Infertility Panel

0:00Welcome to the Open Adoption Project. I'm Lynette Nelson and my husband Sean will be moderating a panel discussion in this episode as we talk about infertility. Today we're going to hear from three families who have experienced infertility. We'll hear from Clarissa and Lucas, Kylie and Chad, and Elise. This episode is more focused on the emotional challenges of infertility. We won't really be delving into the medical issues behind different experiences. Our panelists are from different parts of the United States and are in different places

0:32in their infertility journeys and we are so grateful for them for sharing their experiences and thoughts with us today. We hope this episode is helpful to you. Thanks so much for listening.

1:02Okay well we are now on the podcast with Chad and Kylie, Lucas and Clarissa and Elise. Thank you guys so much for being here with us. We're excited to hear from your perspectives and learn from you. Let's go ahead and get started with just some introductions. So tell us a little bit about yourselves. Chad and Kylie, why don't you guys go first? I'm Chad and this is my wife Kylie. I grew up in Northern California and Kylie grew up in Utah. I'm currently a third year OBGYN resident and Kylie is working at a tech company as

1:33a wellness and culture lead. We have two dogs, Piper and Tonks who to my surprise are treated like little humans, especially our doodle Tonks because she likes to be carried around our house. We love to be in the mountains and watch musicals when we can and we started rock climbing together this year and we absolutely love it. Something interesting about us right now is that we are hosting a high school student, an exchange student from Sweden for the entire school year.

2:06We've been really enjoying this opportunity to get to know her and her culture and show her all the wonderful sites in the United States. Thanks guys. Let's have Clarissa and Lucas go next. Go ahead guys. So my name is Lucas. My wife's name is Clarissa. We are a family of four. Clarissa and I have been married for coming up on six years in December, which is kind of amazing. We have two baby boys who are both almost four months old. I started a PR agency right out of college.

2:37So I've been doing that for five or six years, which is great. And I love the Oklahoma City Thunder and the NBA, a huge NBA fan. I love disc golf. I love soccer. And I recently made a goal to learn to swim a mile in a lap pool. So I'm not a good swimmer, but I really enjoy that sort of thing. Like Lucas said, my name is Clarissa. I am from Utah. I love Disney.

3:07In fact, we are going there in about a month and you might think we're crazy to bring two four month old boys to Disneyland, but that's how passionate I am about it. I love animals and I love hiking. And something interesting just about our family life right now, like Lucas mentioned, we have two baby boys. One of them is biological and the other one is adopted and they are three days apart. And so that's been a fun little adventure for us to go from zero to two pretty quickly.

3:41I can't even imagine going from zero to two basically overnight. So that's awesome. Thanks for sharing with us. Elise, why don't you tell us a little bit about you and Zach. My name is Elise and my husband is Zach. I've lived all over the United States, but Zach is from Oregon and right now we currently live in Utah. We've been together for seven years and we have a two year old daughter. I love Disneyland. I love New England, traveling and Zach loves Oregon football.

4:11And in our marriage, we've kind of introduced those loves to each other and come to love them ourselves. Awesome. Well thanks to all of you for being here today. Infertility is a topic that comes up a lot in the adoption community and is one of the primary reasons people choose to adopt. Not the only, but a significant one. And navigating infertility is a really important thing to figure out. So we brought you guys together to ask some questions, to understand what you've done

4:44in this situation, to stay positive, to stay focused on good and to learn from the experience you're having. Tell us a little bit to get started, how infertility has affected your relationships. Before we had our daughter, infertility had a larger impact on our relationship. Because right, we weren't parents yet and there's, it's just the stakes are a lot higher before you have children. Because you have the question of, am I even going to be a parent versus, you know, we

5:14have a child and are we going to have a second or third or fourth? So I'd say infertility had a larger impact before our daughter, but in general, it's only been a positive impact on our relationship. I know this isn't always the case for couples, but it was something we made a conscious effort to do during the whole journey to kind of remember that our relationship is the foundation of any family that we would grow together. So if we weren't strong together, that wouldn't be good for any children that we would bring

5:44into our family. Regardless of the method that we had children or brought children into our family, that we had to be strong. Otherwise that's not a good family to bring a child into at all. So it's always described like you and your spouse are the cake and children are the icing on the cake. They're the bonus. And that the foundation of a family centers around spouses, around partners. And that's something that we felt was really important, that we weren't going to let infertility break us apart because our relationship with each other was the most important relationship

