Corey and I have been trying to have a baby for over a year now. Many people don't understand what it is like to deal with infertility. Its very difficult and isolating to say the least. Obviously there are many people that go through it but i think the reason they don't talk about it is that if you talk to someone who hasn't been through it themselves, you always feel worse afterward.
People that haven't been through it say the most horrible things to you. Sure they think they are being helpful but they don't know. They say things like "just relax", and we think you might as well say "stupid" or "silly" at the end of that sentence. And of course everyone always knows someone who 'as soon as they stopped trying they got pregnant. so just don't think about!" wow! that's the simplest thing ever, why didn't i think of that before! i'm so dumb! thanks, i'll just go home and not think about when i need to have mechanical sex with my husband on a certain day out of the month to increase our ever dwindling chances!
Stress is not a cause of infertility like many people think anyways. The people that get pregnant after not trying or adopting would have gotten pregnant anyway. Those of us who are actually suffering from infertility have good reasons why we are not getting pregnant, whether we have the answers why yet or not.
Infertility cause s serious depression and self doubt. There are times where I have felt like less of a woman and wife because I have not conceived yet. In a good state of mind I know that is not true at all, but when i'm having a bad day, the littlest thing can set me off. Sometimes it catches me off guard when I see someone else with their baby, or hear of yet another person who is pregnant, or worse-when i get another negative pregnancy test. Sometimes I don't even care if i have a child, i just want to know that i could if i wanted to.
That's not to say that we infertility sufferers are not happy for people who become pregnant. But its an odd feeling to be really happy for someone because you know how much you want to have a child, so for someone else to have something that is so wonderful IS wonderful, but at the same time you feel like everyone else in the world can get pregnant no problem except for you so there must be something terribly wrong with you.
The best thing to do for someone who is expressing to you their troubles with getting pregnant is to just listen. You can say how sorry you are to hear that they are having a hard time and/or offer prayer or a shoulder to cry on when needed. But please don't offer advice, unless its something like a support group or counseling if you think its needed. Don't tell success stories of people you know either because sometimes this can be more negative than uplifting.
After all this time we are finally getting some answers and a plan of attack. I had always been uncertain at how easy it would be for me to conceive because of my history with ovarian cysts. To add to that my thyroid and prolactin decided to go crazy. Prolactin is the hormone that tells your ovaries to release eggs. My thyroid is under control now, but prolactin is not yet. I've had lots of fun tests too, all of which showed me to be fine, but things didn't add up because I'm still not pregnant. Today at the fertility dr we did an ultrasound which was very telling. My right ovary is storing up eggs and not releasing them, while my other ovary as a cyst the size of a golf ball that is weighing down on it restricting the fallopian tubes from catching my eggs. Our plan of action is to make that right ovary release an egg already with the aide of medication and also doing an IUI to increase chances of egg and sperm meeting up. We have three months of trying this method, and if at that time we are not pregnant we will have to reevaluate then.
I've debating a long time about blogging about this, especially because sometimes it would have sounded extremely negative and depressing to say the least. I know i wrote a little on what not to say to people struggling to get pregnant before, but it wasn't as personal. I felt I should because I wish more people talked about it so i wouldn't feel more isolated myself. I also thought that writing about it could help me feel better as well. I hope that if you are reading this it can help you or someone you love cope. There are time i have a hard time believing it myself, but there is always hope. it may not happen when you want it to, but never ever say never. thanks for listening.
