When Standing Still Stops Working

Starting IVF wasn’t an automatic choice for us. It took five years to reach a place where we could look at each other and say, “Okay. We’re ready.”

If you had asked me even a month ago whether I would do IVF, I would have said no. I had always believed it was a hard road. I knew it involved hormone injections that change your body and your mood. For a long time, I didn’t think I was emotionally strong enough to handle that. IVF felt like it would require more physical, emotional, and mental strength than I had.

Turns out, you don’t decide you’re strong enough.You just get tired of standing still.

You get to the end of your disappointment and pain, and you decide, okay, let’s do this. Let's do something about this. Let’s start the final phase of infertility.

The final phase.

That phrase scared me for years. It feels like the end of the road. If this doesn’t work, that’s it. And that is the scariest part. But when you’ve exhausted every other option, when you’re worn down by the monthly disappointment, you reach a point where you stop hesitating and decide to go all in, knowing that there is the possibility that it won't be successful.

If you’re unfamiliar with IVF, it’s easy to assume it’s one simple procedure. Go in, get the eggs, done. In reality, it’s a process. A long one.

Here’s the simple version.

A woman’s cycle usually lasts about three to four weeks. Under normal circumstances, one egg matures and is released each cycle. With IVF, medications are used to encourage multiple eggs to mature at the same time. The goal is simple: give your body more chances.

Those medications start early in the cycle and involve daily injections done at home. Usually it’s one or two shots a day. For some women, it’s more. I haven’t started this part yet, but I know what’s waiting for me.

I know the side effects many women experience. Headaches that linger. Cramps. Bloating. Feeling uncomfortable in your own body. Some women feel constantly hungry. Others lose their appetite completely. Weight can fluctuate quickly. Emotions can feel closer to the surface. You might feel grumpy, short tempered, or overwhelmed by things that normally wouldn’t affect you this deeply.

And all of this happens while life keeps moving.

You’re still expected to go to work. To be productive. To show up. To be pleasant. To give yourself injections on a strict schedule, sometimes in a bathroom or your car, and then turn around and act like nothing is happening. You don’t get to fall apart when it’s convenient. You learn how to keep it together because there isn’t another option.

What makes this heavier is knowing that, based on our personal numbers, this likely won’t be something we do just once. We’re going into this understanding that it may take more than one round. More injections. More appointments. More emotional and physical endurance than we ever expected to need.

This constant push, the pressure to carry on as usual while your body is being pushed to its limits, is one of the reasons we chose to do IVF in Mexico.

We wanted the ability to step away from our day to day life and focus on the task at hand. To remove ourselves from the rush and the expectations. To take the injections privately. To respond however our bodies and emotions need to respond, in the way that feels safest and calmest for us. We wanted to create a nest.

When the timing is right, a final injection is given. This is called the trigger shot. About thirty six hours later, the egg retrieval happens.

The retrieval itself is quick. It’s done under light anesthesia and usually takes less than half an hour. The doctor collects each mature egg, and that part of the process is complete.

ICSI process

From there, the eggs are fertilized. For some couples, this happens by mixing sperm and eggs together and letting nature do its thing. For others, including couples with male factor infertility, a process called ICSI is used, where a single sperm is injected directly into a single egg.

The fertilized eggs are then watched closely for several days. Not all of them will continue growing. The ones that do may become embryos. Some of them say goodbye along the way.

This is the part no one really prepares you for.

If an embryo makes it through, there comes another step. The transfer.

On paper, the transfer is simple. No anesthesia. No surgery. Just a quiet procedure where an embryo is placed back into the uterus. But emotionally, it carries enormous weight. This is the moment everything has been leading to. The moment where science steps back as much as it can, and waiting takes over again.

After the transfer, there is nothing left to do. No injections that can change the outcome. No appointments that can guarantee anything. Just days of holding hope carefully, trying not to let it run too far ahead, and waiting to see if life takes hold.

IVF is a numbers game.

Not every egg becomes an embryo. Not every embryo survives. Not every embryo leads to pregnancy. Even with science, medication, and doctors, there are no guarantees.

That reality can feel cruel. You can do everything right and still end up with nothing. Or you can start with very little and end up with more than expected. There is no formula that ensures success.

Some people believe IVF goes against nature, or against something sacred. That by participating in it, we’re trying to control what was never meant to be controlled. But science doesn’t create life. It can only create opportunity. Whether you believe in God, the universe, or something unnamed, every baby still arrives through something bigger than human effort alone. Everything still has to align. Timing still matters. A spark still has to be given. Doctors can guide the process and do their best to help, but they cannot decide outcomes. In the end, what is meant to be will be.

Strength doesn’t always look like confidence. Sometimes it looks like showing up with shaking hands and an open heart, fully aware that this could end in loss. We understand the risk. We understand the possibility of failure. And we move forward anyway. Not because we’re certain, but because there’s a small, quiet hope that refuses to go out. And as long as it’s there, we will keep going. We have to.

And so, after five years of waiting, we finally looked at each other and said,

Okay. We’re ready.