Page 10 of First Comes Forever

“It’s okay. We’ve been through this before.” I ignore the tightening in my chest and force myself to keep my voice steady. “All right. So we go another round. I thought the seventh time would be the charm, but maybe it’s the eighth, you know? I’ll just, um…make the usual appointment, a few days before my ovulation window—”

“Amani?” My first name sounds odd coming from Dr. Michel. I’m so used to “Ms. Rhodes” by now. “I normally only recommend three to four rounds of IUI before we move on to other treatments. We’re well past that. I think we can safely assume at this point that this method of conception isn’t going to be successful.”

I inhale and touch my stomach, hyperaware that I’ve been talking to a fictitious cluster of cells for the past couple of weeks. “When I first came to this facility, you told me that IVF was twenty times the cost of IUI.”

“That’s still accurate,” he replies. “And your insurance doesn’t cover it.”

“And the success rate…remind me again?”

He hangs his head. “Better than IUI, but—”

“It’s fine. I’ll find the money. Let’s just move on to IVF then.”

Dr. Michel swivels around to collect a blue folder. He holds it in the air but doesn’t open it. “Your hormone levels,” he says like it’s an explanation.

“Are?” I ask.

“Have you ever heard of POI?”

“POI?”

“Primary ovarian insufficiency. It’s rare but real and it is a major inhibitor to successful conception.”

“No.” My eyelids feel heavy as I blink. “So I’m infertile?”

Dr. Michel shakes his head like a teacher at a student who misunderstood that one plus one is not eleven. “Infertile wouldn’t be clinically correct. There are rare circumstances where women diagnosed with POI still conceive, even naturally without any medical interference. But those cases are very few and far between.”

“So wouldn’t IVF help those odds?”

He clasps his hands together. “A big part of my job is to help you succeed. It would be irresponsible for me to recommend a course of treatment that inmy opinionis futile.”

“I don’t understand, Dr. Michel.”

“I had suspicions after our fourth round of IUI, but the reason you’re not getting pregnant is due to your eggs—both the sporadic nature of their release and the quality. I want to do some additional tests, but do you happen to know if your mother or grandmother experienced irregular cycles and early menopause?”

Mom was one and done. She had me at nineteen. I remember her telling me she had weird periods her entire life. The fact that I only have a cycle once every other month wasn’t abnormal in my household. I didn’t really think much of it.

“It’s possible,” I mumble. “So with things as they currently are, if we proceeded with IVF immediately, what are my chances?”

“Rough estimate?”

“Sure.”

He shrugs. “Less than ten percent.”

“Less thanten percent?” I parrot back. “Wow.”

“There’s more of a chance if we used both donor eggs and sperm.”

Donor eggs?“So it wouldn’t bemybaby?”

He clicks his tongue in a painfully patronizing way. “Of course it’d beyourbaby, Ms. Rhodes. You’d carry the baby. They just wouldn’t share your DNA. Even if you didn’t become pregnant, an adoptive mother is still a mother to her child, right?”

Of course. But that’s not why I’m here. I want to grow a baby, and when it’s delivered, I want to look down at that baby bundle and see my eyes, nose, or lips. I want to have the world’s most genuine connection and divine purpose that people can’t poke, prod, and break apart.

I want what Noa has with Jonah. The way he desperately needs her after every elbow scrape and knee bump, expecting her to fix it. The way she can hold his entire four-year-old world together simply with sweet kisses and cuddles. I want to matter, to be needed in a real way.

It’s not until Dr. Michel swivels around and grabs a box of tissues before offering me one that I realize I’m crying. I didn’t notice the warm streaks running down my cheeks. But now I do. Now, I notice my hands shaking as I reach for the tissue box and swipe underneath my eyes. I sniffle loudly then hold my breath, trying to suck back my disappointment.

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