A woman has candidly opened up about the devastating end of her years-long struggle to become a mother – revealing how her struggles ‘ruined her life’ and saw her spending a staggering $165,000 on failed treatments that resulted in a heartbreaking miscarriage.
Katie Abdou, 37, had always imagined cradling her newborn baby in her arms and dreamt of the day she would set up a nursery and plan her baby shower.
The Massachusetts-based food broker spent three agonizing years exhausting all possible options out there to bring a child into her life – trying everything from adoption, fostering, intracervical insemination (ICI), and in vitro fertilization (IVF).
However, after every option failed and she devastatingly lost her baby while 17 weeks pregnant, Katie had to come to terms with the fact that her life had been ‘ruined’ by her numerous attempts to have a child.
The food broker confessed that she was ready to share her story with others so that other woman struggling to conceive wouldn’t feel so alone.
Katie explained that she had always wanted to be a single mom, adding that she had no plans of being in a love affair.
She said: ‘I was never interested in being in a relationship, but I always wanted kids. It was a conscious decision to be single.’
Because she didn’t have a partner, at age 30, Katie initially decided to look into adopting or fostering a child, but found that those routes were too costly.
‘It’s exorbitantly expensive. The more I looked into it the more unethical it felt.
‘It felt icky to be buying someone else’s child because they couldn’t afford them. I looked into fostering but the rules were extremely strict,’ she admitted.
After giving up on adoption and fostering, Katie decided to try at-home intracervical insemination (ICI), which is when sperm is inserted into the cervix, after she found a donor online.
However, after five attempts and three chemical pregnancies she sought medical help.
An X-ray showed that her tubes were blocked and she was told that IVF was her only option.
Katie knew she would have to cough up serious cash for IVF, where one round can cost anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000.
Her insurance wouldn’t cover her treatment because she couldn’t prove she was having sex with a man for a year without getting pregnant,’ she told .
However, she was determined to welcome a baby into the world, so she sold her house for $100,000 and moved back in with her parents so she could start the process.
She found a clinic in Albany, New York which offered a cheaper rate and went for her first round in November 2021.
Katie had three viable embryos after her first egg retrieval but was crushed when she had a chemical pregnancy with one and the other two didn’t take.
She said: ‘I was feeling pretty low. I was just going to give up. Then my best friend, Chris, 37, offered to be my donor.’
Katie went for another round using her best friend Chris’ sperm and had two embryos transferred.
She was overjoyed when she learned that she was pregnant in November 2022. Katie said: ‘I was very excited but still very careful.’
The hopeful food broker couldn’t contain her joy and named her baby Lawrence, set up a nursery, had a baby shower, and even made him a Christmas stocking, according to an article published on Today.
However, her heart soon broke when she went in for a check-up and heard the words, ‘I can’t find a heartbeat.’
In a matter of seconds, Katie’s world was crushed and she had to undergo a dilatation and curettage (D&C), which is a procedure to remove tissue from inside your uterus.
Katie said: ‘I had got the nursery all ready. I had planned the baby shower. I went for an ultrasound and his heart had stopped. He was gone. It was awful.’
She thought she had been given a false sense of hope and safety, just for it to be brutally taken from her.
Katie had a ring made of his ashes, which she wears every day, and has a tattoo of her son’s footprints on her shoulder.
Despite suffering a tragic miscarriage, Katie’s family and doctors convinced her to keep trying – advising her that she’d still be fertile after miscarrying.
She used the remaining embryo from her previous transfer – but it didn’t take. Katie went for a third retrieval in April 2023 but all her embryos failed to take.
In April 2023, Katie underwent a surgery to remove polyps in her uterus – an abnormal growth.
Instead, they found it was an infection called chronic endometritis – which causes infertility. Katie was put on antibiotics and given fresh hope when she went for next round of IVF.
She said: ‘I was given hope again that if try again I should get pregnant.’ This time Katie tried priming – to improve the egg quality – and took a growth hormone.
She also had PRP therapy – which involved taking blood from separate platelets and injecting them back into the uterus.
Katie revealed: ‘I had blackouts. I gained 50 pounds. Each time I tried [IVF] I had hope it would work.
‘It feels like the death of a dream. I have spent so much money. I estimate it is $165k. IVF has ruined my life.’ Following her egg retrieval in October 2023, Katie only had two viable eggs.
That night she woke up in excruciating pain and was taken for emergency surgery when doctors discovered her ovary had exploded.
She said: ‘I lost three pints of blood.’
Katie had her ovary ‘glued back together’ and had to wait for it to heal before she could try again.
In January 2024, she went for her fifth egg retrieval after her ovary had healed ‘perfectly’, but had another failed attempt.
She said: ‘I would have been ready to give up but I had enough medication for another retrieval.’
Katie thought her luck was turning around in February 2024, when she went for her sixth retrieval and got five fertilized eggs.
The food broker added: ‘I was thrilled. I thought, “this is going to work”‘.
She transferred one egg in March 2024, however, her dreams soon came crushing down when she once again discovered her pregnancy hadn’t taken on March 28.
‘I felt like a broken person, it was heartbreaking,’ Katie admitted.
And she had lost all sense of herself through the process, including her self-esteem.
She added: ‘It changed me. I used to be a confident person. I went from a size 10 to a size 22.’
After each failed transfer, doctors gave her hope the next round would stick but after finding out she wasn’t pregnant in March 2024 Katie feels ‘heartbroken’.
She estimates she has spent $165k on egg retrievals, transfers, medication and travel and has finally decided to stop.
Despite Katie’s personal negative experience, she still wants people to know that she thinks IVF is an amazing treatment – adding that she wants to see more people talking about it and offering support.
Katie said: ‘I think there needs to be more support for single and queer people. I’d love for more information on IVF to be available.’