How to Pick an Egg Donor – Lessons Learned from the Gay Dad Reporter
- Brainz Magazine
- Nov 14
- 8 min read
Written by Bryan McColgan, Physician Journalist
Dr. Bryan McColgan is an international authority on IVF and surrogacy for gay men. He is the founder of the Gay Dad Reporter, the world’s first online platform dedicated to news about surrogacy and rainbow families with a focus on gay men.
There are critical moments during a surrogacy journey for gay intended dads, and one of those is choosing an egg donor. It’s a big decision, and it makes the idea of becoming a parent feel like a reality.
Finding your egg donor: Family, friends, or an agency?
There are several ways to approach egg donation. The first is through relatives and friends. Many gay fathers-to-be have a female sibling or a close female friend who has generously offered to provide their eggs. For sisters who are able to help, this has the benefit of providing the child with a more similar genetic makeup to the couple, but it does have the downside that only one of the fathers can contribute their sperm. With either a close friend or family member, egg donation through these known contacts offers a seamless connection for the child to the egg donor.
Some gay intended dads, my husband and I included, don’t have the option of a personal, known donor, and other intended fathers may want more emotional distance between the donor and their family. Every journey is unique, and that’s where egg donation comes in. With egg donation, it is entirely possible to find a donor who is not anonymous and is willing to be contacted by you and the child at a future date. This was important to my husband and me, and it’s something I will discuss later in this article.
The first step for intended gay dads not working with a family member or friend is to find an egg donor agency or database. For my husband and me, this was available through our all-in-one fertility clinic, egg donor, and surrogacy agency. Many IVF clinics have egg donor databases, so this is a great first place to start. For other intended fathers, they may go through separate agencies that are not affiliated with a particular clinic, especially if the intended dads have specific requirements related to background, physical characteristics, or ethnicity.
Fresh or frozen eggs? (Human ovaries, not grocery store eggs)
After selecting an agency, the next step is to decide if you want fresh or frozen eggs. This may sound like a bad grocery pun, but it is possible to select eggs that have already been retrieved and frozen in a set or to have a donor undergo a fresh retrieval. A previous Gay Dad Reporter article I wrote describes the medical procedure of egg donation, and even though a fresh retrieval is complex and more expensive than frozen eggs, many gay intended dads opt for this because it results in more eggs than in a frozen set, which usually contains six eggs. This allows each intended father to use his sperm to fertilize half the eggs, allowing for embryos that are genetically linked to each intended parent. It is also possible to split frozen eggs and fertilize half with each sperm. There may even be multiple frozen sets that can be purchased at once, but frozen eggs are generally less effective when it comes to the development of embryos compared to fresh eggs.
Selecting an egg donor: What is important to you and why?
Once you have decided to pursue either frozen or fresh eggs, it’s time to think about what you want to look for in an egg donor. While not a requirement, our agency had my husband and me talk with a psychologist about what we were looking for in a donor. I would highly recommend this for other intended dads. Even though my husband and I had already discussed what we were looking for, I feel that hearing my husband explain his thought process to the psychologist made it even clearer what he valued and prioritized in the search. Having that objective and compassionate third party helped us focus our requirements and understand the reasons behind each of our decisions.
From that discussion, my husband and I came up with a list of essential characteristics for our egg donor. I think this is a must for any intended gay dads. Once you start looking through the database, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Having this short list will help you both focus on the donor who is best for you.
Everyone’s short list will be different, but here is what my husband and I came up with:
No history of mental health. I have mental health issues in my family, and I myself have struggled with mild depressed mood and anxiety throughout my life. My husband has ADHD. For these reasons, we didn’t want to compound the genetic impact of mental health for our child with an egg donor who also carries any of these characteristics. For other intended dads, there may be other medical issues or concerns you have. While genetic testing will be done to rule out known issues, there are others that science is not able to detect yet. Therefore, it’s important to rule these out yourselves.
Younger than 30. It’s a scientific fact that younger eggs are more viable and less likely to lead to genetic malformations. I think this is applicable to all intended gay dads, as you want to have as many viable embryos to choose from. You may be splitting the egg donation to fertilize half with each of your sperm, so the number and health of the eggs are critical. There are tests that measure a woman’s egg reserve, so if you find a donor who is older but really want to consider her, ask your fertility doctor to discuss her donation potential with you.
Partial Hispanic background. My husband is half Mexican, and having this connection to Hispanic background is important for us to share with our children. For many, whether mixed-race couples or not, this is important. Be honest with yourself and your partner so you can ensure this is captured in your egg donor search.
