Want to have a baby with my partner - any advice/information gladly received!

[bluepumpkin]

Hello, I'm new here and my partner and I have just agreed to start trying for a baby next year. (I'm on a course at the moment so don't want the stress of TTC at the same time.) Anyway, I think plan will be donor insemination at a clinic as we don't have any male friends who would be appropriate for donation. My question is, do I go to my GP now and get on a waiting list? How easy is it to get fertility treatment as a same-sex couple? Also, are we better off trying to self-fund to start with, as I thought I remembered reading that the NHS will only fund you if you have NOT had any self-funded treatment already. Sorry for all the questions, but I don't really know where to start! I'm 32 by the way.

My nearly 25-year-old partner with regular cycles is now 15 weeks pregnant with our DS1, who was conceived after only 2 tries of AI at home with the 'yogurt pot/syringe' method, we found him on www.free-sperm-donations.com, it only cost the petrol to get him here.

We wanted to meet him face to face, but not have any involvement from him at all until baby is 18, as does he. He also donates at a clinic, so has up-to-date tests, motility counts, etc. every month. He is well-experienced having had 18 positive pregnancies from his donations, and he has a family of his own with 2 DC's.

We are very thrilled with our setup and equally thrilled it happened so quickly. He has also agreed to help us conceive number 2 whenever we feel it's the right time.

Hey Starberries - I have looked at this site too, as a possible option, although I'm a bit worried about meeting some weirdos! Also, I'm a bit worried about how much trust we'd be putting in someone we don't know to be disease-free etc. Did you ask him for written proof of test results or did you just gauge his trustworthiness based on when you met him?
Also, did you use the first one you met or did you meet s few donors before making a decision?
Congratulations by the way!

My partner has just succesfully confirmed her pregnancy :)

We also used www.free-sperm-donations.com

The donor we used also donated to a clinic and so had been fertility tested, STD tested etc. and had the written proof to show us which was a requirement for us.

It cost us nothing more than the petrol for him to travel, he is not local but it still works out MUCH cheaper than a lot of other sites I have seen.

We went with a known donor who will allow us to pass his details onto the child at age 18 but will have no contact until that point and he is happily signing away his parental rights and allowing me to adopt the child.

Worked out great for us!

Congratulations Rockmaiden! After much discussion I think that my partner and I have finally decided on treatment at a clinic, and we are leaning towards egg-sharing rather than IUI now. Partly because the rates of success are higher, partly because it works out cheaper to do egg-sharing (which gives us more potential goes at it if it's not successful the first time) and partly because it feels right to us both. Am still waiting for my hormone and viral test results to come back before I can even be considered, so fingers crossed!

Does anybody else have experience of egg-sharing and how did you find it?

Hi blue sorry for very late reply! He had documentation of his updated testing results as well as his printout from sperm donation clinic he also uses. We would never take anyone's word! Much too cynical

We did only meet him, as it's very easy to weed out the losers/creeps/timewasters by means of telephone. We had 3 telephone conversations with our donor before meeting up and he drove down to us where we met in a pub to go over all his documents and we all signed a contract. It was another 6 months before we were ready to try but luckily only took us 2 cycles!

Now nearly 23 weeks pregnant and couldn't be more thrilled .

Rockmaiden he sounds exactly like our donor - I wonder if we have the same person! Does he have dark brown hair? hehe

Ah, congratulations ladies! I'm glad it's all worked out so well for you all.

LeninGrad - I meant that the rates of success for IVF were higher than for IUI - and if I egg-share then the IVF is virtually free. IUI with drugs works out as £1400 per cycle, and much more than that for the first cycle (with assessment costs, sperm reservation fee etc). So am waiting on hormone tests etc before I know if I've been accepted or not, fingers crossed!

We could never afford IVF if not egg-sharing, and at £1400 plus per IUI then that wouldn't give us many goes either - and with a 20% success rate for IUI we'd probably need a few goes. Plus it just feels right to be helping someone else if I can, as I know how important it is for me to have a child.

My partner has said she's really not happy about the idea of finding our own donor so we're definitely aiming for the clinic now.

I would advise everyone to seriously check out stonewall's parenting guide- gives lots of legal info. when ours is born (due next fri... am feeling huge!!) DP can automatically go on the birth cert with me as we are in a civil partnership. the (known) donor has no parental rights because of this, which we are all quite happy with.

I had clomid but only one cycle, and we did home insemination. (pot of stuff, speculum, 5ml syringe, torch and DP is all that is required!!)

good luck for anyone trying. we're in cornwall and trying to set up a gay parenting group, message me if you're interested xx

Is that the 'Pregnant Pause' booklet? I found that very helpful too. Good luck Towanmummies!

Apologies if this is already on this thread, but if you would like your partner to have parental rights then you should be in CP/married before conception. Then whether you know the donor or not, they don't have parental rights (as long as conception is done artificially).....

I found the Stonewall website to be really superb & full of really useful information.

If you go onto some of the sperm donor website you can get advice there also, even if you are interested in using a donor from there. I found them to be really friendly & very helpful in hearing lots of different opinions.

Best of luck.

Pixie

one thing- if you have a known donor (like we did) be very upfront and honest about EVERYTHING before you even give him a pot. Ours was and is fab, but at one point was going round telling his friends he was going to be a daddy. This really upset DP and I as it was not what we had agreed at all, and he knew he would have no parental rights etc. My fab DP sat him down and spelt out how his behavour was making us feel and he was mortified... all fine now but you need to be able to have difficult conversations.
to DP sarah who is fab in every way xx

Hi, just wondering if you are still considering donors or if you have got sorted. if not have a look at a great site, Pride angel for gay and straight people who want a sperm donor or want to donate, you can look at profiles etc. They also sell home insemination kits. They also have forums so you may benefit from some advice? Have a look it is really helpfull and some lovely people on it too.Best wishes Dawn x