I’ve had the unfortunate luck to experience that firsthand over the past year or so. Two years of trying to get pregnant, an unsatisfying diagnosis of “unexplained infertility” and several tests, medications, and procedures later, we’re still no closer to the family we dream of.
The entire process has been a revelation for me. I never realized how common infertility is. How expensive assisted reproductive technologies are, and how low the odds are of them working. How little the medical community really understands about how babies are made. How much of a fight it can be to get insurance companies to cover any of the procedures.
I wrote a piece on my blog (you can read it here) to try and get my feelings out as well as to spread a little bit of awareness about the condition. I’m lucky, and grateful, to have any insurance coverage at all for what I’m going through. But everything is more expensive because it goes with the “infertility” diagnosis. It’s a giant red letter on my chest, as far as my insurance company is concerned. A blood test that would normally cost me $3.50 is $40 when it goes along with an infertility procedure. I am also lucky, and grateful, to be making enough money that these medically-assisted attempts to get pregnant are even an option for me. And my employer has been extremely understanding of my need to take time off for medical appointments on very short notice – often I get a call in the afternoon about labs drawn in the morning, and I’m told to come in the next morning for an ultrasound. Not everybody enjoys that kind of support.
It’s a frustrating, expensive, isolating journey, and millions are going through it. Those who aren’t, know very little about it, because nobody really talks about it. So I’m talking about it, in hopes that some people will come away with a new understanding and compassion for the 1 in 8 couples who desperately want to have a family, but have to deal with infertility instead.
(Full disclosure: I asked for mod permission before posting, because there’s a link to a fundraising page in that blog post. I’m participating in a Walk of Hope this summer and I’m raising funds for the National Infertility Association. But I’m not here to shake the SDMB down for money. I just want to give the topic the attention it needs.)
Sorry. My daughter is going through her second attempt at getting pregnant. They just removed 8 eggs a couple of days ago. (Hopefully I’m using the right terminology)
Hopefully it works this time as her insurance only covers 2 attempts. And as you said, it’s expensive.
My best friend suffered from infertility. She described her feelings of grief akin to that of having a loved one die. I was really unaware of the level of trauma that a woman goes through until she shared with me. Fortunately IVF worked for her and she now has two children but it was a long, hard path to get them.
I just had drinks with a friend of mine, commiserating over this - I had three miscarriages and spent three years trying to get pregnant before I had my son; she would have had a baby two weeks younger than my son but miscarried in the first trimester. We were talking about how infertility and pregnancy loss is like some terrible club you don’t know anything about until you join. Even when you know someone else going through it, it’s hard to grasp. And it’s really hard, too, because it makes it so incredibly difficult to hear others’ good news - our get together was prompted by her sister, pregnant for the third time, who was so gleeful that it just crushed my friend, missing the baby she didn’t have. You feel guilty and want to be happy for your friends and family getting pregnant, but there’s so much sorrow and jealously of your own. And that sounds terrible if you haven’t been there, but it’s true.
We just hit one year of trying without luck, so we’re officially in the club. Thirteen cycles, three pregnancies, three early losses. We already have a daughter (who came with no trouble whatsoever) so I don’t have a baby-sized hole in my heart, but it compounds the frustration. Why the hell can’t we do it again?
My friend, who had the infertility problem, joined a therapy group dedicated to the issue. Even now, with her oldest daughter at sixteen, she refers back to things she experienced in the group. It was such a comfort to her, God knows I wasn’t as understanding as I should have been at the time. I think so many of us who haven’t experienced it can’t truly understand and that’s why group therapy was so helpful to my friend.
My sister-in-law is pregnant with her second, and it’s so hard. I love her and I’ll adore my niece, but I have a tough time hanging out with her while she’s all glowy and pregnant. When I found out, I was happy for her and so very crushed for me. She’s very understanding, thank goodness. We won’t do a big Mother’s Day shindig with the in-laws this year - my husband and I will take my MIL out at a different time. They’re all ok with it.
I’m so sorry for your losses. I only (only!?!) lost one, last fall, and it nearly killed me. My Mom tried to be wise and helpful but saying things like “well, at least you know you can get pregnant!” is really not all that kind. The would-have-been due date’s in 2 weeks, so that will be a barrel of fun. The blood test for our second round of IUI is two days before that date, too, so I’m praying it’s not a double blow. I’ve got wine ready.
