Photography by Nick Meek
Lyndsay and Duncan did IVF for 10 years. Nine goes. One in London, three in Greece, two in Spain and three in Las Vegas. Four years ago they had their son.
"Giving up was always going to be harder for us than carrying on. It was the first time we felt that hard work and good humour couldn’t make something work for us," Lyndsay tells me. With careers in creative direction and architecture, Lyndsay and Duncan know all about running fast with budgets, and gathering and directing the best teams. And their IVF adventures — as they referred to them — were no different.
The need to use an egg donor, due to suspected early menopause, was identified when Lyndsay was 37. She was told it was unlikely that she'd be able to conceive, co-incidentally, on the same day she got to know Duncan at a party. "I never had the choice to use my own eggs, so egg donation wasn't as hard of a decision for us, as it is for some. Initially I grieved not being able to have a genetically-related child, but then I focused on them being biologically mine, fuelled by my body giving them vital life and rhythm. Through research, I found that a mother can affect her child's genes from carrying the child in her womb, which eased the worry. My son really looks like me and has mannerisms I had as a young child. Most of the egg donor-conceived children I know look a lot like their mother," she explains. I've read a number of articles that discuss how every cell in a baby's body is developed by the pregnant mother's body, and through carrying the child, it makes her the child's biological mother.
“Most of the egg donor-conceived children I know look a lot like their mother"
There's still a need to destigmatise using an egg or sperm donor. Or gamete donation, as it’s often referred to. "I once saw an ad about egg donation on the tube, it had been graffitied over with the word 'immoral'. I was, and am to this day, so incensed about this. We were aware that others may have felt we were tampering, instead of accepting our situation. In this day and age we tamper with and assist all parts of our health and bodies, why is fertility any different?" Lyndsay asks.
The couple headed to The Lister in London and did their first round of IVF with an egg donor. But it didn't work. Egg donors in the UK aren't in abundance. It's more of an altruistic act, rather than a financial incentive — donors are only compensated £750, a vast contrast to the US, where women can earn up to $14,000 depending on their qualifications and how many eggs they produce. In the UK, you can expect to join a waiting list for over six months for a donor to become available, and then you only get limited information about them, like: height, weight, eye colour, hair colour. Not wanting to wait for another donor, Lyndsay and Duncan decided to head abroad for treatment.
Close friends of theirs went through a 10-year fertility struggle a few years ahead of them, which spurred them on and enabled them to learn from their friends' research. They followed them to Greece and Spain but it never resulted in a full-term pregnancy. The experience of the clinic in Crete was incredibly positive though. "They had a much more caring nature than we'd received in the UK," Lyndsay comments. The clinic in Barcelona had a spa vibe. And there, the team really question the sperm's impact on fertility problems, rather than just blame it all on the quality of the eggs — which is the common opinion. "It was a refreshing change to share the burden of what was going on with our fertility," Lyndsay says.
After unsuccessful treatments in Europe, they were looking for the next stepping-stone to help them get across. "It really is about stepping-stones, having to work your way through to feeling OK about the next decision. Between the stepping-stone plateaus, you find you're led through these adventures. I picture them now like the slumps and strange landscapes in Dr Seuss' ‘Oh the places you’ll go’" Lydnsay says — reframing something which is so hard, into something so much softer. Having always been open about their fertility struggle meant when friends met others with similar problems, they wanted to put them in contact. So it was a friend of a friend, who recommended a clinic in Las Vegas, at a point when they had lost their way over where to try next.
"A number of our friends have had IVF, so we never felt alone. And it bolstered us all to share things. I called our IVF trips abroad our adventure holidays because they replaced our usual trips away." They were less hiking up and jumping off mountains, although emotionally it felt that way. "They were emotional adventures where you felt you were stretched sideways to places you had never been to."
“It helps to know my son's got so much from me”
One reason they were interested in Las Vegas was because the clinic treated killer cells seriously. This over-active immune system can affect the success of a pregnancy. Some UK fertility clinics address it seriously now but back at the time when Lyndsay and Duncan were having treatment in London, the clinic shut it down when they tried to discuss it.
