"Bust an Infertility Myth" - Today's Topic: Age and Infertility

Photo courtesy of Monica Wiesblott.
Saturday Morning
Archival Photograph

Myth #1: You waited too long to have kids.

Busted:

I am not the kind of person who waits. At the age of eight, I was already wearing (and needing) bras. By the time I was ten—home alone and without parental supervision—I cared for and babysat my two younger siblings for long stretches of time. My first period showed up shortly after my 11th birthday. At 16, I tested out of high school and, within months, began working full-time. I bought my own car, paid my own way (rent, groceries, toiletries)--including saving for college--all before I was an adult. I fell in love at 17, was engaged to that same young man at 19, and married at 21. At 22, I was pregnant. Nine weeks after that, I miscarried.

Those periods I had at 11? They were pretty brutal, at least for a young girl. After the first couple—light and delicate, a gentle nudge towards womanhood—they came fast and furious. At 11, I was bleeding through pads in less than 45 minutes, and by the age of 12, I knew well enough to double up: a super tampon with a pad, changed every hour. If this wasn’t bad enough, my periods came every 11-15 days.

I was passing clots too, quarter-sized, and the first time it happened I thought I’d passed parts of a baby. The thought made me feel sick. I’d never had sex before but I’d been raised to believe a virgin had once given birth to a child in a stable, and so, at the age of 12, I thought something was terribly wrong with me: God had gotten me (a virgin) pregnant and I had bled the baby out. 

My periods got worse: I bled heavier with each cycle and the cramps became so bad that without large doses of ibuprofen, I was left hunched over in the bathroom, vomiting. At 17, I was still doubling up on extra absorbent tampons and pads, but I was now changing them every 30-45 minutes.

I discussed my problems at my annual Well-Woman exams. 

“I’m taking 12 ibuprofen tablets every two hours for the pain,” I explained, and the physician’s assistant said she thought that was a lot of pills to swallow. Then she handed me a prescription for 800 mg ibuprofen. “Here,” she said, “Now you’ll only have to take three pills at a time for the same relief.”

When I asked if my periods would affect my ability to have kids, I was told that I was young, so why worry. “You have your whole life ahead of you,” she said. 

But I did worry. And I missed days of work because I couldn’t seem to take enough painkillers to take the edge off. And then a year after I married my husband, I fell pregnant—a spontaneous BFP—and I thought, Okay, at least I know my body works, and I walked around feeling pretty relieved, until the day that baby—at nine weeks—slipped out of me, quietly, and without bleeding, while I was at work. I was devastated.

At my annual exams, I continued to explain how painful and heavy my periods were. I’d done some research and I told doctors I thought my progesterone was low. I told them I thought my luteal phase was too short. “I think I have endometriosis,” I said. My clots, I told them, were sometimes the size of golf balls.

“You’re young,” they all replied. 

You’re young. You’re young. You’re young. 

In one way those medical professionals were right. I was young: young enough to think that I didn’t have a voice, young enough to think that I didn’t have the right to argue with doctors, young enough to believe that maybe I was simply, well, overreacting. My husband and I were both applying for graduate school, and I thought, Okay, maybe my body just knows it’s not the right time. And so I waited. And my periods continued to show up every 20-23 days, heavier with each coming year. 

And then one day, it clicked: all those doctors and physician’s assistants had medical degrees, but when it came down to it, wasn’t I the expert on my body? If I thought something was wrong, wasn’t it worth looking into? And so, I armed myself with research, a list of symptoms, a series of BBT charts, and a fighting energy, and went back to the medical community.

At 28, I was diagnosed with infertility. And after a series of unsuccessful medicated cycles, IUIs, tests and surgeries, it was discovered that I have the Perfect Trifecta for the Worst Periods in the World: endometriosis, adenomyosis, and uterine fibroids. That same trifecta makes it pretty difficult to get pregnant. I was told I had maybe a 3% chance of ever having another spontaneous BFP.

Infertility is not a discriminating disease. It affects women of all ages. Infertility had already clawed its away into my life by the time I was a teenager, and by the age of 22, the year most young people are simply gearing up to graduate from college, I’d already experienced one of its greater griefs: pregnancy loss.

I didn’t wait too long to have children, and there are thousands upon thousands of other infertile women (with polycystic ovarian syndrome, hydrosalpinx, premature ovarian failure, and antiphospholipid antibodies, just to name a few) who didn’t wait too long either. We simply were born with bodies that need mending, and into a world where the medical community has been trained to look past us. “You’re young,” they say, while we’re crawling around, frantic to find relief from our symptoms, desperate to conceive a child. 

Written by: Dani from Rhode Island (guest writer, Ladies in Waiting Book Club)

Photo courtesy of Monica Wiesblott.
Four and Twenty
Photopolymer Etching

Myth #2:  Infertility is a problem for older people.

Busted:

“But you are so young.” I cringe every time I hear those five words. Actually, I cringe every time someone asks my age right after I say we are trying to have a baby because I know what is coming. “But you are so young”. Or a close cousin: “You have lots of time”. Infertility has been pushed off in society as a problem for “older women”.  There seems to be a myth that young people don’t have ANY problem getting pregnant.

