This is the worst thing about freezing your eggs as a single woman

Invasive treatment wasn’t the hard part of egg freezing as a single woman – it was the doctor asking if I’d pay cash and making me fill out forms about ‘me and my husband’

• Jenny Saft was shocked when she saw the eye-watering figure on her bill 
• Still, she went ahead with the procedure and now pays even more yearly  
• The Berlin-based entrepreneur now wants to make things easier for others
• Visit Metro.co.uk to read the full version of this article

As Jenny Saft was getting ready to have her eggs retrieved, she was expecting words of reassurance from her anaesthetist. 

Instead, he asked her if she would like to pay by cash or invoice. 

‘This was just one of the odd moments that punctuated my egg freezing journey’, Jenny, 32, tells Metro.co.uk. 

‘I decided to pursue egg freezing in 2019. I’d been living in San Francisco for almost three years, where the procedure was the norm for women my age and is often funded by peoples’ employers.’

Jenny Saft was shocked when she saw the eye-watering fees that came with egg freezing

But on moving back to Europe, Jenny realised that this wasn’t the case everywhere.

‘In the States, doctors are used to selling their services and delivering a standard of care worthy of the eye-watering cost. But my doctor in Berlin was quiet, and seemed surprised by my questions, offering little in the way of reassurance, information or support.’

‘I left the clinic unclear as to how many cycles I would need, how they might make me feel, or how much it was all going to set me back.’

Still, despite the discomfort she felt, Jenny went ahead with it and ended up with eight healthy eggs ready for freezing.

The Berlin-based entrepreneur now wants to make the process easier for other women

While the Berlin-based entrepreneur thinks the process can be empowering, for her it wasn’t wholly positive.  

‘It speaks volumes that the hormones, procedure and recovery weren’t the worst bit for me, not by a mile: it was the lack of support and empathy I experienced from the clinic that left me wanting. 

‘For example, when I went to my first appointment, the nurse at reception asked me if I was there with my husband – but I was single. Then all the forms I needed to fill out asked for information about me and my husband.’ 

This was made harder to stomach by the fact that she was paying a hefty sum to have her eggs frozen. 

‘I paid around £7,500 all in – including a second cycle – but nearly paid more when they overcharged me for blood tests that never happened.

‘I was billed for each procedure in turn, receiving countless invoices every week in the post, which charged me individually for everything from diagnostics through to storage and cryopreservation fees (£345).’ 

‘I will always believe that the process was worth it. And if I had to, I’d do it all over again’, Jenny told Metro.co.uk

The whole experience led Jenney to want to improve it for other women considering going down the same path, and she’s since set up a company, Apryl, to fill in the gaps in care and hold patients’ hands through the process. 

‘Everyone deserves to access treatment on their terms, armed with knowledge, facts and resources, so they can make informed decisions about which treatment feels right for them.

‘I still haven’t touched my eggs, and there’s a chance I’ll never need to.

‘But I will always believe that the process was worth it. And if I had to, I’d do it all over again’.

Visit Metro.co.uk to read the full version of this article 

READ MORE: 

I will never depend on a man – I’m freezing my eggs at 37 so I can have a baby whenever I please

We kept six IVF embryos frozen for years… only to realise we could never afford a brother of sister for our son 

Most common age for having children over the last 250,000 years is 27 – while fathers are consistently older than mothers, study finds 

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