Series tackles a serious subject with lighter touch
Answer: “Hahahaha! That’s hilarious!”
Question: What’s the most inappropriate response to a loved one who tells you they’re struggling with infertility? Or, maybe it’s not.
The new comedic web series How to Buy a Baby suggests as much, as it follows 30-something couple Jane (Meghan Heffern) and Charlie (Marc Bendavid), who discover they’re infertile. They’re determined to stay lighthearted amid the heavy diagnosis, but the emotional and financial burden threatens to overwhelm.
Inspired by the struggles lawyer-turned-writer Wendy Litner and her husband faced, the CBC original series launches Monday on the CBC TV app and cbc.ca/watch.
“We went through rounds of infertility treatments, and I just felt like it was such a lonely, isolating time,” says Litner, whose treatments filled the greater part of five years.
“When we were diagnosed, we were committed to being able to laugh at it. There wasn’t a lot of romance or intimacy to it, so we decided to approach it with a sense of humour. One in six Canadian couples struggle with infertility, so we hope that it tells their story as well.”
Unfolding in 10 episodes that run between five and eight minutes each, How to Buy a Baby doesn’t sugar-coat the toll of the treatments.
“You have to go in for cycle monitoring every morning, a blood test and an ultrasound. It’s just all so intrusive, and especially in Canada, I wasn’t used to having to pay for medical treatments,” Litner says.
“I felt like I couldn’t shut up about it. I was getting shots in my behind, and I felt like I needed everyone to know that this was happening.”
Some scenes in How to Buy a Baby come from real-life experiences, like the time Litner and her husband argued about whether to have a December baby or a January one (“a ridiculous discussion,” Litner admits). But others and many of the supporting characters — the doctors, the friends — are fictionalized.
Once a strictly hushed-tones topic, infertility is increasingly being brought into the open: Celebrities including Tyra Banks, Chrissy Teigen and Jimmy Fallon have shared their personal stories of late. Still, there are many misconceptions, so to speak.
“I think there’s a misconception that it’s a female issue, and it’s not. It’s equally a male issue. I think men especially feel isolated in this experience, because I don’t know that they’re getting the support they need and deserve,” Litner says.
“Also I felt like I was doing something wrong, that I did something to deserve it — like I drank too much coffee. And it’s just not true. It’s just like any other disease, and I think that people don’t know that infertility is considered a disease by the World Health Organization. There’s quite a lot of judgment around.”
Says the show’s producer Lauren Corber, who met Litner when they were in law school together, just finding common ground with others can help.
“We held interviews with couples that have gone through infertility, and each person came in with a different story, but there were so many similarities,” she says. “A lot of them talked about how they go to infertility clinics and nobody talks to anyone. Everyone just sits there looking at the floor, looking at their phones, but everybody is going through the same thing.”
Despite the treatments, Litner didn’t end up having a biological child after all. But working on the show helped her process the experience.
“I actually found myself more emotional watching the series than making it.”