Have you ever wondered: “How do parents going through in vitro fertilization (IVF) have remaining embryos — and how do they decide what to do with them?” I know I did.
There’s an excellent embryo adoption guest post over at Harvard Health Publishing that addresses these questions and the options parents must closely assess.
Quoting from the post by Ellen S. Glazer, a clinical social worker specializing in infertility and adoption:
“I have found that many people deal with this with avoidance. Each year they pay a storage fee and give themselves a pass to avoid the topic for another year. Some regard their embryos as a kind of fertility insurance policy. The embryos are there should they need them. For some families, however, the decision cannot be passive.”
Families that place embryos for adoption have an extremely complicated decision tree to navigate. Our placing family has certainly been a blessing to us, and articles such as this one help me more fully appreciate God’s providence and care for these families and these precious babies.