THE QUACK

Hate reading? Let me read for you.

I don’t know what I was expecting the egg freezing clinic to look like. I had hoped it would be a huge glass dome with people in lab coats, doors with dry ice coming out from the cracks, maybe babies growing in tanks….

So, I was disappointed to drive up to a grey office building in a business park, with overly groomed flower beds, and a fountain stuck on a round about. It was like being in a SIMS video game where the player had dragged and dropped ‘outside features’ to make the place more appealing. 

The reception area was overwhelmingly green; the walls, the carpet, the chairs were all the colour of a bitter banana. Along the walls were framed artwork pieces of water-coloured flowers in the shape of human eggs, (which like the fountain on the round about, seemed to be a way of disguising the fact we are creating babies next to a ring road ).  

I had a bit of waiting time, but thankfully I had my book. I was reading, How to Kill Your Family, which in hindsight, probably was not the most appropriate novel to bring to an IVF clinic.

The first appointment is a test where you get to see your womb on a monitor. As I was lying there with my legs apart, and the nurse trying to find my ovaries with her gel-covered camera stick. I was thinking that this would be the greatest way to start a Channel 4 modern nativity series.

NURSE: (Gasp) You don’t need your eggs freezing Mary because you’re pregnant.

Mary thinks back to the last time she had sex

MARY: But…but…that’s a miracle

After the follicles in my ovaries were counted, (GOSH WILL YOU STOP WITH THAT SEXY TALK), I was booked in with with the consultant.  And the very next week, I was walking in to the consultant’s room, which was also tremendously green and decorated with creepy flower-egg shaped artwork. The consultant offered me one of the three chairs opposite her.  

I had originally thought that the whole egg freezing process was a quickie; I’d come in, be numbed, they’ll collect a few eggs, and then like a bag of peas they will be stored in a freezer until the man of my dreams divorces his first wife and finds me. 

It turns out that it wasn’t such a simple task, and that I had to do some homework. The consultant said that I would inject my own tummy for up to two weeks. The injection would be stuffed full of hormones, which amongst other side effects, can bring on mood swings. 

Mood swings. Hmm. Like most women, I have been known to put on a pretty good show with the hormones I already obtained.

For instance, I have a Spotify playlist called ‘Week 4’, which has songs like Say Hello, Wave Goodbye, David Grey, and How to Disappear, Lana Del Ray, which I listen to on repeat as I stare out of windows for a week. Other actions include biting the head off an ex for using my Jo Malone bubble bath, storming out of coffee shops for no reason, and sending that one-letter text that makes every man want to crack his phone in half…

K.

So, for the sake of world peace I asked the consultant, “on the scale of La La the Teletubby having a good time on the hill, to Carrie unleashing her powers in her school hall killing all of her classmates…how crazy are these hormones going to make me”

The consultant smiled professionally and said, “some women say they feel no changes to their moods, others will say that they started crying because they didn’t know what to have for breakfast.” 

A vision of me sobbing on my kitchen floor, surrounded by broken bowls, Coco Pops and croissants flashed across my mind.

“Yes, I think I’ll fall into latter category,” I said.

The consultant then explained that after the injecting hormone stage, (and if I hadn’t blown up the world), I’ll be ready for the big scoop and freeze, (not her words). She advised that I have someone pick me up after the operation as I will be slightly battered, (also not her words). I mentally ran through my Hinge inbox and wondered what man would be most appropriate for the job. 

Now the process had been explained, it was time for business. The consultant twisted the screen to show me the cost breakdown. That’s when I saw that the storage of the eggs will costs £350 a year. Naturally, I was already doing the girl maths in my head:

Hugh and Mary start dating on the 1st June. On the 30th September Hugh tells Mary he’s ‘not looking for anything serious’, how much money would Hugh have wasted on freezer costs?  

£117.12

(As you know from my Maths blog – this would be a very rough sum)

In total egg freezing (including putting your eggs back into you), costs around £8,000.  I leaned back in the green chair studying the breakdown to make my baby. The injections, the operation, paying for Hinge George’s Deliveroo, to say thank you for picking me up from an egg clinic on our first date, and of course the annual £350 freezer cost.

I got back in my car and rang Mum.

“The thing is Mary…a kid is not the be end and end all,” she said, forgetting her audience. “You could spend £8,000 on freezing your eggs, force a baby into your life, and the kid could be a real piece of work…like Joffrey in Game of Thrones, or The Omen…”

“Or a TikToker,” I said.

“Exactly,” she replied. “Perhaps you should just let nature do its thing. If you spend £8,000 hanging around Italy for a year, I’m sure will happen naturally.”  (Mum has a thing for Italian men). She then added, “But if you do go ahead with it, can you please give me plenty of warning I just need to pop it in diary when you are going to be hormonal goblin…..

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