Talking About Infertility

To add insult to injury, when talking about infertility the language can be touchy. Some of it is just plain hurtful. And some of it simply and completely, sucks.

Some infertility words I hate:

1. infertility
2. failed
3. arrested
4. hostile
5. abortion
6. diminished
7. advanced maternal age
8. poor response
9. artificial
10. unnatural
11. hysterical
12. crazy
13. over reacting
14. selfish
15. depressed
16. incompetent
17. unsuccessful
18. unlikely
19. more testing
20. barren
21. peri-menopausal
22. inappropriate hormone levels
23. birth control
24. migraines
25. bruises
26. injections
27. co-pay
28. no insurance
29. credit card limits
30. unexpected pregnancies of friends/family members
31. facebook sonograms
32. just
33. secondary
34. primary
35. impossible
36. not possible
37. no further treatment options
38. transfer cancelled
39. retrieval cancelled
40. hyper stimulation
41. male factor

There are so many more. These are just a few personal non-favorites.

And to go a step further, here are the worst of them:

1. incompetent
2. hostile
3. failed
4. impossible

Why are those the worst? Because they accurately expressed my feelings as well as my medical condition.

Coping With Infertility With An Arrow Through the Heart

While coping with infertility, I felt incompetent, hostile, like a failure and that fertility treatment was impossible.

It added insult to injury that those words were used to express medical conditions/situations. 

Abortion for a miscarriage was an arrow through the heart. Pierced truly and completely effectively.

Sticks and stones and all that?

Words hurt.

And the words above hurt me every time that I heard them. 

Would you share with me which ones hurt you? Or name the ones that I didn't list?

I would love to hear from you!