article in W magazine

This is the agency I donated/sold my eggs through:

Daddy's Little Helpers
Thanks in part to surrogacy coordinators Growing Generations, gay Hollywood is in the midst of a baby boom.

I feel especially awesome being a contributor to "gay Hollywood."

somebody's kid is going to be half-gay and half-really good at the SAT

I am donating eggs to a gay man (again). I've been at it for weeks, actually, but today I finally started the egg-makin' hormones. I just gave myself no fewer than three injections in the stomach. I feel tingly and fertile.

Knowing I was going to be sticking needles into myself, I've been eating burritos freely so I'd have a protective layer of bodyfat. Who knew that burritos had so many salutary side effects?

My ovaries are on overdrive! When I say I "contain multitudes", I really mean it.

Egg Donors vs. Sperm Donors: Who Is Valued More and Why?

This article suggests that sperm donors are underpaid because we don't really value fatherhood. And additionally, that egg donors are treated like precious, beatific saints because that's what we like to think about mothers.

That sounds kind of flattering for the women, at least, until you realize the flipside -- women who are mostly in it for the money are pathologized, whereas it's expected that men would donate sperm entirely for the money.

This stigmatizaton of market-motivated egg donors is aptly analogous to issues surrounding motherhood, as women who prefer participation in a market economy to the oh-so-precious task of wiping tiny noses have also long been pathologized.

I'm off to the fertility clinic for an ovarian reserve test to see if my eggs are still any good (28 is antediluvian for an egg donor!) If they are, I have a taker!

there is no more anonymity

An addendum to my last egg post (The "Egg Donors Are People Too" Story), another topic of discussion in the panel was the fact that anonymity cannot be promised; the child you produce with donor eggs or sperm is going to become a teenager with internet access, and very possibly find not only the donor, but genetic half-brothers and half-sisters. This Broadsheet post says much the same thing. Here's the money quote, from a woman born of sperm donation:

"We didn't ask to be born into this situation, with its limitations and confusion. It's hypocritical of parents and medical professionals to assume that biological roots won't matter to the 'products' of the cryobanks' service, when the longing for a biological relationship is what brings customers to the banks in the first place."

The "Egg Donors Are People Too" Story

A couple weeks ago, I participated in a panel discussion entitled "Egg Donors Are People Too," which was part of a fertility conference at the Grand Central Hyatt (a quite nice hotel). The woman moderating the panel was a psychiatrist (maybe a psychologist, I forget) specializing in fertility issues. She was beautifully dressed and coiffed and had a sort of blue-blooded air about her, as though, despite having an enviable job, she didn't actually need to work. She was the one who named the panel.

Things got off to, in my view, a hilarious start when Dr. Upper Class began with a poignant paean to egg donors, women who really care about other people's infertility and are so giving of their time and of themselves. Because, of course, no one would go through all that just for the money!

And then the floor was turned over to me, to introduce myself and talk -- in a teary, estrogen-fueled sort of way, I imagine -- about what it meant to donate eggs.

"Of course," I began, "when we say 'donating,' we're not really donating at all. That's why all the ads in the Village Voice prominently list how many thousands of dollars the gig pays." Some egg professionals in the audience looked stricken.

I then spent the next ten minutes metaphorically pointing at the white elephant in the room and jumping up and down, saying the same thing I always say: women are adults who can make their own decisions in a market economy. If our bodies are our own, then we can make economic decisions about them as well. Men can choose to endanger their health working in coal mines; women can choose to inject themselves with hormones for cash. (Imagine a blue-blooded society woman claiming "No one would go underground in those dirty pits and mine coal and risk black lung disease just for $25,000 a year! Surely these kind souls must really care that rich people need to burn fuel for energy!)

Egg donors aren't heartless people who don't care about infertility, I pointed out, but seriously, but I think a lot more broke twenty-year old women apply their altruistic instincts towards, say, Darfur, or global warming, or AIDS in Africa, than towards the inability of American couples to conceive. And rightly so. What kind of arrogance does it take to think that, when typically lower-middle-class women donate eggs to upper-middle-class buyers, it's not about the money?

