u/Sweetyrickaa

Hey everyone,

I posted here about a week ago, the night before my retrieval, and I just wanted to come back with an update because so many of you were incredibly kind to me on that post

18 eggs retrieved and 16 were mature!!! 😭
I’m genuinely SO happy with the result and mostly just relieved. After everything, knowing that it’s actually done and that I have 16 mature eggs frozen feels a little surreal.

Recovery has definitely been more intense than I expected though. I had a lot of cramping and was VERY bloated after the retrieval. I was also absolutely exhausted for pretty much the entire week and, emotionally… all over the place lol. I don’t know how much was the hormone crash vs just everything catching up with me, but I definitely underestimated that part.

Then my period arrived on day 5 post-retrieval and OH MY GOD It is probably the heaviest period I’ve ever had and the cramps are painful. It’s manageable, but definitely not my usual period.

The good thing is that I’m with my family right now, which I think has made such a difference. I don’t really think about the discomfort when I’m talking to people, laughing, doing things etc. It’s mostly when I finally sit down or lie in bed that I suddenly realise how exhausted and sore my body still is.

So I guess my ovaries gave me 16 mature eggs AND an emotional life lesson 😭

And ALSO, I think the biggest relief is knowing I don’t have to constantly think about my biological clock anymore. As a woman it takes SUCH a huge weight off my shoulders now I can just focus on myself, my life, what makes me happy and actually have kids when I feel ready, instead of feeling like I’m running out of time.

thank you again to everyone who commented on my first post. I was reading your replies before my retrieval and they genuinely made me feel so much less alone.

For anyone currently going through stimulation or waiting for their retrieval: you’ve got this. And please give yourself permission to be absolutely useless for a few days afterwards if your body asks for it !!

Hi everyone!!

Feel very nervous to post this but I need some advice because I’m trying to figure out if I’m actually being realistic with a role I’m applying for 😭

I’m in my 20s, based in London and bilingual French-English.

I currently work as a Tech Analyst for a corporate intelligence firm, and my wider background is mostly in international security, diplomacy and public affairs.

So basically, on paper, nothing really screams “Executive Assistant” lol.

BUT alongside my analyst work, for the past 2+ years I’ve also been heavily involved in supporting senior leadership within an international organisation, and when I actually look at what I do, a lot of it is basically EA/PA work.

I manage calendars and inboxes, organise meetings across different time zones, prepare agendas/briefing packs/presentations, organise travel and accommodation, deal with expenses and invoices, draft emails and official correspondence, follow up on actions after meetings and organise conferences/events.

I also deal with board members, diplomats, government officials and external partners, work with confidential information and I’m very often the person behind the scenes making sure everything is organised and actually gets done 😭

Before that, I also worked in a government/diplomatic environment where I helped coordinate international delegations, official meetings and events, prepared briefings/correspondence and worked with different government and international stakeholders.
I’ve done quite a lot outside of the traditional “admin” side too, like research, project coordination and funding applications. For example, I recently helped secure around €80k in funding for a project.

Basically, I’ve realised that although my career has naturally gone towards analysis/policy, I actually REALLY enjoy the executive support side of what I do. I like organising everything, anticipating what someone is going to need, fixing random problems, dealing with different people and just making things run smoothly.

So now I’m seriously considering moving into EA/PA work full-time.

My main questions are:

Would you consider what I’ve been doing as actual EA experience even though EA has never been my official job title?

If you work in EA recruitment, how would you personally position this background?

Would really appreciate honest opinions/advice, especially from London EAs or recruiters!

Hi everyone! I’ve been reading so many posts on this subreddit throughout this whole process, and honestly, thank you to everyone who keeps this community alive. Reading about other people’s experiences genuinely made me feel less lonely, especially on the days where I felt like nobody around me really understood what I was going through.

My egg retrieval is tomorrow morning and I think it’s only really hitting me tonight that I actually made it through this whole process.

I did pretty much everything alone. The screenings, blood tests, appointments, scans, hormones, injections, watching my follicles grow, worrying about whether everything was progressing properly, the trigger shot… everything.

Oh, and somewhere along the way I also found out 4 months ago that I have TWO uteruses 😭 because apparently one wasn’t enough. Honestly, at this point my reproductive system has more plot twists than my actual life.
But jokes aside, this whole experience has been weirdly emotional.

On one hand, I feel incredibly powerful. I’m literally so impressed about seeing what my body is capable of. I’ve been injecting myself with hormones, going to appointments, dealing with my body changing and still carrying on with my normal life. Now I’m about to have my eggs retrieved and part of me is like… holy shit, I actually did all of that.

