Selling my eggs to make rent

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 18:00:00 +0000

At 1:57 I stumble out of the underground and run up the street in budding frost and blinding light. Only one minute late. What’s my best excuse — one that makes me sound normal, charming, not frantic? This is my second test, a second round of interviews. I hope I get the job.

My name is called; I follow the name-caller into a small room. A pleasant, bright, but not overly warm blonde woman says hello and introduces herself. I am asked to undress and put on a gown with the opening and ties in front. I step out from behind a curtain, hoist myself upward, place my ankles in the stirrups, and scoot my behind to the edge of the papered table as I’ve been told. I am asked a few initial questions and told that I’ll feel pressure. Meanwhile, a sterile, phallic-shaped object is inserted into my vagina.

There are my ovaries on the screen to my left. I’d passed a first test already; my organs are what I’ve come to have interviewed today. The blonde woman, a doctor, points to the screen and explains how my insides stack up against her ideal uterine candidate. I twist my neck to see. She tells me I have 18 follicles on the right side, 21 on the left.

Salon.com > Kaye Cain-Nielsen

Selling my eggs to make rent