By Jane, Guest Author for ITNB

F is a loaded letter. F is for Frustration. F is for F#@K, this sucks! And yes, F is for Fertility.

When my husband and I first started this process, we quickly amassed a mounting pile of paperwork from our various doctors. So I organized it and neatly tucked it away in my filing cabinet under F for Fertility. I very intentionally chose to label it “Fertility” rather than “Infertility.” You could say that I had a beef with the word “Infertility.”

Though there’s an accepted medical definition for infertility—no conception after one year of regular intercourse—that’s not my interpretation. Perhaps I could accept something milder like “Subfertility,” but to me, “Infertility” sounds like more of an absolute: No Chance for Fertility, Ever. It just sounds so negative, so final, so harsh. Especially when I was just starting the process…shouldn’t I be allowed a glimmer of hope, without being slapped with such a drastic label?

I decided to boycott “Infertility.” I refused to utter it. When I confided in a friend, I used an alternate term. “We’re fertility-challenged” or “we’re seeing a fertility doctor,” I would say. When I first called up the reproductive endocrinologist’s office and was given the choice between a gynecology appointment or an infertility appointment, I asked for a fertility appointment. In my mindset, it seemed absurd to ask for an infertility appointment. Infertility? Why would I want to sign up for that? No, thanks. I’ll take fertility, please.

As long as I am struggling to remain optimistic about the process, I would like the outside world to offer me some optimism. But when I hear the word “Infertility,” I just think about the past and what hasn’t worked so far. Personally, I try to redirect my negative thoughts as much as possible—though it’s often a challenge—to something more hopeful. Whenever I hear “Infertility,” it just drags me down.

I think my semantic choices have been based on a combination of optimism, denial, and a touch of superstition. Admitting that my husband and I were infertile meant acknowledging a possibility that we might never be able to conceive. It was hard for me to admit that then, and it’s still a difficult scenario to think about now, though only time will tell.

And though I’ve resigned myself to the term “infertility” by now, I still wince a bit whenever I use it. Semantics can be quite significant in the way that we perceive something. As long as we’re on this emotional journey, perhaps a better label would help us all feel a little better?

ITNB would like to once again thank to Jane for her article. Sometimes we would all just like to say “F-THIS!!”

By NewsGirl, Guest Author for ITNB

Infertility is a very personal battle. And this struggle…this fight…this abyss of sadness is something we tend to keep to ourselves. We don’t share it with the people who we see everyday or those who love us most. We retreat to our computers where we find amazing support on message boards and blogs from people who don’t know us and wouldn’t know us if they walked right into us on the street. But this is a huge thing that we go through. It is physically and emotionally draining. (I’m not even going near the financial implications, see The Price of Money below.) It is a lot to keep from the people you love and share your life with, isn’t it?

The majority of people decide they want to have a child and get to make love to their partner in the privacy of their bedroom. They get to surprise the world with a pregnancy whenever they see fit to share it. We don’t get that. Those of us fighting this battle get phone calls and emails asking when our next doctor’s appointment is…when the next procedure or cycle will be. Our sex lives (or lack thereof) are out there for the entire world to know. (Doesn’t it feel like that sometimes?) We can’t have a baby the “old-fashioned” way. We need doctors and embryologists and anesthesiologists just to have a chance at having a baby. We get looks of pity and pep talks. (And who needs or wants those!? Or is it just me that gets really angry from that crap?) We get poked and prodded and used as pin cushions. We don’t get to surprise anyone with the news if …IF…we actually get pregnant. And we don’t even get definitive results…we have percentages of success based on age and a whole host of other things that are beyond our control.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve skipped lot…and I mean A LOT…of family functions over the past two years because I couldn’t handle seeing kids or because I had just gotten a BFN again (see Becoming Estranged below). In a way, it feels like I’m hiding from my life. I hate that. How much of your life have you missed since finding out that you were infertile? How much of your struggles with infertility have you kept from the people you see every day or those you love? Telling our loved ones may make this fight easier to bear but telling them comes with questions…the ones about when you decided to have kids… what have you done so far…are any of us ready to answer those questions? Do we even have to?

I mentioned all this to a good friend of mine who is also struggling with infertility. And in all her infinite wisdom she said to me: “If they ask questions, you can say with impunity, ‘This is a really difficult process for us, and we’d prefer not to talk about it. I hope you can respect our wishes.’ And who knows, maybe having the visible support of your extended family will help us cope? Maybe in keeping it private, we’re giving ourselves a heavier burden to bear?”

And you know what? She is 100% absolutely positively right. How many of us suffer in silence daily only to cry to our computer screens because the people we talk to in cyberspace are the ONLY people who can even begin to imagine what it is that we are going through. We get by on virtual hugs instead of trusting those who can actually hug us. We go through the motions of every day life. We suffer through the intrusive and insensitive questions such as “Are you having kids?” We smile at family gatherings and hang out at the bar (there should always be a bar at family gatherings) because it’s easier then facing the kids that are running around laughing or the talk of so and so’s pregnancy.

But the question remains…are we making this harder on ourselves then it needs to be? Maybe we should have a little more faith in those we love? Maybe we should come out of the infertility closet?

For more articles by NewsGirl including the original of this article, please visit her blog I’ve Got News For You and follow her on Twitter @GotNewsForYou .

It is well known that discussions of money and finances inevitably lead to awkwardness within relationships. That is a general view. In today’s trying times with the current economic recession it is cliché but true to say that “everyone is feeling the pinch.” Within the trials of infertility, the “money” topic tends to rear its ugly head more often than not. Although it is not something that is often talked about beyond the private conversations of the affected couple, we would like to deal with the issue here for a bit.

Most infertile couples would state that they are willing to give anything just to have one child. That list would include body parts, religious affiliation and, of course, piles of money. Whatever it takes! Since infertility treatments require multiple and seemingly endless trips to doctors and specialists, we also gladly give our time, our patience and literally our blood to this process. What we begin to see during this struggle are the mounting costs associated with every visit inside those same sterile medical rooms.

Insurance, while it is a serious hot-button issue in the political and media arenas, is an important factor in which treatments we can and cannot pursue. For those lucky enough to have insurance that covers the majority of these procedures, there still seems to be enough out-of-pocket costs to create a dent in any budget. Others have the even more difficult decision as to whether or not to even begin treatment as they might not be covered at all and everything would have to be paid for by the infertile couple. Even though infertility is blind to class structure and income levels, for all of us going through this it is an added expense we never thought we had to build into our financial plan.

We all realize that children cost money. Our friends and family have made that point inexplicably clear. Infertility costs money too, sometimes more than an actual month-to-month newborn budget. Let’s consider this example which is close to our own hearts; a couple is covered by insurance so most procedures are covered after deductible etc. For years they try the medical route with the maximum IVF attempts and everything leading up to that. Costs could run close to $15,000 or more. The couple then changes gears and looks at adoption ($30K) or donor eggs/sperm ($15K) or surrogacy ($60K++). By the time any of these scenarios play out the couple is out between $30K (min) and up to approximately $100K on the high side. Did I mention that they had insurance?

For those who don’t readily have this cash on hand, it can be difficult to start taking out loans or running up credit cards. So if there is a baby at the end of all that, wouldn’t it be safe to say that the family is then starting off “in-the-hole” money wise? With emotions at an all time high and adding money questions or problems on top makes for a very stressful mixture. We can cry foul or scream that this is unfair until we’re blue in the face. But maybe, just maybe, a child at no matter what the cost, will dissipate any and all problems, even money concerns…