Not anonymous. It was paramount for my husband and me that our child have the option of connecting with their egg donor later in life. We want our child to be proud of and really know where they came from, and this means that they will likely want to communicate with their egg donor in the future. It’s important to know if this matters to you, as many donors wish to remain anonymous.
‘Passionate’ about something. This was the most challenging aspect to define by far. Essentially, we did not want to focus on her SAT scores, what sports she did, or what college she went to. This does matter to some people, and that is definitely something that can be prioritized. We wanted her to really care about something. It could be art, reading, movies, sports, her family, her culture, or even just the ambition to have a better life for herself. Vague, but this was the ‘je ne sais quoi’ that we wanted in order to know that she was the right ‘fit’ for us.
Again, everyone’s short list will be different. There is no right or wrong list of characteristics. I would recommend that you try to keep the requirements to five or fewer, as it does become challenging if you are too specific.
Navigating the database: Think Facebook Circa 2007
With this short list in hand, we embarked on searching through the donor database. The best way to describe these databases is like a Facebook profile from the mid-2000s. Remember the time when we had static Facebook profiles with only a few profile pictures, no wall of posts or activity, and an “about me” section? Well, that is essentially what the donor profiles are, but also with a detailed medical history about them and their family, often going back at least two generations.
This makes it fairly easy to filter for things like age, height, ethnicity, location, and medical issues, but less easy to filter for things like “passion.”
Don’t get me wrong, the pictures are great and a key component of the search for any couple. Many donors put up pictures of themselves as babies and children, so you can get a sense of how they looked through the years. If they have their own children, they may include those as well. However, the number of pictures can be limiting, as sometimes there are only about five, and other times all the pictures are of the same event (for example, graduation), so you don’t get a sense of how they look in different settings. Also, I’m a video person, and the profiles from our database did not include any videos. Some databases do include videos of egg donors.
While it’s not too challenging to navigate the medical and psychological histories for the donors and their families, the personal aspects are more difficult to tease apart. The prompts ask the donors questions like “What is your favorite book, movie, sport, or food?” These questions are more the “small talk” of getting to know a person. Other prompts, like “What are you most proud of?” or “What is your message to intended parents?” can provide a bit more depth into their personality and character.
One aspect of our search that I would recommend to other intended gay dads is to go through the database together. We mirrored a laptop to our TV and made a discussion and review of it as a couple. I know some intended dads do it separately and see who they select individually, but we didn’t want to make it seem like we were advocating for our “chosen” donors. While this was a good approach, we went through the database with our selected filters multiple times, and some new challenges developed.
We found it hard to say “No.” Some donors just had too little information or too few pictures to get a sense of them. Also, for profiles we did like, we still found ourselves wanting more. What does she sound like? How does she move, converse, and behave in a conversation? The process felt a bit like internet dating, but without the final step of meeting in person and knowing if there is a “spark.” So, we felt like we needed more.
Ask and you shall receive
Many intended gay dads may find exactly what they are looking for in an egg donor database without additional information. However, if you are like us and want more pictures, videos, or information, you should feel empowered to ask the agency to see if they can provide it. Sometimes the egg donor will say no, and that’s totally fine. You can decide if you still want to consider them, but at least you asked the question.
This is the recommendation that I have for every intended father who is at this stage in the journey, ask more questions. You may start with a list of requirements or characteristics, and this is a good start. However, ask for more and whatever you need to be sure of your selection. This is an important decision, and one that you should feel confident about. Don’t rush. Take your time. Make sure you have all the information you want to make an informed and exciting choice.
For my husband and me, asking for a video of our egg donor telling us about herself, her life, and what she is passionate about sealed the deal. The minute we saw that video, we knew she was right for us. You may need to ask to find what you need to have that “spark.”
Choosing an egg donor is the first part of the IVF and surrogacy process that is outside the control of you as dads-to-be. Researching and choosing a clinic and agency, donating sperm (read more about my awkward experience), and genetic testing are things you do as intended fathers, but selecting an egg donor is the first of many stages that involve other people. However, so much of the process for gay men is about relinquishing control and having trust. That’s why it’s important to get all your questions answered and feel confident and comfortable. You’re creating your dream rainbow family. It’s meant to be an exciting and enjoyable journey.
Read more from Bryan McColgan
Bryan McColgan, Physician Journalist
Dr. Bryan McColgan is a Stanford and Columbia University-trained physician who is currently on his first journey to fatherhood through surrogacy. Navigating IVF and surrogacy in the United States from his current home in Sweden led Bryan to start the Gay Dad Reporter, the leading online platform dedicated to assisted reproduction for gay intended fathers. His mission is ethical surrogacy for gay intended dads everywhere.
