Can't Keep My Mouth Shut - My Mid-Thirties Elective Egg-Freezing Journey

Episode Date: December 9, 2024

If I could go back in time and freeze my eggs in my twenties, I would 100000% do it without question. So what exactly happens during the egg-freezing process? Let me tell you all. With love, Nixalina.  ​For more awesome content to read including beauty, fashion or dating & love features, please do head over to my digital platform www.nixalina.com. Don't be shy, come say hai! Head over to my Instagram or Tiktok @nixalina to slide into my DMs.

This podcast contains strong language and discussions about relationships, sex, and love. It may not be suitable for younger listeners. This is the Can't Keep My Mouth Shut podcast, and I am Nick Salina. Hi, and welcome back to another episode of Me. Today is quite a serious, but not kind of topic. one that I've never discussed before, but it's so popular these days, and I can understand why. And it is called My Mid-30s Elective Egg Freezing Journey. Ooh, interesting. So I'm going to have to start with, I guess, some tea spilling, and I might get cancelled

for people that are anti-abortion. But if you are anti-abortion, you're probably not going to want to listen to any of my podcasts anyway. I have previously been pregnant. Not in my 20s, in my 30s. And I've been pregnant by accident. And it was a tough decision to decide to keep or not. But at the time, I was very conscious that I'd only met the person a few months prior. And it was an accident, right? You know, I've made it to my mid-30s without a single scare, okay? So it's not like, oh, you should be more careful. No. And actually, I got to the point where I thought, I remember like 31, 32, and I was in a five-year relationship. And I thought, oh my God, I've never had a scare. Like maybe I'm barren. Maybe I can't get pregnant. You know,

that's what goes through your head. So when I did get pregnant, I was like, oh, and it was very, it was easy. It was easy for me. It was a one night accident done. I was then like, okay, cool. That's okay. But very, very, very, very difficult decision to say no. And it's something it was discussed and you know, I don't take it lightly. In hindsight, now knowing what I know, am I glad we made that decision, 120% yes. And I can't imagine having said, yes, let's go through with it. I can't imagine how traumatic and destructive that family unit would be now. And it's really sad to say, but we'll leave that there. So yes. So I then get to, so mid thirties and I've, you know, have a pregnancy scare and people keep saying, and I'm single and people's like, you

probably freeze your eggs I'm like no no no no no no and then I think but maybe I should so basically I feel like these days women are finding their career and their success a prominent thing over starting a family early this is I'm not trying to stereotype here but I just feel like as egg freezing becomes more popular which it has why is that and it's because women are like, I do want children, but like not right now. And so your eggs, in case you aren't aware, but I'm sure you are, you know, the younger you are, the better. And if I wish I could go back in time and freeze my eggs like 28, 29, 110% would have. But at that age, I just assumed by my mid 30s, I'll be married with children. My life has not gone the way it was planned. Let me tell you

that. I did not expect to be here, ladies and gentlemen. But now I am. I'm like, let's explore. So when you freeze your eggs, so basically the egg freezing process, let's start with that. You have to go for a fertility assessment to begin with. And they take your bloods and they do an ultrasound, an invasive ultrasound. I at first thought it was like an ultrasound on my outside. I was like, yeah, cool. And then they, you know, get you to sit up and spread your legs and get that old fucking dildo looking camera out. And I'm like, what is that? What is that? So yeah, it's invasive, but doesn't hurt. And what they do is they take your bloods and the ultrasound to see how your ovaries are, because you can't, they won't advise elective egg freezing should you,

you know, your ovaries not like you've got one egg in there, for instance. I don't know. I mean, I don't know what their depleted levels are, but they do this to see how adapted you will be to the process. And I had what my right ovary is way better than my left. I don't know why. What's wrong with my left ovary? Come on, babe. Come on. So I think I had five eggs in my right and I had two or three in the left. And then what they said for me, in one cycle of egg freezing, I would probably get five to seven eggs. And that ain't a lot. That ain't a lot. And I believe if I done this 28, 29, I'd probably get double the amount. So often women do like two cycles of egg freezing. So if I did that way, I'd be looking at 10 to 14 good eggs, which is a really, you know,

decent number. Hi, allow me to pop right in here for a quick break and introduce you to today's sponsor, which is the Meat Club, an online food delivery service based in Singapore. These guys started out in 2014 because they were finding it difficult to source high quality, affordable meat in Singapore, and I totally get where they're coming from. I really struggle with my home cooking on finding the produce. Now, I love to cook a British Sunday roast dinner. If you're on my Instagram, you know it's my thing. But it's always about the produce and ingredients you start off with. And so when I found The Meat Club, I was really excited to try out their fresh, organic, cage-free chicken, the vegetables. They source everything from New Zealand and Australia,

so that kind of tells you the quality of food that you're dealing with. Now they're not a butchers so let's get that straight. They do not touch, fill, seal or open any of the produce. They completely trust their suppliers to bring in the best food which means they also remove any unnecessary freezing and defrosting cycles. Basically you're getting I say as best you can farm to table given we do live in the city right. Now with these guys the subscription service that they offer. You can do it every week, every two weeks, every four weeks, or you could even do a one-off shop just to dip your toe in, see if you like it. But I love how they take the hassle and the stress out of worrying whether my kitchen and fridge is going to be full of food or not.

You can do quite literally a click, set, and forget subscription model with them. That's it, done and dusted. You don't need to worry anymore. They also offer $140 in rewards with your subscription service. And if you use my personal code MIX15, that's N-I-X-1-5, you will receive $15 off at checkout. So once again, thank you so much to The Meat Club for sponsoring today's episode. And thank you for making my personal roast dinners taste even better. And with that, we'll head back to the story. So the process is after you have your fertility assessment, If they say, yep, yep, good. Like they said to me, you know, some eggs are better than none.

