Mike and Nicole’s Adoption Journey

Hello, my name is Sara Minser and I am the sister to Michael and Nicole Urban. I have decided to create this page to help alleviate some of their financial worries as they pursue their dreams of adopting a child! Mike and Nicole are high school sweethearts who have always dreamed of what their family would look like one day, and after facing infertility that has made them unable to have “biological” children, they are hopeful to adopt and give endless amounts of love to a child in need! Unfortunately, adoption comes at a cost, and this cost can range anywhere from $40,000-$50,000 however this varies from state-to-state dependent on where the child is born. This cost reflects many necessary components such as medical expenses/care for the birth-parent, agency fees, legal fees, cost to complete a home study, travel costs if adopting outside our home state, post placement visits for social workers, etc. I am hopeful that spreading their story and this page will help them to achieve their dreams of expanding their family!

Their story;

Our Infertility Journey:

No one warns you about the possibility of how hard it can be for some people to become parents. They don’t teach you in school that infertility exists, that roughly 1 out of 5 couples struggle with infertility, or that roughly 30-40% of couples struggling with infertility is due to male factor.

Over the last 14 years, Michael and I have had hundreds of conversations, hopes and dreams of what our family would look like one day. We have always wanted children and like many, would have never expected that this issue found its way into our lives, until it did.

For the last 2 years, we have been trying to grow our family. This last year has been filled with lots of appointments and tests to try and get to the bottom of what’s going on and to learn if we would ever be able to have our own biological children.

About 4 months ago, Michael was diagnosed with a very rare disorder that was preventing us of from having children naturally. His Urologist recommended that he should undergo a procedure called a MicroTESE in hopes of finding viable sperm to potentially use for IVF in the future. During this procedure, his Dr would also take several biopsies for further testing because Michael has several pre indications of testicular cancer.

Fast forward to 12/4, Michael’s procedure day which was also the day that we learned we will never be able to have our own biological children. Although his surgery went smooth, his Urologist discovered that he is missing certain cells in his reproductive system that make it impossible for him to procreate. However, the good news from this procedure was his Surgeon and his medical team did not find cancerous tissue after further examination which Michael is at an elevated risk for because of this disorder.

He is at home recovering through December. He has his post op appointment scheduled for 1/6. During this appointment he should be almost fully recovered and cleared to return back to work.

It’s been hard to understand why this is happening to us and we know it was out of our control. Continued research is still being made today, but the Science and understanding of this disorder just isn’t there yet. Simply put, this just happens on a deeper cellular level during development to a very small percentage of people.

We said it in our wedding vows, “wherever we go, we go together”. That remains true. We know that together we can get through anything life has to throw at us. In our first 2 years of marriage we have had to overcome a lot of life’s obstacles that have been “pretty heavy” to say the least. Each day has been a team mindset because we’re in this thing called LIFE together. We know that our road to becoming parents isn’t over, we are just taken a detour on this journey.

Our intention of this news is to bring everybody up to speed and to help inform each and everyone of you in our lives on what we want most right now, isn’t possible for us how we originally hoped. We appreciate all the love and support we have received so far. It means the world to us to have such a strong support system to get us through these challenging times. We intend to share progress moving forward.