Things Women Don't Talk About: Part 1

Note to reader: the title of the post is a means of therapy for me. I've found that unless you have sisters, a mom you can talk to about anything, or close girlfriends, women don't usually talk about all the gross details of being a woman.  Later topics to come.

FERTILITY (not infertility)

If you've ever tried to get pregnant, you'll find that you hear story after story of the Fertile Myrtles who go off the pill and are immediately blessed with pregnancy.  You talk to friend after friend who knows someone who... and they all live happily ever after with the pitter patter of little feet.

But it isn't until you find yourself taking negative pregnancy test after negative pregnancy test that you realize you may not be Fertile Myrtle, and modern medicine may need to play a part in your family planning.

This is where I found myself.

Back story: my husband and I got married and decided to wait one year before starting our family.  But on our one year anniversary, my husband admitted that he wasn't ready yet.  This is just fine.  I was ready the day after we said "I do," but I didn't want to move forward without my partner if he wasn't ready.  So we waited.  About four months later, we decided to "pull the goalie" as my husband so-romantically phrases it: I went off birth control.  And just as birth control had screwed up my cycle when I went ON it, it screwed me up again when I went OFF of it.  I didn't have a cycle for three months (and about 7 HPTs later)... then I started a new job... then we moved... then I admitted that I wasn't ready.  But when we moved into our new home in July 2009, we were settled and moving forward, and we decided to start trying again.

I tracked my temperature every morning and noticed zero pattern.  I watched for every sign my body might give me that I was ovulating.  Zilch.  I read about it.  I learned way more about my own reproductive system than I thought I ever wanted to know.  And as we reached the year mark of trying to get pregnant, my husband suggested I call the doctor.  I was scared.  And to be honest, it was hard for me to admit that something might be wrong with my body.  Why is my body not doing what it was made to do??

Rightfully so, my husband started to question my desire to start a family.  He didn't understand why I wouldn't call the doctor when all I had ever talked about was being a Mommy.  But honestly, that was a hard phone call to make.  Really hard.  And I put it off for days and weeks. 

Finally, it went something like this:
(nurse) "What is the purpose of the appointment?"
(me) "I, um... well... we need to... uh, I'm not... it's just that... (deep breath) we-need-to-talk-to-someone-because-we've-been-trying-for-a-year-and-we-aren't-pregnant! (PHEW!)"  There, I said it. 

No problem.  They set us up for an appointment with a nurse in the office that specializes in fertility.  Not necessarily INfertility, but fertility.  Exactly the reason I called: let's figure out why I'm not pregnant yet.  The nurse was amazing, and she made us feel like we were her only patients.  The process seemed to take forever and was very stressful as we went through it, but in actuality, it was pretty quick and painless (minus the numerous blood draws!)

July: meeting with fertility specialist
August: track my cycle, discover that I didn't ovulate. Blood draw and hormone testing confirms.  Wah wah.
September: ...No cycle. Rut roh! (Are you SURE I'm not pregnant? Yes, you didn't ovulate.) 
October: take medicine to kick-start cycle, then take second medication to make me ovulate. BINGO!
November 1st: take home pregnancy test to reveal the greatest outcome I had always hoped for: positive.

In retrospect, that seemed so fast!!  I know that not everyone has those results, but I was thrilled we had the options, the help, and that wonderful outcome.
We are pregnant and ELATED.  I was in shock, giddy, nervous and happy, anxious, scared, thrilled... and SO thankful for modern medicine.  In all actuality, we didn't have to go through months (or even years!) of testing and medication and expenses of additional methods.  Our journey was relatively short on time, but not on stress or emotion.

One of my husband's friend's wife contacted me via Facebook to ask about our infertility issues.  I hesitated writing her back (knowing her history of an ectopic pregnancy and other issues), and I wanted to make it clear that we didn't have INfertility issues, rather we went through some fertility testing.  I gave her the same timeline I outlined above... but I didn't hear from her again after that.  And I felt bad.

I recall several dinners and conversations with my girlfriends talking about what John and I were going through. One of my girlfriends pointed out that these are the stories you don't hear: people that struggle to get pregnant.  It's true!  How many times do you hear about a woman going off birth control and getting pregnant the next month?  But unless you (or someone close to you) has the opposite experience, you don't hear much about that.  I have one sister that I joke can walk past the bed and get pregnant, and my other sister went through similar testing that John and I did (actually, at the same office even, which was a blessing to me to be able to talk to her about what we were doing.)  Both sisters have multiple kiddos (4 and 2, respectively) and I love that I can learn from each of them.

Getting pregnant is not easy for everyone.  For some, yes.  And God bless them!  For others, it takes a little time, patience, maybe some medicine, and a lot of prayers!  So all wrapped up into one, I'll say it again: I thank God for modern medicine (and our precious little peanut as a result!)