When I’m on Twitter I often run a search for #IVF or #infertility to see what the latest news is in that arena. I often come across fertility clinics and infertility support pages that post up things like this:
And this stupidly oxymoronic one:
And these vaguely sinister ones:
Where to start?
I usually just ignore memes but in the context of trying desperately to conceive I find most of these fairly offensive. People need reassuring that it’s fine to stop low-chance, debilitating, expensive treatment if they feel that they would have a better quality of life without it.
You do not “fail” when you stop trying to get pregnant. You just stop. Einstein was talking about something else, I’m pretty sure about that.
I stopped trying relatively early, and I have NEVER, EVER regretted not continuing to chug on with IVF. I hope that’s more inspirational than these horseshit memes.
Different Shores 
I feel your pain. People just don’t seem to understand unless they have personally gone through it themselves. I found a good e-book which is supposed to help you conceive within 2-4 months. I just recently got it so not sure if it will work or not but i figured i have nothing to lose by trying it. I definitely feel healthier so that’s a plus!
LikeLike
I couldn’t… agree… more… so much is exploitative giving false hope – which is crueler in the long run x
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you Rambles, so true!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I agree with you. So many assume the baby is the miracle. One day I realized how short sighted that was of me. I choose to redefine what a miracle is – for me the miracle is living a glorious abundant fulfilling life without the baby in this strangling baby centered society.
Thank you for your voice. Jane
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thanks so much Jane, I agree
LikeLike
The more infuriating ones are the ones taken from activist, especially civil rights activist speaking specifically about their fight. I’m like, yeah… no. A little research goes a long way, everyone.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Horseshit is a good description. I find the ‘never give up’ type statements particularly maddening. Giving up fertility treatments is not easy, and it’s certainly not a failure! Bleugh.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I love this perspective and it is so true. People need to find contentment in whatever they choose to do and each choice is personal and the right one for them.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Katie
LikeLike
Amen to that. We are preparing for our final round of DEIVF after 2 failed IUIs and 5 failed DEIVF rounds including a traumatic miscarriage this past summer, and while we could keep going if this 6th attempt doesn’t work, we’ve made a conscious decision to not spend all of 2017 poisoning my body all over again, and to move forward. I find the most people who say “never ever give up” and all that are the ones who a) have no fucking idea what I’m going through, or b) are the ones on the other side of the fence, who finally DID get pregnant and thereby honestly think that optimism, not science, is why they have a baby now. Fuck that shit. If we want to end the chapter, we should be supported – NOT told that our decision is somehow wrong and that we should continue torturing ourselves physically and emotionally. I’m not the woman I was before I was diagnosed with fucked up ovaries and found that even with an egg donor my body wasn’t in any mood to welcome embryos, and I have to find a way to move forward in this new normal – not be dragged down by people who think they know better than I do about my body.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I hear you completely – I can relate to every bit of that. Thank you so much, you have expressed it in a nutshell x
LikeLiked by 1 person
I am not all that fond of the constant pressure to be positive in the face of anything and everything, so this post hit home. Thanks!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Me neither, and telling people that they have to think positively in order to succeed at something has been proven in studies to add to stress (I like to think).
LikeLike
Thank you! I hate memes like this. And I hate when people say this stuff to me. After I had my baby, so many told me, “See what happens when you don’t give up?” And I wanted to sob. It hit so close to home, us trying that “one more time” and if it didn’t work, we were done. I think these feel good memes are supposed to inspire, but they have always left a bad taste in my mouth.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m glad other people hate them!
LikeLike
I 100% agree with you. I can’t believe (or maybe I can, and that’s sad) that fertility clinics actually use memes like this. I’ve hated them for a long time – including the sayings “you can achieve anything if you try/work/want it hard enough.” And yes, you probably know I’ve written about that a number of times, and at length!
LikeLike
Ha yes.. I wonder if anyone actually likes them.. (well I know a few friends on Facebook who do, but they’re on ‘Hide’…)
LikeLike
Those people who keep on telling us not to lose hope and never stop trying don’t understand our pain. A couple of weeks back I chatted with an old friend and when I told her I am enjoying my life and if motherhood is for me it will come, she told me another miracle story of a couple who had a baby after fifteen years of trying so I should not stop as well. She never knew my whole story. We were so close back in college, she now lives in the US with her American husband and handsome kid, she got pregnant right away despite her ovary problems, and here I am who can’t even afford to have a decent internet at home because I need to support my mother financially.
The idea of borrowing money to get an IVF (that is very costly here in the Philippines) is not appealing to me. I could get pregnant and buried in debt, and how am I suppose to afford to give my baby a better future if I’m raising the kid while paying off debts worth ten or more years of hard work. So I decided to stop and just let everybody think childlessness is my choice. I just don’t care anymore.
I’m so sorry to vent out like this…
LikeLike
Hello please don’t apologize… those stories are the worst of all; I would never put my life in limbo for 15 years. I hate that some people can only see one ending. There are many different endings. It’s especially insulting when you tell the person that you’re enjoying your life and you’re alright. It’s basic respect: I would never try to persuade someone to change their lifestyle (see their kids less! for example) – it’s rude. Please vent here whenever you want! x
LikeLike
Well said. And I’m so robbing that inspirational quote piss-take. Yeah, deep, man…
LikeLiked by 1 person
I never wanted children, but if I did and couldn’t conceive, these would have made me feel like a total and complete failure. And the false hope it dangles in front of women – it’s sad, really.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s funny that clinics fight hard to keep (rightfully) from giving cookie-cutter treatment to all patients since one size (or protocol) does not fit all, yet they feel that doling out advice like this is applicable to all patients…
LikeLike
And by “funny” I mean “not funny.”
