Gone are those days when every woman’s dream is to start a family very young. Nowadays, many women would rather have that dream realized later in their lives because of their own personal or professional reasons. Reasons can vary from career pursuit to fitness goals, amongst other things. Unfortunately, such a decision may come with a huge price, as fertility in women tends to decline with age. PLANNING TO FREEZE YOUR EGGS? WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
Luckily, there’re options available to women who decide to go this route, and one of them is egg freezing.
With egg freezing, you can schedule your pregnancy for a later time in the future when you’re ready to start a family. This allows you to focus on your personal goes and not get bogged down by the age constraint.
So, what exactly is egg freezing?
If you know about IVF, egg freezing will not be difficult to understand. However, both terms are not to be mixed as they are completely different procedures.
In simple terms, egg freezing is the process of harvesting a woman’s eggs and storing them till a time when she’s ready to use them.
Age is an important factor when it comes to natural conception in a woman. So, younger women have high-quality eggs. But as they begin to age, the quality of the eggs declines, and in most cases, this leads to a situation where the woman struggles to get pregnant or face infertility-related issues.
Her eggs can be collected early at a younger age through egg freezing and stored to maintain their quality. This ensures the woman has healthy eggs available when she’s ready to begin a family.
What Are the Process Involved?
Here’s a breakdown of what an egg freezing cycle looks like:
First, some fertility medication is prescribed for the woman to stimulate multiple egg production by the ovaries. This process can produce up to 25 mature eggs in a single month. In some cases, the woman might be given medicines to prevent early egg release.
Upon maturity, the eggs are retrieved by the doctor through a brief surgical procedure (micro-surgery).
After the eggs have been retrieved, they are then reviewed for quality.
The healthy eggs are then frozen using an advanced cryopreservation technique. The frozen eggs are then stored for use at a later time.
Egg Freezing VS IVF
The major difference between egg freezing and IVF is the former gives you more options for the future.
During IVF, the eggs are immediately combined with sperm in a lab to form an embryo. The embryo or fertilized egg is then implanted back into the woman’s womb.
On the other hand, with egg freezing, the eggs are not fertilized with sperm immediately. Rather they are stored and held until the owner is ready to start a family. When this happens, the eggs will be taken to the lab and thawed. Later can use the eggs for the IVF process or other fertility treatment.
The process is suggested to younger women, which has everything to do with egg quality and fertility. Thus, a woman who had her eggs frozen has a higher chance of getting pregnant later in life.
We suggest you talk to your fertility specialist about Egg Freezing to know more details and medical advice.
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