Congresswoman Sara Jacobs

But I also think to myself, like a lot of women who are going through this are doing it while they have two toddlers at home.

If they can do it, I can do it.

And this is this too shall pass.

And this is a momentary discomfort to get to my ultimate values aligned goal.

We know that military families face higher rates of infertility than the civilian population, one in four military families.

reports infertility and it makes sense right for all the things you said right in your primary productive years you're far away from your partner you're being exposed to dangerous things to chemicals and we know that a lot of military service members are leaving the military because they can't build their family and serve the country the way they want to

And it's a readiness issue, right?

You know this, right?

We train, we put so much money into training these folks for them to leave at the prime of their career because we're not giving them the support they need.

It's not good for our national security.

And I do wish more people understood the real sacrifices we're asking, not just of the service members, but of their whole family.

I talked to a

Her husband served multiple combat deployments.

She's an Army wife, and she has tried 11 rounds of IUI.

They've not been successful.

Their doctor recommends IVF as the next step, but they can't get TRICARE to cover it, even though his service is great.

part of why he's facing infertility challenges and they've literally considered divorcing so that she can go somewhere else to get the coverage she needs that's not what we should be asking of people who already like sacrifice so much for us right and on this topic of agency right like

Agency isn't just about the ability of yourself to make a choice.

It's about having choices, right?

It's about having accessible choices that you can then take agency in your own life to make.