AKRON, Ohio — The miracle of childbirth is all the more special for parents Eric and Brienne Alves, after going through years of fertility issues.
“Threw their hands up and said it’s the end of the road. This is your only option. Take it or leave it,” Eric recalled.
“They said, you know, there’s no chance of having a biological child,” Brienne said.
Today, their baby, Noah, is seven months old. He’s happy and healthy and to the Alves family — Noah is absolutely a miracle.
“We’re not unaware of the fact, how lucky we are that it just kind of all kind of fell into place for us,” Brienne said.
Eric and Brienne have been married for seven years.
They got a house in Akron in 2016 and knew they wanted to have kids, so Brienne stopped using birth control.
“I always wanted to be a mom,” she said.
Two years later, however, no pregnancy.
At first, they didn’t think much of it. But eventually, they saw an infertility specialist.
“Went in thinking still there was nothing wrong and we thought if there was something wrong, chances are it was probably on my side and it was something simple,” Brienne said.
“That’s when they diagnosed me with azoospermia,” Eric said
About 1% of all men and as many as 15% of infertile men have azoospermia.
Essentially, the condition means a man has no measurable sperm.
“To hear there’s a possibility, there’s no sperm at all. You’re not going to have a child. It starts getting stressful and you start feeling and internalizing this. There’s shame about it. You’re letting people down. You’re not quite as much of a man as the next individual, so you really start blaming yourself,” Eric said.
Eric and Brienne refused to take no for an answer.
They saw specialist after specialist until they found a doctor at the Cleveland Clinic who believed there was hope.
“He, you know, told us there were options. We could try different medications. We could try surgeries. We could look into other routes and so that’s what we did,” said Brienne, referring to Dr. Neel Parekh.
Those other routes led to microTESE and IVF.
Eric had the invasive surgery while Brienne’s eggs were retrieved down the hall. On Eric’s birthday, they got the good news.
“I just kept asking Brienne, like is this for real? Like is this really happening?” Eric said.
This Father’s Day is his first Father’s Day and after all they’ve been through, the holiday is that much sweeter.
“It’s a little surreal to be actually able to celebrate, considering the journey,” he said.
This couple is sharing their story in hopes of uplifting the millions of people struggling with infertility.
“It’s OK to get several opinions. It’s OK to tell a doctor you don’t accept a no,” Brienne said.
“We do realize how lucky we are and we’re hoping that by us telling our story, that it gives them that hope and drive to just push a little more and hopefully have the same story,” Eric said.
