Dreaming of baby Byers
Donation protected
Sarah and I have been together since October of 2005. We met while I was going through the basic law enforcement training academy and she was working at a nursing home. Our love and friendship all but immediately solidified itself and we have been off to the races of life ever since. I am currently a police officer with 12 years’ experience and she is a medical administrative assistant.
We were married in June of 2010 (I know, it took me long enough!) and in December of that year we decided that we wanted to try and start a family. Fast forward 3 and half years. Along with a sea of emotional highs and lows and ‘well meaning’ statements of encouragement, “just relax about it; don’t stress, stress is the worst thing; it’ll happen when its meant to happen; you just need a weekend getaway, etc..” and here I am, holding my best buddy in the whole wide world in my arms. She is crying uncontrollably, because for the first time in her adult life, she had been late for her period. But she had just looked at her fourth negative pregnancy test in 2 days. I had less than zero idea what to do, say, or how to fix any of it. All I could do was hold her and the only thing I could mumble through my own tears was, “I love you”.
Thus begins the medical journey. The first of what would eventually be two of the same procedure. The title of the procedure was to the word “mayonnaise” what mayonnaise is to the word “it”. Essentially my wife was injected with a dye that was meant to check the status of her reproductive function. In the process it was discovered that she had a tubal blockage, but the procedure itself moved the blockage.
Another year passes with no glimpse of achieving our goal. I was accessed at her suggestion and found to be fully fertile. The worst part of this particular point in our journey was that she…. Right then, took emotional responsibility for our failure to succeed and didn’t tell me for a very long time. (Support each other and confide in each other at every turn readers, it is never not needed.) The second procedure found that now both tubes were blocked and would require surgery. My wife had never been through any surgical type procedure and neither had I. She expressed a fear of it and I don’t mean a, “scared of the dog up the street because he has a mean bark scared”. I mean a complete fear of the unknown, “floating in the dark alone, in the middle of ocean without a life vest” fear. Now we’re entering 2016.
Sarah decided on her own that her fear was far outweighed by her need and want to be a mother. The surgery was scheduled and she soldiered right through. It was found during the surgery that one of her tubes was so badly damaged that there was no chance at repair and it had to be removed so not to hinder the repaired tube that was believed to be viable. So we were granted a chance and a window for natural reproduction. With a caution that the scar tissue could again block the remaining tube. Another year plus and she goes back for a follow up and it is believed that the remaining tube has closed up again.
Surgery number two is scheduled and it is confirmed that the tube is blocked. That determined that our only chance at having children would be through the IVF process. Also, the blocked tube had to be removed due to the chance that it could cause complications with achieving pregnancy through IVF.
With no options left for having our own child naturally, we set out to complete the IVF process. We borrowed money to finance this attempt at our dream and we were off. Somewhat counting eggs before they hatched, (pun intended) we proceeded with high hopes and faith as always. Even swapping names of our potential unborn babies as we had not done for a long time. A whole bunch of shots and medications later and her retrieval was set the week before Thanksgiving 2018. Everything went well and they were able to gather 16 little chances that day. We soon found out that we had 5 embryos and waited for them to make it to the critical development stage (my words, not theirs!). Tuesday the week of Thanksgiving we found out that 2 of our potential kiddos had made it and were slated for genetic testing. We were beyond excited, everything was clicking along like a well-oiled machine. A week passes and I get a phone call from my wife who can barely speak. Genetic testing showed that there was nothing viable to our embryos. They were the equivalent to a false positive or an extremely early miscarriage. There were not enough embryos that made it to the “blast” phase to determine an exact cause one way or the other what went wrong. Several days of tears, praying, and patching together broken pieces followed and here we are. Staring at $25,000 of debt and a process that we need to repeat at the same cost if we want our intended results. It’s worth noting (to me at least) that there are 15 states that require insurance coverage for IVF diagnosis and treatment. Low and behold, the state of North Carolina is “not” one of those. Our families have and are helping as much as they can. We are working class people and are thankful for what we do have. But Sarah and I both want one dream above all others in this world. That is to one day be called mommy and daddy by a child of our creation. We are not opposed to alternate methods of becoming parents in any way. We just want to exhaust every effort to achieve our dream.
I tell you all of that to tell you this. This has not been an easy or sudden onset process for either of us and I think we have endured fairly well and become stronger as a couple. It’s not easy for us, to reach out and ask for the kindness of others though that is how we try to live. If anyone who finds this can, or is compelled to help us continue our journey toward becoming parents, thank you. Anyone else, we still love you too. Whether it is by donating or by sharing our story to help or letting someone else know that they are not alone, thank you.
We are raising money so that we can go through the IVF process again as soon as possible.
