Deciding what to do...

with your stored embryos.

Is the first sentence on the letter that landed in our mailbox yesterday.

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When we started  IVF and completed the consent form, which asked questions about storing embryos and what to do with them when you no longer wanted them stored, I have to admit I didn't really think about having to actually make the decision.

You complete this form at the beginning of the treatment. When you have no idea if it will actually work or what the hell you are getting into. When there are is no baby in your arms and no embryos to store.

We are one of the lucky ones and we now have a baby in our arms and stored embryos. Every day I am thankful for IVF and the precious gift it has given us. If we lived in a different time we wouldn't have our beautiful children.

Now I look at this letter and feel sick about the decision that faces us.

There are five choices when deciding what to do with your stored embryos.

Keep them and pay $500 per year.

Discard, but use for training. The embryos would be thawed and then used by the scientists to continue to improve techniques.

Discard. The embryos are thawed and then disposed of. Some patients opt to collect their embryos once they are thawed to put them in a special place. A further option is to have the embryos transferred into the uterus at a time when pregnancy could not occur.

Donation to another couple. There is a lot of criteria that you need to meet to donate to another couple. If you meet this criteria you can choose a couple to donate the embryos to and your details are added to the NSW donor register.

Donation to research. The embryos would be thawed and then used in research projects. At the beginning of any research you are told about it and have the opportunity to say that you don't want your embryos included.

Hubby and I are certain that we don't want any more children. We are beyond happy with the two healthy happy children we have, our little miss and little mr.

Now that we are faced with this decision I am an emotional mess. My heart aches for our little embryos. Every time I think of them I see my kids and tears flood my eyes. I think of them as our little babies.

This will be one of the hardest decisions of my life.

Big decisions

Image from here

The decision to have children is a big one. Probably one of the biggest.

They are seriously life changing. But in a good way, right?

Admittedly we were extremely naive when deciding to have our first baby. Before you experience it first hand you can never truly know what it is like to have a child.

I remember saying to a good friend, between sobs, "Why didn't you tell me it was like this?". She said, "You wouldn't have believed me and it wouldn't have changed your mind anyway." She was right.

When it came to deciding whether to add to our brood with a second child, it took us two and a half years to  make our mind up that indeed it was time to try again.

We don't regret our decision to have two kids. They are simply gorgeous and when they smile at you it makes it all worthwhile.

However, now that we have two children we seem to be constantly faced with big decisions.

Circumcise or not? When to return to work and for how many days? What preschool and how many days?

Currently our big decision with Little Miss 4 is where to send her to school next year.

The prospect of "big" school has sent me in to some kind of neurotic meltdown for a while now. The fact it is looming ever so close is giving me the anxious sweats.

Yesterday we went to a walk-through at one of the prospective schools. It was so big and Little Miss 4 seemed so very small. My anxiety levels rose rapidly.

I was thankful that she was so excited and skipped through the school happily. When we got home she talked about what she had liked about the school. This morning she pretended that preschool was actually  big school.

I think she is way more ready for this transition than I am.

We have another school to look at before we make the final decision. I believe the school she goes to will set the foundation for a lot of things in her life.

It will be a hard decision to make and I hope we make the right one.

Do you make big decisions in relation to your kids? Was the school they went to a big decision?