Our Primary Infertility Story

“So I’m not the sort of girl that puts her life up on Instagram. I have been hiding my story for a long time. I believe that no one has figured me out and I believe that no one knows what’s going on. But people around us are not silly.

I have had a very painful 10 years of infertility. After we got married, I truly believed that nothing could ever ruin us or break us. We were so young, and we were so naive. We started our fertility journey dreaming and wondering what it would be like to have a family, to have little ones bouncing around, so we started to make that dream happen.

Until it didn’t.

Doctors wouldn’t take us seriously because we were young. They said, ‘You have ages. Live life.’ They commented on my weight and said lose some and maybe this could work.

We spent a long time trying burying our feelings inside. We had no help emotionally. We had no one we wanted to talk to about it. All our friends Bh were all very fertile, so why be the couple who is miserable?

When a few years passed and people questioned, we explained we have [lots of time], we are working, we have a lot we want to achieve. We didn’t obviously.

We wanted a baby so badly.

We went to dr after dr, who constantly criticized us and told me it’s because I was too overweight and nothing would work.

I cried for hours and hours and my husband and I drifted apart.

I was so angry at Hashem (Gd) and he wasn’t and I couldn’t understand why.

A lot of Rosh Hashanas past, and periods came on Yom Kippur. I stormed out of shul (synagogue) a million times; I couldn't just sit and be. I wanted answers.

One Yom Kippur, I was fuming. I thought I was pregnant as I was late. Kol Nidre (the first prayer on Yom Kippur) started and I felt that feeling we all dread, that feeling of our dreams disappearing. I stormed out of shul. The wind was so loud and booming, and I screamed all the way home. I didn't understand what I had done, what we had done as a couple that was so wrong.

We decided it was time for someone to help us, sort us out and get back to our game plan. I realized then that if plan A doesn't work, there is plan B and if that doesn't work, there are a lot more letters in the alphabet.

We again saw different doctors and we found one who was amazing and couldn't wait to help us. 6 months of medicated cycles began, a lot of IUIs and nothing.

In the meantime, I knew I needed to get fit and healthy mentally and physically. I decided I needed to do this for me. I had a job to do. My job was to be ready to be a mother.

So I started. I lost a ton of weight, got my head in the game, while we both worked on our marriage and our individual selves. We found out our doctor had left the practice by the time we had returned, but we didn't give up.

No way.

Not now.

We found another doctor, at another clinic, and he understood about Judaism and our halachot (laws) and he was brilliant. He got us.

We started again, more medicated cycles and monitoring. Life was manic. Work. Hospital. Work. Hospital. Couldnt catch my breath.

Every time I felt I couldn't do it. I looked at what I had achieved and I wasn't giving up.

He said, "You've already done an IUI. I'm not wasting your time or money doing it again. I think you should do IVF."

Our hearts stopped. IVF.

Did he just say that?

We came home and instead of crying, we did our research. It was our worst nightmare. We took a couple months break and went for it.

Without thinking we did it. Injections after injections, tears and bruising every little bit of it worth it if I got what I wanted. A friend of mine did my injections at work for me.

Again, something we just had to do and it didn't even bother me, because I knew it had to happen.

We had a date set for the embryo to be put back in. For 5 days, you wait for a doctor to call you, and tell you how many eggs you have. The waiting is horrendous.

You think there might be something one day, and you hope they are ok. We ended up having a few and that's all we needed.

We made it to that day..... We saw the embryo.

We watched as they transferred it. We watched on the screen the little bubbles and it was so clear that it was a little embryo.

We davened (prayed), we waited, I hardly moved, I doubted a lot...

Of course this wasn't going to work. Why would it?

Rosh Hashana came. It's the day that I dread every year as

Every year my prayers are the same and every year it never happens. I was really ill and my transfer booked before Yom Kippur... But nope!

I hyperstimulated, and couldn't do it. They had to be frozen. I couldn't understand-

I was so close and so far. How could I not be ready?

Hashem (Gd) knew I needed a few more days to recover, to get my body in the best place to have this Embryo put back in.

But 9 very long days later

we got the call.

For the first time in 10 years, it was positive!

I don't have an ending to this journey just yet, but the little embryo is still growing inside and we are holding on to all the positive. Who knows what will be, but we know that please Gd, in a few months, this little baby will be here because my husband and I never gave up.

It was close. We did a million times say we were done but we didn't give in. It is because of our sheer fight, we are where we are today.

It's weird- many friends along the way had only pity for us, we lost a lot of friends and made a lot of amazing ones. But I don't pity us.

We grew together, we developed, we understand how we both work, and how strong we are as a couple. A part of me is grateful as we are two very different people now.

We are not two people in a marriage wanting something separately and not working together. We became a team, with a goal, who wouldn't take no for an answer.

I am grateful for the challenges we have had and I hope that whatever comes our way, we will fight it together.

I don't know what will be with the corona virus in the world, but we are not giving up now. So I don't have an ending for you just yet but whatever happens, we will be a family.

Whatever it takes.”