I met Rosaline through work a little over a year ago. She has become a dear friend and as I learned of her struggles with fertility, my heart would break as she and Josh experienced so many disappointments. This week, they were given news that they weren't expecting and that comes with significant emotional and financial stress.

This is Rosaline and Josh's story, in their own words:

"Never in our wildest dreams (or nightmares) could we have imagined this is where we’d be.

After 3 years of infertility treatments and many tries, our dream of having a family that has always been just out of reach is at risk of truly staying a dream.

After we married in 2015, at the ripe “fertile” ages of 28, we began trying to have children. A year went by, one month after the other a complete failure with countless negative pregnancy tests and no answers. We had testing done with a doctor and discovered mild fertility issues. When a death in the family happened shortly thereafter, our plans to tackle the fertility problems were put on the backburner, as we moved 2 hours away to take care of a grandparent. Insurance and living circumstances changed so we waited, thinking we still had some time to figure it all out.

Fast forward to 4 years ago. We made a big move to the Midwest and my new insurance allowed for decent infertility care.

Long story short - FIVE IVF cycles and 2 miscarriages later, with poorly developed embryos the norm, as well as a newly diagnosed autoimmune condition (that is now being managed), we’re at the point where if we want to move forward with having children, we’ve been advised that embryo adoption or regular adoption are going to be our best chances for success. To say we’re devastated is the understatement of a lifetime.

We’ve gone into a bit of debt to pay for fertility treatments, as well as had some help from family, and still have some medical bills to pay. Josh had back surgery at the end of March 2023, right after losing his job. This Friday 07/21/23 was our original due date for our baby girl, Soffija, whom we miscarried. We also had over $20,000 in unexpected home repairs less than a year ago that's contributed to the financial strain. If we were younger, we might consider taking a little more time to pursue embryo adoption, but we've also been advised that we shouldn’t delay.

Since I was a young girl, I always knew that having children was the #1 experience I wanted and needed to have in my life. I have an intense, rooted desire to experience pregnancy and give birth to a child. Coming from a family where one parent is an adoptee, the idea of my child not being genetically related to me makes no difference to me. Embryo adoption will be the cheaper of the two routes we could take, and it’ll still allow for the pregnancy and childbirth experience that I desperately desire. Embryo adoption is not covered by insurance to any degree, so we need to find a way to pay for it, with financing no longer available to us. We’re at the point where our only option is to reach out to the community to help us move forward in our infertility journey, and hopefully grow our family.

The funds raised from this will go towards adoption fees, FDA-required disease testing of donor parents, additional diagnostic testing on Me (Rosaline), necessary transfer and immunological medications, some outstanding IVF medical bills, and any additional medications that are not covered by insurance.

Believe me when I say this – if it wasn’t truly necessary, we wouldn’t be asking you all for help. We’ve said no to doing something like this multiple times when family or friends have offered to fundraise for us. We wanted to do as much of this on our own as possible. We didn’t want to burden others with our “misfortune”. But I’ve come to realize that, yes, we CHOSE to seek fertility treatments, but we DID NOT choose to have infertility. This has been the most challenging and saddest journey of our lives, full of so much heartbreak and pain.

If our next best step is embryo adoption (the cost is a fraction of regular adoption), we need a little help to make this happen. There are so many other couples going through infertility and it can be a very lonely road when you don’t have the support you need - mental, physical, emotional, financial, or otherwise. There’s a lot of shame and guilt that comes along with infertility. We want other couples to know that they are NOT alone in this fight. We hope that our story can be a beacon for others that need it, and we are here to support other couples along their journeys as well.

Anything you can donate helps, even $1. We are so grateful to our friends, family, and the community for the support we’ve received thus far, and I promise you we’ll never take it for granted. Thank you for taking the time to read our story, and if you cannot donate, please share it with others. Thank you!!!"

-Rosaline and Josh

You can follow some of our most recent IVF journey on TikTok -

@chinadollrosie2011

Rosaline -Our IVF Journey