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Samantha & Steph's IVF Journey

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Hi everybody!

One year ago, we were preparing to traverse the US with our dogs and a 1-year-old. We knew life in Utah would be wildly different than life in Florida and we have FINALLY unpacked all our boxes and have fully settled into our house. We’ve known for a while that we have wanted to have multiple kids, and now that our daughter, Adeline, is 2, we decided to revisit our fertility journey.

We had our initial visit with a fertility clinic here in Utah, just wanted to get more information about pricing, and their process since all fertility clinics are different. We had planned to start the IVF process later this year, which would have given us some time to get the money set aside and plan for a new baby.

Here's where things get interesting…

Our fertility doctor said that based on Sam’s age and bloodwork results, we would qualify for a fertility study that would pay for a lot of what our insurance wouldn't cover with IVF. THE CATCH: We have to come up with $3500 in 3 weeks.

To participate in the study, we would have to start the IVF process (taking meds to grow Sam’s eggs for retrieval) by the first week of May, which would require us to come up with a $1900 down payment + the cost of sperm ($1100) + additional testing ($500). The total amount we need to have by early May would be around $3500.

This fertility study would cover medication costs (around $4000), genetic testing for all embryos ($300 per embryo), as well as almost the entire implantation process (around $6000), + one year of free embryo storage ($1200) which would be HUGE savings for us.

Keep in mind, this is JUST the cost to retrieve, fertilize, and freeze the eggs. The study will also cover around $4500 for a future implantation if for some reason the first one doesn’t stick.

OUR OPTIONS ARE:
1. We somehow come up with the down payment and the money to buy sperm ($3500 total) by early May and have a ton of our IVF process covered by the study, which would save us roughly $12K. This is the option we are hoping for with your help from this fundraiser!
OR
2. We forgo the study. We would still need to pay the $3500 for the down payment and sperm, but then we would have to cover all the additional costs above. These costs are our out-of-pocket costs with our insurance.

For funsies, if you’re unaware of the IVF process, feel free to read my non-professional, I’m an engineer, not a doctor, cliff notes version below:

Step 0: Meet with Doctor, get the rundown, come up with monies, buy the things.
Step 1: Start taking meds to grow a ton of eggs.
Step 2: The doctor does an “egg retrieval” which sucks all your eggs out using a tiny vacuum (science!).
Step 3: The doctor puts a single sperm into each egg to (hopefully) fertilize the eggs.
Step 4: Doctors watch the fertilized eggs and take notes for the next 5 days and see which ones make it to the blastocyst stage (a fertilized egg that is 5 days old and in good shape).

At this point, the blastocysts go into the freezer and are sent off for genetic testing (insurance would only cover genetic testing of a max of 10 blastocysts, whereas the study will cover unlimited blastocysts). The genetic testing is to ensure that the blastocysts (embryos?) don’t have any genetic abnormalities (also figure out whether they are male or female).

Step 5: (This can happen at any point in the future, within reason, we aren’t getting any younger). This step is called “Implantation”. More meds to prep the body for a fertilized egg, then the doctor implants a single embryo and we cross our fingers for the next few however many days until we are allowed to take a pregnancy test.
Step 6+: For any future kids, all we’d need to do is repeat step 5 until we decide to stop having babies.
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TL:DR
We need to raise $3500 by the first week of May to be able to participate in a fertility study that would cover a significant portion of our IVF journey. #nopressure
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Thank you so much for your help! Every dollar makes a difference.

Love,
Steph, Samantha, and Adeline (who desperately wants a sibling)

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Donations 

  • Bosco Aburto
    • $125
    • 10 mos
  • Stephanie Parsolano
    • $100
    • 10 mos
  • Meckenzie Sprague
    • $50
    • 10 mos
  • Danielle Mettler
    • $25
    • 10 mos
  • natalia Radler
    • $25
    • 10 mos
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Organizer

Samantha Mettler
Organizer
Ogden, UT

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