Introducing "Everyone's getting pregnant without me"
Plus an essay on how I chose a name for our IVF baby
Hi friends - Kayti here.
We’re trying something new with the newsletter name and format, hoping to make this space feel more personal and community-rooted. From the beginning, when Amy and I launched the podcast, our mission was simple but important: to create a space where others feel seen and held through the messiness of infertility and IVF. While we’ve shared our own stories, our hope has always been that this would feel less like “our thing” and more like our collective thing, a space where everyone belongs, even if the membership fee is one none of us ever wanted to pay.
With that in mind, we’re evolving this little corner of the FriedEggs universe into a place for stories and micro-essays — snapshots of what it means to live through infertility, IVF, and everything that comes after. Every Friday, you can expect to receive a short essay from someone else in the infertility community, whether they are in the beginning, middle, or on the other side of the journey. Because there is an after. Sometimes it looks like pregnancy or parenting, sometimes it looks like grief or pivoting to a different path altogether. But in all its forms, the after is just as complex, layered, and worthy of being named.
This week, as I return from maternity leave after the birth of our daughter, I’m sharing the first of these essays. Motherhood on the other side of infertility has been radiant and disorienting, tender and exhausting. It has brought both joy and a surprising undertow of grief. My daughter turns three months old this week, and as her “transfer birthday” approaches (I really think this should be a thing. It feels like the truest anniversary), I’ve been reflecting on the long, twisting road that led us here. One piece of that reflection: how we chose her name.
Choosing a Name for Our IVF Daughter
For years, I dreamed of what I might name our baby, if I ever got the chance. After our transfer — our perfect 5AA embryo — my husband and I were convinced it was male (thanks to too many Reddit threads and one small study that said 5AA embryos tend to be male). When we learned we were having a girl, we were stunned. So stunned, in fact, that I needed to wait for the NIPT test to believe it. We tried on names for months, never landing on the right one. Then one day, we thought: What if her name tied us back to the Nordic countries we love, and to the family we have there?
That’s how our daughter became Lumi, meaning snow in Finnish.
Choosing her name also brought me back to a moment from the trenches of infertility. It was an ordinary morning at the gym, but I remember feeling anything but ordinary. I was raw, gutted with envy, probably fresh off another negative test or the cruel arrival of yet another period. A pregnant woman moved beside me, and though I knew nothing of her story, I convinced myself it had been easy for her, that familiar lie we whisper when our own hope is thin.
At the end of class, the lights dimmed for stretches, and the trainer played Taylor Swift’s Snow on the Beach. I folded into child’s pose and wept quietly on my mat, the music breaking me open and holding me all at once. Later, I sat in my car with the song on repeat, letting it soundtrack both my grief and my longing.
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The week she was born, I played that song again, this time from a different perspective. I sobbed, remembering the weekend before her transfer, when my husband and I waded into the October ocean, tipsy on too much wine and raw with fear. The waves were sharp and loud; I was certain our transfer would fail, certain this would end in more heartbreak. I just wanted to get it over with so we could move on to more tests, more retrievals, more next steps.
But then it worked.
On October 7, with sand still in the floor mats of our car, we transferred our girl. And she stayed. She became Lumi. Our girl. Our miracle. Like snow on the beach.
When I think about her name, I also think about timing. Because this time last year, I was on the verge of giving up. After six months of stubborn ovarian cysts, thousands of extra dollars on meds and monitoring, and what felt like endless ultrasounds, I was convinced we’d never make it to transfer. Then one morning, my RE finally said the words I had longed for but never thought I’d hear: the cyst is gone; it’s time to transfer. Within a week, everything shifted. I hoped it would work, but I didn’t dare believe that one year later I’d be tucking our IVF baby into her bassinet, which is part of why I share this story now. To remind myself—and maybe others—that things can change in a moment, even when it feels impossible.
And also because our community isn’t just for those still waiting. Infertility reshapes us forever. Parenting after IVF is both a miracle and a challenge, and it can feel lonely at times, especially when meeting parents who haven’t carried the same emotional, physical, or financial weight it took to get here. It’s not about comparison; it’s about being understood. So whether you’re in the trenches, on the other side, or navigating something in between, please know this: you belong here. Always.
This week’s episode 🎧: We’re excited to return to the pod after a long summer break! In this week’s episode, we catch up on our summers, chat about maternity leave, and Amy gives an update on her surrogacy journey.
Small ‘j’ joys 💜:
for the sour-loving queens, we’ve been snacking on these treats all summer (so addicting + avail at Target)
air purifiers for our ivf arsenal—but make them cute
our new favorite album 🕺
this barn jacket that’s on sale (psa: if you live near a Gap, we found them in stock in-store)
One of our prouder social media moments:
This is beautiful - thanks so much for sharing, Kayti. I had a particularly hard fertility week, and when my yoga teacher played Kacey Musgraves' Rainbow during class this morning, it felt like my tears were pouring onto the mat. I cannot wait for the day when I'll be able to hear that song while I hold my rainbow baby. Just taking it one day at a time.
I needed this. Thank you so much.