The journey to become a parent can be a long one. You know you’re ready, motherhood is calling, but it’s not happening. Let’s acknowledge a few things here.
The way to motherhood can be quick, it can be excruciatingly long
Nothing is fair in life. I think we need to establish this straight out. You have friends who will never have to worry about getting pregnant, it works every time. Or within three months top. You know people who get pregnant “by accident” – though I prefer to say it’s a surprise.
And sometimes you have to wait. Six months, a year, three, even more. And now with the progress of science, people are quick to suggest you jump on the medical solutions because they’re there. But after asking a few women around me who were struggling to get pregnant, I know that usually, we want to know.
We want to know why we can’t conceive naturally, when we know that ultimately we’re here to have children. I’m not saying motherhood is our only mission on earth, far from it. But if we compare men and women, the biggest biological difference is that we can bear children.
After making sure that, for years, you don’t get pregnant when you’re not ready, irony stings. And we don’t know enough yet to diagnose infertility. When you run tests, you’re being told what you don’t have, rather than what is causing the infertility. I know women who have been told that they’re physically perfectly capable of having children, while not being able to conceive for years. Cheers doc.
The “it’s in your head” comment you didn’t ask for
After we’d been trying to conceive for almost a year with my husband, I went to see a fertility nutritionist. I changed quite a few things in my diet, and I was openly saying why to friends when going out. In the space of one week, I got the same comment twice, from friends who’ve known me since I was 6 years old.
“Don’t you think it’s a bit psychological?”
I was so taken aback that I didn’t know what to respond at that specific moment in time. I never got to check if they were asking me if I was too obsessed about getting pregnant. Or if they were basically telling me that I was creating my own fertility issues.
Bottom line is, if you have a friend who is going through this, please don’t tell her it’s in her head. It’s difficult as it is, without having people tell her it’s her fault. Motherhood carries its own level of guilt, don’t add to it please.
Women have been misdiagnosed for centuries, not been included in studies and instead labelled as crazy. You still have doctors who tell their patients that extreme period pain is just something they need to live with.
We’re now learning that there are so many issues that we can have due to our womb and a beautiful complex hormonal system. We are at the beginning of a shift, and I can’t wait to see what comes up and what discoveries are made to help women live better.
Side note: if thinking too much about getting pregnant was a block to getting pregnant, does that mean that thinking about it is a contraceptive?
Didn’t think so.
You can be doing everything right
As a certified health coach, I like to think that I lead a pretty healthy life. And yet, I had a miscarriage and had to wait a year to get pregnant again.
I was (still am hehe) eating nutritious foods with lots of vegetables and fibre. Paying attention to my protein intake. Exercising regularly and meditating (yes, even visualising and manifesting). Sleeping my 8h a night, tracking my cycle, Seeing friends and family, spending quality time with my husband. I’m not overweight nor had gynaecological issues, I was 33 so not even geriatric age by doctors standards !
And yet, no baby. I know that I “only” had to wait a year, and not three or more, or even go through more miscarriages, to have my baby. Some people might think it’s ok, but I believe we’re trying to normalise infertility. And we shouldn’t. We should help women earlier.
When I had my first meeting with the fertility nutritionist, I asked her if she could do something for me, because I thought I was doing the right things. She told me that yes, there were things we could do. So we started working together.
I was pregnant within 6 weeks.
I’m sure there were multiple factors that led me there. And as I said, I didn’t have any issues (that I was aware of) down there, I was going to start running some tests. I was rather healthy so it was probably the last push I needed.
Focused nutrition and a relaxed mind
It did reinforce the idea that there is a nutrition adapted for every purpose. Whether it’s for your heart, your muscle mass, your mental health, your weight, your fertility, etc. And there were lots of other things I did to encourage a pregnancy, like getting rid of toxins and endocrine disruptors.
Who knows, maybe it’s starting to work with someone that unblocked something in my mind and body. Maybe the yoga retreat I went on relaxed me on a deeeep level. But until it’s ok to ask someone if their stagnating cancer is a bit in their head, I don’t think you can ask someone if their infertility is in their head. Motherhood is a journey that starts way before you have a baby in your arms.
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