Embryo Adoption
Embryo adoption involves the legal transfer of cryopreserved embryos from donor families to recipient families. This path to parenthood is governed by contract law and has been wrapped in the safeguards of established adoption practice. To ensure the well-being of all parties, Chrysalis House is honored to support you with excellent educational resources and fully prepare you to parent a child that will not be biologically related to you.
As an inclusive, non-discriminatory agency, Chrysalis House believes embryo adopting families come in all shapes, sizes, spiritual and ethnic backgrounds. We are also pleased to support our embryo adopting families in accessing any program that feels like their best fit, however we do offer an established partnership with the Snowflakes® Embryo Adoption Program.
How does embryo adoption work?
In the U.S., embryos created by couples pursuing pregnancy via in vitro fertilization (IVF) are cryopreserved. As couples complete their efforts to build a family, they must determine what to do with their remaining embryos. The families have several options: Maintain the embryos in a frozen state and pay an annual storage fee; donate them to science; thaw and dispose of them; Or - many couples elect to donate their cryopreserved embryos to another family for reproductive purposes.
Once a match is established, legal contracts are reviewed and approved by the donor and recipient parties to finalize the adoption process. Next, clinical approval and shipment of the embryos will be arranged; and an adopting mother collaborates with her physician to prepare her body to receive the embryos. On the day of the frozen embryo transfer (FET) the physician will thaw a pre-determined number of embryos and transfer them into the woman’s womb. Should a successful pregnancy result, she will be able to experience pregnancy and give birth to her adopted child.
In this path to parenthood, an openness to establishing ongoing communication with the placing family is encouraged. The amount and type of contact will be determined by the families themselves; however, open relationships with organic growth are key to allowing children born from this process to maintain connections prioritizing both their biology and their biography. Research has proven that having even minimal communication between placing and adopting families is beneficial not only to the adopted child, but to all parties in the adoption.