Everyone says to wait a year. “Wait a year to be tested for fertility problems. Don’t stress.” “Stress is what’s going to prevent you from getting pregnant.” “You have time. You’re young.” “Enjoy your spouse.” “Don’t stress.” “Most people are fine. I’m sure you’re fine.” “It will happen when it’s supposed to.” “I treasured the time it took for us to get pregnant even though it felt like a very long time.” “The worst thing you can do is stress about it.” “You know, so and so was so worried and it took x months or years for her, and you know, she just stopped trying, she just gave up. And then it happened for her. That’s what you just have to do. Just stop trying.”
For someone with fertility problems, these comments are very stressful. Let me just tell you, in case you don’t know, having to face head-on the possibility of never having children is stressful. There is no way it could not be stressful.
And to these thoughts I ask, but what of our intuition? What of us being the people living inside of our bodies; the experts of our bodies? Maybe I feel stressed because it’s an internal sign that I need to do more to be able to move forward in this process. What if waiting decreases my already low chances? What if I need to let my worries help me to get moving to treatments and outsider help to be able to have children? Then, my worries and stress actually play a role in helping us.
If I’ve learned anything throughout this process, it’s that I truly know my own body. I can trust my body and my sense.
Medical providers have an amazing amount of knowledge and great experience, however, they are not in our bodies. They are not receiving the intuition and internal direction we are. Sometimes we equate a medical provider with a person with absolute knowledge. The field of medicine does not contain all scientific knowledge, but simply what has been learned up to this point. It’s a constantly changing field. We learn new things from experience and research every day. Absolute knowledge has not been attained. In our society we come to trust doctors as having that absolute knowledge. We also forget medical providers are imperfect people. They forget things. They make mistakes. They are human. People suggest second opinions for a reason. But I know, it’s a lot of work to get a second opinion. Just to get time off to go to the doctor in the first place is a miracle, let alone carving out the time again for another opinion, figuring out who your insurance will cover, trying to explain that you really do not have bad anxiety but you are just advocating for your body and your internal sense…it’s all…complicated.
I thought I had a problem because my periods started to get really heavy and just kind of off; and they have always been very painful. I have a family member with endometriosis and I know that I was having some symptoms of endometriosis. I talked to my healthcare provider about it years ago before I was even trying to get pregnant. What did she say? Something along the lines of that if I wasn’t filling a pad in x amount of hours and if Advil does anything to help me, then I don’t have endometriosis. What science is that based on? That was a false assessment. My intuition and concerns were hardly glanced out and then thrown out the window. And, it’s hard to stand up to a medical provider. They are in a position of authority. They have “studied.” They “know.”
But we know too.
Endometriosis can be very severe with little-to-no symptoms. A surgeon told me he has done hysterectomies on women for other problems and come to find out while operating, they have very bad endometriosis. Sometimes I wonder if there was more research out there about endometriosis and therefore easier ways to test for it, perhaps my fertility could have been better preserved back then when I thought that was what was going on.
So, trust yourself. Trust your body. While I can’t regret where we are and what decisions we’ve made, I think I was completely right in being the first person to believe I had endometriosis, which has since been proven true (win!) and the urge I felt to need to get testing going before the year mark was also spot on. Fertility decreases with age. Some problems, like endometriosis, worsen with time. Therefore, it was not at all helpful to wait a year. Would we have been up for spending a ton of money on fertility treatments before the year mark? I don’t know. But, we could have learned what we could do to increase our chances right away, because there was no reason to wait. Everything could have been tested for and could have directed us as to what we would have to do, well before the year mark. I just don’t see how that would not have helped. Trust yourself.
I understand why medical providers say to wait a year. However, I think that we should each balance that with our age, the number of children we want, any physical symptoms, personal history, family history, and other factors that are important to us. When you really can’t get pregnant, you really can’t get pregnant. It’s not something to wait on to work through. The issue is we don’t always know if we just have lower chances or in actuality no chance without medical intervention. I think we need to feel empowered to consider all of these questions.
A word about anxiety. There is a difference between your internal sense and anxiety. Anxiety is clear fear, doubt, negativity. “Something bad will definitely happen.” “This definitely won’t work for me.” “Something good can’t happen for me.” It’s a lack of hope and positivity. This is not to be your guide. This doesn’t help you get to where you are trying to go, unfortunately. Yet some of this is bound to happen. It’s natural.
Your internal sense and that internal guide you have is really a feeling that something is as it is, which tends to lead us to an action to work on the issue, not to just fret and be negative. It can be especially difficult to distinguish between the two because everybody will think you’re just being anxious (probably because they already have been pregnant before, they’re on “the other side”).
Be strong. Trust yourself. You know you. You are walking an important path upon which you will feel some direction and guidance, because we are driven to that outcome of having children, because it is a very important part of life and it is what keeps the world going round and round. Don’t feel bad because you know what you need, even if no one else believes you.
warmovenblog 