Parenting | Pregnancy | Childbirth
Gain insight into how to navigate what might be an incredibly challenging and delicate conversation.
Email me at BaileyGaddis@yahoo.com if you have any questions about pregnancy, childbirth or early motherhood that you would like answered on this channel 🙂
If you would like more information about pregnancy-and-beyond topics, check out Feng Shui Mommy: Creating Balance and Harmony for Blissful Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Motherhood – https://www.amazon.com/Feng-Shui-Momm…
Before the birth of her daughter, Aurora, in 2016, Heather Huhman, host of the podcast Beat Infertility and founder of content-marketing firm Come Recommended, went through seven cycles of in vitro fertilization (IVF), suffered four miscarriages and gave birth to stillborn twins, Eric and Alexis. As difficult and heartbreaking as the Washington, DC, woman’s journey to motherhood was, she never stopped working—she had to foot the almost-$60,000 bill for all those fertility treatments.
Heather is not an anomaly. A survey by FertilityIQ, a fertility doctor and clinic evaluation website, found that 92 percent of women undergoing fertility treatments are employed. Of those, 68 percent work a full 40 to 50 hours a week.
One big reason? More and more women are postponing pregnancy until their mid-to late 30swhile they’re furthering their careers—and this delay often makes fertility treatments necessary to start a family. But medical need isn’t the only reason working women make up the majority of fertility-care patients: The high price of help forces many women to continue earning a paycheck while trying to conceive. The American Society of Reproductive Medicine reported that the average cost of one IVF treatment in the United States is $12,400, not including the extra medications a woman might need and the added fees for using an egg or sperm donor, or gestational surrogate.
Terry’s hand was shaking as she asked, “What if they hate me after I tell them? What if they want to move in with their father? He’s the only parent genetically related to them.” Then she started crying. I held her. We were about to tell her 4-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter that they were conceived using donor eggs.
We walked into her living room where her son was draping blankets across a web of chairs and her daughter was scrolling through her phone. As she told her children the truth about their genetics, her daughter looked bored and her son stood up half way through the talk and continued with his fort.
After she finished her delicately prepared speech we asked if they had any questions. Her daughter said, “So, was my donor famous? Can I tell my friends she’s famous? This is cool.” And her son interjected with, “Can we go get ice cream?” They seemed unfazed.
I stayed with her as we presented answers to questions that weren’t asked and when I reached for her hand I noticed she had stopped shaking—she was smiling.
I checked in two weeks later and she reported her children had asked a few more questions but seemed more interested in the egg donation than confused or upset.
Terry is a member of a growing group of moms: Today, as more and more women are focusing on advancing their careers before stepping into motherhood, the average age of conception continues to rise. Data released by the CDC shows that the number of women waiting to have children until their mid-thirties to early-forties is increasing, meaning that more women will likely require IVF (in vitro fertilization), often coupled with egg or sperm donation, as egg and sperm count and quality decrease with age.
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