On the question of whether $8,000 is enough to go through all the hormones, I said that, towards the end when it was two injections a day and lots of PMS-type side effects, I simply took the amount of money I was still owed, divided it by the number of injections remaining, and told myself that figure every time I had an injection to do. The number was over $100. Was I, and had I always been, in an economic position such that I felt that a worthwhile exchange? Obviously. That's why I signed up to do it.

Of course, it's not entirely about the money. It's also about a desire to spread my genes anywhere I can, just as men have always done, and male hip-hop artists regularly rap about. That ("I'd like to knock you all up, quite frankly") didn't go over so well at the panel either, at least among the organizers. However, a number of people-trying-to-be-parents came up to me afterwards and thanked me for making them laugh. (If only "comedian on call" could be my title! Of course, it's easy to make people laugh when you're the only comedian in the room and no one is expecting a comedian).


On a related note, a Melbourne IVF clinic is
offering a children's book explaining egg donor conception.
The title sounds just a bit dirty though, doesn't it?

(I donated eggs to a gay man in 2005. For my previous egg donation posts, go here).

"You supply the pictures and I'll create the war"

This article, from the UK's Daily Mail, screams out "I donated eggs to friends... now I've been left infertile."

Ooh, scary! Our heroine here, Donna, donated eggs to two women out of the goodness of her heart (paying egg donors is illegal in Britain), and now she's infertile. Hrm. Here are two key quotes:

Although the doctors would not make a definitive link with the treatment she had in donating eggs, one gynaecologist admitted: 'It could be scar tissue from the procedures.'

One doctor "admitted" it "could be"? Even my toothpaste has four out of five dentists behind it.

And this:

In order for Gina [the egg recipient] to jump the waiting list she [Donna] had to give eggs to an anonymous recipient as well. It meant a higher dose of hormones and 20 eggs were retrieved.

Whoa, shit! It's illegal to pay egg donors in Britain, therefore the few extremely generous souls who do donate (often to sisters, for instance) have to also donate eggs to strangers, for free, by undergoing a more dangerous procedure! (20 eggs is off-the-hook crazy -- reputable Americans agencies are looking for 10-12 eggs per retrieval).

So much for the paternalistic British government "protecting" egg donors! Not paying donors = incredible shortage of donors, therefore the answer is ... subject the few who will do it for free to overdoses of fertility drugs and force them to share eggs with everyone!

My point here is as it always is: adult women can handle making their own choices in a market economy.

At the bottom of the article, we're informed that "A full version of this interview plus more pictures appear in this week's copy of Grazia Magazine." Grazia's story-teasing (or story-hoarding) indicates that, as is common with British tabloids, they have almost certainly paid Donna for this story. The truth and nothing but the truth? Dubious.

(I donated eggs to a gay man in 2005. For my previous egg donation posts, go here).

an army of me

I was quoted in an article about egg donation in the Penn State Collegian, a newspaper produced by students at a school to which I have no particular connection.

I love this image, with the needle poking askancely into the ovary:


I'm really glad that the journalist mentioned that I'm a comedian before quoting me as saying, "I think I have completely fabulous genes, and if someone's going to make a baby, they should only buy the best. I think all babies should be part-me."

I mean, otherwise, I'd sound like a super-arrogant prissy bitch that other women should try to slap. For real. I could post a list of my flaws if that would ameliorate things. Did I ever mention the jump-rope/manhole-cover-accident scar on my right knee? Let's start there.

A Modest Proposal to Anti-Choice Folks

Update: What timing! Pro-life Senator Dan Patrick said, er ... much the same thing. He's just really, really off about the price. Here's my original post:

If anti-abortion types really just want to save fetuses, why not the most obvious solution: make it legal to sell babies?

Okay, I didn't really mean that -- what I meant was, it's legal to pay an egg donor for her "pain and suffering" in the egg donation process, without actually paying her for the eggs themselves (uh-huh). So why not make it legal to pay women for their gestational services in "donating" a full-on baby?

I love when anti-abortion people ask abortion-seeking women, "Why not just have the baby and then give it up for adoption?" Are you kidding? You can sometimes get a guilt-riddled Christian teenager to do that. But, obviously, very few employed adult women are interested in carrying a baby, enduring childbirth, getting stretch marks and getting fat and possibly incurring other, more serious, physical consequences (urinary incontinence is way more common than most people want to discuss, and I'll never forget the diagram I saw in a medical textbook of a "clitoral fissure"), taking time off work (those employed outside large corporations do not get maternity leave), and explaining the whole thing to people who ask questions about your obvious pregnancy. If you don't have a religious belief in the all-out personhood of fetuses, there is simply no reason you would do this. Well, no reason you would do it for free. (I wouldn't have donated eggs for free, and that doesn't even cause stretch marks).

