Hello everyone, my name is Brittany. My husband Dustin and I have been married for seven years this June. Getting married you learn to live your life as husband and wife, there are many changes that come with that. There are also many expectations that you as a couple have to discuss as to what works best for you as a couple. We chose to find out who we were as a married couple and just spend the first year enjoying the next step to our relationship.

We both strongly believe that everything happens for a reason even if those reasons aren’t clear. With that being said we were not trying or preventing to have a child, if it happened it was meant to happen. Each day goes by, waking up, going to bed just to go to sleep to wake up the next day. A couple years go by and we decide to start timing intercourse. Each month I would start a new cycle, I must not have been tracking right is what I told myself.

More time goes by and it’s now 2015, still no positive pregnancy test. Out of nowhere I start having pains during my ovulation. They started out as mild cramping and quickly become so much more. I make an appointment with a Dr who runs your routine blood tests in which everything shows to be normal. Emergency room visits became regular for me as I was having hemorrhaging cysts during each cycle.

Enter 2016 my Dr decided to do surgery to see what the issue really was. I had a fibroid tumor and stage four endometriosis where twelve spots were burnt off. At my follow up my Dr discussed that endometriosis can come back, but it’s not very likely. In fact she expected me to become pregnant shortly after. Seven months go by without pain but also without a positive pregnancy test.

After those seven months go by here comes more pain. My dr said it was likely my endometriosis had come back and I wouldn’t be a good candidate for removal again since it had come back shortly after it was removed.

My dr advised me to start birth control to see if we could regulate the pain. I know starting birth control when trying for a baby doesn’t make sense but if you’ve dealt with that type of pain you would try anything for your chance to have something work.

Fast forward to October 25, 2016 my father in law unexpectedly passed away. During that time my husband and I decided life is too short and I needed to get off birth control. Who knew stopping birth control would result in even more pain than I was in before. Another Dr visit was made where my Dr wanted me to either stay on birth control or put my body into early menopause. I was in disbelief, I am sitting here telling her how I want to have a family and she’s telling me my options are to not have a family.

I made an appointment with a new Dr where she wanted to start from the beginning to run her own set of tests. During these tests we learned that I had very high prolactin levels that were not normal. I was then sent to an endocrinologist where we discovered I had a tumor on my pituitary gland and I have hypothyroidism as well as hashimoto disease. New meds were started to treat both and now I had two Drs working together to get me pregnant. I ended up in the emergency room again, this time it wasn’t a hemorrhaging cyst, nope it was my fibroid tumor that my first dr in fact left inside of me during my first surgery.

After a year of not conceiving my Gynecologist referred me to a specialist. During my consultation my RE moved me from his office to an exam room to see if he could see anything on an ultrasound. In a year of going to the specialist we learned that I have low ovarian reserve. I am 30 years old and my ovaries are at the age of 43. Three failed times cycles, three failed IUIs we moved forward with a hysteroscopy. Everything with that looked well enough to move forward with IVF.

Next came the waiting game to hear back from insurance only to find out they denied all ivf including meds. Cash price we have been quoted at $14,500 with an additional $5,000 for ICSI and up to $6,000 in medications. Unfortunately this money has to be paid up front so for now we will continue to have faith and save back money until we have enough to start the process.

Infertility isn’t for everyone, you have to be strong physically, mentally and emotionally. It is easy to get defeated but we must remember that there is a reason for us to go through this. You must see that it will be all worth it when each of us can say we beat all odds against us while holding our blessings in our arms.

Speak up and tell your story for it can help someone in some way as well as raise awareness.