LikeLike
Not a fan of these kinds of memes/messages either. :p
LikeLiked by 1 person
What kind of meme would you do?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Good question – something like ‘Giving up is not failing, it’s knowing when you’ve had enough”. Or “Respect yourself enough to walk away from anything that is making you unhappy”. But I don’t do memes at all, to be honest.
LikeLike
Depending on my mood or where I’m at emotionally on any given day I can find those type of meme’s to either be totally inspirational and just what I need or total hogwash and I think how ridiculous. I don’t think most of them are meant to make people feel like failures for deciding to stop trying but more they are meant for women who feel like they can’t stop trying and need the emotional support or extra boost of cliche meme’s. I feel like I have been on both sides, having decided to stop all treatments and went two years without “trying” and actually trying to pursue living what a child free life would be life and then also making the decision to start treatments again and when we were deciding to try again those silly meme’s stating don’t stop trying for something that you can’t go a day without thinking about helped me to justify that we were making the right choice to try again because we couldn’t stop thinking about having a family with children in it. I guess what I’m saying is I feel they can be helpful and relevant depending on where you are in your journey.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I can see how that would be; yes it does depend on circumstance and perspective…
LikeLike
Oh jeezum, NO. Those are terrible. And that mentality is EVERYWHERE. It’s inescapable. I have a magnet that I bought, that has Churchill’s quote “Never ever ever give up,” but it means something different to me now. I hate when people say “give up” rather than “moved on.” It’s MOVING ON, not a failure. I like to say that IVF failed me, rather than the other way around. I got real mad in the English class I co-teach, because the quote of the day was a Walt Disney quote, “All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.” The gen ed teacher said, “if you work hard you can achieve anything!” I might have loudly said, “WELL NOT EVERYTHING, actually, some things are out of your control and not a given.” I felt like Mrs. Bitterpants a bit, but what if you have a student in your class who lost a parent, or who recently became homeless? Why make it something that is YOUR FAULT if you don’t “achieve” it, because YOU didn’t do enough? Argh. And how insidious that it’s infertility clinics who spread that horseshit around the most. That one about being realistic and expecting miracles really gave me a laugh, though…that one is priceless. 🙂
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind hope and inspiration, but it shouldn’t make you feel like shit if you aren’t successful with IVF or what have you. Maybe something tempered, like “Try until you hit your enough, not everything is possible as you envisioned it!” Hmm, not as catchy.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Ha Jess I love your fabulous comment – thank you 🙂
LikeLike
This post is one of those that started quite an emotional process with me, Different Shores. I read it a few days ago, but had to digest it first.
Wow, I had quite a reaction. Somehow this reminded me of my own faith (the one I had but don’t have any more). Which was deceived, of course. And which – I only realize it now – left me very angry. What is faith for? Why had I believed in the first place? And who had made me believe? Had I just desperately wanted to believe myself? Maybe so? I don’t have the answer just yet.
Miracles are called miracles because they hardly ever happen. They are not the norm. So why would you make people believe that those miracles happen all the time? It’s just not true. You can’t make them happen by “believing enough”. Because otherwise they wouldn’t be miracles. They could be achieved by anyone, right?
There is more, but I am at loss of words, especially when not writing in my mother tongue.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Elaine thanks so much for that! Very interesting about the faith you had. Have you written a post about it, I’d be fascinated to read it. I agree completely about “miracles”, and in the context of infertility treatment I think it’s criminal to use such language.
LikeLike
There is no post on that subject yet. Maybe I’ll write one when I am more clear about it ;-).
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s a heavy subject for sure
LikeLike
Couldn’t agree more. One of the infertility groups I’m on has something like “when giving up isn’t an option” as their slogan and it always bothers me. A friend of mine was telling me about someone she heard of who did IVF 20 times to eventually have her baby! When I hear something like that I am happy for her if she is happy now and got what she wanted but for me personally I wouldn’t want to do IVF 20 times even if I knew I’d be guaranteed a baby at the end of it!! There is definitely a limit for me where it would not be worth it at some point to keep putting my body through treatment. I admire people who have the strength to decide to stop pursing infertility treatments and move on with their lives, that takes courage and it definitely isn’t giving up.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh no I don’t like that slogan – I understand that if someone is in that mindset, then it works as a call to battle. But in an infertility support context it should be far more balanced: it’s just emotionally unintelligent and excluding to have a slogan like that.
LikeLike
Well said. I’ve known some who have gone through IVF and the much longed for pregnancy can become like the carrot dangling in front of the horse. It makes me sad to see so many struggle and these quotes like you mentioned just prey on their doubts.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh what a bunch of meme bullshit that is. I half expected one of them to say “Just relax and it’ll happen.” Cue eye roll now.
LikeLike
I find the one that implies that not getting pregnant is equal to failure particularly offensive.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s awful.
LikeLike
I love this!
I am so over positivity porn!!
Maybe life can be hard or crap or difficult, and that’s okay.
This constant need to be happy or positive or whatever to avoid confronting anyone else with actual feelings about actual things in our own actual lives… that have nothing to do with them anyway – really frustrates me!
Well said! ❤
LikeLiked by 1 person
Amen to this! The first thing people say to me when they realise my infertility is “did you freeze your eggs/are you doing IVF” and if I respond with i’m unsure etc they often respond with “don’t give up on miracles they happen all the time”. If miracles happened all the time, well, they wouldn’t be miracles would they? I would much prefer someone to tell me about all the possibilities in life I have to look forward to, even if I will be childless!
LikeLiked by 1 person
The miracles thing is definitely very irritating!
LikeLike