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Trigger Warning: This narrative includes accounts of emotional distress, coercion, and medical trauma associated with egg donation. Readers who are sensitive to themes of bodily autonomy and exploitation or who have gone through comparable experiences may find it distressing.

Iyanuoluwa, 24, has never been the same since she gave her eggs to an Abuja fertility clinic four years ago.

In Nigeria, donating eggs is frequently promoted as a kind and safe way to assist a couple become pregnant and earn up to ₦500k.

However, a poorly regulated sector silently preys on young women who are at risk behind the pristine clinic walls. Since there is no clear national regulation regarding egg donation, many clinics function in an opaque and unaccountable manner.

As a result, many egg donors—particularly students and low-income women—are left to pay for hurried surgeries, unmonitored hormone injections, and potentially fatal consequences, while the clinics profit from desperate couples.

Iyanuoluwa continues to experience anxiety, a profound feeling of loss, hormone imbalance, and persistent worry that her fertility may be jeopardized four years later.

This provides a glimpse into the realities of some Nigerian fertility clinics and the silent costs faced by vulnerable young women.

READ THE STORY BELOW

It was November 2021.

I was 20 and in my final year at a university in the southwest. I had over ₦180k in unpaid fees, and my parents couldn’t afford it. My dad had already taken a loan from work and couldn’t access another.

My school fees had been unpaid for a year and seven months, and it was clear my dad couldn’t get the money. He would have found a way if there was one, and it weighed heavily on him.

My mum always mentioned how he couldn’t sleep at night and how frequently they had to check his blood pressure.

It broke them, and it broke me, too. So, I took matters into my own hands.

Egg donation ads were everywhere, and girls talked about how easy it was. The agent I contacted told me I’d get ₦180k. Later, he said the Abuja clinic could only pay ₦140k. I didn’t care.
I just wanted out of my situation.

I joined a WhatsApp group with over 200 other girls. Most were from Benin and Port Harcourt, and some had donated more than once.

In November 2021, I travelled to the fertility centre in Asokoro, Abuja.

That trip altered my life forever.

Something felt off the moment I arrived. We couldn’t leave the compound.

No visitors.

No noise.

No freedom.

The injections started immediately. They injected us in the morning and evening every two days for the first week, then daily from Day 9 to Day 14.

They jabbed needles into the side of my belly, followed by constant vaginal scans.

They’d insert a long and thick instrument into my tight vagina to check out the eggs. The pain was excruciating, and even when I cried out in discomfort, the nurses often just shouted at me to “cooperate.”

Nobody cared that I was in pain.

After all the form-filling, endless tests, settling in, and being told I couldn’t leave, I realised there was no turning back. This was what I had gotten myself into.

Day 14 was egg retrieval day.

They sedated me with anaesthesia. Just before I passed out, a nurse in the facility — let’s call her Nurse Y leaned over and asked if I’d ever had sex. I shook my head and signalled no. I was barely conscious.

When I woke up, I was bleeding. I didn’t have my underwear on anymore. I was alone in a private room.

I knew I had lost my virginity on that table during that procedure. Nurse Y later came in and apologised. She admitted they should’ve taken note.

Then she begged me not to tell anyone.

When the meaning sank in, pain and anger tore through me.

Two days after I returned to school, Nurse Y told me over the phone that my eggs weren’t viable, and I was sent ₦40k as opposed to ₦140k. Since I didn’t have money to travel back, I borrowed ₦10k from Nurse X to cover transport and had to pay her back.

I also sent ₦5k to the agent who linked me, leaving me with ₦25k.

I cried my lungs out. I was shattered, helpless. I sobbed like my world was ending because, at that moment, it was.

I cried and cried.

Some girls went back to fight after being underpaid. But I didn’t even have the transport fare to go back.

What would I have said if I got there? That I was a virgin, and they took that, too?

The agent said it didn’t matter, that the procedure wouldn’t affect my virginity.

But it did.

While at the facility, some girls who had completed theirs before I arrived showed up and caused a scene. They were angry, claiming the clinic had deducted their pay.

