While a woman’s age at thaw has relatively little impact on a woman’s chances of success, the age at ... [+]
Lilia, a full-service egg freezing concierge, today announced they are now offering egg freezing directly for their clients at nearly half the price of an average IVF procedure and in half the time, and coordinated to make the experience less isolating. With this new breakthrough offering, women have access to the leading, most progressive doctors in the country dedicated to Lilia’s mission of giving every woman the freedom to make her own decisions on her own timeline.
According to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, the U.K.'s independent fertility regulator, the data shows that “while a woman’s age at thaw has relatively little impact on a woman’s chances of success, the age at freeze does, with evidence showing that if eggs are frozen below the age of 35, the chances of success will be higher than the natural conception rate as the woman gets older.”
Alyssa Atkins, founder and CEO of Lilia
As a Y Combinator graduate, and having raised roughly $1.5 million to date, Lilia is revolutionizing how women plan their futures. Founded in 2019 by Alyssa Atkins, who froze her eggs at the age of 29, the idea for Lilia was conceived when she founder realized the whole experience was built for an IVF couple, not young women focused on their futures. The company is currently operating with doctors in New York City, Chicago, and San Francisco, with plans to go national by the end of 2023. As explained by Atkins, Lilia is now a “single point of contact for women - no more waiting on hold for doctors’ offices or fielding a million emails from the clinic’s different departments.”
The convenience of Lilia’s offerings is reflected in the fact that they coordinate everything for the patient— from contracts, to appointments, meds, and virtual consulting and prep work. The whole process, Atkins highlights, “takes less than a month.” And let’s be honest— until now, no one has focused specifically on serving the millions of women aged 24 35 for whom egg freezing works best.
Most women have considered freezing their eggs at some point and many have been thinking about it for years. But when they turn to Google, they are bounced out by the complexity of how to start, where to go, or what to do. Egg freezing, when done early, is the best way to relieve reproductive pressure and give women more optionality. Optionality is freedom and freedom is everything for women who don’t want to be pressured into having a child before they are ready.
“Lilia is changing a stale narrative about what a woman’s life ought to look like. Society is pretty prescriptive about its expectations of women— college, career, marriage, baby —in that order and ideally by 30, which leaves most women feeling behind no matter what they’ve accomplished or what their personal goals are,” explains Atkins.
It’s 2022 (in case you haven’t noticed) and it’s time we usher in a new normal. One where egg freezing isn’t perceived as something you do in your late 30s as a last resort, but something you can do early, in your 20s, because you have the right to reproductive freedom, autonomy, and choice. It’s not just something to be done for your future self; it has real and direct impacts on the present you by taking the pressure off, especially in dating. With eggs secured early, women don’t have to rush; every first date isn’t an evaluation of whether the person in front of you is the future father of your children.
Atkins admits she sees so many women in their late 30s saying they wish someone had told them to freeze their eggs earlier. So, she and her team are working on showing women how common and normal this process is and educating them along the way. “People think egg freezing is about the future you, but really it’s about taking the pressure off of you today because it lets you date differently, make different career moves, and live with more freedom,” she adds.
“It is more important now than ever that women have the power of choice and freedom. Choice over whether they take certain jobs, and when or whether to have kids at all. They deserve the freedom not to settle, to stop doing the dating math, and not to be rushed in making important decisions about their careers or matters of the heart. Every woman deserves the feeling of freedom and inner peace that comes from knowing all doors to her future are open,” continues Atkins.
So who are Lilia's users and target audience? Obviously, someone for whom being a biological mom is incredibly important, and they want to ensure this happens at some point in their lives. Perhaps it’s a woman who knows she wants to use a surrogate at some point and so egg freezing is a path to this; startup founders, who are super busy and want kids but know they need time to build their companies first; women who aren’t sure they want kids at all, but want the option later; basically, any woman who wants to take the pressure off and keep their options open.
“We believe that in time, egg freezing will be as common as birth control, and it should not only be a luxury for a small group of society. While egg freezing might not have been part of our fairy tale stories growing up, it has become extremely common and is one of the most radical acts of self-care a woman can make. We don't want women to wait until egg freezing becomes an absolute emergency, at which point it’s either often too late to retrieve enough healthy eggs, or to do so would require many cycles and the corresponding costs that come with it,” adds Atkins.
Lilia is under the medical leadership of Dr. Roohi Jeelani, who does the highest volume of ... [+]
The time and cost savings are created to let the company deliver an outstanding experience to women for a predictable $9,000 all-in, instead of the nebulous $15,000+ women are usually faced with. Under the medical leadership of Dr. Roohi Jeelani, who does the highest volume of egg-freezing retrievals in the country, Lilia is able to deliver this breakthrough offering while maintaining the highest standards in medicine.
“We have carefully selected clinic partners who are equally committed to making egg freezing affordable and accessible to all, and dedicated to together creating a better experience for women.”
Atkins and her team spent a lot of time getting the offering right, ensuring they could drive down costs and improve the experience while maintaining a superlative standard of care. Now that they’ve done this, they’re working on changing the entire narrative around egg freezing and normalizing this process as a regular part of womanhood.
“We’re especially interested in how dating and egg freezing relate, because we know when women freeze eggs early they’re able to date differently and that it gives them more power in their love lives. We’re working on telling more women’s stories about who’ve frozen their eggs so women see just how common this is. Something I realized when I froze my eggs is I had all these friends who’d done it but weren’t talking about it,” concludes Atkins.
