804: The Retrievals
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A quick warning, there are curse words that are unbearped in today's episode of the show. If you prefer a beeped version, you can find that at our website, thisamericanlife.org. From WBEZChicago, it's this American Life, I'm out of glass. So over a year ago, one of our producers, Susan Burton, found the story that she wanted to do. And it was something that a bunch of us were very excited to hear her try, this thing that had been in the news briefly, but it seemed like there was so much more to say and figure out. And then she started interviewing people, and it became clear to her very quickly that this could be so much more than just a one hour story that we would put here on our show. And so she had it off to make it as its very own podcast, its own show, where the coworkers had serial productions in the New York Times. And the show is now finished, it just launched this week. I'm thrilled that we can present the first episode of their show here on our show, and that is what we're going to do today. It's great. And without further delay, let's just get into it, here's Susan. The women are seeking fertility treatment for a variety of reasons. They've had a couple miscarriages, and they're pushing 40. They don't have fallopian tubes, or they need sperm. One woman has a diagnosis that's like a metaphor from feminist sci-fi, a uterus with a single horn like a unicorn. All of them wind up at the fertility clinic at Yale University. A couple of the women choose this clinic because they work at Yale, and that's what the Yale Health Plan covers. Others go to Yale in the recommendation of their doctors. But in Connecticut, you don't even really need the recommendation. Yale Medicine, it's a blue chip medical brand. You know, Yale's just a huge name, and you just think anything that has anything to do with Yale is going to be, you know, the best of the best. It's really not close to our house, it's not where I would have gone, but we figured, you know, another doctor from another hospital said this is the best you can get, and you want. Of course, you want that. To some of the women, the clinic seems to live up to its billing. They like their doctors. Feel cared for by that. That man is an angel, one of the women tells me. He is by far the best doctor I've ever had. Others are not happy at the clinic from the start. It's things like feeling like a number, or issues with communication. There's a lot to communicate. You don't know how hard fertility treatment is until you get into it, and once you start it in one place, it can be difficult to go somewhere else. So they talk themselves into staying. That's the first thing they go against their instincts and talk themselves into. The women drive to the clinic before work in the morning for blood draws, and then wait for the afternoon email from their nurse team. You really have to trust your nurse team, one of the women tells me. At this point, she did.
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