A Gwinnett County Teacher Went Through Several Egg Retrievals and a Severe Anemia Diagnosis Before Finally Becoming a Mom at 41

Tamica Brown spends her working days with other people’s children. For years, the Gwinnett County elementary school teacher wondered whether she would ever have one of her own.

On July 23, 2026, she did. Brown, 41, and her husband, Ted, welcomed a daughter named Tamia Janae after a long run of IVF that included several egg retrievals and a hospital stay in the middle of treatment, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

A Timeline That Kept Moving

Brown married later in life, and by the time she and Ted felt ready to start a family, the COVID-19 pandemic had arrived. The couple put their plans on hold.

When they did start trying, pregnancy did not happen on its own. Brown told the AJC that life had not followed the timeline she pictured when she was younger, and that there were stretches when she quietly wondered whether motherhood was simply not going to happen for her.

The couple turned to fertility treatment, and eventually to in vitro fertilization. Brown has said the process turned out to be far more involved than she ever imagined, and that clearing one hurdle often just revealed the next one waiting.

What Each Round of IVF Involves

Brown went through several egg retrievals before Tamia arrived. Each one is its own small marathon. According to the Mayo Clinic, a cycle begins with hormone shots that help several eggs develop at once instead of the usual single egg, a phase that usually lasts one to two weeks.

During that time, patients return again and again for vaginal ultrasounds that track the growing follicles and blood tests that check hormone levels. The retrieval itself happens 34 to 36 hours after a final trigger shot, when a thin needle guided by ultrasound removes the eggs in a procedure of about 20 minutes.

Eggs are then fertilized in a lab, and an embryo can be transferred to the uterus two to six days later. Mayo Clinic notes that a full cycle takes about two to three weeks, that more than one cycle may be needed, and that maternal age is one of the biggest factors in whether treatment works. Its guidance says people 40 and older are often advised to consider donor eggs to improve their chances.

Age raises the stakes in other ways as well. The same Mayo Clinic overview says miscarriage risk climbs from about 15% for pregnant people in their 20s to more than 50% for those in their 40s when fresh embryos are used. Every retrieval and every transfer carries that weight for patients past 40.

For Brown, each round meant another stretch of injections, appointments, ultrasounds and blood work, the AJC reported.

A Diagnosis in the Middle of Treatment

The hardest stretch came when Brown’s own health faltered. During her fertility treatment, she was hospitalized and diagnosed with severe pernicious anemia and a vitamin B12 deficiency, the AJC reported. She kept going with her fertility plans anyway.

Pernicious anemia is an autoimmune condition. The National Institutes of Health’s Office of Dietary Supplements explains that people with the disease cannot make intrinsic factor, a protein the body needs to absorb vitamin B12 from food. B12 helps keep blood and nerve cells healthy, and a shortage can cause fatigue, weakness, pale skin and heart palpitations. The office says doctors usually treat pernicious anemia with vitamin B12 shots.

The same fact sheet lists infertility among the possible signs of a B12 deficiency in adults. The AJC’s report does not say whether the condition played any part in Brown’s difficulty conceiving, only that the diagnosis came while she was already deep into treatment.

Adding a serious diagnosis to a demanding treatment schedule would test anyone. Brown has described the whole journey as a series of hurdles, and this was one of the steepest.

Tamia’s Growing Cheering Section

Tamia is now a little over three months old, and her mother says the baby is already very clear about what she wants and when she wants it. The sleepless nights have arrived too, and Brown’s answer to them is simple: she is happy to take the tired.

She has also said she still catches herself in disbelief that she is really somebody’s mama.

Brown entered Tamia in the 2026 Baby of the Year competition, and the contest has given the family a way to share their story. The prize for the winner is $25,000 plus a national ad campaign, according to Romper’s guide to the contest, which says voting closes Nov. 5 and the winner will be announced on or before Dec. 5. Each supporter gets one free vote every 24 hours. Entry is open to babies under 24 months, and registration is free.

The competition is run by Colossal and benefits the nonprofit Baby2Baby, with The Honest Company providing the ad campaign and Variety running a feature on the winner, WFTV reported while covering another family in this year’s contest.

Whatever the contest brings, Brown has said the outpouring already means a great deal. Tamia was loved and wanted long before she arrived, her mother told the AJC, and now she has a whole cheering section around her.

Stories of long roads to parenthood have resonated with Parent Diaries readers, from an Idaho couple who endured five pregnancy losses before an adoption call came to a Florida family whose IVF baby led to a DNA surprise. Brown’s version ends, for now, with a 3-month-old who arrived on her own schedule and a mother who finally got the title she waited for.

Get stories like this by email. Sign up for The Parent Diaries Letter.

This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.

Image: DeKalb, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons