My husband Austin and I (Kaitlin) tied the knot on August 29th, 2020. We both love exploring and going on adventures! The day we got married we had no idea that we were about to step foot into the biggest adventure yet... Infertility and pregnancy loss.

Austin and I have put our deposit down for IVF and are on the waiting list to start November of this year.  This is an extremely costly experience. The national average after adding medication, costs around $20,000-25,000 PER CYCLE. 

We have been asked multiple times if we had a GoFundMe so.. here we are. We decided there was no way we could reach this dream of starting a family without swallowing our pride and putting our story out there while asking for a little help <3 We appreciate everything and can never thank you all enough for supporting us and this journey to having a family of our own!

Our Story of How We Got Here:

I (Kaitlin) was diagnosed back in the springtime of 2019 with a hormonal disorder called Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and Anovulation after I set an appointment up with an OBGYN to discuss my extremely irregular menstrual cycles (ranging 33-60 days). My OB did a number of blood tests that along with my physical symptoms proved to be exactly what she was thinking. We were told that when we wanted to officially start "trying" for kids that I would need to be put on an ovulation induction medication called Letrozole.

Immediately after our honeymoon I started taking Letrozole, and it actually was working! (I was ovulating for the first time in a LONG time!) However, 2 months passed with no pregnancy so my OB ordered an Hysterosalpingography (HSG) which is an X-ray procedure that is used to view the inside of the uterus and fallopian tubes. She also ordered a semen analysis for Austin. His results came back mostly normal, except he has borderline low sperm count. My HSG results were normal except my left fallopian tube was slightly dilated which I later on learned puts me at high risk of having an ectopic pregnancy which can be life threatening if gone uncaught.

Our 3rd medicated cycle (the same one I had my HSG test done) we ended up pregnant! We found out the day after Christmas and were so over the moon excited! We couldn't believe it! Unfortunately, just 5 short days after, we found out that we had lost little "Bean" (is what we call them) This was a journey in itself trying to mourn our loss, but also keep pushing forward to start our family.

We immediately jumped back into trying. 4 more medicated cycles passed and still nothing was happening so we made an appointment with The Fertility Center of Grand Rapids in March 2021. I was started on Metformin (a common plan for women with PCOS) and was also prescribed a "trigger" shot (Ovidrel) which gave my body another boost to force ovulation. We did one Timed-Intercourse cycle with this regimen which failed.

We then went on to try Intrauterine insemination (IUI). We had both IUI's fail and so now we are waiting to start IVF this fall. 

We will be posting updates on here for anyone interested in following along on our journey. <3