"But none of this crying was from actually being sad; I just felt too connected to the lives of others..."

"... to the vulnerability I could hear in someone's voice or hanging plainly on his face," writes Catherine Lacey, who, to become an egg donor, had taken injections of Lupron (which "greatly reduces the sex hormones estradiol and testosterone") and Menopur ("made from the urine of post-menopausal women") and Gonal-F, ("a mega-follicle-stimulating-hormone that is bovine-derived").

If I made eye contact with anyone I immediately wanted to mourn and rejoice them. Subways were impossible. Strangers were emotional landmines. I was the menopausal, pregnant, and postpartum mother of the world.

I realize now that it sounds dramatic. It was dramatic, even to me: I'm not the weepiest woman who ever was. I'm known mostly for well-intentioned sarcasm, level-headedness, and an ability/susceptibility for detaching. So I found the over-emotional side-effect strangely enjoyable, like I was renting some more emotional woman's brain.

It's quite disturbing to think that these stereotypically female qualities are so chemical, that they could be injected, but then perhaps I wouldn't find it so disturbing if I were not myself female.

ADDED: A reader emails:

I used IVF to get pregnant. I took Lupron, Menopur, and Follistim (which is similar to Gonal-F). I didn't have any emotional symptoms at all. The only thing that happened was mild bloating and weight gain. Lacey's experience is totally foreign to me.