Should I Give Up?

I hear this repeated so often in the messages I receive on my YouTube channel and it makes me sad but at the same time....I was once there asking the same question so I know these ladies are not alone.  Realistically, when should you stop trying to get pregnant?  When do you just take a break?  What is the last straw for you before you decide you are done trying?

Here is the YouTube video I recorded when I found out I was not pregnant and decided to take a break but only a week before I conceived....



Women who have PCOS or experience infertility are in "The Club."  The same club where women who accidentally get pregnant (not to mention over and over again!), missed one dose of birth control and got pregnant, decided it would be nice to have a baby in June so they could take the summer off and therefore planned it and BAM got pregnant just in time for a June due date.......just aren't members of The Club.

When talking to non-members, it's sometimes easy to think you should stop trying early on, after a year, after the first couple doses of Clomid, that first IUI, second IVF attempt, etc. because if you were meant to have a baby, wouldn't you already be pregnant?  I say....BS!  I fully understand that some women literally cannot get pregnant no matter how much science, baby dust, praying and baby dancing they do, sometimes it's just physically impossible.  But all I have to say about that is for the majority of women, you have a whole lot of tests, procedures and trying to go through before a highly educated fertility specialist gives you the news that you will never get pregnant.

I'd say the 2 biggest obstacles I hear women with PCOS tell me is money and access to the right doctors.  My first appointment with an ob/gyn to tell her we'd tried for years on our own and were not pregnant still was followed by 4 months of spending $1000-2000 a month OUT OF POCKET.  Because the idiot diagnosed me as infertile, put that on the paperwork submitted to insurance so of course they were not going to pay anything to do with getting pregnant because to them it was like asking for a surgery on my wrist even though my entire arm had been amputated!  Okay, that's a little extreme, I have all my limbs, but you know what I mean?  It was after those first 4 months that I seriously contemplated giving up and moving forward with a private adoption because I knew I financially could not spend $20,000 trying to get pregnant and have it not work and then  be broke and not even be able to adopt.

Then I met my amazing "doctor" who is a  Nurse Practitioner and specialized in infertility!  She diagnosed me with anovulation and 6 weeks later I was pregnant with her help and all I paid was 10% copay!  I love that woman!

Many people are limited by the doctors in their preferred network, military doctors, etc. but in reality, no one can tell you that you can't see other, better doctors because it's your body!! But the catch is you might have to pay out of pocket.  Do it.  Get a second job, sell your car and drive a beater, cancel cable, get a basic cell phone, sell crap on ebay and craigslist....do whatever it takes but do not throw your money away on crappy doctors!! 

Now that you have the right doctor or the best doctor you financially can get, how many attempts at pregnancy do you make?   First off, let's just be honest, if you are overweight (I weighed 192 when I got pregnant on my 5'2" frame so I was about 60-75 pounds overweight) the doctor will suggest you lose weight.  There are plenty of studies to back up the fact that losing weight in many cases can help you conceive plus if you are obese, trust me, it's much easier on your body if you are not carrying around the extra weight so if you feel like giving up and you haven't yet lost weight, I think effort needs to be put there right away.

Think Clomid is a cure all and you've tried it 3 or 4 times and still not pregnant?  WRONG!  If you follow the statistics, I believe it's somewhere between 25-30% (I'll research and update this later) that actually conceive on Clomid so yes, the majority will not and it'll take something else!  So don't think you are the only person that did not get pregnant on Clomid!! 

In closing, I'd just tell all the TTC'ers to take it one month at a time.  If you are stressed about what the next 6 months or a year may be for you if you DON'T get pregnant, stop it!!  Live in the present.  I regret all the hours and days I wasted sitting there thinking about how I probably wouldn't be pregnant next month, in 6 months etc.  It made it so hard when I did get my BFP to actually enjoy the moment and the first words I spoke to my husband were "Don't get too excited, it could be a mistake."  Damn me!  I wish I could take that moment back.

Where are you at with TTC?  What have you tried and have you decided when you may decide to stop?  I'd like to hear from you all.