Campaign Story

My name is Ashley Juul and my husband Ben and I have been together 17 wonderful years and have been married for 8 of them. Growing up I have always had extremely irregular and painful periods. Not knowing that was not normal, I never thought to ask a doctor or even be concerned that this was an issue that I should have looked into. I was 19 years old when I had my first of what would eventually be many ruptured ovarian cysts in the middle of the night. I woke up not knowing what was happening and rushed to the ER thinking my appendix must have exploded or something because of how much pain I was in only to be told that I had suffered a ruptured cyst on my ovary and to follow up with my OBGYN. This was the start of a very frustrating and confusing chapter of my life as it was only then that I was diagnosed with PCOS and possible endometriosis. A few years later I would go on to meet my now husband Ben. We had quite a whirlwind romance spent enjoying concerts and doing a lot of laughing along the way. We were very surprised when we suddenly learned that I was pregnant with our son, Reilly. I am so grateful that we were blessed with our miracle now that I know how many tears I would end up crying over our infertility journey. Reilly was born full term at 7:42pm on February 18th. He was and continues to be the light in both of our lives. He walked me down the aisle at our wedding, and is starting high school this fall. We absolutely love being his parents and tell him every single day that we are proud of him. Seven years ago we decided that we were ready to expand our family and give Reilly the sibling that he has always wanted. After trying unsuccessfully for 6 months I contacted my doctor to have fertility testing done knowing in my gut that something was not right. Being told that I have an extremely low AMH level due to the PCOS I was immediately put on Chlomid to help regulate my hormones in hopes of ovulating and after 6 months of failed cycles (out of which I only ovulated once) we were then referred to a fertility clinic an hour and a half away from us. That was 6 years ago. Since then we have tried femara cycles, injectable cycles, timed intercourse, and IUIs with no outcome of pregnancy. During that time I also had an HSG procedure, laparoscopy endometriosis removal, and a D&C due to almost hemorrhaging clotting during a PCOS bleeding cycle. To say that we are heartbroken because of our secondary infertility would be an understatement. We are hoping to be able to fund enough money to begin IVF cycles through our clinic as we are told it is most likely the only way for us to conceive. As much as it should be, IVF and the medications needed for it are not covered by our health insurance. Being told that we should “just be grateful that we have our son” is such a hurtful thing that we have unfortunately heard more times to count. But the pain stemming from the inability to conceive a child is as I imagine, we feel to our core no matter who is experiencing it. We know how happy our son has made us and we have so much love to give another child. Please consider donating to our secondary infertility fundraiser to help our dream come true because secondary infertility, is still infertility.