From the Old & Bitter Dept, excerpt from a woman's story: she conceived 'after two days short of a year of trying'. Sympathy Stretch much?
After considering my friend's mildly-amused-but-still-slightly-pained facial expression, for some crazy reason, I thought it would be a better blogpost than tweet. I suppose it's better to take a snarky viewpoint and turn it into a teaching moment.
But here's my point -- TTC'ers, please don't buy into the hysteria about how long it should take you to get pregnant. Easier said than done, I know, but really -- there are so many women out there who never gave a second thought toward becoming a mom until she started to panic about her BBT charts or the months passing her by...
I know that it doesn't help soothe the savage cycle a bit when fertility websites often spin the stances of respected institutions like the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. In the name of making their content more attractive and readable, patient-focused sites will sometimes simplify the complex. That's how we wind up moving from this --
"Couples are generally advised to seek medical help if they are unable to achieve pregnancy after a year of unprotected intercourse." (ASRM)
to this
"Considering that both the man and woman are healthy and ready for baby making, it still takes a normally healthy couple up to a year to get pregnant." (BabyHopes)
and even this, from a physician's Q&A site
"If you and your partner have been trying for more than a year without success, it is a sign that there may be a problem." (Ask Dr Amy)
The time it takes to conceive is a hugely sexy quandary. Why, there's even something called the Time to Conceive study at the University of North Carolina (and it's not the first such research, by any means, but what a catchy title!)
Here's the deal: our bodies -- even those of us who seem to function "like clockwork" -- are not made up of simple mechanisms. The whole reproduction thing is pretty haphazard for mammals (just ask any embryologist) and there are myriad variables at play.
So to whittle down to any one factor, like 'time', and its impact on the big picture of conception... is over-simplifying things. True, we need such watered-down versions of biological complexities just to wrap our heads and hearts around scientific realities that challenge us. But in the end, after the puzzle pieces get boiled down to a junior high level pulp (did you know that's the reading perspective that most websites are aiming at?) -- misinformation abounds and TTC Hysteria thrives.
The kernel of truth: statistics are subject to interpretation.
Here's one to consider, before you lose your mind with worry over that approaching one-year TTC mark: generally, with all variables optimally in place, women in their 20's have a 20 percent chance of getting pregnant during each cycle. Women in their 30's, again with all else perfect, move that percent marker down to 15 per cycle.
So, the woman I almost tweeted about (who conceived in her early 30's) was actually doing just fine to get pregnant when she did -- and chances are the stress she felt to beat that calendar wasn't helpful in the least.
Some more reasonable perspectives are out there. It's usually not a whopping difference in data, but a tiny variation in word choice. It may make for less friendly reading, but it can mean the difference between proceeding with confidence versus panic:
Average Time to Conceive on LoveToKnow.com
Infertility on knol.google.com, written by urologist Craig Niederberger & repro med specialist Brad Van Voorhis
Human Fecundity & Fertility Studies at the National Institutes of Health




