As National Infertility Awareness Week has come to a close, I want to thank everyone for reading, for sharing, for following along. I will leave you with a small request. The Center for Infertility Justice, run by RESOLVE, is the only patient advocacy group in the U.S. that fights for the rights of women and men who are infertile. Visit their website here to read about current advocacy efforts and proposed state and federal legislation that either supports family-growing options or threatens the rights of people like me. Sign up for their updates, and call or email or write to your representatives if there are proposed bills in your state. Please, stand up for the 1 in 8. We need the support of the 7 in 8 or our representatives may believe that these issues do not deserve their support.
An easy first step towards advocating for the 1 in 8 is to contact your U.S. Representative in the House of Representatives to voice your opposition to two bills: H.R. 586 and H.R. 681. The language in these bills states: "To provide that human life shall be deemed to begin with fertilization." These bills have dangerous unintended consequences that will interfere with in vitro fertilization (IVF). Here is what RESOLVE says about the bills:
If microscopic fertilized eggs/embryos are deemed as human life, anything that puts an embryo at risk could be a violation of law, even if its goal is the undeniable social good of helping someone have a baby.
It is unclear at this time precisely which assisted reproduction technology (ART) procedures would be deemed illegal because of their possible risks to an embryo, but we believe the legal uncertainties stemming from the proposed bill would make it difficult or impossible for fertility doctors to treat patients at all using ART. This law would also drastically change the practice of cryopreservation (freezing of embryos not currently needed for treatment), in ways that would drastically reduce patients' options and could even pit embryos against their own progenitors. Cancer patients rely upon embryo cryopreservation to preserve their fertility before cancer treatments.
RESOLVE makes it easy for you - simply enter your information on this website and add a message (or just use their form language) and they will send a message to your representative.
Next week, this blog will return to regularly scheduled programming, picking up the vision quest in Sedona, AZ. Thank you for your support this week, it has been an honor to share my story with you all. The more we talk about infertility, the less alone people who are struggling will feel. Let's keep a dialogue going, and step underneath the clouds of our loved ones' struggles.