In Vitro Fertilization Grows Families: #ThanksIVF

I’m really worried.

It’s not a secret that our twin boys are the miracles of science. After three rounds of in vitro fertilization, and the mourning of many of our embryonic children, on our fourth attempt our boys were conceived.

I had morning sickness like clockwork.

I remember the weird little vibration in my abdomen while I was doing charts at work, the boys’ first movements an absolute wonder.

The ultrasounds seem like just yesterday. From the first furious fluttering of their little 6-week-old hearts to Baby B turning sommersaults at 20 weeks. He still has that kind of energy 16 years later.

The fear when their triple screen was abnormal. The intense relief when we learned both boys were healthy.

The swelling up to my waist, the weeping edema, the third trimester insomnia. The pre-eclempsia, the induction, the blood transfusions. All worth it.

It took a monumental effort to get our boys here…by doctors, lab technicians, nurses and the parents who wanted them so very badly. We are grateful each and every day for the amazing gifts medical advances afforded us.

For anyone to believe my children shouldn’t be here, that my boys are soulless shadows of real people, that they are criminal…well, these are an extremely privileged, sheltered people who have no understanding that 1 in 8 (that’s 12.5%) of couples struggle with infertility. And don’t care. They fail to even try to understand that every story has another side, that maybe there is more than one right way. That maybe, beneath the heavy blanket of emotion, reason exists.

Think of a small stone dropped into into a placid lake. The point of impact is not the only disruption of the water’s surface. Ripples fan out from where the pebble touched. Roe v. Wade is the “splash” point. IVF, artificial insemination and Clomid are among the ripples. And so is the Pill. And medical treatments. Roe v. Wade is vital beyond the highly emotive clash it is known to provoke.

IVF specialists are speaking out. So are we parents who craved parenthood so badly we went to the ends of medical ability to get there. Just ask writer Amy Klein. And if you support the IVF choice, the choice to use oral contraception or any possibility in between that keeps family planning in the hands of real live people, make your voice heard with the hashtag #ThanksIVF.