6:17that we could have. I really love that focus on making sure that your relationship is really strong so that when children do or perhaps eventually come, that your relationship is rock solid. I love that. Chad and Kylie, what would you add? I think the biggest way that it has impacted our relationship is that it has made us learn how to adapt to different stages of life when they weren't exactly what we thought they would be. That includes like both good and bad experiences, but it does require us to grapple with the

6:51question of what happens if our dreams of being parents can't be realized? And sometimes that's what if that dream can't be realized forever? Or what if that dream can't be realized while you're in medical school or while you're in residency? And that is something that we didn't expect. And also having children is fairly expected by society. So it has also impacted how we interact within social circles and how we rely on each other

7:28for companionship. I really appreciate your thoughts on adapting to different situations in life. We can learn from our circumstance or we can just kind of be frustrated with it. So I love that take that, you know, you got to kind of take what you got and run with it. That's really well said. Clarissa and Lucas, what would you guys add? So just a little background. Lucas and I, he said, you know, we've been married for almost six years. We started trying to get pregnant probably a year and a half after we had been married.

8:03And we struggled with that for, you know, almost four years until I actually got pregnant through multiple fertility treatments. And so it impacted our relationship a lot because I had this plan for myself that, you know, we got married. I was still in school. Lucas had just graduated. I was going to finish school. We were going to have kids and then I was just going to be a stay at home mom.

8:33I never wanted to be this career woman. And so after I graduated school and we weren't getting pregnant, I was like, oh my gosh, what do we do now? Lucas was working and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what career path to take because that's not really what I had hoped for for my life. I just wanted to be a mom. And so that really put kind of some pressure on our relationship when we were trying to navigate what our life we're going to look like. Okay. So for each of you, infertility looks a little bit different.

9:03Some of you have children, others don't. But at this point, how would you say that infertility helped you grow closer together? Obviously infertility is a huge trial. So I mean, working and navigating that together as, you know, obviously brought us together. I think one of the other ways it's brought us together closer that you may not always think about is just that it's given us time to really get to know ourselves individually

9:33and get to know ourselves as a couple. I think you hear about people who, you know, once their children, children leave the house, they don't know what to do with each other. And maybe that will happen to us in the future. But I do think it's given us a lot of time just together to really form a strong relationship and bond with one another. I would also add that it has required us to grow our bond in different ways.

10:03So it can be as simple as comforting each other in the aisles of Target. Like if we are walking and I see a stroller, sometimes it will make me cry. Sometimes it doesn't, but sometimes it does. And Chad has to perceive that and recognize that. And it's, there's just moments when we sometimes understand the hurt that each other is experiencing without words even being said.

10:33Infertility gave us an opportunity to bond together more and to support each other in new ways. And it really allowed us to dig deep in deciding if we wanted to have children because it's not like one person was all in on having a child and one person was like 70% of the way and then we just spontaneously get pregnant. Okay, we have a kid. Like now when you have to wait a long period of time and you have to see what the costs are associated with that or the emotional costs, the physical costs you're going to go through, you really ask yourself, is this something that we want?

11:07And so I would say that was a positive impact and a lot of circles that we were really, really on the same page. In addition, one of the other ways I'll just go closer together, Zach was by, I mean, we were really by each other's side during every procedure, every test. But I mean, arguably women have more painful physical tests than men have to go through and really the pain, the tests that women go through can feel really violating, at least for me, they can feel very violent, violating and vulnerable.

11:39In addition to that physical pain. And so it was so helpful to have Zach there with me supporting me. Like during my HSG, I just had a full on panic attack and had I been there alone, I can't even imagine how catastrophic that experience would have been like. But at least, you know, I did have a panic attack, but having him there helped me manage that a lot better and helped it kind of not be such a big experience as it might have been otherwise. And then also infertility gave us just more evidence that we will always have each other's

12:12backs, that we can do really hard things together. It just, it provides a really strong foundation, you know, whenever you're presented with a new challenge in life, you look back and go, well, we went through that, we went through that together and we were unbreakable, like we can get through this next thing together. So I found like that was really, really important in helping us in terms of like a positive impact in our relationship. I really appreciate that sentiment of being kind of unbreakable as a couple after having

12:42gone through this together and how it strengthened you. Great. Clarissa, Lucas, anything that you'd add? Clarissa and I have talked about this and for us, the biggest thing was probably that we had to learn, it sounds weird because this actually brought us closer together, but we had to learn to kind of get beyond ourselves a little bit, so we're very believing spiritual people and we really learned to lean on God throughout this four-year period where we

13:13were just having trouble getting pregnant. I can speak for myself and I'm sure I speak for Clarissa as well that the nature of our prayers really, they became more sincere. Probably the first time in my life that I really needed to fast for something. I think that our relationship with Heavenly Father was strengthened and because of that, our relationship was strengthened as well. I love that.

