Dean and Mallorie

When Dean and I got married, the plan was always to start trying for kids right away. We both came from large families and wanted to have 2, maybe 3 kids of our own. It never occurred to me that it wouldn’t happen right away. Growing up you hear all these stories about how careful you have to be not to get pregnant, but nobody ever tells you that’s not how it works for everyone. When my sister announced the week after the wedding that she was pregnant, I was so excited! Now we could be pregnant together and our children would be so close. But three months went by, then six, and then my niece was here and there had been no signs of life in my uterus yet.

After a year we got referred to the fertility clinic, which after some not so fun tests, were able to tell us that Dean had a chromosome translocation which affected his sperm count. While conceiving naturally was still possible, it wasn’t likely. Our best option for a child of our own was IVF/ICSI which does not come cheap.

Another 2 years went by while we figured out how to pay for this procedure. At the time there was talk of government funding for IVF but we knew time is not a friend to fertility and we didn’t want to put it off any longer, so with the help of family and friends and a big loan from the bank we went ahead with our first IVF cycle. But I didn’t respond as expected to the meds so that week of injections was a horrible back and forth about whether or not we should cancel. I went into one of our last check ins determined to cancel the whole cycle and try again but some of my follicles had caught up and we decided to keep going. And I’m grateful every day that we did because otherwise we wouldn’t have our little miracle.

Once Enver was about a year old we decided it was time to try for a sibling. We still had one frozen embryo left so we did the transfer that summer and nothing. At this point the provincially funded IVF program was in place and we had gone ahead and put ourselves on the waiting list.Before we started our funded round, my doctor had me do a blood test to check my AMH levels, which came back as low, which meant that I had a low ovarian reserve, so we were going to try a different protocol this time and max out the meds. Unfortunately, none of the extras did much and we ended up with nothing to transfer and our funded round was done.

We talked a little bit about doing a natural round of IVF, but to pay that much money again for such a low chance of success was too much for us. So our journey was over. No more treatments, no more injections, no more trips to the clinic.

We feel so lucky every day that our first round worked and that we have this amazing little boy to call our own. Our family and friends were so supportive, and I’ve tried to be so open about this part of our lives, but it still makes me feel so alone sometimes. Which is why I’ve tried to share my story and bring awareness. Even though this chapter is closed, I will always be a fertility warrior. My son reminds me every day of how blessed I am. He will always know how much he was wanted and how much we love him.