The following is an excerpt from an article published in the OC Register:

They met on a blind date in 2005 and were married less than two years later. Children were always in the plan. Four, they figured, would be perfect.

She was an elementary school teacher; he was a godfather six times over.

Back then the Newport Beach couple assumed pregnancy was something you could plan, like which show to catch at the movies. So they waited until their first anniversary to start trying.

"There was not a doubt in my mind I would go off the pill and get pregnant the next month," Ashley says. "Then the next month comes...."

"...And goes," finishes Mike, 41.

Six months come and go, to be exact, with no pregnancy. Just a bunch of wasted testing sticks.

A painful cyst and subsequent ultrasound brought the first clue. Ashley had a hormonal disorder called PCOS, polycystic ovarian syndrome, a common cause of infertility. The doctor handed her a brochure and commented: People with this typically never get pregnant.

"It was," she says, "a horrible moment."

She changed gynecologists and started the first of what would be many unsuccessful rounds of fertility hormones and drugs.

Nearly a year later they moved on to a specialist, Dr. Lawrence Werlin at Coastal Fertility Medical Center in Irvine. Attending an information session they realized their personal misery was not unique after all.

About one in eight U.S. couples is diagnosed with infertility.

They found that sharing their feelings and their experience helped them and it might encourage others.

"At first you are so protective and secretive, and you think you shouldn't tell anybody," Mike says.

"But as you go on, it's easier to let people know."

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