You could get this amount of solid good eggs. What then happens on the journey is you have to wait until you are, so my period would be a week before the ultrasound and there's one egg there that's getting ready to release. So I think you start hormonal injections on the day of your period or just after. I think you can do it up to a week after if I can't remember exactly what she said. But basically, yeah, before you're ovulating and you start these hormonal injections, and it's not a big needle, and you have to inject it into your belly fat nightly for about 10 days. Okay. And what that does is that gets your body ready to have all the eggs get ready. Because what happens every month

is one egg at random, picked at random, is the one that gets enlarged and released. The injections trick your body almost to do that to all of them. So they're all enlarged as if they're all going to be released. Then when that's done, you then go in and you have your egg removal procedure and you are put under sedation. And I don't think, I think they're a step before that where they basically have to check that the eggs are ready. So I think you have an ultrasound, again, invasive to see if all these eggs are now enlarged. And then you have the procedure. It's under sedation, but it's really quick. It's through your vagina, through your womb, but you're, you know, you're out for it, and it's maybe 15 or 20 minutes, and then you wake up. There's no aftermath pain. You

feel fine. You can go back to work or go and have some lunch. And then those eggs are taken to the laboratory, and it's only after they remove them can they really see if there's any abnormalities. So they might remove, I don't know, lucky cycle off me, they might have been able to remove 10 eggs, and then once it goes to the labs, they're like, only five of those are quality eggs. okay. And then you freeze those eggs and you pay per year to freeze those eggs. And then obviously when you're ready, you can unfreeze them. They go back in. Hopefully the sperm meets them and hopefully you get pregnant, right? That's it in a nutshell. I am not a professional doctor, nurse, nothing. So, you know, this is just me telling you what I've just sat and listened to,

okay um but so for me that I'm like okay I can do this there's a few questions that I asked I thought you might want to know I'm like the hormones is it going to fuck me up and they're like yeah I mean I said I get really bad PMS a really bad PMS they're like well yeah yeah like you it does make you moody you know your body's over producing the kind of hormones that you get during your cycle, right? But it's 10 days of your life, okay? And it's like, you know, you might get cramps, you might get headaches, you might get bloating, you might be irritable, mood, you're sad, but you can still function, you can still go to work and all that jazz. And it's just 10 days. And then you can also, once you have your egg extraction,

if you want to do a second cycle, you can actually start it immediately. and sometimes it's better to do that because your body is riding the wave of the past month's injections and the hormones so they might if you then do the second set straight away then it might give you even better set of eggs okay for me the problem is the price now there's two problems and it's not really a problem that both can overcome it egg freezing is very expensive it is it's very expensive globally. It's not a Singapore thing. It's a global thing. There are some countries that have cheaper rates than others. You will always be paying for storage per year. You always have to pay for the injections, or you also have to pay for the sedation, the anesthetist fee,

the operation theater, all of that jazz. So it's not a cheap decision. The other thing is, do you I even want kids and it's a it's a fucking maze of a question like someone like I'd rather take a bullet than answer it yes and no I do and when it is yes and no when I was pregnant uh last I I was like I I I kind of want to keep it but I'm not sure but I do but I don't and I never expected to feel that way so then I'm like but then no I don't and I'm and I'm glad I can't now imagine my life if I'd gone down the different route but now I'm like but what if this is because I'm single what if I meet the one and and I've left it too late and my eggs are like you know just because I have previously been

pregnant doesn't mean I have quality eggs for reproduction and I feel like that's another thing, we all assume, well, I've been pregnant before, so I don't need egg freeze and I'll be fine. No, especially not as you age. And your age limit, things start to dramatically drop off about 38 onwards. People's eggs deplete. So even in six months, I could go back and she'll be like, now you've only got total four eggs in there. And I'll be like, what? It's just the age, it's the body clock, it's how the female body is designed and it sucks. Um, there are antioxidants and, um, she did describe actually some enzyme antioxidant thing for me to take to help your body. Um, and also your lifestyle choices help with your ovary

and egg production. I smoke, I drink a lot of coffee and I drink alcohol. So I am the arch nemesis of quality eggs and I've accepted that. Um, but yeah, that's the journey. that's where I'm at. I am not entirely sure when I will do it. I am looking at going to Malaysia to get it done and I will keep you updated. I mean like I can do miniature podcasts or reels or vlogs on like how it feels with the injection if you're worried about that or you know the mental space and all that jazz but yeah I thought I would at least do an episode introducing the idea and then telling you exactly what goes down. So yeah, you don't have to go off and do your own research. I'd be interested to know how many of you ladies have the same mindset. Are you thinking

about it? Is it something your friends or family members have suggested? Are you scared? Are you not? Do you want kids? Do you don't? Yeah, let me know. Slide into my DMs as always, at nixalina n-i-x-a-l-i-n-a and with that i will end this episode and i will see you all next week thanks for listening to the can't keep my mouth shut podcast produced and hosted by me nixalina i'm recorded in the splice car studios in singapore i'm available to listen to on spotify Apple Podcasts, Google, and all major podcast listening apps. Do subscribe to enjoy a new episode every Monday evening. Please do give me a five-star review. It helps other people also find my podcast. For more content and features to read, you can check out my website,

nixalina.com. That's nixalina.com. I'm also on social media. Simply search at Nixalina, N-I-X-A-L-I-M-A to find me don't be shy come say hi