It's big business in the States for egg donors. The first donor they chose accepted, then suddenly wanted $5,000 more. Put off by her money-orientated approach, they went with someone else. But how do you choose an egg donor? The clinic advised them that going with a donor who has a good track record for pregnancies was a positive route. Lyndsay and Duncan were successful on their third attempt in Las Vegas. "We joke that we went gambling in Las Vegas with lots of money," Lyndsay says. And eventually those chips won big. "No one knows why IVF didn’t work for us for so long — the doctor in Vegas thought it was killer cells but he also questioned the role PGD played. The last time we did IVF was without cell testing, as seems to be the case with many successful last goes with people I’ve spoken with." And this is something I’ve heard before. Some believe that the whole process of taking a biopsy from an embryo can interfere with its development.
It's hard to know what's the right recipe for a pregnancy progressing to full-term. When it worked for Lyndsay and Duncan, they were relaxed and happy having an adventure in the States. They sucked up earth energy by enjoying the great outdoors, they went mountain biking, clambered down rocks to the Colorado River, swam in lakes — all a huge contrast to the glitz and trappings of Las Vegas, and tense feelings and cold environment of a fertility clinic.
Lyndsay is known for her tenacious, investigative and innovative approach in her work, and it turns out these qualities helped her and Duncan through their IVF years. "There's no hand holding once you start treatment oversees, you need to make your own choices of supportive, collaborative agencies to supply and ship the drugs, do all the blood tests and killer cell infusions in the UK, all the medical testing required by the States before treatment. I did sometimes long for a hand. My weak point was always at the GP’s, hiding the tears, as I tried to seek-out supportive doctors to help with the blood tests required, being told that I had to have them all done privately. I felt that there was no support, even for something so small in the scheme of my treatments. I felt like it was monopoly money, the concept of it got a little warped at times. But I was lucky enough to work in a field where I was in demand, could work hard to raise funds and had job satisfaction that made sacrificing life's treats and activities much easier."
“I did sometimes long for a hand”
They put everything into it. And it wasn’t easy. In Europe they were spending between £5k-£7k, and in the States approximately £15k-£20k per treatment — including travel, drugs and associated alternative therapies. Fertility treatment is painfully expensive, and a lot of people aren't in a position to be able to finance it. If you're able to earn the money, that money goes straight into the baby-making pot. And as Lyndsay says, you then go gambling with it. Even when a consultant says the odds of winning are low, people still fork out the cash.
Lyndsay was 37 when she met Duncan. She was 49 when she fell pregnant with their wonderful son. "I found I focused so hard on making the IVF work that once that battle was won, I felt I needed an emotional break — but as a parent you don't get one. Of course you feel victorious, feel blessed, but there is a bit of you that is really spent, your jar has been so full of brimming emotions that it's hard to bounce back from things as well as you’d like, the jar spills over easily. You can be an older parent because of the years and years of trying, which wears you out. And then you need to dig deep for sleepless nights and toddler tantrums."
Lyndsay's career often took her oversees. A lifestyle that doesn’t fit with the family life they now feel so lucky to have. So she's channelling her creativity in other areas. In her HERE NOW projects, born from adventures with their son, married with a passion for parenting, wellbeing, print and photography. The first HERE NOW projects are a series of adventure guidebooks including cycling, nature and treasure hunting. And will expand into exhibitions and talks. The projects enhance and celebrate their adventures, unity and identity as a family, whilst creatively inspiring others. With everything they've been through to create the family they so wanted, it's important for them to not miss it, but live in, and capture, their here and now. Lyndsay and Duncan's creative spirits and gumption got them through their long hike to parenthood. The fact that they saw their 10-year journey through the 'adventure' lens says a lot about them and their positive energy. And it's back to the land of Dr Seuss, Lyndsay concludes with, "it's such a tricky thing to navigate, but in-between the unknown, it's helpful to make adventures to share however you can. To look for the ‘Boom Bands playing’ along the way. And you will get there. It will happen.”
The clinic in Spain with a spa vibe: http://landing.institutomarques.com
The fertility clinic with sun and Tzatziki on the side: https://www.fertilitycrete.gr
For infusions to treat killer cells: https://www.londonwomensclinic.com
For fertiliy treatment in Las Vegas: https://lasvegasfertilityclinic.com
Some Dr Seuss philosophy is what we all need in our lives: http://denuccio.net/ohplaces.htmn
How a woman's body can influence the genes of her baby in the womb:
