I scored 1240 on my SATs. I thought that was OK. So did Temple. Coulda gone anywhere …
Apparently my verbal and math skills just don’t cut it for some people. It’s a shame. I could really use an extra 10 grand. And, somewhere, there’s someone who could really use my eggs. That means ovaries, son. My half of the embryo. The gold nuggets of womanhood, if you will.
All I have to do is give up 15 of them or so and I’m rich, bi-yotch. Egg donation nets donors anywhere from $7,000 to a three-figure payback, depending on her qualifications (like a minimum score of 1300 on her SATs. Drat!).
So simple. All these hours spent wrapped in a waitress apron when I could have been shelling out my would-be offspring for cold, hard cash. Where was the 411, guys? Who decided I should be kept in the dark?
It’s probably better that I was. This whole cash for eggs thing does not sit well with me. For the past few months, I’ve been noticing the two-column-by-five-inch egg donation ads we’ve printed on various pages. In a college newspaper.
I’ve even read them more than once in designing the features sections (I occasionally earn my keep around here).
It’s an enticing offer staring me down from the other side of the screen. So quick and painless – not to mention profitable. Like most who are in oodles of student loan debt, I’m hyper to get out of it. Would anyone really notice a few cells missing in the scheme of things?
I don’t know if I’d be able to sleep at night. Not only for the potential side effects of donation, including diarrhea, nausea, potential fertility problems, ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, shortness of breath, abdominal bloating and even death, in rare cases (what’s rare?). I have a hard time trusting someone else with my goods.
‘Oh, how heartless,’ you might be thinking. Selfish little me. I am fully on the same page if you’re about to argue in favor of the altruism with which women donate their eggs to others who are incapable of producing or fertilizing their own. This charity benefits countless hopeful mothers. God bless.
So, then, what exactly is my problem? You know me so well. I’m full of mini-Armageddons. I’ll start with the personal. I think embryonic stem-cell research is reprehensible.
This process replaces DNA from and unfertilized egg with another egg’s DNA, which kills the resulting embryo, all in the name of research. This aligns with my staunchly pro-life stance.
You can take that or leave it or put it in your pipe and smoke it. That’s why I warned you that this is the personal section. In considering this transaction, I feel it is important to be informed about what will happen to your eggs should you donate, and to weigh that outcome against your morals.
I would not sleep well knowing I’d traded in part of my body for money and that there was some loss of life as a direct result. This belief is my prerogative.
You think that kind of stuff only happens in far-away laboratories surrounded by miles of desert and cacti? Think again. Last year, New Jersey was ranked one of the top three states in the U.S. in spending on stem-cell research programs. Eerily a hop, skip and jump away.
Second, I’m peeved about the whole selection process – that donors are either accepted or not based on outward qualities, age, talents and intelligence. Sheesh, it’s like picking a couch. “Well, I’d like a nice Aryan boy, at least six feet tall, I want him to particularly enjoy basketball and join the debate team.”
Sold! Next!
You can surf for your kids and your groceries online at the same time. Now that’s multitasking.
I think it is contradictory to hide behind “donating” eggs when the real reason, at least the one that makes marketing to college girls so profitable and successful, is money. Talk about selling out the seeds of life.
Ladies, this is big-time stuff. This isn’t like giving your old sweaters to Goodwill in a brown paper bag for a tax write-off. Your eggs could eventually be someone’s baby. Are you giving them up for the right reasons?
I like looking at myself as much as the next person. But, I don’t want to wander the streets wondering if I’m passing my sons and daughters without knowing. And, I don’t want to wonder 20 years from now which cause I was helping.
What disgusts me most, overall, is that money – huge sums of it – is inspiration for an act of giving that is, in its right form, a beautiful one, but that people are instead cashing in out of financial disparity without seeing the whole picture.
It concerns me that the bang for your buck is so big – and that we college students are being targeted because of our age, education and financial status. Just you wait.
Soon they’ll have a cooler-than-life cartoon character to pitch their program.
Finally, Joe Camel would have someone to hang out with on the weekends.
Nadia Stadnycki can be reached at nadias@temple.edu.
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