We tried to conceive for 3 years, and never had any explanation for our medical diagnosis of "undiagnosed fertility". In that time, I worked on a daily basis with parents who were at risk of having their children removed from their care due to allegations of neglect, and all types of abuse. The mothers who had baby after baby after baby removed, were the hardest ones to be around. As were drug using parents with new borns; all I could ask was how could an anorexic heroin addict get pregnant, with all the abuse she had done to her body, when I couldn't? My friends seemed to sneeze and fall pregnant. Every gathering with friends was bitter sweet while they talked about their little ones, and celebrated their news. I was happy for them, but distraught for me. I left one gathering, and cried the whole 6 hour journey home on the train. My friends knew I was sad but they didn't know how to help me and, in truth, they couldnt.
I now have a two year old child after successfully conceiving through IVF. Conceiving, and now having a child, still feels like a total miracle. I still struggle now to think about the pain that we went through to have our child. TTC was so emotionally traumatic that we decided we weren't going to try for a second. I couldn't take the heartbreak each month. I simply couldn't go through that trauma again.
We have recently discovered we are expecting another child. Conceived entirely naturally, entirely accidentally, and it still doesn't really seem real.
I guess I'm posting this long ramble, because it always helped me to read that IVF did work for people, that babies do arrive after years of heartbreak, that miracles do happen. I know how bleak it can all feel but there are some amazing stories of people conceiving after many years, and I think it helped me to hold on to those. My friend recently had her daughter after 3 years of TTC and a third and final attempt at IVF.
Good luck to anyone who this rings a bell with. And one last thing I will say....it hurt me more when I refused to tell my friends what was going on with me. The minute I opened up to them, everything hurt that little bit less and became that little bit more bearable.