When I asked Nurse Y what was happening, she explained that the clinic often deducted pay from donors who skipped injections or missed a day.

Apparently, donors had to sign a register every day for two weeks, and missing one day meant a deduction from their payment.

I didn’t miss a single day, and no one ever mentioned that I could be shortchanged if my eggs didn’t ‘meet their expectations.’

Most of the girls in that facility were my age or younger. One of the nurses even said, “This clinic pays more than the others. You people are lucky.”

It didn’t feel like luck. It felt like a factory. They injected us, scanned us, collected what they needed, and sent us off.

Some girls who lived in town were even encouraged to bring their friends for a commission. The more desperate girls they brought, the more they earned. It was a system — a business.

I still don’t believe my eggs were unusable. I responded well to the injections and treatments for the entire two weeks. They argued that my AS genotype could have been a factor. I don’t know how true that was.

I don’t even know how many eggs they took. I was unconscious.

But I remember the clipping pain near my clitoris. Even while under mild anaesthesia, I felt it, and the pain was sharp and unbearable.

My next period after the procedure lasted two weeks. I had severe blood clots, cramping, and bloating that made it hard to walk. I thought I’d damaged my body and was dying.

I called Nurse Y to voice my concerns. She claimed it was normal.

“It’s just your body reacting,” she said.

But I wasn’t okay.

I locked myself in my room for days, drowning in regret, anxiety, fear, anguish and a sense of loss. I didn’t eat for three straight days. I only forced something down on the fourth day when it felt like my soul was slipping away.

I still didn’t have the money to pay my fees and couldn’t write my exams. Everything I had done to solve the problem had made it worse, and I couldn’t tell anyone.

I started having suicidal ideations. I didn’t feel like myself anymore. I felt like I’d been taken advantage of and lost something I could never get back.

Socially, I withdrew. I was terrified my friends would find out and judge me.

Not being allowed to write exams shattered me even more. I blamed myself again and again.

Eventually, after a student protest, my school lifted the “no fee, no exam” policy. The protest shut things down for two months. This gave me the time I needed to heal. I went home to my parents.

When I got home, I worked part-time as a waiter, cleaner, and sometimes cashier at a restaurant. Thankfully, my boss paid my school fees under a written agreement that I’d return to work for him after exams. If I couldn’t, my dad would have to pay him back within three months.

He paid upfront, and my dad settled the debt after five months once his loan came through.

When school resumed, I wrote my exams and the ones I missed were also re-conducted for those who couldn’t pay earlier.

Since they told me they couldn’t use my eggs, I’ve been stuck in a constant cycle of fear and panic, wondering if I’ll ever be able to conceive.

I don’t even know if they were telling the truth or just lying to me, but the statement hasn’t left my mind since.

The panic eventually eased. But the impact didn’t entirely go away.

I wasn’t in any relationship before, and I’ve not been in any after. I just can’t bring myself to try. I have a constant fear of abandonment: that they’ll leave me once they find out what happened. They’ll think I’m damaged and walk away.

I’ve blamed myself several times for choosing that path and for trying to solve something that, in the end, was taken care of by my dad, with the help of my boss, just a few months into working.

And for losing something so important in such a cheap way.

Four years later, I still live with the consequences. My periods are irregular. My anxiety hasn’t left, and I haven’t told a soul in my family.

The worst part is that nothing has changed. Clinics like this still exist, still hunting vulnerable girls and silencing them with shame and fear.

I didn’t know any better. I just needed help, but what I got was trauma.

The National Health Act of 2014 is the only law that attempts to regulate egg donation in Nigeria, but it doesn’t directly address it. Section 53 criminalises the buying or selling of any human tissue, blood, or blood products, and since eggs are considered human tissue, this creates a legal grey area. Egg donation itself isn’t explicitly illegal.

There are no regulations or clear rules specifying who can donate eggs, how often, or what compensation is fair. As a result, many young women go through the process without proper counselling, medical support, or clear information, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation.

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