We hope that life finds you happy and loved.
Thank you, Cameron and Sarah Byers
We were married in June of 2010 (I know, it took me long enough!) and in December of that year we decided that we wanted to try and start a family. Fast forward 3 and half years. Along with a sea of emotional highs and lows and ‘well meaning’ statements of encouragement, “just relax about it; don’t stress, stress is the worst thing; it’ll happen when its meant to happen; you just need a weekend getaway, etc..” and here I am, holding my best buddy in the whole wide world in my arms. She is crying uncontrollably, because for the first time in her adult life, she had been late for her period. But she had just looked at her fourth negative pregnancy test in 2 days. I had less than zero idea what to do, say, or how to fix any of it. All I could do was hold her and the only thing I could mumble through my own tears was, “I love you”.
Thus begins the medical journey. The first of what would eventually be two of the same procedure. The title of the procedure was to the word “mayonnaise” what mayonnaise is to the word “it”. Essentially my wife was injected with a dye that was meant to check the status of her reproductive function. In the process it was discovered that she had a tubal blockage, but the procedure itself moved the blockage.
Another year passes with no glimpse of achieving our goal. I was accessed at her suggestion and found to be fully fertile. The worst part of this particular point in our journey was that she…. Right then, took emotional responsibility for our failure to succeed and didn’t tell me for a very long time. (Support each other and confide in each other at every turn readers, it is never not needed.) The second procedure found that now both tubes were blocked and would require surgery. My wife had never been through any surgical type procedure and neither had I. She expressed a fear of it and I don’t mean a, “scared of the dog up the street because he has a mean bark scared”. I mean a complete fear of the unknown, “floating in the dark alone, in the middle of ocean without a life vest” fear. Now we’re entering 2016.
Sarah decided on her own that her fear was far outweighed by her need and want to be a mother. The surgery was scheduled and she soldiered right through. It was found during the surgery that one of her tubes was so badly damaged that there was no chance at repair and it had to be removed so not to hinder the repaired tube that was believed to be viable. So we were granted a chance and a window for natural reproduction. With a caution that the scar tissue could again block the remaining tube. Another year plus and she goes back for a follow up and it is believed that the remaining tube has closed up again.
Surgery number two is scheduled and it is confirmed that the tube is blocked. That determined that our only chance at having children would be through the IVF process. Also, the blocked tube had to be removed due to the chance that it could cause complications with achieving pregnancy through IVF.
With no options left for having our own child naturally, we set out to complete the IVF process. We borrowed money to finance this attempt at our dream and we were off. Somewhat counting eggs before they hatched, (pun intended) we proceeded with high hopes and faith as always. Even swapping names of our potential unborn babies as we had not done for a long time. A whole bunch of shots and medications later and her retrieval was set the week before Thanksgiving 2018. Everything went well and they were able to gather 16 little chances that day. We soon found out that we had 5 embryos and waited for them to make it to the critical development stage (my words, not theirs!). Tuesday the week of Thanksgiving we found out that 2 of our potential kiddos had made it and were slated for genetic testing. We were beyond excited, everything was clicking along like a well-oiled machine. A week passes and I get a phone call from my wife who can barely speak. Genetic testing showed that there was nothing viable to our embryos. They were the equivalent to a false positive or an extremely early miscarriage. There were not enough embryos that made it to the “blast” phase to determine an exact cause one way or the other what went wrong. Several days of tears, praying, and patching together broken pieces followed and here we are. Staring at $25,000 of debt and a process that we need to repeat at the same cost if we want our intended results. It’s worth noting (to me at least) that there are 15 states that require insurance coverage for IVF diagnosis and treatment. Low and behold, the state of North Carolina is “not” one of those. Our families have and are helping as much as they can. We are working class people and are thankful for what we do have. But Sarah and I both want one dream above all others in this world. That is to one day be called mommy and daddy by a child of our creation. We are not opposed to alternate methods of becoming parents in any way. We just want to exhaust every effort to achieve our dream.
I tell you all of that to tell you this. This has not been an easy or sudden onset process for either of us and I think we have endured fairly well and become stronger as a couple. It’s not easy for us, to reach out and ask for the kindness of others though that is how we try to live. If anyone who finds this can, or is compelled to help us continue our journey toward becoming parents, thank you. Anyone else, we still love you too. Whether it is by donating or by sharing our story to help or letting someone else know that they are not alone, thank you.
We are raising money so that we can go through the IVF process again as soon as possible.
We hope that life finds you happy and loved.
Thank you, Cameron and Sarah Byers
Fundraising team (2)
Cameron Byers
Organizer
Forest City, NC
Sarah Byers
Team member