I think people going through secondary infertility have it harder sometimes, because people can say things like “well, aren’t you grateful for the kid you have?” Obviously you are, but it’s still hard when you can’t have another. I hope you get all the kids you want to have.
I feel so bad for you. My daughter also suffers from infertility so I see firsthand how painful this process is. I really really hope something will eventually work for you.
My daughter and her husband made the decision to go with adoption through the county. That process has some negatives, but they were lucky enough to get a 3 month old girl and the adoption will be final this September.
Anyway, I wish you the best of luck in your efforts.
Antigen, is there any way you could get yourself back to Quebec province for a while? Fertility clinics, in-vitro fertilization, all that stuff if free, covered by l’assurance-santé (Programme québécois de procréation assistée). Mind you, I ask you that, but I realize that you have a good job in Maryland, and a life there…
I feel for you. One of my nieces who lives in Alberta went through this sort of situation. Her marriage ended, and I think it may have had a lot to do with the ups and downs of the process. and the heartbreak.
It does suck, doesn’t it? I was lucky to have insurance coverage. We did six cycles of IUI on one policy, then switched to another one at the next open enrollment and did three cycles of IVF. We didn’t have any luck. I am actually on yet another policy now that would let me try again, but at 40 years old, I don’t know how well I could handle going through it all again knowing that I now have the further disadvantage of age. I am trying to concentrate on other things. I feel the loss all the time. My feelings on adoption are more complicated than I expected them to be before everything, so that is not on the table right now.
I’ll admit I’ve thought about it, but I’d have to be there several months to meet the residency requirement before I’d be allowed to use RAMQ, and then be there several months, maybe years, through treatment. And that’s if I get to start right away and not have to wait for referrals. I can’t leave my husband and job and new home behind like that, and I can’t uproot and take him with me, either. He’d do it, I’m sure, if it was the only way or if I told him I needed to go back, but it would be incredibly stressful. Not to mention that it would likely throw a huge wrench into my US green card process!
No, for now, I’m doing ok. My insurance covers some IUI stuff at 50%, which is better than nothing. From our initial testing and diagnosis and the two IUIs we’ve done, it has cost us about $2500 out of pocket so far. My insurance company won’t pay for IVF, though, even though Maryland law seems to say they have to. That’s something I’m investigating, and RESOLVE is helping me figure it out.
Mostly I’m annoyed at how unscientific this whole process is, despite it looking very sciencey from the outside. “Unexplained infertility” just means they have no idea what’s wrong. And when they doubled my dose of medications for my second round and I still didn’t produce more than one follicle, they said “well, every cycle is different and we never know how your body will respond.” It’s incredibly frustrating to see that even the experts on the subject are basically guessing. I’m intelligent. I’ve got time and resources to do the research myself and ask questions and make sure my care is well-managed. I feel bad for the women who don’t have those same resources and who just go along with everything the doctors say because they’re doctors. They don’t always have it right, even though the white coats make it look like they do. I fought to be taken off progesterone supplements, for example, because the side effects were dangerous for me. I asked them to please test my progesterone level and see if it’s low enough to require supplements in the first place, and the doctor seemed to think this was a great idea! Why in the world was that my idea?
Silvorange, my feelings on adoption are complicated too, and it’s not an option for me right now. That’s not to say it won’t change, but it’s not something I want to work towards yet. I’m sorry that you had to go through so much and I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you. It’s not like adoption is a walk in the park, either. I’ve seen folks working towards adoption and it can be as heartbreaking a hell, and as expensive as IVF.
I personally think adoption is too often held out as a “cure” for infertility, as an unalloyed blessing/wonder/whatever. It’s not.
How infertility was dealt with in my marriage worked for us, but I’m savvy enough to know that there is no one size fits all solution to this problem. Telling a person struggling with infertility “You can adopt!” can be as callous and unfeeling as telling someone who has had a miscarriage or death of a child “You can have another baby!”
So, my sympathies everyone going through misery over this, and I wish you both good fortune and a happy end (however it is achieved) to your problem.