13:43I love hearing the positives and the good that has come out of the challenges that you've all had together, but I know that it's not all positive. I know that it's not all, you know, being able to grow and learn together. So tell us, let's shift the conversation a little bit and talk a little bit about how infertility has challenged your relationships. Elise, why don't you start? We had to really respect, really learn to respect each other's processes.

14:13So if one of us needed alone time or didn't want to talk about something right then, we just had to kind of like let it sit and let the other person go through that process in their own way. I'm an extrovert, I'm a verbal processor and my husband is the opposite. He's introverted, he's very reserved, doesn't really share emotions or talk about them. So he would often not want to talk about things and I would need to talk about everything. So finding ways to compromise on that, respect each other's boundaries, finding other ways.

14:48So like for me, I confided in my mom. That way I wouldn't have to put all of that sort of burden on my husband if he wasn't ready to talk about it. And that was in the beginning. And then now that we're actually trying to have a second child right now, and a new challenge that we have this round that we didn't have the first time has been differing timelines and different approaches. So one of us has been more assertive wanting to get retested early to get a jump on things to, you know, so our kids could be closer together in age. And one of us doesn't necessarily feel the same urgency.

15:18So we haven't really been on the same page with that. And then also one of us is willing to do IUI, IVF, whatever it takes, and one isn't necessarily ready to jump into IVF right now. And I would say those are kind of, I don't know, the challenges change after you already have a child. So the stakes aren't as high because you have a child, you no longer have this question of am I going to be a mom or am I not going to be a mom or am I going to be a dad, am I not going to be a dad? And now it's more of a question, are we going to have another, a second child or a third

15:48child? How close together will they be? But it doesn't, at least for us, the emotional stakes aren't as high, which has meant we have different approaches to things. In the beginning, we were both willing to do whatever, whenever, and to be really assertive about it. And now that we have a child, that's changed a little bit. So that's been kind of challenging, but nothing that we can't, you know, navigate together. Lucas and Clarissa, what kind of challenges do you face as you kind of figured out that

16:20this was going to be part of your path? It just wasn't our plan. And so that was very stressful. We are both very, we like to be organized. So when things were unknown and things were up in the air with our, in terms of what our family was going to look like that put a lot of pressure on our relationship, I think just we don't know what was coming and that was scary. Yeah. Kylie and Chad, anything you guys want to add?

16:51Aside from shattering our expectations for our life, which 20 year old me had perfectly timed out finishing having our fourth child by the age I am right now. There are other challenges that we face as a couple to get infertility. I think one of the harder ones is that feelings about infertility are often fluctuating and our feelings don't always align. Sometimes one of us is more ready than the other to take the next steps.

17:24And also what those next steps are can differ in what our goals are. And it can even just come down to who is more able to talk about our infertility than the other at certain times. Yeah. And additionally, just an extra tier of complexity, I guess, is my job working as an OB. Sometimes a lot of times it's really rewarding to be a part of others' birth stories when

17:56we haven't had ours yet. But sometimes it's a struggle and it's really hard to be around that environment and even bringing that back home and talking to Kylie about things that work. Sometimes it's triggering. And like I said, other times it's really exciting and most of the time it's great, but it can be difficult at times. I bet that is really hard. What tips would you all give to others that may be struggling with infertility?

18:28As Kylie mentioned before, we recently got into rock climbing together, which has been amazing. But really just the theme of finding ways to connect outside of the home has really helped me for coping. Other activities that I've gotten involved with was trail running back when we lived in Alabama. We lived close to a really awesome trail system and that was my main way to cope with the

18:58trials of infertility. I was just running out in the nature. I don't think that infertility necessarily has to define who you are and your relationship with your spouse. I think it's really important to be you and find other ways to connect and live. Yeah, I second that. I think that just finding new ways to push yourself so that you can be filling your childless hours with things you enjoy on your own.

19:29And it can come in so many forms, but I think it can be really easy, at least for me, to let what I sometimes perceive as a failure become my identity. And so just trying to utilize the time to become a more rounded person or do healing work or whatever has been one of my ways of coping with infertility. Lucas and Clarissa, what tips would you guys give?

