Taylor & Danielle's Fertility Journey

As many of you know, Taylor and I have struggled with fertility during our marriage. As you may also know, we are generally not ones to ask for help from others, but would rather offer help. At this time we are the ones coming to our friends and family for help. Here is a little bit about our journey and what we are asking for from those that we love and that love us. If you want to hear our story, read on, if you just want to help, skip to the bottom.

Before Taylor and I met in the spring of 2018, he was diagnosed with testicular failure after going to the doctor for extreme fatigue in 2016. When we met it was one of the first things that Taylor told me. He wanted to put all of his "red flags" out right away. Over the next few months as we dated, learned about each other, and grew closer, I knew that despite the "red flags", mental health challenges, and my longing for more children, I loved Taylor and wanted to share my life with him.

Over the next year and a half, from March 2018-July 2019, there were many changes and challenges. Taylor was hospitalized twice for his Bi-polar, we were engaged and married within 6 weeks, we moved 3 times, and changed towns moving an hour away from where my life had been. Shortly after we were married, while sitting in Stake conference, Taylor turned to me and said, "I know that I said I wanted a 'honeymoon' phase, but I feel that we should go ahead and pursue having a baby." We knew that this would be a long, difficult, expensive journey.

During this time, with moves and changes also came many job changes which made us really cautious with finances. While Taylor struggled with mental health and finding and keeping a job that would provide for a family, yet be good for his health was difficult to say the least. All of this was complicated with the onset of Covid.

We searched, researched, prayed, saved, and sacrificed. We did med changes to hopefully help with Taylor's sperm production. We tried. We cried. We hoped. I yelled. But we kept going. We didn't know how to make this HUGE financial thing happen,but we knew we were to keep going. At an appointment we were told that we should start considering sperm donors. We were heart broken, but came to the resolve that it would still be Taylor's child and OUR child and that it would be ok. We started looking at donors, but we kept trying to increase or change Taylor's sprem and fertility.

FINALLY, after months of new meds, our newest fertility clinic asked for a new semen analysis just to see if anything had changed, it had! Taylor after 6 years of infertility and zero sperm count, had some sperm. Not much, but enough that we could use his sperm instead of a donor as previously thought.

We started freezing Taylor's sperm. The cost of everything though was still going to be too much. How were we going to do this?! We kept talking to friends that had gone through this journey. We finally figured out that with sacrifice and diligence with our budget, we could make it work. We kept looking for other options though. Taylor happened to come across a clinic closer to us and that took our new insurance that I got from my new job with the school district. Best of all, their cost was over HALF of what it was going to be at the other clinics we had gone to.

We were able to talk with their financial person and intake scheduler quickly. They helped us get the necessary paperwork done and saved a spot for us with scheduling because they knew we were working and doing the things to get our paperwork in and scheduled. We were able to even get our appointment moved up due to a cancelation. Things were moving quick and we were thankful.

Even though we have had our struggles, I have always known one thing for sure, Taylor is and will be an amazing dad. He has done such a wonderful job stepping in as a father for Hannah. He is loving, caring, patient, kind, fun, goofy, and strives to give her the best. I know he will do this with our children as well.

We know that SO much of this has been through miracles from our Father in Heaven. We have relied on and leaned on our faith and continue to do so. We are so grateful for the love of our Heavenly Father and the gospel. We continue to pray for miracles and know that through our faith we will continue to see them.

Where we are now. We have had our consultation with our doctor who we LOVE! We have more sperm freezes scheduled. We will have 2 tests I need to do prior to starting treatment the end of August. Depending on scheduling and my results we will being our treatment for IVF in September or November.

What we need. Although this clinic is less than the others we were with, it is still going to be close to $15,000. We would appreciate any help that you are willing to give to us. We love you all and appreciate all of your love and support of us during all of this.

Thank you again!