A trans man says donating his eggs so his sister can have a baby was the "easiest decision" he’s ever made - despite worrying about feeling "less of a man".
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00:00 I am super nervous right now.
00:04 I called Shizy to help calm me down but...
00:08 I can't believe I'm doing this.
00:13 We're here now.
00:15 I think I'm going to have to come out.
00:17 I'm transgender and I'm harvesting my eggs for my sister.
00:20 You all had questions, so let's answer them.
00:22 Why didn't I harvest my eggs before I transitioned?
00:25 Before I medically transitioned, I was experiencing intense gender dysphoria.
00:30 And so for me, alleviating that became urgent and more important than the idea of having a biological child someday in the future.
00:37 That was the right decision for me and I'm really glad that I did it that way.
00:40 Because had I went into a process that was going to make me more aware of my body at that point in time, it would have broke me.
00:48 Have I become dysphoric as parts of my body that are associated with being female are focused on?
00:53 No. No.
00:57 I think that's a testament to my growth.
01:00 I am totally comfortable in the body that I'm in.
01:03 And the fact that some people will see me as biologically female, that doesn't really bother me.
01:08 At the end of the day, I know who I am and I'm confident in the skin I'm in.
01:11 Did I have to come off testosterone?
01:13 Also no.
01:14 I haven't stopped my testosterone, but I have reduced it.
01:17 I was taking three and a half pumps daily and I dropped down to one a day.
01:20 Did being on testosterone affect my egg count?
01:23 Yes, it did. But in a good way.
01:26 I actually spoke to my doctor about this on our consultation call.
01:29 Obviously, there's little to no research on trans men going through this process.
01:33 So instead, they use the statistics based on cis women who had high levels of testosterone in their body.
01:39 What the research said is that cis women who had high levels of testosterone tend to have more eggs in their egg reserve.
01:45 So actually, being on testosterone has potentially benefited me in this situation.
01:50 Is there anything in this process that surprised me in good or bad ways?
01:54 There's definitely two things that come to mind.
01:56 The first being that I have PCOS, which I've never been diagnosed for,
02:00 but makes sense because I always used to have really painful periods and pass out.
02:04 And the second thing is definitely how the doctors and nurses have treated me throughout this process.
02:09 I feel like my identity has been completely respected,
02:12 no matter what room I've walked into or who I've spoken to.
02:15 I don't know why I'm getting upset by that. I'm going to blame the hormones.
02:19 It's just, it's really special. It's really special.
02:24 I'm just really grateful because I was worried about that.
02:30 All right, I think we should stop there.
02:33 Thank you for watching. Bye for now.