19:59You just need to consider your options with respect to infertility. And there's just so many options that people don't even really know about. People maybe watch on television what works for somebody in the movies or maybe have a family friend that went through infertility issues. And they think that maybe it's a one size fits all solution. In reality, there's just so many different options out there. There's so many different doctors you can work with.

20:30There's a lot and things that we didn't even really think of initially. We got pretty involved with the foster care system in Utah and we're licensed foster parents currently. That was never something that we had planned on doing or entertained while we were dating or even earlier on in marriage. I didn't know the difference between an agency adoption or a private adoption before we started looking into those things. There's a lot of things that you can do to combat infertility and find meaningful solutions.

21:04I would just recommend to somebody that they explore all of them because there's surely something that can work for you. There's something that will work out in the end. Also something that was actually kind of a blessing for us in disguise even though coping with infertility was so hard was it gave us a lot of time to spend just us together. We developed a lot of hobbies that we did together that was really, really fun and that

21:37brought us really close together. I think it just deepened our love for each other. Those are really good thoughts guys. Elise, what other advice would you give for coping with infertility to couples that might be in that situation? Don't blame each other and keep each other as your number one focus. Sometimes with infertility, it can be medical issues with both partners. It could be just one partner or just the other.

22:08In the cases where it might feel unbalanced where maybe it's just like the woman has PCOS or maybe it's just male factor infertility or it's imbalance where there's 80% of the burden is on one side or the other. Don't blame each other and if one partner is feeling like oh my gosh it's 100% my fault because your tests are fine and my tests aren't, don't let your partner sit in that feeling of grief or that feeling of guilt.

22:40Then similar just honor each other's processes whether it's needing alone time or needing someone to talk to, respect each other's boundaries. There's a lot of opportunities to talk and to support each other and you may have differing perspectives, differing approaches. Always listen to understand. Don't listen just to respond or refuse or try to push forward your objective. If you can, go with your partner for as many tests or procedures that you can go to unless

23:12they feel very strongly they don't want you to go. Sometimes I think we can be like oh it would be cool if you could go but it's fine if you don't when really in their hearts they're like yes I need that support and sometimes we won't. Even with our partner who we feel like maybe the closest to, we won't necessarily advocate for ourselves and say yes please come with me to this HSG or please come with me to the IUI or please come with me to the same analysis. We may not explicitly say those things that we need and so unless your partner is feeling

23:43very strongly like no I do not want you here, make the point to go with them because you never know if they aren't willing to like really tell you what they need and they're just like yeah it's fine. They may secretly wish that you were there to support them so whatever you can if you can clear your schedule or take time off from work or whatever do what you can to support them when they're going through their stuff. Thank you everybody. I think that's a great list of ideas. We'll throw together an Instagram post that kind of collectively gets all of those thoughts

24:15together. So this next question kind of goes back to something Kylie mentioned earlier about societal norms but what would you wish that people would or wouldn't ask you when it comes to infertility? I personally am just of the personality, a very open book and so it didn't bother me a ton when people would ask me when are you going to have kids? I would just tell them we've been working on it.

24:45It didn't bother me a ton but I know that for a lot of people that is really heart wrenching for people to ask especially when we had been married for a long time and it's like well you don't have any kids yet, why not? And then some people don't like to be open about that. The other thing as well is I guess the flip side of this question, what do you wish that people would ask about as opposed to would not ask about?

25:15And again this might just be the way that we are. Clarissa's very open book and she would admit that, I think she just did actually. I'm not as open about things but I don't really – there was never a time when I would be offended if a friend or family member was like hey I heard you have infertility issues, what's going on? And I was never offended by anyone walking on eggshells around me with respect to infertility. You know what I mean? I could always have that conversation. In fact, when somebody would ask me about the various things we were looking into to

25:48have kids or to start a family, I would give them too much information. I would ramble on for like 15 or 20 minutes because I was so into this process and figuring out what was going to work and it was so dear to me that I would probably just ramble on and on and not stop talking. So as far as what people could ask me about, I guess my advice would be don't be afraid to talk to people about it because there's a good chance depending upon who they are that they actually want to talk about it. It might be therapeutic to some degree as well.

26:21Also if anyone has any advice or anything like that, I know that through talking about it with other people, we were able to look into the different avenues and things that we hadn't heard about before. And so if you do know someone who is struggling with infertility and you know about something that worked for another family or something like that, bring it up because it helped us. There were families in our church who had adopted through the foster care system.

