If you haven’t heard of Bresha Webb, you’re missing out. You might know her as Imunique from Love That Girl, as Yvette Brown from Marlon, or as Jasmine in Tyler Perry’s A Fall From Grace. Or maybe without knowing her, you’ve seen her in countless other moves and shows. Her new TV show, Run the World, premieres May 16 on Starz, so if you don’t know her yet, that might change. The actress has been speaking her career into existence since she was a four-year-old, and she’s primed to become a household name.
Run the World is a comedy about four smart, funny, and unapologetically ambitious Black women—Whitney (Amber Stevens West), Ella (Andrea Bordeaux), Sondi (Corbin Reid), and Renee (Webb)—who are thriving in Harlem. If Sex and the City comparisons seem natural, you’re not wrong (Patricia Field is a lead stylist on Run the World), but Webb says there’s a key difference.
“Seeing independent women in Sex and the City made me aspire to go to New York and go shopping and spend my money and have aspirations for a Mr. Big,” Webb says. “They were always running toward a relationship and—at times—letting the relationship define them. And that’s where Run the World is different. It’s about four best friends, and they’re running it. The men are with us (or they’re not), but they’re still running it.”
This tendency to take control and “run it” extends beyond Webb’s latest role. Two years ago, Webb made the immensely personal decision to freeze her eggs. The procedure, known as mature oocyte cryopreservation, has helped many people potentially expand their timeline for having kids. But just as fertility depends on various factors, egg freezing discussions require nuance too.
To freeze your eggs, doctors stimulate your ovaries so that you produce more eggs than usual, then monitor the eggs as they mature, the Mayo Clinic explains. Then, your doctor will retrieve the eggs and freeze them for potential use later on. (FYI: If you’re fertilizing the eggs with a partner or sperm donor first, that would be considered embryo freezing.) It sounds pretty straightforward, but it’s important to remember that frozen eggs aren’t a sure thing.
“For an individual, the cost-benefit analysis is quite personal,” Alan S. Penzias, M.D., chairman of the Practice Committee of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) and an associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology, and reproductive biology at Harvard Medical School, previously told SELF. “But nobody should walk away from a conversation thinking that freezing oocytes represents a guarantee of future childbirth.”
The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists (ACOG) cautions against freezing eggs solely to extend fertility without thoroughly understanding the costs, risks, and potential alternatives. But, even with inherent challenges involved, freezing eggs can provide people with comfort and a sense of control. Below, Webb—who is aware of the limitations but is optimistic about her future—chatted with SELF about her egg-freezing journey and how it helped her relax a little more. (Hint: There’s a pandemic love story involved.)
SELF: The idea that your show isn’t centered on finding a relationship is a fitting segue into your egg-freezing experience. Can you take me back to the moment when you decided to do it?
Webb: I had just gotten out of a three-year relationship. You get to an age where you’re dating, you’re having fun, and you look up, and all of your friends are married and have children. And I was just so focused on my career. I wasn’t thinking about it. And I just turned 33, and I was working on Marlon Wayans’s movie, Sextuplets, and my character was having a—what’s the word for an old pregnancy?
SELF: Geriatric pregnancy?
Webb: Yes, geriatric. And I thought that word was so rude. I spoke to a friend who froze her eggs, and I was weeping at her house. I was saying, ‘Oh, my God, I ruined everything. I’m not going to find a husband. I’m not going to have children. I don’t know how this is going to work.’ And she was like, ‘Bresha, just freeze your eggs.’
I had made some money, and I was working, but I really think that it should be covered by insurance, at least a portion. It can be a $15,000 surgery that you’re getting. [Editor’s note: Annual storage of your frozen eggs is an additional cost to consider.] So I did it between projects—I think I was still filming Sextuplets, but I had, like, a four-week window. I went to a couple of doctors because I was like, these are my eggs. I saw it as my first duty as a mother.
SELF: It sounds like you felt a lot of agency during the process—like you interviewed several doctors. How did you know when you’d found the right one?
Webb: Well, I knew that I found the right doctor when he told me that his wife had frozen her eggs and that he’d been through the whole thing himself with her. He also told me more of his story and his successes as a doctor, and he assured me I would be safe, because I was petrified.
A lot of people, including myself, don’t know the egg freezing and fertility process. So my doctor had to draw a picture and break it down for me. That’s not what they teach in school now, you know? But my doctor was amazing. He made me feel very confident about doing it in four weeks.
SELF: What stands out about the entire process?
Webb: I got a lot of blood work done in the beginning to know where my hormone levels were. I got on the pill just so that they could control my cycle and know exactly where I was in my cycle. And I was shooting myself in the lower abdomen every day, sometimes twice a day, with hormones.
Before the procedure, I was going in for ultrasounds every day. I was driving from the Valley to Beverly Hills daily, but it gave me a lot more confidence to go in every day and see my body producing eggs.
In the end, we were able to get 21 eggs. At the time, I wasn’t even really convinced that I wanted to have kids. I’m the only biological child of my parents, and my dad really wants me to have kids, but it was never a dream of mine. I was cool with being the sassy auntie with the dollar bills. But I’m so proud of myself for doing it because the older I get and the more babies I see, I’m like, Wow, it will be cool, you know.
SELF: What was the hardest thing about the journey?
Webb: Being by myself. I felt so lonely. I didn’t feel like it was a punishment because I had girlfriends and friends around me, but you’re going through those hormones, and you’re feeling your body change and shift, and it was depressing. You’re going to a doctor’s office every day to prepare for your future that you can’t see, and that could be sad. But, you know, I also had to have faith that it was all going to work out and that everything happens for a reason.
SELF: I love the idea of preparing for a future you could not see. I’ve heard you speak about the kind of career you want with so much conviction—how have you found that conviction in your romantic and personal life?
Webb: I don’t even know. I mean, my parents have been in love for 38 years now. And so I aspired to be in love like them. And then seeing people around me—seeing Tiffany Haddish in love, and seeing her have a career and happiness—gave me faith. And I fell in love! That’s been the highlight of my 2021. A person introduced me to someone while I was in quarantine in Canada. We connected virtually, and we’ve been together since.
Manifestation and prayer are so important to me. I’ve seen people that don’t reflect love, and I’ve seen what comes to them. So I’m always trying to be on that happy frequency. It’s easier to be lifted, easier to live life a little higher. I’m not going to act like I’m a saint. It’s an everyday battle to be gentle and take care of myself. I don’t know how people do it with kids.
SELF: You’ll have to let me know.
Webb: I’ll let you know when I get to that mountain.
Quotes have been edited for clarity.
Related:
- So, Let’s Talk About That Whole Fertility and Age 35 Thing
- IVF Costs Upwards of $12,000 Per Cycle—Here’s How Real Families Paid for It
- What Black Women Need to Know Before Seeking Fertility Treatment