Weighing My Options

We've been trying to select an egg donor for the past few weeks and still haven't made a decision.

The dilemma, as I wrote the other day, boils down to one basic question:  how much does it matter if our egg donor (and therefore our potential child) looks nothing like me?

The donor that we are considering appears very close to the perfect package:  healthy, intelligent, athletic, ambitious and compassionate.  But she's a fair-skinned blue-eyed blonde and I'm none of the above.  Total opposite, in fact.

Logically, I've come to accept the reality that no matter what, our child will not carry my genes.  And honestly, that's probably a good thing - there are some serious coconuts and bananas hanging off the branches of my family tree and I'd just as soon not risk passing along any of their traits that may be twisted among the strands of my DNA.

But still. I had hoped, on an emotional level, to find a donor that looked a little like me. One with at least a few drops of Italian blood in her veins. It's hard for me to let go of that. I've already had to let go of so much. As a friend commented on my last post, "...you've made so many concessions. If you don't have to make this one, better."

But sometimes I think that infertility is the universe's way of forcing me to let go of my need for perfection and control. Oh yes, I'm a hard-core control freak and the universe really does have to hit me over the head with this lesson a bunch of times before it sinks in. There's no such thing as the perfect child and I can't create one by finding the "perfect" donor. The ache to hold a baby in my arms goes down to the marrow of my bones and I know just as deeply that I will love and cherish that child whether they are anything like me or not.

I asked the question: if we adopted a child he or she would look nothing like me and it wouldn't matter, so why does it matter now?

I guess the difference is when someone says to an adopted child, "gee, you look nothing like your parents," the answer, "I'm adopted" is easily understood and accepted and everyone moves on.  My child would have to face a decision, every time someone comments about how they look so different from their mother, either to share the very personal story of their unusual conception and deal with the questions and reactions that ensue, or shrug it off by saying "I take after my Dad's side of the family."

I don't want to make this decision based on fears of what random strangers may say, because random strangers say stupid shit all the time and you can't live your life worrying about those assholes. 

But I don't want my child to be reminded constantly of their "otherness," and I fear that's what all those comments and questions may do. Adoption has been around for centuries and is universally understood, but donor egg IVF is a relatively new technique and still shrouded in secrecy and confusion.  Some women choose not to tell anyone they used DE IVF, not even the child that results from it. While I respect that choice, it is not the one that I plan to make.

I still haven't made up my mind.  I can't bring myself to pull the trigger and I can't bring myself to walk away.  But in the meantime, I'm watching this video a LOT and hoping that I could raise a child as well-adjusted as the lovely Allegra.