26:52We knew people who had adopted through independent adoptions and we knew people in our own family who had done IVF treatments and had children that way. So yeah, we just explored all of those connections and really just got as much information as possible. Cool. So pretty much open to most questions and most conversations around it, not feeling too uncomfortable. Chad and Kylie, what would you guys add? I think this is a difficult question and probably very different for everyone. But for me, I don't think it should be like a taboo topic.

27:27I realize that asking questions that some people might be triggering. But for me, I think the honest questions are always welcome. I think the problem lies where people assume things and in certain communities and churches or different environments, people pressure you. Well, they don't pressure you, but they expect you to have children by a certain age. And when you don't meet that kind of cookie cutter mold, that's where it kind of hurts

28:00when people expect you to have children without really thinking of what you could be struggling with or going through. Yeah. Actually, someone once had us start working in a child's church group and they were like, we are putting you in here and hopefully it will inspire you to start a family of your own. And we had already been trying to have children for, I think, three years at that point.

28:30So it is just recognizing that your assumption may not always be right. And then I also would add that Chad is often asked a lot about his career. And then immediately after, I'm asked about what our plans are for children. And our next steps don't always need to lead to a talk about our reproductive plans. Chad and I do want children and we're very open about that.

29:00But it cannot be the end all be all for me. So I think that I would like if people ask me about my career or interests or hobby and help me remember that I'm a person worth talking to, regardless of my parental status. Oh, that was so well said. And I hope there are some specific people listening to comments like that. I need to hear it. Elise, anything that you would add, what do you wish people would or wouldn't ask you

29:31when it comes to family planning or infertility? I feel like your perspective might be a little bit different. They just shouldn't ask anything. Regardless of your fertility, whether or not a couple has children is none of anyone's business. I have friends who are childish by choice and that's totally fine. And they hate the question, when are you having kids? Because then they have to go like, well, you know, actually, like, you don't want to have kids. Then they have to rationalize it to somebody who it really is none of their business.

30:04So I'd say if you're a close friend and, you know, your friends have confided, you know, your loved ones have confided in you like, oh, we're trying to build a family or we're hoping to have kids soon, or maybe they've sought your support, then it makes sense to ask how they're doing. But otherwise, if you haven't been like invited into that situation or you don't know much, I think questions about family building are off the table. Similarly, if you know someone is having fertility struggles or just trying to conceive in general, unsolicited advice is also not appropriate.

30:35I've had people tell me like what positions we should use to have a baby, how often we should be having intercourse. Most of them have been strangers. One of them was a former boss of mine, like so inappropriate. Literally, one was a woman in line at Costco, because she's talking to us and she was like, oh my gosh, how long have you guys been married and we're like, oh, a couple years. Well, why don't you have children yet? And you're like, well, we're trying. And then she said so loud that we just needed to try all night until we got a baby.

31:06It was just mortifying. It was it was awful. I almost I thought that I would just mute myself while I was laughing, but I just can't stop. Some people are right. Wow. Costco, of all places. Thank you for sharing. I totally can sympathize and agree with a lot of what each of you said. So in cases where we, you know, don't have to pry to get information about people, we know that a family member, a friend or somebody is struggling with infertility.

31:37What advice would you give to people that are in a situation where they have a friend or a family member that they're close with that they know is struggling with infertility? What advice would you give that person? Something that Lucas mentioned that meant a lot to us was just the prayers and the thoughtfulness. My dad fasting for us every single week so that we could get pregnant meant a lot. Also, just for me, like I said, everyone is different and everyone deals with things differently.

32:13Really talking about the people that I'm close to and that I trust a lot helped me, especially when I was going through fertility treatments, you know, like, oh, this is what I have to do. I would have friends who would help me give me my shots and things like that. Something that I did have an experience with that I didn't love, obviously I didn't love infertility at all, but I had a friend who she's one of my very closest friends and I

32:44told her everything about my infertility. I opened up to her about everything and this was months and months and months of this. Yeah. And she had been pregnant and didn't tell me for six months because she was afraid of telling me because I had struggled with infertility. And then when she finally told me, I felt kind of stupid because I'm like, I have opened up to you about all of these struggles I've been having and you've been pregnant this whole time and I'm not angry that you're pregnant.

33:15I'm so happy for you. And so that kind of hurt me because she was one of my very, very best friends and she felt like she couldn't tell me that she was pregnant because of that. And so I don't know if any of you have ever been in that situation or anything like that, but that's something that hurt me. Thank you. Elise, what are some of your thoughts? How can people support those going through these type of struggles?

