For the BHED Donor - What Can I Do While I'm Waiting to be Matched?

Once you’ve reached the end of the application process and had a successful interview with a member of our donor team, our staff will add your profile to our database of donors for recipients to peruse.

Congratulations, you’re now an active donor with BHED (Beverly Hills Egg Donation)!

There can be quite a lot to do leading up to this point - gathering pictures and transcripts, doing your own research on the donation process, putting together information on your family’s medical history, and scheduling your interview - that it may seem like the flurry of activity tapers off slightly after you’ve finally been made active.  One of the questions we get a lot is, “how long will it take for me to be matched?”  To tell the truth, there’s no way of knowing.  Some egg donors are matched within a matter of days, and for others it takes longer - sometimes even weeks or months.  It’s really all a matter of the right recipient coming across your profile at the right time, and for some donors, that doesn’t happen right away.

The most important thing to do during this time is to make sure to keep your profile accurate and up-to-date.  Review your profile occasionally and contact us with any changes in contact info, updates/successes in school or work, or new information regarding your medical history.  Also, we always love to have new pictures to add to your profile so feel free to keep them coming!  We store the extras on our server in case a potential recipient requests to see them.

Another big thing to keep in mind while you’re waiting to be matched is to make sure you’re easy to get in touch with.  Sometimes a recipient has a couple of donors they’re interested in, and wants to make a decision quickly, so make sure to respond to any phone calls or emails that you get from us as promptly as possible.  You’ll also receive a phone call from our team every three months to confirm your availability.

Finally, a great thing to do after you’ve been activated is come to one of our photo shoots!  We hold these shoots every 4-6 weeks in West LA.  It’s a wonderful way to get beautiful, professional photos to enhance your profile and it’s totally free to you.  It takes just 15 minutes of your time, and you get a high-resolution jpeg of your favorite shot to keep.

Of course, you can feel free to contact us at any time with questions or to see if there’s been interest in your profile.

We look forward to seeing you matched!

L's Story: Part One

If you’re thinking about or trying to use an egg donor, you’ve probably already been through a lot.  I am 34 years old and I was told about a year and a half ago that I suffer from a diminished ovarian reserve and it was very unlikely that I would be able to give birth to my own child.  

While I knew there was something wrong very early on, I never expected to hear that it was very unlikely and that it probably wouldn’t happen.  My FSH was only borderline in the beginning so we decided to hurry up and try an IVF cycle first.  We got 6 eggs (a miracle we thought), 5 fertilized, 4 survived the first 2 days and 3 were viable for implantation.  They weren’t a very high grade and they didn’t have the best cell count but all 3 were implanted anyway, there’s always a chance.  Well, I couldn’t help but be elated to find out on the first attempt that I was pregnant according to the first blood test.  Within a week though, my levels dropped, instead of doubling every day, and I was told that I had a chemical pregnancy but it wasn’t viable.  My eggs just weren’t strong enough, healthy enough.  Encouraged by the fact that I thought they were wrong and I DID have eggs, I wanted to try again.  We tried a different protocol the second cycle and I ended up getting canceled this time before retrieval.  We finally gave in and decided to go the donor route.  We’d like to have more than one child and recognizing this could take a long time, felt we should get moving on to the donor process.

We’ve now worked with two clinics in two different states, 3 different agencies and I’ve lost track of how many donors, probably a dozen.  I’m sure there are recipient couples who’ve matched quickly and had a successful transfer on the first attempt, however, that was just not our luck.  We, unfortunately, suffered a very miserable experience with a terrible agency in FL that really highlighted the importance of a good agency.  At first, I didn’t care which agency we selected because I was so picky about which donors were an option for us.  It will save you a lot of time if you are selective about both.

-L, Recipient

Editor's Note: L's story will be continued in part two of this installment.  If you'd like to share your story on our blog, please contact Katie at katie@bhed.com!