My husband and I got married in the fall of 2008. Our plan was to eventually have kids and we never thought twice about it being a big deal. I remember us talking early on in our marriage about how we wanted two or three kids because we each had two siblings and wanted our children to have similar experiences. The thought of having a family and being the Mom I always knew I wanted to be was exciting!
We found out pretty quickly that it was going to be anything but easy to build the family we had dreamed of. After about six months of trying and no success, we sought medical advice and I started what would be the first of two rounds of Clomid. After a year of no luck, I was feeling pretty defeated. That feeling of wanting so badly to build a family and not being able to is truly gut wrenching. It is something that is so hard to describe to someone who has never experienced it. For me, it felt like my whole life was falling apart and that nothing would be as I had once dreamed. We ended up finding out that it wasn’t just me, it was my husband too.
After many rounds of medication, tests, surgery for me, and finally a surgery for my husband, we were told the chances of us conceiving were slim to none and that IVF wasn’t even an option for us with our scenario. After lots of prayer we made the decision to proceed with adoption. We hit the jackpot with our son later in 2011.
From that point forward we assumed that adoption was how we were going to continue to grow our family. Four years later, after a meeting with our adoption agency and finding out that the price had drastically increased, I approached my husband with “what if” things had changed and could we just see if pregnancy would ever be an option for me. He agreed and so began our IVF journey. We found out that nothing had changed with me, but that anatomically everything was good. For him, his sperm count had miraculously gone from zero (yes, ZERO!) to having a count that might be enough to attempt IVF. So after several months of testing we got the final go ahead. In the fall of 2015 we did our first round which unfortunately failed, causing us to lose one of four precious embryos that had survived the process. In 2016, we transferred 2 of the remaining 3 frozen embryos and got our (2nd) miracle baby boy. After lots of consideration and prayer, we decided to transfer our final remaining embryo in February of 2019 and we are now blessed with three beautiful children.
One of the biggest struggles in trying to grow our family was the impact it had on our marriage. For us, this journey has taken up the better part of the eleven years we’ve been married. That is a long time to battle something so big. We have fought and argued more than I’d like to admit and had come to many breaking points. I can remember hearing that financial stress and infertility were two of the top burdens within a marriage and the reason why so many couples divorce. That terrified me because as most people know, adoption and fertility treatments are not cheap! In addition, the biggest struggle for me while trying to grow our family was not really knowing who I was or what I’d become if I couldn’t be a mother. I felt like a failure. I became so good at pretending and putting on my happy face. No one but my husband (and many times I didn’t feel that he even understood) knew what I was going through. There were many days that it was a challenge just to get out of bed. The desire to become a Mom had sort of overtaken and consumed me. All around me, friends and women I knew were getting pregnant and it seemed as though they didn’t even have to try. Then when we were graciously chosen by a birth mother and adopted our son, I felt so overwhelmed with gratitude and joy. Over the years though, I still felt incomplete in a way that was difficult to explain and knew deep down that I had to at least try one more time to see if carrying a child was possible. It was just this nagging feeling that I could not seem to shake.
Being a NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) nurse and seeing some of the things we routinely see made the stress of the unknown and not being able to grow our family that much harder at times. Ultimately, the plan God had for us was much better than I ever could have imagined and I’m so thankful for all we have gone through to get to this point in our lives. I learned so much through the process of trying to grow our family. Infertility is emotionally and physically exhausting and can be incredibly lonely. I learned to find an outlet that helped me cope with the stress. For me, it was running. It was a time for me to get away from it all to be silent, cry, vent, or just talk to God. I am a much stronger and more empathetic, grateful, and understanding person now after having gone through these struggles. I am still in awe that we have two sweet boys and a precious baby girl after years of waiting and hoping. Sometimes I have to pinch myself because I can’t believe how blessed we are. I wouldn’t wish any of these feelings of hopelessness on anyone. For anyone going through this I can tell you that there is an army of women and couples out there who have dealt with it and you are not alone. There is hope!
Here is a link to a video of our story that our church put together a few years
ago: https://youtu.be/rE-V0fxgV3k.
Here is a link to a video of our story that our church put together a few years
ago: https://youtu.be/rE-V0fxgV3k.
– Carly Steinborn
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