33:48Check in on your loved ones frequently, especially if you know that they have like procedures coming up or they're processing test results that they've gotten. But when you ask, I find that it's always helpful to just let them know that there's no hurry for them to respond. Just because sometimes it's a lot of emotional labor to share like what you're going through. So what I've done in the past, I'm like, hey, I know you have your HSD today. Let me know. I'm here for you. I'm holding space for you. If you need to talk, let me know. But no pressure to respond because I know you're probably dealing with a lot right now.

34:21So just even something like that, like them knowing that they're on your mind, but you're not, you don't owe that. They don't owe you results or they don't owe you a narrative is helpful. And that's been helpful for me when people have offered that support to me. Planning fun outings or get togethers with your friends when they're going through infertility, just knowing that like they have things to look forward to outside of just like their brains being occupied 24 seven with what test is coming up next or what's in their cycle

34:52schedule. If they've just done IUI or IVF that two week wait or three week wait is really, really hard to find things to occupy, occupy your time and occupy your mind. So planning things to do together can kind of help that time pass. And then I'd also say for ways to support your loved ones, acknowledge their pain, but don't try to fix it. So that that goes into that unsolicited advice territory as well.

35:22You can just say like, wow, that sucks. That's really hard. I'm really sorry you're going through it. Just letting them vent and validating their experience can be super, super supportive. Kelly and Chad, I'd love to hear some of your thoughts on this too. Like Chad said about like what people can and can't ask about. I think that it really depends on the person. But for me, I'm telling you that I'm better off because I get to sleep uninterrupted or

35:52get to have more time to read because I'm childless. That hurts me. And I understand that there are days that parents are exasperated and tired and probably looking at my life. It seems like a dream. I have a lot of time to myself and I get to do all my favorite hobbies. But the majority of the time I would give a lot of my hobbies and time to myself to have those sleepless nights in return to holding a sweet baby that I'm raising.

36:26I think probably the most important thing is really just to show love for people. Maybe that goes without saying. That's probably the answer to a lot of things. But honestly, when I think about a good example of this, it would be Sean and Lynette. They were really good friends to us when we were at undergrad. And they never let the fact that we didn't have children get in the way of becoming friends

36:56with us. I feel like that happens a lot where we aren't necessarily included in groups simply because we don't have children. And we don't, like I mentioned before, meet the mold, I guess, of certain communities. But Sean and Lynette, they always invited us over. And we hung out and had good times. And they always showed love for us and cared for us.

37:27It's also important that you're, again, people don't have to tiptoe around the fact that you don't have children and not invite you to be a part of their children's lives because for fear of offending you or triggering you. But it was so important to us to be a part of their family and be friends with them. And it was important for us for you guys to be part of our family. And we were so sad when you guys moved away and our kids too.

37:57And I love that you highlighted that, like, people are in different phases of life and people struggle with different things at different times. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't exclude people from different social circles or treat people differently because they're in different stages of life. So thanks for highlighting that. And thanks for the sweet shout out. All right. We talked a little bit about this before when you gave some tips to those struggling with infertility. But what advice might you give them as maybe some parting words for them?

38:32There is nothing wrong with you. Don't let infertility write a story about who you are because you're not any less of a woman or a man because of your test results. Something that I really struggled with personally was I'm not worthy to be a mom and that's why I can't have children. And that's just not true. Like, like that's like irrationally untrue. So please do not let this experience astern me. It's really hard. And the work like don't make it worse on yourself by letting it write some story about who you

39:05are or your worthiness as a result because it's it's not true. The other advice is it's really hard but try to like find the really amazing parts of this season of waiting and try to make memories together with your partner. So for Zach and I we had a few extra years to be really selfish to go on trips more easily to sleep in to have more spontaneity. We were able to save more money and we were even more prepared to be parents. I did even more research into like okay when we have a child here's like some developmental

39:38things that we can do here are things that we want to do early you know it just gave us more time. We really got to dig into our relationship and make really special memories just the two of us. We traveled a lot and I checked a lot of things off of my bucket list. Looking back I really really value the years when it was just the two of us. So don't put your life on hold until you have children. And then advice like medically don't be afraid to get a second or third medical opinion.

40:08During our very first consultation the fertility specialist said it was 100 percent my fault for being overweight and that a woman of my size could never get pregnant. And for reference I'm about a size 18 and I'm almost five foot ten so I'm like tall and broad and he said that if I really want a baby that I needed to exercise some self control with my eating. Like all it takes is a little self control and then you can have a baby. What better motivation is that? It was so insulting and demoralizing and he said all of that without any test results.

