Narrator: This is where human eggs are frozen.
Harvesting them is a long, painful,
and incredibly expensive process.
The chances of any of those eggs
leading to a successful pregnancy are extremely low.
- No one said, "Don't do it."
No one said, "You're crazy, lady,
don't spend this money.
It's not going to work."
No one stopped me.
Narrator: But if it does work...
This is day one for Isa Watson.
She'll inject hormones twice a day for the next 10 days -
- Done my dosage, 150.
- to stimulate egg development.
She'll do this until the eggs
are extracted from her ovaries.
- This one hurts.
Narrator: But for many women,
the pricey journey isn't likely to end in pregnancy.
- At one point, I was spending
just under $1,000 a day for medication.
I used whatever money I had and I maxed out my credit cards.
So this one's $1,120, $1,960, $4,687,
$1,650, although I know that it cost me more than that.
Narrator: Angela Anderson tried twice
and only managed to get eight viable eggs into storage.
Altogether, she spent about $50,000.
- Every day, the results were not good.
And when they call you and tell you
that none of them worked,
they don't tell you you'll never be a biological mother,
but that's what they're telling you.
Narrator: But for many women, it's worth the risk.
- If I didn't freeze my eggs,
I would probably feel more pressure
to get married right now.
Narrator: At 32, Isa still wants to put her tech company
before anything else.
- I feel like my company and the growth of it
is my kid right now.
And I don't have time for other kids.
Narrator: Thousands of women
go through this process every year,
even though each egg that gets extracted
has a 12% chance at most of leading to a viable pregnancy.
Egg freezing is a fast-growing sector
of an exploding industry.
Fertility clinics and startups
brought in over $13 billion in 2018,
a number that's projected to more than double
over the next few years.
Isa started her journey
at the brand new Trellis Health in New York City.
It opened in 2018
and looks nothing like a regular doctor's office.
The clinic even has fresh-pressed juices.
It's one of a handful of new clinics marketing
towards women on social media
using colorful ads and playing with the idea of time.
Invoking a sense of urgency isn't new, but it works.
- I knew that there was a clock ticking.
- The one thing I can't get back is time.
- Maybe I can buy a couple more years.
Narrator: Fertilized embryos are easier to freeze
and have better odds at viability,
but some of these clinics are for eggs only,
which is much trickier on a biological level.
- Eggs don't like to be heated or cooled.
They're used to being inside of a body
and being protected at all times.
Embryos are a little bit tougher.
They're just stronger and they're hardier
and they can handle it more.
Narrator: But in terms of finding customers,
embryo freezing takes at least two people
to collect an egg and sperm.
Egg freezing requires just one customer,
like physical therapist Marisa Rose.
She froze her eggs twice about a decade ago.
- I knew that at 36, if I hadn't met someone yet,
that chances were that I was going to have kids later.
Narrator: Six years after freezing her eggs,
she got pregnant naturally and unexpectedly.
- You want to put the trains together?
Narrator: Even though Marisa is single,
she wanted her son, Milo, to have a sibling.
So she dipped into a reserve of frozen eggs
and used a sperm donor.
- I have many siblings and I thought,
"I can't imagine him being alone."
This is a very social, very loving, very caring child.
- Dog, dog!
To me, this wasn't an only child.
Where's the baby?
You want to give the baby a hug?
Oh, thank you for my hugs.
Narrator: But not everyone has the same luck.
Angela's doctors told her she'd have a good chance
of freezing her eggs in her early 40s,
though statistically, the younger you are,
the greater your chances of success.
- I think, total, they retrieved 16,
but only eight were frozen.
You know, you just still have that little bit of hope.
Like, well, at least I have eight.
There's these eight little eggs,
and if I'm meant to be a mom, it'll happen with those eight.
Narrator: Soon after, she went through
in vitro fertilization twice
with her partner, Paul, when she was 46.
But combining sperm with a previously frozen egg
in a lab dish to make an embryo isn't easy.
- Essentially every day they called and said one was gone.
And then on the last day it was like, you know, I knew
the call was going to come that it was over, and it did.
It was awful.
And they were so scientific about it, you know?
I think they even used the word discarded.
They said, "They've all been discarded," and - sorry.
Narrator: A week after she lost all of her eggs,
Paul proposed, and the couple hasn't lost hope yet.
- Right now we're 50-50.
My guess would be we're either going to remain child-free
or we're going to try to have a child through egg donation.
We're going to have to make the decision
in the next probably few months.
Narrator: While there's no breakdown
for egg freezing specifically,
there have been almost 1 million pregnancies
using fertility technology over the past few decades.
One thing is for sure,
the number of frozen eggs that end in successful pregnancies
is only a tiny fraction of the total.
And for Trellis, a business model built
around egg freezing alone wasn't enough.
In November, as we were reporting this story,
the fertility clinic shut down due to a lack of clients.
Isa's 19 eggs were safely stored
before Trellis closed.
Now she's back to her normal life.
- I actually feel the most change emotionally and mentally,
more so than physically.
And I feel like I've taken complete ownership of my future.
Narrator: For Marisa, one frozen egg
changed her future forever
on the morning of December 18, 2019.
On that day, she gave birth
to her baby girl, Matea.
Marisa's mom was with her to help bring the baby home.
- Hi!
- Sh, sh, sh, she's sleeping, bubs, quiet.
All came into one day of putting one embryo in and saying,
"Let's just see what happens,"
and, you know, roll the dice.
I got what I wanted and I'm feeling pretty lucky.
I'm pretty happy about that.