A lot of Transpeople would want to have their own children in the future and to do that successfully you will need to freeze your sperm or eggs. If you are already in the process of HRT it might be on your mind that is it too late for spem or ovum banking.
Too late for banking?
The answer is no! You can still do your sperm or ovum banking after you have started HRT but you will have to pause the process for a while to do it. Dr Kalra says, “In case you have already started HRT then what we do is we stop HRT for some time, 2 to 3 months and then we do the tests and then we do the sperm banking and the ovum banking then restart HRT.”
Sperm and Ovum Banking are difficult
Dr Kalra and other doctors realise the issues that come with banking “See, normally I tell all my clients to freeze their eggs in the beginning before our HRT or even the sperms need to be banked. But many times, because of financial constraints we cannot do it at that time. Or family issues or they want to immediately start the HRT process and then decide about it later. Or at that point of time, we are not in a position to decide about it.”
It is okay to take your time in deciding what you want to do with your sperm or eggs. A lot of Trans people aren’t even sure if we want kids and this is a very stressful time in our life. It is important that you can decide about this in advance so that you do not face issues.
Will there be issues?
According to Dr Kalra, there might be some difficulties if you decide later. “At that point in time, retrieval of the ovum would become very difficult. If you are wanting to do it, then do it before HRT.”
Financial Issues
All of these things cost money and so in case you have financial issues, you are not able to do it, you have already started on it or you don’t want to do it yet, you stop HRT for 2-3 months and do the sperm and ovum banking.
Facilities
Doctors often try to connect their patients with sperm and ovum banks but it is up to us if we want to choose the same place. Dr Kalra does so in Bangalore, “In Bangalore, we have in our own hospital also facilities and other hospitals. We give our clients the addresses to the fertility hospitals. We don’t contact the hospital on the client’s behalf. The hopital tells us the details and gives us the liberty to go there and get it done.”
Cost
An important thing to keep in mind here is the cost of these things. While the cost differs from city to city and place to place. Dr Kalra talks about her approximated rate keeping Bangalore in mind. “Approximately differs so I can’t tell the clients because I don’t directly deal with this. But for 3 years, around 75k is an approx cost but it differs again from city to city.”
So, if you want to go forward with sperm and ovum banking keep these things in mind, especially research about the cost and the risks to do it after you start HRT.