Tick-tock: Racing against biological clock

Many women like DJ Charmaine Yee are rushing to be part of Singapore’s first elective egg freezing batch next year due to age and medical reasons

- Jeanmarie Tan

Kiss 92 radio DJ Charmaine Yee was all set to head to Kuala Lumpur next week to begin her egg-freezing journey with a fertility clinic there.

Even though the Singapore Government announced last month that the Republic will allow elective egg freezing, which is done for nonmedical reasons, for women aged between 21 and 35 from next year, she was still worried she will “miss the boat” as she turns 35 this July.

But Yee’s “concrete plan” changed when Minister of State for Social and Family Development Sun Xueling said in Parliament last Tuesday that women who miss the criteria slightly can get their fertility doctors to appeal on their behalf.

With this new possibility on the horizon, Yee hopes to undergo the procedure in Singapore instead.

It has always been her preferred choice, even though it will likely cost her thousands more and there is no age limit in Malaysia.

She tells The Sunday Times: “My gynaecologist recommended we put in an appeal. We are crossing our fingers that it will be successful.”

Yee is racing against her biological clock for medical reasons too.

When she was 25, she underwent emergency surgery to remove her left fallopian tube and ovary due to a 10cm ovarian dermoid cyst which had undergone torsion (twisting), resulting in the loss of blood flow to that ovary.

She recalls: “Initially, I was dejected and worried about how my chances of having children were halved, but I was reassured I still have one good ovary and am still young.”

A couple of years later, she discovered another dermoid cyst in her right ovary, which has remained stable so far at 4cm in size.