S7 • E4 May 23, 2025
Tanika, a 46-year-old network journalist in Atlanta, Georgia, was looking forward to starting a family after getting married. But her hope of becoming a mother faced an obstacle because she has noncancerous tumors in her uterus called uterine fibroids. According to the University of Michigan, African-American women are two to three times more likely than white women to have recurring fibroids or suffer from complications. In "Mending Miracles", Tanika explains how she handled the struggle of living with uterine fibroids and how she refused to let these issues take away her dream of motherhood. Later, Medical Stories travels to Brighton, Michigan, where another couple are trying to overcome a medical condition that's preventing them from having children. Despite growing up with unusual symptoms, Sara wasn't diagnosed with endometriosis until she was in her thirties. It's a condition caused by tissue similar to the lining of the uterus growing outside the uterus. And Johns Hopkins Medicine claims up to half of all cases of infertility can be linked to the disease. Sara, now 39, and her husband, Brian, open up about what it was like dealing with a mysterious disease throughout their relationship, before revealing how their story wound up with an unexpected happy ending. "Mending Miracles" also features in-depth commentary from renowned experts Ayman Al-Hendy, MD, PhD, FRCSC, FACOG, CCRP, Professor (Tenure) Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Chicago Medicine, and Sawsan As-Sanie, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Michigan.