40:42And for me personally I have a history of disordered eating and it was really really bad for me and I spiraled really hard after that. We did our initial testing at that clinic but I said I was never going to go back to that doctor because I felt like he was practicing lazy medicine and was really fat phobic. And after our test results it turns out that our infertility had nothing to do with my weight and I actually had a really easy pregnancy and delivery. So get other opinions. If a doctor doesn't if it doesn't feel right if a clinic doesn't feel right find another

41:13clinic or find another doctor. Find somebody who will advocate for you who you feel like has your best interest at heart. Listen to your gut if something doesn't feel right ask more questions. They are the experts they should be able to answer the questions that you have. Ask the question all the questions you need to ask until you feel comfortable and you have clarity. You will often have to be your own advocate. Clinics aren't great at communicating so sometimes you are going to have to take the lead in calling to get test results that they said that you might have today or calling to get

41:46clarification on when your cycle actually starts or how the medication is supposed to be administered things like that. Clinics also have made mistakes in the past with patients where maybe they mix people up or they prescribe the medication wrong or dosage. So just double check your cycle schedules your prescriptions things like that and don't be afraid to be annoying and ask questions. Kanyin Chad what would you add what advice do you have for those that are facing infertility? The emotions for me with infertility are cyclical and I used to feel a lot of shame when I would

42:21have feelings of gratitude for having time to better understand who I am as a person or explore my relationship with Chad and that would compound because I would feel really hurt when people would say things like at least you're young or at least you're going to have this time with Chad. And so just make me feel ashamed that I was feeling grateful if I was then feeling hurt. And so it has helped me to practice recognizing that two things can be true at once.

42:55I'm not perfect at this but when I can remind myself that I can be utilizing this unexpected time to explore my personhood relationships and goals while I also can be mourning what I thought my life would be. Sometimes one of these emotions is more intense than the other but that doesn't mean that the other thing isn't true and I am not an awful person if I am enjoying my life without

43:31kids. Clarissa and Luthius, anything that you'd add? I think Clarissa and I sometimes planned a little bit in like a worst case scenario. Like we would talk about and maybe this is more me than Clarissa but I like to plan things in my brain worst case scenario just so my expectations aren't too high and that's with everything in life. And sometimes we would be having pillow talk or whatever and I would say, you know, if

44:04we can't ever have kids, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, or it'll be okay because of X, Y, and Z if we can never have kids. But in the back of my mind, the more that I explored the various options that are out there with the people that have infertility, the more I never really thought that we were never going to have kids. There was always something that could happen. There's obviously artificial insemination, there are IVF treatments but even on a more specific like finite level, there are different kinds of IVF treatments.

44:35Like I said, we explored foster care, we explored agency adoptions, private adoptions, just a host of things that you can do to find a solution. So if having a family or starting a family is something that's really important to you, it can absolutely happen. My advice to others experiencing infertility is something that we've already kind of previously mentioned but I just want to go into a little bit more detail is just to be open.

45:06When we have been trying to have kids for about a year, Lucas had met this family who had done foster care and he came home and said, we need to look into foster care. And I immediately was like, I'm not doing that. That's way too hard, I want to have a biological child, that is not what I want to do. And he said, no, I think we should do it. So finally, kind of reluctantly, I was like, okay, we'll look into it and to get certified,

45:39you have to take countless hours of classes and learn all this stuff. And I started learning about it and I thought, okay, maybe this is the route that we need to go. And we learned about it and then we looked into adoption as well. We started taking classes about adoption and I still was kind of doing it all a little reluctantly like, this isn't what I want. I want to get pregnant on my own but I'm going to do this anyway.

46:10And while we were doing that, we were doing countless infertility or countless fertility treatments and I had done multiple that failed until I finally did get pregnant. And so after fertility treatment and fertility failure, failure, failure, we were kind of like, all right, we probably need to move forward with these other options. And we kind of decided, okay, this is the last fertility treatment that we're going to do before we look into something else.

46:41And that's the one that I ended up getting pregnant on. But something that really interesting, well, just miraculous in my opinion that happened was when I, like we mentioned earlier, we have two boys and one is adopted. And so when I was pregnant, a situation came up for us to adopt another boy who was due the same time that I was due.

