Thank you for taking the time to check out my fundraiser!

For anyone that has walked the journey of infertility, you know how impossibly painful it can be. When I was 17 years old I found out that I was born with Complete Infertility due to MRKH - aka, I was born without a uterus or cervix. The only thing I ever wanted to do when I was growing up was be a mother until the rug was pulled out from under me. I was given few answers, virtually no professional support, and this feeling I was broken, incomplete, a freak (teens can be so dramatic).

12 years later, I have come to terms with my condition. I don't hide it (I don't exactly have it printed across my forehead though either) and I have accepted that motherhood for me will look a little different, and that's ok. 

Something like UTERUS TRANSPLANT was never something that occurred to me as an option. Until a facebook friend shared with me about the first baby born to a woman with a transplanted uterus. Could I do that? Would it be worth trying? So after a simple Google search, I found the clinical trial at Baylor, Scott, and White in Dallas, TX. And I just threw my hat in the ring. "Why not?" I thought, "it's worth exploring." I didn't hear anything for months, then when I did it was the slowest back and forth for about 5 months, to be honest I didn't really think I was really being considered. That is until I got a call from one of the nurses the morning of June 11th, asking me a few follow up questions and "so when can you come out to meet the team and get some testing done in the next couple weeks??"

Ummmm WHAT?!

So I had a decision to make. Was I willing to leap and try and reawaken a dream long released?

Hell. Yea.

2 weeks later I was in the clinic in Dallas with my mom asking as many questions as I was answering. Getting poked and prodded and imaged. And being told if we were serious, we had to start IVF medication in two days, because surgery will be in 2 months!

Here are the details of what the nest several months will look like:
- Multiple trips back and forth to Dallas
- 10-ish days in Dallas for IVF egg retrieval and embryo creation and pre-op labs
- Uterus Transplant surgery projected middle of August
- If everything looks good and no rejection of the organ, one embryo will be transplanted in my new uterus 2-4 months later

Why I am asking for financial help:
Seeing as this is a clinical trial, the estimated 300k the procedures and medications cost is covered by the hospital (yay!). But we are responsible for all IVF costs ($20,000 plus storage fees), travel expenses and accommodations, relocation, and significant time not working.

Here's the other kicker; to be a part of this trial, I have to be a resident of Dallas. We are picking up our lives, leaving jobs and families and friends. But we are going to chase a dream.

And this is all happening now. Like, NOW, now. 

So since no one can give you what you need unless you ask for it...

How you can help:
- Donate here. Any amount, no matter how small, makes this a reality.
- Airline miles. We have a lot of back and forth before we can get settled and those flights add up quickly.
- Prayer, thoughts, energy, spells... whatever you do, I humbly ask you to remember me and Chris as we walk forward in this season.

For anyone who made it all the way through all of that, I so appreciate you!

To follow the journey, connect with me on Facebook (Marianne Wood), Instagram (@mariannewood_), or my new blog dedicated to my UTX process, wombservice.home.blog

"Life is a gamble. There are no sureties. If you want something badly, you'd have to trust your heart and your instincts and then take a LEAP OF FAITH." - Alyssa Urbano