Egg donor blog

I just filled out an application to be an egg donor and was accepted! I have a few questions though and I did not want anyone lying to me so I figured I should ask a donor :). I am worried about weight gain more than anything; my job requires me to be fit and small or I may be fired. I was wondering what you thought about weight gain. Could really use the money for college and would love to help another family, but this is important.

Congratulations on being accepted!  Weight gain…uhhhh, well, since I don’t know what kind of job you have, I can’t say if you’ll have a problem, but I can tell you that you will gain a little weight, yeah.  But, it’ll be like a period.  You retain water, you’re a little more swollen than normal, etcetera.  BUT, no one ever notices that, only you can tell, because you’re the one putting on your clothes in the morning.  Your ovaries will go from the size of a walnut to about the size of a grapefruit.  That will add a pound or two, and that takes up a little more room at your waistline.  No one ever knew what I was going through, and I wore running tights and a tank top every single night to go for my exercises.  And going back to what I said about not knowing what your job is, I don’t know how physical it is.  You will most definitely not be able to be active as you normally would once you begin you stimulation injections.  Your ovaries will increase in size and weight and your fallopian tubes will not.  They’re very fine and delicate, and–doctor’s orders–you wont’ be able to jostle or they might tangle, and then it’s game over.  So, you’ll have to eventually decrease your activity.  You will feel absolutely everything happening inside of you; that may not mean much now, but when you’re going through it, you’ll understand.  Egg donation trumps every other aspect of your life while you’re going through it.  It just does.  You are being paid a lot of money to put your body first.  Not your job, not your school, not your social life.  It’s a big commitment.  And it should be.  I’m not sure how your body reacts to hormones, so I can’t say definitively how affected you’ll be, but you will be, and you won’t really know until you’re in it.  But keep in mind, the stimulation part is only about 2 weeks.  If you have a job that requires weight maintenance, you probably have a lifestyle in place that promotes that, so I can’t imagine 2 weeks of hormones are going to derail your physique.  I’m a runner, and I gained, maybe 5 pounds, and lost it in a matter of days.  Everyone is different, of course, but I don’t think it’s anything you need to lose sleep over in terms of s factor.  GOOD LUCK!