then finally launched the website over the Easter break this year.  

Since the launch of my website there have been lots of support groups and websites popping up which is great news for spreading the word on the growing issue of infertility, the more we can get this message out there and help couples achieve their dream of having a family, the better. 

I am soooo excited that we are sooo very close… though I have a decision to make about timing of the cycle, of course I want it to happen now but we also have had a 6 week holiday planned since we were away last year…. my body and mind feel like they need the planned break to swim, relax, bush walk and just enjoy after a busy and emotional year.  Should we make our holiday the egg donor cycle and spend time around the house doing work or should we go away, come back refreshed to do the cycle in August??   The dilemma is amazing and each time I think about it, I change my decision. We have decided to think it over this long weekend, of course I have debated it in my head over and over and discussed it somewhat with Shane in between his going to work and sleeping!  I hear my best friend and well she’s really a sister to me saying do it.. spent many many years trying to conceive and lost many babies and now has two wonderful boys to a sperm donor, so she knows how it feels.  Then I hear another best friend and sister to me, saying to do what’s right, and then another I think I need to talk to, she is one of my rocks and an amazing person, I love all my wonderful friends and couldn’t have gotten through the past ten years without your love, support and guidance, thank you xox

Of course we only have a week to decide before our leave starts and I have soooo much to do… I think it’s time for a cuppa, check the fire as it’s fwweeeeezzing here and do some more work and maybe think about it later when I take the doggie for a walk and run..

Will keep you updated and let you know of my decision

Dianne xox

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Support groups on the web and FB

It’s fantastic and interesting that there are new Facebook and websites popping up supporting infertility and egg donors…the more help there is to support infertility and especially egg donation in Australia, hopefully the more dreams we can fulfill.

I have had some feedback on my site with people saying that it’s expensive and I guess questioning why they would pay to look for an egg donor when they can post an ad on forums like bub hub and essential baby and on Facebook groups and pages.

When I came up with this website idea over six months ago, I had been travelling my own journey for several years and had tried most ways to find an egg donor and yes that included all of the above and more.

The reality of finding an egg donor is that it’s extremely difficult.  There are lots of wonderful women out there that offer and think they can do it but when the reality of it all sets in, a high percentage pull out, understandably.  There are lots of women that are happy to donate but finding them and making them aware is the hard part. 

When I launched the Facebook page, I paid hundreds and hundreds of dollars to see if I could find potential egg donors and I did, I then spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars to firstly set up this website and most importantly again spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars to source potential egg donors to come to this site.  I did this over a 5 day period and had over 300 hits to the website of potential egg donors, what a wonderful result!

I know that potential egg donors will possibly find other sites where couples are advertising for their egg donor angel but they are only tapping into a % of the population and in a certain period of time. 

I have over 20 years of marketing and PR experience and now love using these skills to help others achieve their dream of a family but like most things there’s a dollar cost.  If you look in the “Child” magazine there are lots of paid advertisements for egg donors, or in your local paper or in the larger newspapers… I am offering an alternative to this but with the promise that the money goes into targeted advertising to find you that Egg Donor Angel.

Good luck and I hope you find your Egg Donor Angel no matter what xox