It simply isn’t true. Infertility does not discriminate, and it certainly doesn’t discriminate based on age.

This myth is based on the truth that women are born with all their eggs, the number diminishes at an increasing rate with age, and eventually the woman enters menopause. However, there are many reasons for infertility and not all of them are egg related or dependent. These can strike at any age.

My “infertility diagnosis” came at 25, just months after I married my wonderful husband. Everyone said I was “so young”. That was three years ago, I may still be young, but I am glad I didn’t wait until now to get started.

What the uninformed conversationalist doesn’t know is that I was first diagnosed with Endometriosis when I was 18. I had surgery for stage IV endometriosis at 19. I knew that having a baby was NEVER going to be easy and I was YOUNG. Women with endometriosis can have trouble conceiving because there are endometrial cells covering their reproductive organs. Endometriosis is often diagnosed in the late teen and early 20’s.

A later diagnosis on our journey was Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS). This condition has a whole host of symptoms including weight challenges, unwanted hair growth, irregular periods, and anovulation (failure to ovulate consistently). These symptoms can manifest themselves during the teen years shortly after a young woman goes through puberty. Women with PCOS can, and do, have children, but they will struggle even when they are young.

Another common infertility cause is a structural problem; this can include blocked or damaged tubes and uterine deformities. Women with this diagnosis often can only be helped through in vitro fertilization (IVF). Structural problems can be genetic or caused by trauma and can obviously occur at any age.

Couples that have male factor infertility face a whole host of other stigmas, challenges, and treatments. For these couples, it is clear that the age of the woman doesn’t matter at all. Telling a woman whose husband has low sperm count that she is “young” isn’t going to win any points.

There are some problems with female fertility that do get worse with age, but youth doesn’t automatically equate to easy conception. Personally, I am glad I started young, because I don’t see it getting any easier waiting until I hear “but you are so old”!

Written by: April from Florida (editor, Ladies in Waiting Book Club)
Visit her blog: A Wife At Home

Photo courtesy of Monica Wiesblott.
Kenophobia (fear of empty spaces)
Photopolymer Etching

Myth #3: You're young! You're healthy!  You don't need to worry about infertility!

Busted:

My story may put fear in the hearts of other young and healthy women, but I wish I had read such a cautionary tale as mine.

After two years of marriage, my husband and I decided to start a family. It was something we both always wanted. In fact, on our second date, my now husband told me his definition of “success” was being a good father. I knew at that moment that we would spend the rest of our lives together… and raise a wonderful family – 2 kids and a dog. I now have a wonderful family, minus the 2 kids, or any kids for that matter.

We were both in our early thirties when we started trying. We’re fit, at ideal weights, and our only vice is the occasional glass of wine. After a few months of trying, we had some preliminary testing done. I had my progesterone checked to see if I was ovulating and had a painful procedure to see if my insides were clear. I passed both with flying colors. My husband had a semen analysis, voluntarily going into what he calls “the gross room”. His results came back “abnormal” on almost every line. How could this happen? He stopped mountain biking over a year ago. He didn’t smoke. He didn’t do drugs. He didn’t drink excessively. He wasn’t overweight. He didn’t go in saunas or hot tubs. He didn’t wear briefs. He didn’t do any of the other things that we knew could harm male fertility. 

Our general doctor said, “You’re young, you’re healthy – keep trying”. Thanks to Dr. Google, I didn’t listen. My husband went to a urologist and was immediately diagnosed with a severe case of varicocele – basically varicose veins in the testicles. These larger veins heat the sperm, which, we knew, was not good for the little guys. He felt better when his hormone panel came back clean, and that his problem was just that he was too “hot”. That helped his damaged ego a bit. He had surgery, but it was really so things didn’t get worse. We were told we would not get pregnant without medical intervention.

It took a few months to get over this prognostication. What a blow. We could not conceive a child “the fun way”. Well, at least there was another way. In vitro fertilization (IVF) was our best bet because of his numbers, so we proceeded down that path. By injecting sperm into the egg, you can totally bypass the male factor issue. Perfect, because I was fine, right? Wrong. Just because a woman is ovulating and her insides are clear, doesn’t mean nothing’s wrong. A more detailed set of tests on my hormone levels showed something was amiss. I was diagnosed with diminished ovarian reserve. I may have been 32, but my ovaries were a decade older. I was either born with less eggs or am losing them faster. We tried IVF with disastrous results. I know 40 year-olds that had better IVF cycles than I did. I go through the five stages of grief on a daily basis, but long to get to acceptance that I may never have a biological child.

I look at my husband and I and still think, “We are not what infertility should look like”. Then I look at many of the couples I’ve met in this horrible journey and realize that neither do they. Infertility doesn’t discriminate.

Written by: Joscelyn from Illinois (member, Ladies in Waiting Book Club)

How have these myths affected your journey or the journey of someone you know?

Learn more about Infertility at Resolve's website:

• Infertility Diagnosis (special note: NONE of the diagnoses listed are linked to age)
• What is Infertility?
• National Infertility Awareness Week

Learn more about our "Bust an Infertility Myth" Challenge, here at the LiWBC.