Back in January, we selected a name completely at random as the winner of our free IVF giveaway courtesy of the amazing Embryolab Fertility Clinic in Greece. Being able to potentially change someone’s life with this gift always takes our breath away.
In total, this will be the 33rd round of free IVF that we have given away in the last 4 years to men and women across the globe whose dreams of parenthood were out of reach due to the costly expense of fertility treatment.
Here, we talk to Suki, who couldn’t quite believe what was happening when we called her to tell her that we had selected her name at random.
Suki, can you tell us how you felt when you got that phone call from us, and realised that you were going to be given a free round of IVF and that your journey was about to begin?
I was actually driving when the call came through as I’m a community cancer care nurse, so Sara left me a cryptic message. As soon as I listened to the message I knew what it meant, I had a small freak out in a Sainsburys car park and called her back. I don’t remember the conversation much apart from saying OMG quite a lot! I don’t even bother with the lottery because I never win anything so this was such a shock! I then immediately called my husband who was just as surprised as me! I will never forget that call and how it made me feel.
Can you tell us about your journey so far?
So our journey began about 3 years ago, we have never had a positive pregnancy test. We spoke to the GP who referred us to a gynaecologist but essentially we have sat on NHS waiting lists for 2 years. Neither of us have any children and we are 32 & 31. We are “eligible” for 1 cycle in our local CCG area but haven’t had any luck moving forward due to NHS waiting lists. We were told we have unexplained infertility, which is so frustrating.
How has your journey made you feel so far?
In 1 word, frustrating! I think with the current pressures on NHS services, the delays and long waiting lists just add to an already pretty stressful situation. Given IVF is so time critical the waiting makes everything feels 10x worse. I also felt quite helpless because essentially it’s a postcode lottery but also so expensive privately. What IVF babble have done with gifting us this cycle is taking away the stress of worrying about finances and waiting lists and being able to focus on the treatment cycle itself and our mental health.
Now that you have this free round, what are the next steps?
So we have had an online consultation with Embryolab and we have our initial visit planned in the next few weeks. Once we’ve got our all our results, the clinic will put together a treatment plan tailored to us. They advised me to start the pill so they can regulate my periods which will help plan the cycle going forward. We are hoping to start in April but we’ll know more once we have had that initial visit. We went to Greece on our honeymoon so I feel like it was fate that picked us for a cycle in Greece, as it holds a special place in our heart!
We wish Suki and her husband love and positive energy on their path to parenthood with Embryolab!
Learn more about Embryolab:
Read more from other Free IVF winners:
Stacie achieves her dream of motherhood with the help of our free IVF giveaway!
