I've known since I was a teenager that I wanted to be a mother one day, but life and relationships can be complicated. By my own choice, I became a single parent, in my mid 30s. My pregnancy as a solo parent was perfect. There were no major complications or unpleasant symptoms. Throughout the entire pregnancy, I only felt peace, contentment and joy. My son was born in 2017.

He is 7 years old now and he's the light of my life. He's adored by all of our family. He's smart and unpredictable and hilarious and sweet. He is homeschooling and he does weekly events with the homeschooling group in our town. He loves science and math and reading. He's really into imaginary play, matchbox cars, and legos. He adores all animals and is gentle even with spiders, centipedes, snakes, etc. His favorite thing to do is play Minecraft.

We live with my mother and the multi generational arrangement is so beneficial to us all. We own our own house, in a small town about 15 minutes from the beach. My mom is a retired school teacher and she homeschools my son. He gets to stay at home with her while I'm working. My mom and I do everything together, with him. We are on the same page regarding parenting techniques. We make a great team and we live a happy life.

We love the outdoors and nature. We have an RV, which we take camping several times a year. We have a lovely park near our home that's right on a bay and has amazing sunset views. We live 15 minutes from our local beaches and have beach days often, when it's warm enough. In 2022 our family vacation was a 2 week trip to Hawaii, in 2023 we went on a 14 day Mediterranean Cruise, with visits to London and Rome and this year we did a cruise in the Eastern Caribbean. We make the most of every moment.

My son's father and I have a great relationship. We are close and we often spend time with him and his older children. (An 11 year old boy and a 9 year old girl). My son's father is excited to be a father figure for any children I may have in the future.

My own father lives 5 hours away from us. We see each other several times a year. His wife and my two sisters (22 years old and 19 years old) are wonderful with my son and have been cheering us on in our endeavor to grow our family.

I've been a vet tech for over 20 years, and I have been at my current clinic for more than 7 years. I have a deep passion for helping animals and their humans. My job pays well and has amazing benefits. I work a rotating schedule which allows me 3 or 4 days off every week, and every 6 weeks I get 7 days off in a row. It leaves a lot of free time to spend with my family, and traveling. The benefits are great, and I'll be able to stay home for several months with a new baby.

Over the last couple of years I've really started to feel like my family wasn't quite complete. My son has always loved babies and other children and he's asked many times about having a sibling. I am not interested in partnering up or pursuing any type of romantic attachment. I prefer my independence and my laid back, drama free life. So after a close look at our finances and several discussions with my family, I decided to look into IVF as a solo parent.

The reproductive specialist I am seeing has thoroughly and honestly discussed my age and the viability of my own eggs. Using an egg donor was brought up as an option. He also mentioned embryo adoption, which I hadn't even realized was a thing, and I LOVED the idea of embryo adoption.

I did one round of IVF with my own eggs and donor sperm. They were able to harvest 18 eggs, inseminated 13, and 7 developed. There were 5 days of hopeful joy before we found out that only 1 embryo had developed to a point where it could be genetically tested. Then there were 2 weeks of attempting to be cautiously optimistic before we found out that the embryo was abnormal.

After more discussion with my family, and another hard look at our finances, we've decided to move forward with embryo adoption. While it would have been lovely to have a child genetically related to myself, I know from experience that family isn't always blood, and I know that we will adore any child we have, no matter how it came to be. It feels like there is a baby out there who can't exist unless I give it my body and my family. I would love to someday tell my child "Your biological family loved you and wanted you so much that they created you. And our family loved you and wanted you so much that we chose you and put you inside my body so you could grow safely and be born".