As you undoubtedly have noticed, we live in an increasingly commoditized world, one in which we have already put a price on this service: surrogate mothers receive about $20,000, plus medical expenses and sometimes payment for lost income, for carrying and giving birth to a child.

As per current law, surrogate mothers are always carrying babies made with someone else's eggs, that way they cannot be said to be "selling their babies."

But if you're really against abortion, and perhaps you'd like a baby for less than the $50,000-$100,000 you might spend on a combo of egg donor fees, surrogate fees, IVF, legal and medical expenses, why not legalize one-stop baby production and delivery?

Or, more specifically, why not make it legal to pay women for gestational services they provide in offering babies for adoption? Someone could found a matching agency. Pro-lifers: if you believe abortion is murder, certainly this is better, no? Pro-choicers: if you believe abortion is a human right, then perhaps you might also get behind the idea that women deserve to be compensated in a market economy for tasks traditionally considered "women's work," just as various feminist thinkers (mostly in Europe's socialist nations) have proposed compensating women for domestic labor, and just as women are sometimes compensated for domestic labor (after the fact) in U.S. divorce cases.

Now everyone's offended! By a comedy blog! Discuss.

filmmaker Vincent Gallo is selling his sperm for $1 million

This is far greater than the fee I received for my eggs, although Mr. Gallo is going to pay for the in-vitro fertilization out of his fee. He also specifies "If the purchaser of the sperm chooses the option of natural insemination, there is an additional charge of $500,000. However, if after being presented detailed photographs of the purchaser, Mr. Gallo may be willing to waive the natural insemination fee and charge only for the sperm itself."

He also specifies that his family contains "no cripples," and that "If you have seen The Brown Bunny, you know the potential size of the genitals if it's a boy. (8 inches if he's like his father.) I don't know exactly how a well hung father can enhance the physical makeup of a female baby, but it can't hurt."

Things get messed up and racist after that. Here's the link (scroll to the bottom).

Related posts:

a few thoughts on egg donation after the fact
No one ever refers to women as "virile"
I'm going to end up in bar fights
the state of things
egg tales
imagine being a nurse in the maternity ward who wasn't told about any of this
cheaper by the dozen
update from solitary hotel room
I'm sure a male comedian who became a sperm donor would not receive cute sperm-related gifts
thanks for all the love

a few thoughts on egg donation after the fact

I read a couple of egg donor blogs today.

Apparently, the UK prohibits egg donors from being paid, and then some infertile couple ends up in the paper just pleading for an egg donor to help them out -- as though other people's eggs are necessary in the way that a donor kidney might be.

Of course, I take a bit of a libertarian view on the matter -- if our bodies are our own, I think we should pretty much be able to sell them (with caveats against exploiting destitute people, and perhaps legally mandated minimums, sort of like a minimum wage for biological components).

But even if your view is more moderate, surely one wouldn't expect (very many) egg donors to endure some-odd ten weeks of drugs, injections, specifically-timed doctor visits, egg retrieval under general anesthesia, and lost income during this period out of sheer altruism. While I could see doing such a thing for, say, one's own sister, I would kind of wonder about the mental health (or potential martyr complex?) of anyone who volunteered to do such a thing for a stranger -- what is it that this person really wants back? I think you might be getting some crazy-lady genes for your baby. How nice!

Interestingly, when I asked the egg agency how the egg donor fee should be reported tax-wise, I was told it was a (tax-free) "pain and suffering" payment, the same as if someone had hit me with their car and I had won a lawsuit against him or her.

I also came across a mention (on a "happily child-free" blog) of egg donors who have no interest in children prior to egg donation, but who develop an interest afterwards, perhaps due to the hormonal shifts inherent in the egg donation process (or just due to spending so much time thinking about babies).

Incidentally, I am back in my agency's egg donor database. They asked me to log in and view my profile -- it's sort of like a dating site for parents and donors! -- and I discovered that someone had listed my IQ at 140 or 150 or something.

I have never had my IQ tested formally, but last time I took an IQ test on my own, I scored freaky-high because I am a standardized test-prep teacher and an IQ test looks disturbingly like an SAT, with the addition of some little patterned boxes you have to rotate (and if I spent some time, I'm sure I could think of a near-foolproof method for boosting students' scores on that as well). I don't think that much of IQ tests. In any case, the egg agency said the value probably got filled in when they were switching to new software.

The writer of this blog was joking about how big your follicles (the pockets in the ovaries that hold each individual egg) get when stimulated -- so big....

...that they beep when I back up?
...that they have their own zip code?

This is humor for a very small audience (with very large ovaries).

Related posts:

No one ever refers to women as "virile"
I'm going to end up in bar fights
the state of things
egg tales
imagine being a nurse in the maternity ward who wasn't told about any of this
cheaper by the dozen
update from solitary hotel room
I'm sure a male comedian who became a sperm donor would not receive cute sperm-related gifts
thanks for all the love

thanks for all the love

I don't know who's been linking to me or giving handjobs on my behalf, but the value of my blog has increased $3,951.78 since the last time I posted about it, making my blog now more valuable than my eggs (last valued at $8,000, now up to $10,000):

My blog is worth $11,855.34.
How much is your blog worth?

I spoke to another comedienne last night about donating eggs. It's weird what the market wants. She was concerned that her SAT scores weren't great, but it turns out she had a great GPA. I was the opposite -- hott SATs, GPA suffering from my propensity to do all kinds of crazy shiznit at once (sound familiar?)

Who knows what people want? I saw one ad from someone looking for an egg donor with no history of male baldness in her family. 100% Japanese or 100% Jewish donors are also in demand.

It's true that many people shopping for eggs want tall, blonde, Roman-nosed women (even if the intended parents look nothing like that), whereas, I think, some intended parents just want to see a picture of a nice girl and kind of fall in love. They want to say "I hope my daughter looks like that in 26 years."

I'm sure a male comedian who became a sperm donor would not receive cute sperm-related gifts

In commemoration of my recently concluded egg donation, Megan brought me a gift -- a graphic novel about eggs who escape from the fridge to pursue life on the outside, and then one of them becomes a ninja.

I bring you Egg Story.

and so it ends, with a cab ride and a Cuban sandwich

I am back in New York and looking forward to many fruitful non-ovarian discussions with all you fine people.

As a (near) final reflection, I will say that producing offspring is indeed our insurance against our own mortality. Having contributed in some minor way to producing a child or several, I can earnestly say that if I were hit by a truck tomorrow and had one last moment to think things over, I'd be that much happier that I had sent some genes off into the world. Good luck and godspeed.

an ode to room service

The only thing I love more
than an English muffin

is an English muffin
delivered to my door in a little basket

lovingly nestled in a cloth napkin
accompanied by individual pots of jam

and paid for by an agency that helps gays and lesbians produce children in ways that would have been biologically impossible just years ago, but now allows for the purchase of genetic material from young women with good SAT scores, and its transport across state lines.

That is how much I love English muffins.

update from solitary hotel room

I have now contributed exactly nine eggs towards the production of little half-gay Jenlets.

When I woke up, one of the nurses marveled at my "perfect makeup." I thought well, it was perfect when I went in -- what exactly were you doing with my face that would make it any different?

The anesthesiologist heard I was a comedian. Then he gave me drugs that made me think I was hi-larious (when, even now, as I am still quite dizzy, it is clear I was not). Highlights:

When the anesthesiologist told me he was going to give me some "relaxation medicine": "That's very flattering, because I hear a lot about roofies and no one's tried to slip me any yet."

As the anesthesiologist was putting in an IV and told me not to move or look: "That's what all the boys say."

When I asked how many eggs had been retrieved and was told it was nine: "Can you tell ahead of time which ones have the best college prospects? Because I can teach them how to take the SAT."

There was more. So much more. Making Jenlets. Need room service. Where IS everybody?

cheaper by the dozen

My eggs are overachieving. I am flying out in the a.m. on Friday and having the eggs out on Saturday, instead of on Tuesday, as anticipated.

My ladyfriend Emily asked last night "When do you hatch?"

I thought it was funny that I'd been through months of egg business without anyone saying that.

one more ovoid artifact

Brian Van of The Lectern (as previously blogged about) photographed his egg from the Jenny Vaudeville Show (click for a recap):

imagine being a nurse in the maternity ward who wasn't told about any of this

Today I learned the first name of the surrogate mother who will be receiving my eggs. I can't tell you the name, but it sounded like a traditionally black name, which made me ask the agency if, in fact, my eggs were being put in a black woman. The agency said they couldn't tell me that. The woman from the agency did, however, share the fact that she herself had been a surrogate mother, and that she is white but gave birth to a 100% Japanese baby.

Now, I assume that the gay man who has selected my eggs is white, since most people want to have kids who look like them, and he is single, so it's not like there's a partner involved who might be of another race (in which case, for instance, he might use his own sperm and a donor from his partner's race).

So, there's a good possibility that somewhere, in about 9+ months, a black woman is going to give birth to the whitest baby alive. I mean, you've seen me. Even if the gay guy is sort of tanned-looking, I am so milky-pale that I'm sure I'd compensate for that.

egg tales

People have been sharing the oddest egg-related anecdotes lately. One friend told me that she interviewed to be an egg donor and was turned down because of a double suicide (of an elderly couple with painful illnesses) in the family, which the psychologist derisively referred to as a "family history of murder."

A charming new acquaintance wrote to say "I sent an application to be an egg donor recently. They didn't respond. I think it was because I'd carried the application around in my bag for so long and it was kind of beaten up by the time I mailed it, which they may fear the eggs I delivered to them would be. Smudged with chocolate."

And finally, Aeric, the photographer who takes the awesome photos on my site, received one of the eggs I donated at the Jenny Vaudeville Show, and he took it home and photographed it:


Doesn't it look ethereal?

the state of things

This evening I had a phone tutorial from the egg donation people regarding the new medications I am taking (on top of the old ones). After fully fifteen minutes of sucking liquid into a syringe and then pushing it into little bottles of powder and sucking the dissolved powder back up, the nurse asks "Are you okay with using your stomach for this?"

This, I do to give a gay man a baby, yes, but also, of course, for the money, which I am going to use to further my career, as it stands. Along with touring (info coming soon!), I am also going to get an iPod with one of those voice recorders, and an armband, so I can record all my comedy performances and then podcast them.

So I just stuck a giant needle into my stomach and injected a bunch of fertility drugs that kind of burn and hurt, but about an inch below the skin, so there's nothing I can do about it.

In response to a mention of my egg donation, comedian Al Wagner replied "How are you going to get an egg all the way to New Orleans without breaking it?"

I'm going to end up in bar fights

When you're already irritated, it's really irritating for someone to tell you why you're irritated.

The egg donation people called and told me to call this clinic, but the clinic didn't receive the records that were faxed in and then I had to call the egg donation people back and wait on hold, and then they asked me to spell my last name, which further annoyed me as they usually know who I am right away. I finally get on the phone with the right person, and I'm saying "Look, I shouldn't have to be doing this--"

She cut me off and told me I have zero estrogen right now and that's why I'm irritable (and hate the bitch at the Internet Garage, etc.) "Your estrogen's in the hopper," she said. "You'll feel better later."

I was startled. This, however, begs the question -- if this is the result of a lack of estrogen ... is this what guys feel like all the time? I think it might be. I have felt even-keeled, sort of laid-back but in control of everything, while prone to occasional outburts of anger.

Do you think I could have magically gained the ability to catch a football? Because I'm pretty sure I never have. I can't catch flying objects, ever, including that thing where someone tosses the car keys over the top of the car at you. I never catch them. Stop doing that.

Seriously, do you guys walk around this way all the time? Is there a possibility I could market hormonal cocktails as "gender empathy drugs," and everybody could take some drugs that made them feel like the other gender for a couple of days, and then we'd all get it? That would deserve a Nobel freaking Peace Prize.

what I received this morning from DHL and FedEx, respectively

My computer has been returned from the Apple repair center! I was not expecting it so soon, but fortunately I was at home anyway, waiting for a shipment of medications from the egg donation clinic.

When I received the clinic shipment, the box was much, much larger than I expected. It was nestled in styrofoam. It contained needles much, much larger than the ones I have heretofore been using. Apparently, the medications in the box are for use during the final week of the process. I would therefore love to know why the box appears to contain thirty extremely large needles. Can I trade personalities with a masochist for awhile? Thank you.

I am still behind on my email and other computer-related work. If you require any kind of urgent reply from me, well ... quite frankly, you should probably realize that I don't work in any kind of industry that deals with urgent situations, and that if you think comedy or standardized text preparation are life and death issues, you are an overprivileged Westerner. Don't call me, I'll call you.

no one ever refers to women as "virile"

Some of my interest in the below topic may be related to my current endeavor of selling my eggs to a wealthy gay man in California, which is, all in all, a rather defiant act of fertility on everyone's part -- me for being an educated woman in any way involved in procreating in my mid-twenties, him for being gay and spending a great deal of money on the process, and the surrogate for (although the paperwork dances around it) selling her bodily services and thus putting a commercial value on work that women have heretofore done for free.

People have asked me whether I worry about my genes being "out there." My reply -- a very instinctive one -- has always been that I stand by my genes, and the more of them out there the better. This guy's going to get a baby one way or another, so it might as well have some Jen in it.

This is the same kind of view that motivates (whether consciously or merely biologically) the young men who have spent time "sowing their oats" since time immemorial, and count their babymamas with a sort of virile pride. I see no reason I shouldn't have the same impulse; until now, it has simply been impossible to physically carry out (and even now, it is, of course, substantially more difficult, but I get paid, instead of owing child support).

If I could impregnate men and make them walk around all swollen up with little Jen-babies ... I might have been doing it for years. Survival of the fittest, indeed.

considerations on welfare statism and fertility-friendly policymaking

In reference to my previous post about Sweden, this article in The Public Interest evaluates the effects of so-called "family friendly" policies, such as "free" day care.

The conclusion is that "free" day care is, of course, paid for upfront in the form of taxes, making its use near-mandatory, as people paying 35-50% tax rates become less able to afford not to use day care. The overall effect is that, to provide free day care, a nation makes it economically necessary for women with young children to work -- and most job growth is in administering the welfare state itself, and most child care jobs are held by women, so the end result is economically compelling women to leave their own childen to care for other people's children.

Of course, the talented ones can use the system to pursue employment as hockey players or lawyers or cabaret singers. But it's not clear that the segment most able to take care of themselves is the segment for whom taxation policies should be designed.

One interesting point is that, while the (now defunct) Public Interest is a conservative publication, this article ends up suggesting rather progressive policy alternatives such as Social Security credits for stay-at-home parenting, and a sort of "GI Bill" for stay-at-home parents (providing tuition credits for later education and job training), who sacrifice career advancement in order to raise children, in a move somewhat analagous to soliders who sacrificed career advancement to defend the nation.

Of course, that leads me to raise the question of whether these benefits would apply to someone who stayed home to raise their children on welfare -- are we to reward them by paying for their education? (If I balk at this, I think it makes me more fiscally conservative than TPI, which makes me itch). Of course, the thought of paying taxes towards such a thing makes working people indignant, but I think most things that would significantly ameliorate poverty and crime (like rehabiliation, college classes, and family visits for prisoners) make working people indignant.

If it would be the case that a GI Bill for parents could be "stacked" with other benefits -- a weekly check just for breeding, plus a free or reduced-cost grad degree? -- well, sign me up. Sperm donors aren't that hard to come by.

Of course, views on subsidizing (or, in some views, fairly compensating) parenting activities are strongly informed by whether one thinks the world needs more people in it. And while I used to be rather smug (like, when I was a high school debater, many of whom are quite smug in general) about how the world is overpopulated and anyone who chooses to have children is using valuable resources, the US is currently only replacing its population through immigration and the high birthrates of first-generation immigrants. Japan is suffering serious economic consequences from its below-replacement birthrate. And there is also the argument that people are going to keep making babies no matter what you do, so maybe the point is quality rather than quantity; measures that alleviate poverty and make those inevitable children more likely to be productive taxpayers and less likely to be criminals are in the public interest and possibly could be cost-effective, regardless of whether one holds the pronatalist view that children are a good in themselves.

This post has no punchline whatsoever. Feel free to reply in the comments.