But I also feel incredibly lonely and Idk if you guys also felt that way?

And I think egg freezing just forced me to confront something bigger about myself. I’ve always been the person who just does shit on her own. I figure things out, deal with whatever happens, keep moving and tell myself I’m fine because technically… I am. I always manage.

But I think I’m tired of always having to manage EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE.
There’s a difference between knowing you can do everything alone and actually wanting to.

People can care about you and ask how you’re doing, but unless you’re living it, they don’t really see the mental load behind it. Your life looks completely normal from the outside while privately you’re organising everything around injections, medication, scans and what your ovaries are doing that day lol.

And honestly, between the screenings, hormones, periods, contraception, reproductive health, fertility and apparently having TWO FUCKING UTERUSES 😭… being a woman is exhausting. Can my reproductive system please clock out for five minutes???

This whole thing has somehow made me appreciate my body more while also making me completely exhausted by having a female body.

I’m proud of myself, I know I’m independent, I know I’m capable of handling difficult things alone, I’ve proved that to myself enough times.

I just don’t think I want to keep proving it anymore.

My retrieval is tomorrow at 9:30 and tonight I’m sitting here feeling powerful, emotional, exhausted, lonely, weirdly proud of my ovaries… and realising that maybe the biggest thing this experience taught me is that being able to do everything alone doesn’t mean I should have to.

I’m done romanticising doing everything by myself.
And genuinely, thank you again to everyone who shares their experiences here.
You probably don’t realise how much it helps the people silently reading your posts at 2am while googling every tiny symptom and wondering if what they’re feeling is normal 😭 You made this whole thing feel a little less lonely.

Has anyone else gone through egg freezing alone and had it bring up way more emotions about their life than they expected?

We met on Hinge about 2 months ago. The connection was instant, we literally discovered we lived on the same street, like 3 minutes apart. We met the same evening we matched. Since then it’s been really warm and consistent, we’d see each other all the time, cook together, he’d call me “baby,” we’d talk every day, very naturally intimate. He was the one being affectionate and sweet first, honestly.

About 3-4 weeks in, we both had travel at the same time I was in New York for work, he went to Spain and Germany. Before we left, things were still really good. Since we’ve both been back, he’s been noticeably more tired and distant. Less initiation, shorter replies, kind of low energy overall.

Then today I offered to drop by and give him a quick kiss before going out. He replied saying he’s drained and needs some time to himself for a bit.

We’ve never had a defining conversation. Everything has been assumed and natural. I don’t know if this is him genuinely needing to decompress after a chaotic few weeks, or if something has shifted. The signals were so clear before, and now I feel like I’m reading static.

Has anyone been through something similar? Is this worth waiting out, or am I missing something obvious?

For several months I was fully in my “I’m just going to have fun, no feelings, no attachments” era. I was actually so serious about it too. I even deleted Hinge because I couldn’t be bothered to date.

And now I’m here… thinking about a guy and smiling for no reason. It’s actually embarrassing.

I met him in the most random way. I had given him my number, ghosted him, forgot about it. Then he texted again, we realized we live literally 3 minutes away from each other and met the same day.

It started exactly how I wanted it to: easy, physical, no pressure. Perfect casual situation.

Except it didn’t stay casual!!!!

We kept seeing each other and somehow… we just started talking. Like really talking. Not in a forced deep way, just very naturally and he’s quite reserved but I can tell he feels things, he just doesn’t always say them directly. And I don’t know, there’s something about that that made me want to understand him more.

At some point I realized I couldn’t actually treat this like a hookup anymore. Nothing dramatic happened, It just shifted ig.

We went on a proper date and I remember going home and feeling weirdly sad. Not because anything was wrong, but because I think I understood that this could become something real and I wasn’t planning for that at all.

There’s something about being around him that just feels easy like I don’t have to perform or be “on”. We can talk for hours or just sit there and it’s not awkward + I don’t feel like I’m trying to impress him, which is new for me.

Then one night I was out, very drunk and he came to pick me up from the station. He even brought sneakers for me because he thought I might be in heels. Like who does that :’( It was such a small thing but it marked me.

And now we’re kind of… not casual. Not in a big official way, but we’re exclusive, we talk all the time, he tells me I’ll miss him when I leave, because I’m leaving for a 3weeks work trip in ny and I know I will too.

I’m not overthinking every message, I’m not anxious, I’m not trying to control it. I just… like him yk

Which is new for me in this context.

Did this ever happen to you?

I just needed to say it somewhere because I genuinely didn’t expect myself to be here.

Also, kind of happy to realize I can still feel things like this.