I married my husband last November. We had talked before and we both agreed that a small family would be best. We both want two kids and I would like to have the first before I turned thirty. We fought a little bit about it last year because the stress of moving, getting married and chanhing jobs probably caused my cycles to be a little irregular. I wasn’t worried about being infertile at that point.
In January, I missed my period. It didn’t come in February or March. I took at least nine home pregnancy tests which were all negative. I finally decided to see my doctor at the end of March. I had held some tiny hope that maybe I was pregnant and somehow I had screwed up all the tests. The alternative was unthinkable to me. When I got the doctor’s results back, I was devastated. I still am actually. I am 24 and way too early to be worried about this. My doctor said my lack of periods was probably stress and that I should take easy. She also pushed me to lose weight.
Since I last talked with her, I’ve lost about 7 lbs and had one period. We haven’t been trying to have a baby and we certainly aren’t ready but just having face the fact that it might never happen has been so heartbreaking. I can’t even imagine what it is like for people who are trying. It really hurts now especially since my best friend has two babies (her second was born last Friday night). Every time I see people with kids, I mourn a little.
Great blog post Antigen. And yes, it’s a lonely world, but yes, there are SO MANY people who struggle with infertility. As I think you are aware, Derek and I have been NTNP (not trying, not preventing) for 12 years now, and have been actively trying with medical help for six years. I hope your journey is more successful and much shorter than mine.
We are also unexplained, but I strongly believe I have immune system issues. I’ve had six miscarriages in the last six years so there has to be something wrong there. My body rejects the embryo’s when I do finally get pregnant. Is this something you could look in to as well? It will, of course, be out of pocket, but there are some amazing clinics in the US (i.e. Dr. Kwak-Kim, Dr. Sher, etc.).
I did Ask The threads when we did our IUI’s and our IVF last year if you haven’t seen them. Some good questions and answers in there too.
If you don’t mind my asking, what clinic are you with? I’ve found through all this, and through my online group of infertile buddies in the US, that if you are dealing with an Ob/Gyn you will not get appropriate treatment (and a GP is 100 times worse), and also that you really, really need to understand what’s going on and take charge (like you did asking for your P4). So many clinics, including my own, are by the book and just do status quo unless you ask for different.
Oh, that sucks so much. It is a terrible thing to go through, I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. The “unexplained infertility” is a hard thing in and of itself. For someone who always likes to have a plan, this was the ultimate in frustration for me. Like you, I was also AMAZED by how many aspects of fertility are still unknown, although I tried to put it in perspective and think about how much progress has been made within my own lifetime. (I’m old enough to remember the hoopla about the first “test tube baby” and now it’s perfectly commonplace, for example).
This. I had three first-trimester miscarriages. Devastating. Then my OB suggests a baby aspirin regimen. Why? “I don’t know,” she says, “but it helps in like 40% of unexplained infertility.”
I started taking baby aspirin and had a baby. Are you F’ing kidding me??? We still have no idea if that is what we needed or not.
And why don’t we talk about this more openly??? I hid myself away for a year. :mad:
It doesn’t sound terrible at all. It sounds human. Don’t sit there thinking “What a horrible think to think/feel about someone else/at a time like this” and add guilt to your emotional burden.
I know what you’re talking about. My wife and I went through years of infertility. Two miscarriages, several rounds of procedures that didn’t amount to anything. And our insurance didn’t cover anything at all, so I think we ended up spending maybe $50,000 in total. We did finally end up having a baby, using a donor egg.
And as you said, the community of infertility is huge. We discovered so many people also going through the struggle. Relatives and friends who confessed that they were seeking professional help as well, once we started telling them our story.
I would just like to add that having suffered for years, and finally having two children through IVF (6 years of various treatment before the first success, no insurance coverage, 6 cycles for one and 4 for the other!), I am amazed when I see women in their early 30’s talk about waiting to have kids. Did no one tell them that it gets way harder after 35???
I think when people read about celebrities having kids in their 40’s, they think it’s no big deal. We were lucky in that we started trying at 30 and so had time to try all kinds of things. We were lucky that we could afford to pay for it ourselves. And we were lucky to have two successes.
But I sometimes feel like shaking young women and screaming, “You don’t have forever! If you want to get pregnant don’t wait forever!”