IVF Journey to Baby Akins

Hi, my name is Amy and my husband’s name is Travis. I am creating this page in hopes to continue our journey to start a family.

Our story began in 2015 when I met the love of my life Travis. We fell for each other hard and fast and even picked out baby names after only 2 months! We couldn’t wait to spend forever together so we married 9 months later and a gorgeous ceremony followed in July of 2017. Our wedding was absolutely beautiful and beyond anything I could have ever imagined. We were overwhelmed with gratitude at how many people deeply cared for us, and supported us in our marriage.

Starting a family has always been a big dream of ours individually as well as together. After a few years of creating amazing memories, we decided it was time for an exciting new chapter and began to look at starting a family. This journey however proved to be harder than we expected.

For 3 years we tried to conceive on our own

without success. At this point we knew something was wrong and I feared my history with irregular periods and endometriosis was a contributing factor to our difficulties of getting pregnant.

In March of 2021, I decided to set up an appointment with my OBGYN to try and find some answers and we were then referred to a fertility clinic. A few months, a lot of tests and thousands of dollars later, we got the news that we were facing infertility challenges and our chances of getting pregnant naturally were pretty much impossible. The news weighed heavy on our hearts and the hearts of our family and friends.

In June 2021, our doctor informed us that IVF was our only option so we proceeded on our journey. We started the process of egg retrieval and got 17 eggs! After the fertilizations, we learned only had 7 viable embryos which was disheartening. We decided to do extra testing to make sure we had the best chance for having a healthy baby. Unfortunately after testing we were only left with 3 embryos but we were still full of hope and ready to continue.

We were giddy with anticipation and excitement when we did the first FET(frozen embryo transfer) in September; then 2 long weeks later we got the call that the transfer failed. We didn’t lose hope yet as we still had 2 more chances. 

We continued on and did our second FET in November; by now we’re thinking “this has to be it!” “this one will stick!” and we got the call…failed yet again.

At this point our concerns grew and we didn’t understand why we weren’t having any luck. There wasn’t any clear explanation so our doctor recommended that we do a mock cycle since we only have 1 embryo left. This cycle works the same way as an FET except at the end when we would normally do a transfer, they take biopsy’s to try and find some answers. We agreed it would be best to exhaust all options and started the mock cycle in December. After weeks of more shots and our biopsy, our doctor regrettably told us that everything came back perfect which meant we had absolutely no explanation for our failed transfers. We lost all hope at this point and decided to give my body, our finances and our mental health a break. We spent the next 6 months trying to get back to a better place emotionally and financially.

As of July 2022, we are still paying off the remainder of our previous IVF debt but we are ready to proceed with our last embryo transfer. Unfortunately, the expense for this is beyond our budget. So this is where we are asking for your help. Having a family means so much to us and we never anticipated that something that comes so naturally for most would pose such a challenge for us.

We’re so grateful for the support system that we have and even if donating to our cause does not feel right for you, we appreciate you reading our story and keeping us in your thoughts and prayers.