A young mother’s hope: Pennsylvania woman undergoes IVF at 19

A Pennsylvania woman’s journey to parenthood included IVF at the young age of 19. Here is her story.

At the young age of 19, Martha Bidnick found out she couldn’t have children. 

It was a shocking discovery, especially since she expected to have kids at some point in her life.

So, she decided to do in vitro fertilization (IVF) immediately.

“It was hard to process at first that I couldn’t have kids naturally,” said Bidnick, who lives in Gettysburg. She was stationed in California at the time, having joined the US Air Force a year before. She’d married young, and she and her now ex-husband were trying to start a family. When she learned that her fallopian tubes were damaged—making it impossible for a pregnancy to occur naturally—she decided to explore IVF.

“The younger you are the better the chances are it will work, so I didn’t want to wait,” Bidnick said. “I was determined to do this.”

Bidnick, now 49, went through IVF treatments and gave birth to a healthy baby girl. This was back in the mid-1990s, when IVF wasn’t under attack. Things have since changed.

In fact, just this month, Republican lawmakers in the US Senate blocked the passage of the Right to IVF Act, a federal bill that would ensure access to fertility treatments. 

The Right to IVF Act had been introduced and was supported by Democratic lawmakers, and needed ‘yes’ votes from three-fifths of the Senate to pass. There are currently 48 Democrats, 49 Republicans, and 3 Independents—all three caucus with the Democrats—elected to the Senate. With 51 ‘yes’ votes, including from both of Pennsylvania’s Democratic Senators Bob Casey and John Fetterman, and 44 ‘no’ votes (plus five members who didn’t vote), the measure failed. 

It was the third time this year alone that measures to protect IVF have been blocked by Republicans.

“They can’t make this political,” Bidnick said. “Women deserve to be pregnant if they want to, no matter how they do it. I really don’t agree with bringing that into the political arena.”

Pathway to Parenthood

IVF is a medical process where an egg is fertilized by sperm in a clinical laboratory, then implanted into a patient’s uterus. According to the most recent data from the US Department of Health and Human Services, 2.3% of all infants born in the US in 2021 were conceived via IVF or other forms of similar assisted reproductive technology. 

As Bidnick learned, the process of IVF isn’t easy, nor is it cheap.

“One of our huge hurdles was financial,” Bidnick said. “It is really expensive. My military insurance didn’t cover it.”

In June, Pennsylvania Congresswoman Susan Wild (D-Lehigh) introduced the Helping to Optimize Patients’ Experience (HOPE) with Fertility Services Act, which would require private insurance plans to cover IVF treatments. It would save families tens of thousands of dollars as they try to build a family. The bill is currently in the House Committee on Education and Workforce awaiting a vote. 

(It’s worth noting that there are 206 Democrats and 208 Republicans in the US House of Representatives, with all seats up for election on Nov. 5.) 

The process itself, Bidnick said, is difficult, both physically and mentally.

“I had to take all these medications and go to all these medical appointments,” Bidnick said. “I was poked and prodded everywhere.”

Bidnick’s doctor was able to retrieve 8 embryos that were viable for implantation.

“I had to sign a consent form saying they were allowed to do a selective reduction if too many implanted,” Bidnick said. “In some states, nowadays, a form like that would be illegal.”

Four embryos were implanted in her uterus. Of those, two started to grow. The remaining four embryos were frozen and put in storage. 

During this time, Bidnick was going through both routine and special testing for her pregnancy, sometimes traveling over an hour just to get the test or treatment she needed. 

“I was very stressed at the time and I actually lost [an embryo],” she said. “I had to go to the emergency room because I didn’t want to lose the other one.”

Thankfully, she didn’t.

“I was lucky,” Bidnick said. “I didn’t have to be re-stationed when I was in the military, so that helped. I was able to see the process through with the doctors I had chosen. Plus, I didn’t have to worry at all that my right to have a child would be taken away. I can’t imagine going through the process now, not knowing if, after going through the draining process and spending all that money, I wouldn’t have my baby girl at the end because some politician said I couldn’t.”

IVF became a political talking point in February of this year, when the all-Republican Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos in Alabama would be considered “children” under state law. Legal scholars worried that the ruling set a precedent for similar decisions across the country, in the wake of the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022. The Roe decision had protected the fundamental right to an abortion in the US for nearly 50 years. Since Roe was overturned, Alabama has had a total abortion ban in place.

The state of Alabama passed legislation to protect access to IVF procedures, but some representatives of IVF clinics there say they don’t feel comfortable continuing to offer services in such an unstable environment.

Many fear that what happened in Alabama could spill over into other states, such as Pennsylvania. While measures have been introduced in the federal government to protect the right, all have been blocked by Republicans.

After having her daughter, Bidnick left the military and moved back to Pennsylvania to raise her child. Her path to parenthood isn’t exactly the one she envisioned, but she’s at least glad she had that option.

“I was more shocked than anything,” Bidnick said. “I couldn’t believe that was what I had to do to have a baby. But at some point, I went ‘well, okay, you gotta do what you have to do.’”

“I accepted that I couldn’t have a baby naturally. I had options. I can’t ever imagine being in that position and not having that option because some politician decided to take it away.”