Infertility Protocols Help Create Many Babies

  Braving the naysayers is not an easy job. You know the ones... the people who tell you every reason in the world why something won't work. Every problem that could possibly come up. Every problem that has ever come up in the history of the Universe.

I hope yesterday I wasn't one of those people. I talked yesterday about what we don't know about our reproductive systems, infertility and the simple fact of our biological clock. I talked yesterday about choices, that sometimes we make them without realizing that we are doing so.

Truthfully, we are inundated with information. Bombarded is another good word for it. We are told constantly by the media about all the health issues, news issues, economic issues, environmental issues and they all need our attention immediately, right this second.

Isn't reproductive health just one more on a long list?  I do have an answer to this question! And that answer is no. It's not one more thing, on the same level as volcanic ash, global warming, economic downturns or any other less personal, very important piece of the world.

It's the body that we live in.  It's the world that we need to take care of, be aware of, and listen to, first and foremost. It's our piece of the world that we need to be educated about and responsible for. Reproductive health and maternal aging; our possibility for conceiving has its own lifecycle. Those possibilities begin when we first start to menstruate and end when we enter menopause. Realistically, most of us don't want to conceive when we first start to menstruate; most of us wait quite a few years past that. And just as realistically, on the other side, conception becomes more difficult as we approach menopause.

Here's a comment to yesterday's blog that perhaps says best what I appear to be bumbling around in the dark trying to say:

I was just having this conversation with some friends (all over 35). We were discussing how little educated we were about age & infertility. We are all highly motivated career & academic women, but yet we never really took the time to get the facts. We knew fertility decreased, but never really looked at the stats! As successful women, I suppose we just assumed we could make pregnancy happen (knowing we might need some help, but never considering/imagining the potential emotional & financial tolls). Looking back now, I wish I had known the facts earlier in life, although I don't know how that would have influenced my career decisions. How do younger women get educated today about age & infertility? Seems like the only mechanism is at the individual level & how curious a woman is to ask? Are there any campaigns or initiatives out there to get women better educated (thru GYNs/other)?

And the bright, bright, shiny news is that there's help. That's the take away message I want to make sure that you hear loud and clear. Yes, we will and are working harder to make sure that women understand their reproductive lives and options. The bright, shiny message is that there is such wonderful help available for those of us who need it. Wonderful fertility specialists (reproductive endocrinologists), highly successful medical procedures, and lots and lots of babies that are coming into this world. A positive, wonderful message.