47:12And I immediately was like, yes, I will do that. And I would not have done that if I hadn't experienced my fertility treatments. And now that I have my two boys, I think about the one who was adopted and I think I cannot imagine my life without him. I'm so grateful that he is in my life and I wouldn't have him if I didn't have my fertility struggles because I wouldn't have adopted him. I wouldn't have been so on board to adopt a baby while I was also having a baby because

47:45having two newborn babies at the same time is really, really difficult. It's very hard. And the other thing Clarissa is that we had done all that training that we had gone through prepared us like we knew what we were kind of getting into as much as you can know before you get into it. Yeah, if I hadn't have been open to doing all those things, I wouldn't have learned all that I know now about adoption and open adoption. It's an open adoption. And just even what we learned in foster care and how to take care of children and how to

48:19deal with trauma and things that are going to come up because of different situations, you know, I wouldn't have known all of that. And so I'm really, really grateful that I did do those things because now that I have my two boys here, it's been a great blessing. It doesn't work out for everybody. There are going to be people who try and try and try and want to have biological kids. And that's just not in the cards for them.

48:51But that's why I think it's just important to look at other options because with my adopted son and my biological son, I love them both the exact same. And I think I sometimes thought before this having my experience, you know, like would I love an adopted child or a foster child as much as I would my own biological child. And now I have one of both and they are equal to me. And you can be a mother and a father and a parent and have a wonderful, beautiful family,

49:25you know, even if it doesn't work out that you ever are able to have a biological child. Yeah, there's no, there's no difference at all. You don't even, it doesn't even cross your mind. Thank you so much for those great thoughts and for being so vulnerable and opening and sharing so much. Let's just conclude with maybe a thought or two. What would you share with any of our listeners to help them understand just the complexity that is infertility?

49:58What might you share to help them understand that? I think just understanding that the challenges of infertility and the solutions to those challenges look different for everyone. There's not a one, you know, there's not one solution for infertility. It's a struggle both, you know, mentally, spiritually, financially. It's a struggle with interpersonal relationships. I think there's so many facets of infertility.

50:32And again, it looks different for everybody and the answers may be different for everybody. So I think just understanding that and not trying to apply your anecdotes or your solutions from friends, issues with infertility, infertility to others. Elise, any final thoughts? Understanding that fertility privilege is a real thing. Some people can have children so easily and when they brag or they joke about it like,

51:05oh, my husband just sneezes when I get pregnant or we put our dirty laundry together and I get pregnant. It can be so hurtful to those with infertility. It can be so hurtful because we can't build our family in the same way and it will never be that easy for us. And that pregnancy announcements are also really hard for us even if we now have a child. Infertility casts a long shadow and the grief and pain of that experience continue even

51:35after becoming parents. Infertility is a diagnosed medical condition that doesn't go away after you become parents. Having a child only cures childlessness, but not infertility. So a lot of that pain and anger and fear and grief that we had before we had a child can still be there even after becoming parents. We grieve that we will never build our family in the easy way that so many others take for granted and it's hard because a lot of like so few people really understand that or acknowledge

52:06it. I would also say don't tell people to just relax and they'll have a baby because that's not how infertility works. You would never tell someone with diabetes to just relax and their blood sugar will be under control. You would never tell someone with cancer to just relax and their cancer will go under remission. Infertility is a diagnosed medical condition and I don't think a lot of people understand that. So it's actual things that are wrong that need to be fixed with the help of a medical professional.

52:37So while the advice can be well-meaning and maybe just like oh just relax it's fine and maybe it's like out of kindness or maybe you aren't ready to kind of like emotionally invest in what that conversation is with your friends who are struggling with infertility. It's better just not say that at all and instead just say I'm really sorry you're going through that like let me know I can support you. It's better to just offer support and not advice. Thank you so much. To all three of you thank you so much for being willing to answer these questions and

53:10to open up. We know that talking about fertility can be taboo or difficult as you've all kind of alluded to and highlighted in this conversation but we really wanted to do this episode because we get a lot of questions about fertility and all three of you as couples are in different stages of fertility and have had many different experiences. So thank you so much again for opening up and sharing with us and sharing with our community to help people be more sensitive, more educated and ultimately kind and understanding in something

53:48that they might not be familiar with and aware of. So thank you so much. Fertility can be such a hard thing to talk about and so we really really appreciate Clarissa and Kylie and Elise and Chad and Lucas for sharing their stories with us today. Thank you so much for joining us for this episode of the Open Adoption Project. We'll be back next week with a new episode.

Transcripts are generated automatically and may contain errors.